As Han weakened, Crow began taking control of him more and more, standing in and enduring hours of torture on his behalf. Han tried to stop him, but he was too weak to prevent it, and it did allow him to get some sleep. When Crow ceded back his body, Han would explore it cautiously, looking for all the new hurt places and making sure nothing was missing.

Han struggled to sit up. His eyes were so swollen that he had to turn his head to see slices of his surroundings. He realized, then, that they’d moved him to a different prison—one that stank of scummer and blood and despair.

He no longer dangled from the wall, but lay on a pile of filthy blankets on the stone floor. His wrists and ankles were still darbied, but the Bayars had given him enough chain to allow him to move in a small arc from bed to slop jar to water skin.

“What’s going on?” Han asked Crow.

“I don’t know,” Crow said. “They moved you here, all in a rush, chained you up, and left again.” He paused. “You have company.”

Han noticed it now—groaning and raspy breathing from the far side of the room. He looked across to see a small heap of clothing against the wall on the far side.

“Hello!” Han called. “Who are you?”

The groaning stopped abruptly, and the heap shifted. “Cuffs?”

“Flinn?” Han said, astonished. Questions tumbled through his addled brain.

Flinn pushed himself into a sitting position, propped against the wall. He’d had always been small, but now he seemed to have dwindled further, a handful of bloody rags over bones—scarcely recognizable. Even at a distance, Han could tell he was in a bad way. His torso was wrapped in bloodstained bandages, and Han could smell the stench of putrefying flesh.

“What are you doing here?” Han asked softly.

“I was going to ask the same thing when they brung you in here, and I saw how you’d been worked over.” Flinn coughed, a hacking, wet cough that sounded ominous. “See, I was the one put the finger on you. I thought you was in with them.”

“I know,” Han said. “I’m sorry. What you heard at the Smiling Dog—I was gamoning the Bayars, and it went wrong. I don’t blame you for thinking I was in their crew.” He paused. “Now you tell. I thought you were Captain Byrne’s. He wouldn’t hand you off to the Bayars.”

“I run off,” Flinn said. “When I came to see the queen, Cat was there. I knew she’d go right to you, and I figured you’d come after me for bawling to the watch. So I kicked the bluejackets and run back to Pilfer to collect my things, but the Bayars had a watch out—for you, I guess—and they grabbed me.