He heard a flurry of conversation, more like an argument, and then a new voice said, “You come to us. Unarmed. Hands raised. Try anything and I’ll spit you like a pig.”

“I wouldn’t do it, sir,” someone said behind him. “They’ll just take you hostage too. We’d best starve them out, I say.”

Amon unsheathed his sword and handed it to one of the guardsmen. “I’m coming,” he called. “Unarmed. Under truce,” he added, just as a reminder. All the while wondering how this would end. Wondering what his father would do.

He walked slowly down the corridor, hands in the air. When he reached the gate, he paused. A girl’s rough voice said, “Come ahead,” and he passed between the torches, skin tingling, expecting at any moment to feel the prick of a blade.

When he entered the cell block, Amon was nearly overwhelmed by the stench of urine and unwashed bodies and the metallic reek of blood. As his eyes adjusted to the dark, he saw that he was surrounded by nearly two dozen prisoners of all ages—from children to one cadaverous, matted-haired old man who stared down at his hands, muttering to himself. Several were slumped against the wall, looking ill or injured.

Two prisoners stepped forward. One was a taller girl wearing an ill-fitting guard uniform. Her face was layered in bruises, her nose badly broken, and those were just the injuries he could see. Alongside her was Raisa, carrying a short sword and clad in trousers and shirt, her hair stuffed under a boy’s cap like some knight’s errant page. Her neck was mottled with bruises and there was a jagged cut over her cheekbone. She looked up at him, green eyes wide, and her finger to her lips. “I’m Rebecca,” she said, in case he’d forgotten. “This is Sarie.”

At that point Amon didn’t know whether to embrace her or throttle her. So he took a middle path. “Where are Sergeant Gillen and the other guards?” he asked.

“They’re safe put away in the cages,” the tall girl, Sarie, said, grinning smugly. “Like the animals they are.”

“What is it you want?” Amon asked.

“We want safe out of gaol, for one,” Sarie said. “We want the Guard to quit trying to make us confess to something we didn’t do.”

“We want Gillen reassigned,” Raisa said. “Send him to the borderlands, where people fight back.”

“Kill ’im!” somebody shouted from the back of the crowd. “Then there’s no chance he’ll come back.”

“Ah.” Amon cleared his throat. “Could I speak with Rebecca a minute? In private?”

Sarie looked from Amon to Raisa and shook her head. “If you got something to say, say it to all of us.”