I licked my lips nervously and glanced at the cage. Lilly said nothing. I wondered what would happen to her if she tried to prompt me.
Like any fluent liar, I was always prepared to fall back on the truth as a last resort. ‘I’m just trying to find out whether Mother of Light knows anything that might help Lily in her trial. Hunter told me Lily was speaking to her — that’s why you were interested in us in the first place. I just wanted to know what it was all about, what it was she really wanted from Lily.’
‘Oh, wouldn’t we all like to know that!’ the warrior growled. ‘Now that’s more or less what your mistress told us.’
‘It’s the truth! We don’t have any idea what Mother of Light’s up to — I don’t understand why you don’t question her! She’s wandering freely around in the palace, and you’re…’
‘Is she?’ the man cried sharply. ‘That’s more than we know. I thought you said you hadn’t seen her?’
‘I haven’t! It’s what I was told!’
‘Oh, so it is. I remember now. Thanks for reminding me. Of course. Hunter and I spoke to the man who told you where to look for her.’
‘There you are, you see . .
He bent down, not stooping but bending his legs until his face was at the same level as mine. I could feel his breath on my cheek and smell the fact that most of his teeth were rotten. ‘Yes, I do see,’ he hissed. ‘I see that you’re a bloody liar! We got this man to tell us exactly where he met you. He gave you very precise directions to the Council of Music. We made him repeat them to us, word for word. When we saw you, you weren’t going from where he met you to the hall of the Council of Music. You were coming back from something. It wouldn’t have been a meeting with our elusive former royal concubine, now, would it?’
‘No! I told you, I didn’t see her — she’d gone by the time I got there.’
‘I don’t believe you.’ Then he reached out, grabbed me by the throat and stood up.
I was dragged to my feet, choking, instinctively hitting out with my arms and legs but striking nothing but air. When Rattlesnake let go of me I staggered forward but managed to keep my balance.
‘Let me show you something,’ he said in a voice that in other circumstances might have sounded friendly. ‘It may give you second thoughts about telling us anything that isn’t the exact whole truth.’ He took my arm in a firm grip and pulled me across the room. The silent man with the torch held it up high so that it spilled its light over the thing I was being asked to look at.
It was a man, or what was left of one. I had not noticed him sitting in a corner. From the way his head was bent forward and his legs were sprawled carelessly in front of him, he looked as if he had been dumped there, and for a moment I thought he must be asleep or dead. Then, however, I noticed that he was moving, but only slightly. He was rocking back and forth, and when I listened carefully I realized I could just about detect the sound of his breathing: a faint rasping.
‘Recognize this man?’ Rattlesnake leaned forward, seized the man’s hair and jerked it back so that I could see his face.
‘I — I’ve never seen him before,’ I whispered, in a voice hushed with shock.
I was telling the truth: I had no idea who this person was. What shocked me was his expression: utterly blank, like that of a man asleep, except that the sunken cheeks, the slack lips and the wide, unfocused eyes were more reminiscent of death. A trail of dried spitde ran down the side of his chin. He was looking straight at me but I could tell he had no idea I was there.
‘Really? Well, it would be nice to introduce you then, but unfortunately he doesn’t seem to be paying a lot of attention at the moment.’ Rattlesnake let go of the man’s hair and his head flopped forward on to his chest again. ‘But this is what I wanted you to see.’ He reached down again to take one of the man’s limp hands. ‘Now, keep this in mind when I ask you questions.’
He thrust the unresisting hand towards me.
The fingers were so heavily encrusted with glistening, black blood that at first it was hard to make out what had happened to them. But then I noticed two things about them. They were too short, ending at the second joint. And the torchlight caught slivers of something white that projected from the dark, pulpy masses around them: little jagged pieces of splintered bone. The fingertips had not been cut off, but crushed.
‘Who is he?’ I asked.
‘You tell me.’
I stared at Rattlesnake. ‘I told you. I’ve never seen him before.
‘You must be very unobservant then. He told us he was following you and Lily’s father. That’s how we caught him — he worked out where you were going and went ahead of you to Hare’s house.’
Suddenly I remembered the nondescript man I had seen in the marketplace. It was impossible to connect his features in my mind with the blank face I had just seen, but I could believe they were the same.
‘All right, so we were followed,’ I admitted. ‘I still don’t know who he is. I can guess…’
‘Try. If you get it right, maybe we won’t start with your thumbs!’
I closed my eyes and whispered fearfully: ‘Is he working for Black Flower?’
‘Oh, well done!’
When I dared to look at him again, Rattlesnake was grinning. ‘Why did you do that to him?’ I demanded. ‘Why not just kill him, if you knew who he was?’
‘He took some persuading before he’d answer my questions, that’s why. Do you know what I’m saying?
