and Malvery emerged from hiding. Frey grabbed the whispermonger by the lapels and dragged him down the corridor, away from the smoke and flames of the study. He slammed Quail bodily up against the wall. Quail glared at him, teeth gritted, defiance on his face. Frey saw himself reflected in Quail’s mechanical eye.
‘Right then,’ said Frey, then stepped back and shot him in the shin.
Quail screamed and collapsed, writhing on the ground, clutching at his leg. ‘What the shit did you do that for, you rotting whoreson?’ he yelled.
Frey knelt down on one knee next to him. ‘Look, Quail. I don’t have time for the preliminaries, and to be honest, I’m pretty unhappy with you right now. So let’s pretend you’ve already put up a spirited resistance to my questioning and just tell me: who set me up? Because if I have to ask again, it’s your kneecap. And after that I’m going for something you can’t replace with a mechanical substitute.’
‘Gallian Thade!’ he blurted. ‘It was Gallian Thade who gave me the job, that’s all I know! It came through a middleman but I knew something was funny so I traced it back to him. He’s a rich land-owner, a nobleman who lives out in—’
‘I know who Gallian Thade is,’ Frey said. ‘Go on.’
‘They said it should be you, specifically you that I offered the job to. But they said . . . aaah, my leg!’
‘What did they say?’ Frey demanded, and punched him in his wounded shin. Quail shrieked and writhed, breathless with pain.
‘I’m telling you, I’m telling you!’ he protested. ‘They said if you couldn’t be found, I could offer it to someone else, last-minute. The important thing . . . the important thing was that the Ace of Skulls was passing through the Hookhollows on that date, they knew that, and they wanted someone to attack it. Preferably you, but if not, any lowlife would do.’
‘You’re not in much of a position to make insults, Quail.’
‘Their words! Their words!’ he said frantically, holding up a hand to ward off further punishment. ‘Someone who wouldn’t be missed, that’s what they said. You’ll forgive me if I’m not thinking too clearly since you just shot me in my damn leg!’
‘Pain does cloud one’s judgement,’ Malvery observed sagely, crouched alongside Frey.
‘You’ve no idea what was on that aircraft?’ Frey pressed the whispermonger. He coughed into his fist. Time was getting short. The corridor was filling with hot smoke, and the only breathable air was low down. The militia wouldn’t be far away.
‘He told me jewels! He said he’d buy them from me if you came back. If not, he’d pay me a fee anyway. It was a cover story, I knew that, but I didn’t . . . didn’t find out what was underneath.’
‘You don’t want to speculate? Any idea why the Century Knights are all over me? Why there’s such a big reward offered that Trinica Dracken is involved?’
‘Dracken!’ His eyes widened. ‘Wait, I do know this! Trinica Dracken . . . she’s put the word out in the underground. Anyone sees you, they tell her. Not the Century Knights. She’s offering an even bigger reward. But it’s for information only . . . she wants to catch you herself.’
‘Well, of course she does—’
‘No, you don’t understand. Dracken doesn’t have that kind of money. Someone’s funding her. I don’t know who. But whoever it is, they want her to get you before the Century Knights do. This isn’t just about a reward, Frey. This is something more. Someone doesn’t want the Knights to find you.’
Frey’s jaw tightened. Deeper and deeper. Worse and worse.
‘We’d
