“Trolls don’t want your money.”
It ground its teeth again. “I’ll ask my Troll,” I said. “But not with you sitting here. You’re a Haverlock-he’s honor-bound to start the War again if you two wind up in the same room.”
“I’ll be back.” Liam rose, and a man with a proper skeleton never moved like that. “I hope you have good news.”
“Sit back down,” I said. “You’ve left out a few things.”
He kept standing, but cocked an eyebrow and stood still.
“You haven’t told me how I stay alive after I wave goodbye to my Troll pal, if he takes your offer,” I said. “Say Haverlock goes to cuddle his favorite War trophy, finds it gone. Say Haverlock finds out that the finder Markhat is still walking around with his head and all his limbs attached. Won’t the Haverlock fly into a snit and send less contemplative boys back around my door, late one night?”
Liam’s dry eyes narrowed. “Haverlock will no longer be a threat to you, Finder,” he said. “Or to anyone else.”
“Time for a change in top-level management?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“And we all live happily ever after.”
Liam hesitated, mulling that one over. “Yes. We live.”
I stood. “I’ll ask my Troll. We’ll see. When will you be back?”
“Later,” it said, turning and grasping the doorknob.
“Watch your step out there,” I said. “Gets rough in the neighborhood, after Curfew.”
It turned in the doorway and grinned.
“Especially tonight,” it said.
The door shut.
I hit the chair seat and fought back the first case of the shakes I’d had since the War.
Mister Smith’s heavy treads sounded at my door. “Come on in,” I yelled. “We’re always open.”
The Troll squeezed inside.
“I heard all,” said Mister Smith. He loomed over my desk, a mountain of fangs and fur, but he blinked and breathed and looked downright friendly compared to the Liam-thing. “You were brave in the presence of death,” said the Troll. “Your spirit is strong.”
“My spirit is scared,” I replied. “My spirit hopes and prays you can just take your cousin’s head and let bygones be bygones.”
“He said he would apologize, did he not?”
“He said so.”
“And does he speak for the clan Haverlock?”
I hesitated. “He speaks for those among clan Haverlock who think their master insane. He speaks for those who would remove the eldest Haverlock as leader, and put another in his place. Will that do?”
Mister Smith crouched down and got comfortable while his translator gargled and barked. He grumbled back at it a few times-asking, I suppose, for clarifications of weird human concepts like removing and replacing clan leaders.
“If we receive the head of our cousin and an apology from clan Haverlock,” he said at last, “We will be satisfied.”
“Who must give you the apology?” I asked.
“Clan Haverlock,” said his translator. “He who speaks for the clan,” it added, before I could ask again.
“That won’t be the same guy that actually stole the head,” I said. “I want to make sure you understand that.”
Mister Smith blinked and burped. “Naturally not,” spoke the translator. “It will no longer be possible for him to do so.”
I took in a deep breath. “I knew this was going too well,” I muttered. “Too easy.”
The translator started sloshing that out. “What I meant,” I said, “was that I’ve missed something here. Tell me-why don’t you expect old man Haverlock to apologize?”
Mister Smith chuckled. “Because,” he said, “part of the apology is the balance of insults. Haverlock kept the bones of my cousin these twenty summers. We will keep his bones for the same span. Honor will be restored, both to our clan and his. Is this not the way of all thinking beings?”
“So I have to give you old man Haverlock’s bones.”
“We’ll go and fetch them, if necessary.”
I shook my head and rubbed my eyes. “I bet you would.” I said. “But they’ll be waiting and even the three of you wouldn’t make it off the Hill tonight.”
“We might.”
“You’d die,” I said. “And that would be my fault and who would balance my honor?”
Mister Smith’s brow furrowed. “You have no clan?”
“Nope,” I said. “Clanless Markhat, that’s what they call me. No one to wash my socks.” I stood and stretched.
Something heavy hit the wall outside. Plaster cracked by my doorframe. There was a muffled thud, a squeal like a stepped-on puppy, and a wet tearing sound.
A Troll voice came from the street. Mister Smith growled back.
“One of what you call the half-dead approached,” said Mister Smith. “Not the one called Liam of the House Haverlock. This new half-dead withdrew a weapon and approached your door.”
“What was the ruckus?” I croaked.
“Mister Jones,” said Mister Smith. “He is sorry. He meant to leave the half-dead creature able to answer to you for the insult to your house, but he fears he squashed it. Shall we see?”
Something thin and dark was beginning to seep in under the door.
“Bring me its clothes,” I said. “Toss the rest in a garbage box, if you please.”
Mister Smith rumbled. There was a shuffling outside, and more liquid tearing noises. Mister Jones was having trouble deciding where clothes ended and half-dead began.
If it was one of the Haverlocks, I probably wouldn’t live to see Liam’s coup begin. If it belonged to another House, that meant word had spread and someone had decided a Troll vendetta might do to Haverlock what a dozen Families couldn’t. And what better way to touch things off than by bopping off that meddlesome Markhat?
Mister Jones shoved a wad of clothes through the door. They were wet, and it wasn’t raining.
I stuck my Army knife in the bundle, plopped it down on my desk, and spread things out with the blade.
Black pants, black shirt, black coat, black cloak. And one black shoe, foot still comfortably ensconced.
The shirt-buttons bore tiny dragon heads.
“He was of House Lathe,” I said. “Not one of Haverlock’s boys.”
I bundled things back up. “These can go with the rest,” I said. “And thank Mister Jones for me.”
Mister Smith made rumbles. Mister Jones bowed-I’d never seen a Troll do that before. Then he took the bundle and faded away.
“Will there be more?” asked Mister Smith.
“Could be,” I said. “But we’ve got to wait here for Liam.”
“We will be vigilant,” said Mister Smith. “Fear not.”
I settled back and grabbed my useless whetstone.
We waited, my Trolls and I. Mister Smith crouched in the corner and used my desk as an armrest. Mister Jones leaned against the wall outside my door and cleaned his foot-long claws. We kept Mister Chin hidden inside Mama Hog’s, and from the gurgling and choking I guessed that he and Mama Hog were gabbing away like spinster aunts. I’d told Mama Hog to stay with a friend until this mess was over. She’d pretended not to hear.
Mister Jones growled a couple times between dusk and the tenth hour, but nothing and no one came closer than the corner. I got sleepy despite the steady whirlwind wheeze of Mister Smith’s breathing and the knowledge that dozens of night people might be licking pale lips and heading my way.
The Watch sounded the eleventh hour. The bell wasn’t yet still when Mister Chin rumbled something long and nasty and Mister Smith unfolded and stood.
