The freak-show of Practicals was scattered about the dim chamber just as it had been when he last visited. The two identical men from Suljuk, with their curved swords. The tall, thin one, the dark men with their axes, the vast Northman with the ruined face. And so on. A good score of them in all. Have they been sitting here all this time, I wonder, just being menacing to each other?

Vitari was already up from her chair. “I thought I told you to keep away from here, cripple.”

“I tried, indeed I did, but I could not banish the memory of your smile.”

“Ho, ho, Shylo!” Cosca strolled out from the hallway, twiddling at the waxed ends of his moustache with one hand, sword drawn in the other.

“Cosca! Don’t you ever die?” Vitari let a cross-shaped knife tumble from her hand to clatter across the boards on the end of a long chain. “Seems a day for men I hoped I’d seen the last of.” Her Practicals spread out around her, swords sliding from sheaths, axes, maces, spears scraping off the table. The mercenaries clomped into the hall, their own weapons at the ready. Glokta cleared his throat. “I think it would be better for all concerned if we could discuss this like civilised—”

“You see anyone civilised?” snarled Vitari.

A fair point. One Practical sprang up on the table making the cutlery jump. The one-handed mercenary waved his hook in the air. The two heavily-armed groups edged towards each other. It looked very much as if Cosca and his hired hands would be earning their pay. A merry bloodbath I daresay it will be, and the outcome of a bloodbath is notoriously hard to predict. All in all, I would rather not take the gamble.

“A shame about your children! A shame for them, that there’s no one civilised around!”

Vitari’s orange eyebrows drew furiously inwards. “They’re far away!”

“Oh, I’m afraid not. Two girls and a boy? Beautiful, flaming red hair, just like their mother’s?” Which gate would they go through? The Gurkish came from the west, so… “They were stopped at the east gate, and taken into custody.” Glokta stuck out his bottom lip. “Protective custody. These are dangerous times for children to be wandering the streets, you know.”

Even with her mask on Glokta could see her horror. “When?” she hissed.

When would a loving mother send her children to safety? “Why, the very day the Gurkish arrived, of course, you know that.” The way her eyes widened told him that he had guessed right. Now to twist the blade. “Don’t worry though, they’re tucked up safe. Practical Severard is acting as nurse. But if I don’t come back…”

“You wouldn’t hurt them.”

“What is it with everyone today? Lines I won’t cross? People I won’t hurt?” Glokta showed his most revolting leer. “Children? Hope, and prospects, and all that happy life ahead of them? I despise the little bastards!” He shrugged his twisted shoulders. “But perhaps you know me better. If you’re keen to play dice with your children’s lives, I suppose we can find out. Or we could reach an understanding, as we did in Dagoska.”

“Shit on this,” growled one of the Practicals, hefting his axe and taking a step forward. And the atmosphere of violence lurches another dizzy step towards the brink…

Vitari shoved out her open hand. “Don’t move.”

“You’ve got children, so what? Means nothing to me. It’ll mean nothing to Sult eeeeeee—” There was a flash of metal, the jingling of a chain, and the Practical staggered forward, blood pouring from his opened throat.

Vitari’s cross-shaped knife slapped back into her palm and her eyes flicked back to Glokta. “An understanding?”

“Exactly. You stay here. We go past. You didn’t see nothing, as they say in the older parts of town. You know well enough that you can’t trust Sult. He left you to the dogs in Dagoska, didn’t he? And he’s all done, anyway. The Gurkish are knocking at the door. Time we tried something new, don’t you think?”

Vitari’s mask shifted as she worked her mouth. Thinking, thinking. The eyes of her killers sparkled, the blades of their weapons glinted. Don’t call the bluff, bitch, don’t you dare…

“Alright!” She gestured with her arm and the Practicals edged unhappily back, still glaring at the mercenaries across the room. Vitari nodded her spiky head towards a doorway at the end of the chamber. “Down that hall, down the stairs at the end, and there’s a door. A door with black iron rivets.”

“Excellent.” A few words can be more effective than a lot of blades, even in such times as these. Glokta began to hobble away, Cosca and his men following.

Vitari frowned after them, her eyes deadly slits. “If you so much as touch my—”

“Yes, yes.” Glokta waved his hand. “My terror is boundless.”

There was a moment of stillness, as the remains of the gutted building settled across one side of the Square of Marshals. The Eaters stood, as shocked as Ferro, a circle of amazement. Bayaz appeared to be the only one not horrified by the scale of the destruction. His harsh chuckling echoed out and bounced back from the walls. “It works!” he shouted.

“No!” screamed Mamun, and the Hundred Words came rushing forward.

Closer they came, the polished blades of their beautiful weapons flashing, their hungry mouths hanging open, their white teeth gleaming. Closer yet, streaming inwards with terrible speed, shrieking out a chorus of hate that made even Ferro’s blood turn cold.

But Bayaz only laughed. “Let the judgement begin!”

Ferro growled through clenched teeth as the Seed burned cold at her palm. A mighty blast of wind swept out across the square from its centre, sent Eaters tumbling like skittles, rolling and flailing. It shattered every window, ripped open every door, stripped the roofs of every building bare.

The great inlaid gates of the Lords’ Round were sucked open, then torn from their hinges, careering across the square. Tons of wood, spinning over and over like sheets of paper in a gale. They carved a crazy swathe through the helpless Eaters. They ripped white-armoured bodies apart, sending parts of limbs flying, blood and dust going up in sprays and spatters.

Ferro’s hand was shimmering, and half her forearm. She gasped quick breaths as the cold spread through her veins, out to every part of her, burning at her insides. The Seed blurred and trembled as if she looked at it through fast flowing water. The wind whipped at her eyes as white figures were flung through the air like toys, writhing in a storm of shattered glass, shredded wood, splintered stone. No more than a dozen of them kept their feet, reeling, clutching at the ground, shining hair streaming from their heads, straining desperately against the blast.

One of them reached for Ferro, snarling into the wind. A woman, her glittering chain-mail thrashing, her hands clawing at the screaming air. She edged closer, and closer. A smooth, proud face, stamped with contempt.

Like the faces of the Eaters who had come for her near Dagoska. Like the faces of the slavers who had stolen her life from her. Like the face of Uthman-ul-Dosht, who had smiled at her anger and her helplessness.

Ferro’s shriek of fury merged with the shrieking of the wind. She had not known that she could swing a sword so hard. The look of shock only just had time to form on the Eater’s perfect face before the curved blade sliced through her outstretched arm and took her head from her shoulders. The corpse was plucked flopping away, dust flying from its gaping wounds.

The air was full of flashing shapes. Ferro stood frozen as debris whirred past her. A beam crashed through a struggling Eater’s chest and carried it screaming away, high into the air, spitted like a locust on a skewer. Another burst suddenly apart in a cloud of blood and flesh, the remains sucked spiralling up into the trembling sky.