“Shall I tell you what would make me happy, Superior Glokta?”

Now for the musings of another power-mad old fart. “By all means, your Worship.”

Marovia tossed his cutlery onto his plate, sat back in his chair and gave a long, tired sigh. “I would like no King at all. I would like every man equal under the law, to have a say in the running of his own country and the choosing of his own leaders. I would like no King, and no nobles, and a Closed Council selected by, and answerable to, the citizens themselves. A Closed Council open to all, you might say. What do you think of that?”

I think some people would say that it sounds very much like treason. The rest would simply call it madness. “I think, your Worship, that your notion is a fantasy.”

“Why so?”

“Because the vast majority of men would far rather be told what to do than make their own choices. Obedience is easy.”

The High Justice laughed. “Perhaps you are right. But things will change. This rebellion has convinced me of it. Things will change, by small steps.”

“I am sure Lord Brock on the throne is one small step none of us would like to see taken.”

“Lord Brock does indeed have very strong opinions, mostly relating to himself. You make a convincing case, Superior.” Marovia sat back in his chair, hands resting on his belly, staring at Glokta through narrowed eyes. “Very well. You may tell Arch Lector Sult that this once we have common cause. If a neutral candidate with sufficient support presents themselves, I will have my votes cast along with his. Who could have thought it? The Closed Council united.” He slowly shook his head. “Strange times indeed.”

“They certainly are, your Worship.” Glokta struggled to his feet, wincing as he put his weight on his burning leg, and shuffled across the gloomy, echoing space towards the door. Strange, though, that our High Justice is so philosophical on the subject of losing his position tomorrow. I have scarcely ever seen a man look calmer. He paused as he touched the handle of the door. One would almost suppose that he knows something we do not. One might almost suppose that he already has a plan in mind.

He turned back. “Can I trust you, High Justice?”

Marovia looked sharply up, the carving knife poised in his hand. “What a beautifully quaint question from a man in your line of work. I suppose that you can trust me to act in my own interests. Just as far as I can trust you to do the same. Our deal goes no further than that. Nor should it. You are a clever man, Superior, you make me smile.” And he turned back to his joint of meat, prodding at it with a fork and making the blood run. “You should find another master.”

Glokta shuffled out. A charming suggestion. But I already have two more than I’d like.

The prisoner was a scrawny, sinewy specimen, naked and bagged as usual, with hands manacled securely behind his back. Glokta watched as Frost dragged him into the domed room from the cells, his stumbling bare feet flapping against the cold floor.

“He wasn’t too hard to get a hold of,” Severard was saying. “He left the others a while ago, but he’s been hanging round the city like the smell of piss ever since. We picked him up yesterday night.”

Frost flung the prisoner down in the chair. Where am I? Who has me? What do they want? A horrifying moment, just before the work begins. The terror and the helplessness, the sick tingling of anticipation. My own memory of it was sharply refreshed, only the other day, at the hands of the charming Magister Eider. I was set free unmolested, however. The prisoner sat there, head tilted to one side, the canvas on the front of the bag moving back and forth with his hurried breath. I very much doubt that he will be so lucky.

Glokta’s eyes crept reluctantly to the painting above the prisoner’s bagged head. Our old friend Kanedias. The painted face stared grimly down from the domed ceiling, the arms spread wide, the colourful fire behind. The Maker fell burning… He weighed the heavy hammer reluctantly in his hand. “Let’s get on with it, then.” Severard snatched the canvas bag away with a showy flourish.

The Navigator squinted into the bright lamplight, a weather-beaten face, tanned and deeply lined, head shaved, like a priest. Or a confessed traitor, of course.

“Your name is Brother Longfoot?”

“Indeed! Of the noble Order of Navigators! I assure you that I am innocent of any crime!” The words came out in rush. “I have done nothing unlawful, no. That would not be my way at all. I am a law-abiding man, and always have been. I can think of no possible reason why I should be manhandled in this way! None!” His eyes swivelled down and he saw the anvil, gleaming on the floor between him and Glokta, where the table would usually have been. His voice rose an entire octave higher. “The Order of Navigators is well respected, and I am a member in good standing! Exceptional standing! Navigation is the foremost of my many remarkable talents, it is indeed, the foremost of—”

Glokta cracked his hammer against the top of the anvil with a clang to wake the dead. “Stop! Talking!” The little man blinked, and gaped, but he shut up. Glokta sank back in his chair, kneading at his withered thigh, the pain prickling up his back. “Do you have any notion of how tired I am? Of how much I have to do? The agony of getting out of bed each morning leaves me a broken man before the day even begins, and the present moment is an exceptionally stressful one. It is therefore a matter of the most supreme indifference to me whether you can walk for the rest of your life, whether you can see for the rest of your life, whether you can hold your shit in for the rest of your intensely short, intensely painful life. Do you understand?”

The Navigator looked wide-eyed up at Frost, looming over him like an outsize shadow. “I understand,” he whispered.

“Good,” said Severard.

“Ve’ gooth,” said Frost.

“Very good indeed,” said Glokta. “Tell me, Brother Longfoot, is one among your remarkable talents a superhuman resistance to pain?”

The prisoner swallowed. “It is not.”

“Then the rules of this game are simple. I ask a question and you answer precisely, correctly, and, above all, briefly. Do I make myself clear?”

“I understand completely. I do not speak other than to—”

Frost’s fist sunk into his gut and he folded up, eyes bulging. “Do you see,” hissed Glokta, “that your answer there should have been yes?” The albino seized the wheezing Navigator’s leg and dragged his foot up onto the anvil. Oh, cold metal on the sensitive sole. Quite unpleasant, but it could be so much worse. And something tells me it probably will be. Frost snapped a manacle shut around Longfoot’s ankle.

“I apologise for the lack of imagination.” Glokta sighed. “In our defence, it’s difficult to be always thinking of something new. I mean, smashing a man’s feet with a lump hammer, it’s so…”

“Pethethrian?” ventured Frost.

Glokta heard a sharp volley of laughter from behind Severard’s mask, felt his own mouth grinning too. He really should have been a comedian, rather than a torturer. “Pedestrian! Precisely so. But don’t worry. If we haven’t got what we need by the time we’ve crushed everything below your knees to pulp, we’ll see if we can think of something more inventive for the rest of your legs. How does that sound?”

“But I have done nothing!” squealed Longfoot, just getting his breath back. “I know nothing! I did—”

“Forget… about all that. It is meaningless now.” Glokta leaned slowly, painfully forwards, let the head of the hammer tap gently against the iron beside the Navigator’s bare foot. “What I want you to concentrate on… are my questions… and your toes… and this hammer. But don’t worry if you find that difficult now. Believe me when I say—once the hammer starts falling, you will find it easy to ignore everything else.”