‘So they can, Lazan. Yes, compound guards. You see, we have gate guards already. And a captain as well, who is presently elsewhere. Now, if you two will follow me, we can meet the Mistress.’

‘Excellent,’ said Madrun,

Scorch and Leff moved well aside as the trio filed in through the gate. Leff then locked it and turned to Scorch.

‘We never got no audience with the Mistress!’

‘We been snubbed!’

Leff collected his crossbow again. ‘It’s because we’re on the lowest rung, that’s why. The lowest… again! And here we thought we were climbing! Sure, Tor didsome climbing, captain and all. But look at us-not even compound guards and we got here first!’

‘Well,’ said Scorch, ‘if we’d a known there was a difference-gate and compound we would’ve pushed for that, right? We was ill-informed-look at you, after all.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘You got orange eyes, Leff!’

‘That was a different kind of ill-informed.’

‘That’s what you think.’

‘If you’re so smart, Scorch, you coulda asked about being compound guards!’

‘If it was just me, I would have!’

‘If it was just you, Studlock never would’ve hired you at all, except maybe to clean out the latrines!’

‘At least then I’d be inside the gate!’

Well, he had a point there. Leff sighed, stared out on the street. ‘Look, there’s the lantern crew.’

‘Let’s shoot ’em!’

‘Sure, if you want us to get fired, Scorch, is that what you want?’, ‘I was only joking, Leff.’

There were looks that killed, and then there were looks that conducted torture. Excoriating skin with incremental, exquisite slices that left blood welling to the surface. That plucked eyeballs and pulled until all the tendons stretched, upon which those long wet ligaments were knotted together so that both eyes sat on the bridge of the nose. Torture, yes, delivered in cold pleasure, in clinical regard.

It was hardly surprising, then, that Torvald Nom devoured his supper in haste, forgetting to chew, and so was now afflicted with terrible indigestion, struggling to keep from groaning as he helped Tiserra clean the plates and whatnot; and the ominous silence stretched on, even as she cast sidelong looks of blood-curdling excision all unconvincingly dressed up as companionable, loving glances.

It was time to return to the estate for the evening. These precious deadly moments of domestic tranquillity-fraught as all such moments were with all that was left unspoken, the topics unbidden yet ever lurking, the hidden pitfalls and explosive nuances or even more explosive lack thereof-why, they had to come, alas, to an end, as considerations of career and professional responsibility returned once more to the fore.

‘My sweet, I must leave you now.’

‘Oh, must you?’

‘Yes. Until midnight, but don’t feel the need to wait up.’ Tve had a busy day. Two new orders. I doubt I’ll be awake when you return, darling.’

‘I’ll try to be quiet.’

‘Of course you will.’

Perfunctory kiss,

Just so, the pleasant exchanges to conclude the repast just past, but of course such words were the flourishes of feint and cunning sleight of hand. Beneath the innocence, Torvald well understood, there was this: ‘My sweet, I will run not walk back to the estate now.’

‘Oh, your stomach is upset? Let’s hope you heave all over your two gate guards when you get there.’

‘Yes. And suddenly it’ll be midnight and like a doomed man I will count the steps to the gallows awaiting me at home. Pray to Beru and every other ascendant the world over that you’re asleep when I get here, or at least feigning sleep.’

‘I’ve had a busy day, husband, just thinking of all the things I’d like to do to you for breaking that promise. And when you get home, why, I’ll be dreaming dreadful scenes, each one adding to that pleasant smile on my slumbering visage.’

‘I shall attempt to sleep on no more than a hand’s span of bed, stiff as a planed board, not making a sound.’

‘Yes, you will. Darling.’

And the perfunctory kiss, smooch smooch.

Blue light painted the streets through which Torvald Nom now hurried along, blue light and black thoughts, a veritable bruising of dismay, and so the buildings to each side crowded, leaned in upon him, until he felt he was squirting-like an especially foul lump of excrement-through a sewer pipe. Terrible indeed, a wife’s disappointment and, mayhap, disgust.

The princely wages were without relevance. The flexible shifts could barely earn a begrudging nod. The sheer impressive legality of the thing yielded little more than a sour grunt. And even the fact that Torvald Nom now held the title of Captain of the House Guard, while Scorch and Leff were but underlings among a menagerie of underlings (yes, he had exaggerated somewhat), had but granted him a temporary abeyance of the shrill fury he clearly deserved-and it waited, oh, it waited. He knew it. She knew it. And he knew she was holding on to it, like a giant axe, poised above his acorn of a head.

Yes, he’d given up slavery for this.

Such was the power of love, the lure of domestic tranquillity and the fending off of lonely solitude. Would he have it any other way? Ask him later.

Onward, and there before him the estate’s modest but suitably maintained wall, and the formal gate entranceway, its twin torches flaring and flickering, enough to make the two shapes of his redoubtable underlings look almost… attentive.

Not that either of them was watching the street. Instead, it seemed they were arguing.

‘Stay sharp there, you two!’ Torvald Nom said in his most stentorian voice, undermined by the punctuation of a loud, gassy belch. ‘Gods, Tor’s drunk!’

‘I wish. Supper didn’t agree with me. Now, what’s your problem? I heard you two snapping and snarling from the other side of the street.’’We got two new compound guards,’ said Leff, ‘Compound guards? Oh, you mean guarding the compound-’

‘That’s what I said. What else do compound guards guard if not compounds? Captains should know that kind of stuff, Tor.’

‘And I do. It’s just the title confused me. Compound needs guarding, yes, since the likelihood of someone getting past you two is so… likely. Well. So, you’ve met them? What are they like?’

‘They’re friends of Studlock-who they call Studious,’ said Scorch, his eyes widening briefly before he looked away and squinted. ‘Old friends, from under some mountain.’

‘Oh,’ said Torvald Nom. ‘That collapsed,’ Scorch added.

‘The friendship? Oh, the mountain, you mean. It collapsed.’ Leff stepped closer and sniffed. ‘You sure you’re not drunk, Tor?’

‘Of course I’m not drunk! Scorch is talking a lot of rubbish, that’s all.’

‘Rubble, not rubbish.’

‘Like that, yes! Oh, look, Leff, just open the damned gate, will you? So I can meet the new compound guards.’

‘Look for them in the compound,’ Scorch advised.

Oh, maybe his wife was right, after all. Maybe? Of course she was. These two were idiots and they were also his friends and what did that say about Torvald Nom? No, don’t think about that. Besides, she’s already done the necessary thinking about that, hasn’t she?

Torvald hastened through the gateway. Two strides into the compound and he halted. Studious? Studious Lock? The Landless! Studious Lock the Landless, of One Eye Cat!

‘Ah, Captain, well timed. Permit me to introduce our two new estate guards.’

Torvald flinched as Studlock drifted towards him. Hood, mask, eerie eyes, all bound up in rags to cover up what had been done to him back in his adopted city-yes, but then, infamy never stayed hidden for long, did it? ‘Ah, good evening, Castellan.’ This modest, civil greeting was barely managed, croaking out from an all too dry mouth. And he saw, with growing trepidation, the two figures trailing in Studlock’s wake.

‘Captain Torvald Nom, this gaily clad gentleman is Madrun, and his ephemer-ally garbed companion is Lazan Door. Both hail from the north and so have no local interests that might conflict with their loyalties-a most important requirement, as you have been made aware, for Lady Varada of House Varada. Now, I have seen to their kit and assigned quarters. Captain, is something wrong?’