“Yes, yes, we know,” Fin said. “Our little King thinks he’s Logan Gyre. He thinks he really is the king!”

“Fin,” Logan said. “There’s two good reasons for you to shut your shit hole. First, I’m dying. I’ve got nothing to lose. If you keep that tooth-filled anus of yours shut, I’ll die and you won’t have to do a damn thing. But if you keep talking, I’ll come kill you. I might be weak, but I’m strong enough to drag your poxy asshole down the hole if I don’t mind falling in myself. Believe me, if we start fighting, there’s more than one person down here who’ll make sure we both go in.”

“And the second reason?” Fin practically hissed. He was uncoiling his rope, adjusting the noose on the end of it.

“If you don’t shut up,” Logan said, “It’ll be your fault that I throw this down the hole.” He reached inside his belt, and pulled out an iron key. “It’s the key to the grate,” Logan said.

Instant hunger filled every eye. “Give it here!” someone said. The Holers started pressing close, and Logan staggered toward the hole. He held the key out over the darkness and swayed back and forth, in not completely feigned dizziness.

The threat quieted the Holers.

“I’m feeling real sick, real dizzy,” Logan said. “So if you all want this key to go to its little home up there, you’ll listen real close.”

“How could you have held onto it for all this time?” Nine-Finger Nick demanded. “We could have escaped months ago!”

“Shut up, Nick,” someone said.

Logan looked around, trying to see where the greasy Khalidoran duke was, but the faces were a blur. “If we want to use the key, we have to work together. Do you all understand? If one person does the wrong thing, we all die. The worst thing is, we have to trust each other. It will take three of us to reach the lock.” They started murmuring, some volunteering, others objecting.

“Shut up!” Logan said. “We do this my way, or I throw away the key! If we do this my way, we’ll all get out. Understand? Even you, Fin. Once we get up into the Maw, I have a plan that will get at least half of us out. Maybe all of us. They’ve been doing construction at the other end of this level, and I think can use that as long as we kill Gorkhy before he raises an alarm. But you all have to do exactly what I say.”

“He’s crazy,” Nick said.

“It’s our only chance,” Tatts said. “I’m in.” Everyone looked at Tatts in wonder. It was the first time anyone had heard the tattooed Lodricari speak.

“Good,” Logan said. “We need three people to make a tower to reach the grate. Gnasher will be the base, I’ll be second, and Lilly will unlock the grate. From there, we’ve got two options—and which one we choose is up to Fin.”

Fin looked even more suspicious.

“First option, all of you who are light enough and strong enough to climb up the three of us can get out, but I won’t let Fin climb out. So me and Gnasher and Fin will die.”

“If anyone’s going, I’m going,” Fin said. “You’re not—”

“Shut up, Fin!” someone said, suddenly brave at the prospect of freedom.

“Second option, Fin gives Lilly his rope. She can tie it to something up there and we all climb out. Fin, it’s your rope, so it’s your choice. Oh, and if I don’t get out, I’m not telling you my plan to get out of the Maw.”

Everyone looked at Fin. Logan was suddenly sweating again. Come on, body, just a little longer.

“You can use the rope,” Fin said. “But you want to use my rope, I’m going to be part of the tower. I’ll open the grate.”

“Forget it,” Logan said. “No one here trusts you. If you get out, you’ll leave us here.”

There was mumbled agreement to that, even from some of the Holers on Fin’s side.

“Well I’m not climbing up that toothy freak. You want my rope, I’m part of the tower, and that’s final.”

“Fine,” Logan said. He’d figured it would be this way all along. He’d just needed to offer the first position so Fin could feel that he’d won something. “I’ll be the base. You be second. Lilly opens the grate.” Logan handed her the key. “Lilly,” he said loudly enough for everyone to hear. “If Fin tries anything, you throw the key down the hole, got it?”

“If anyone tries anything, I throw the key down the hole,” she said. “I swear by all the gods of hell and pain and the Hole.”

“We do this one at a time,” Logan said. “I’ll tell you who goes next.” He drew the knife and handed it to Natassa. “Natassa, anyone comes close before their turn, you stick them with this, all right?” Again, he said it loudly so everyone would know.

“Natassa will be the first out. She’ll tie the rope to something up there so we can all climb out. Fin and me will be the last, but everyone’s going to get out. We’ve paid for our crimes.”

Fin walked around the hole, uncoiling the sinew rope from around his body. He rolled it into big loops with an almost frightening ease. He claimed to have strangled thirty people before he was caught, not counting islanders and women. Underneath the ropes, he looked like anyone who’d been in the Hole for a long time. Scrawny, skin deep brown with dirt, reeking, his mouth bloody sometimes from the scurvy that every long-time Holer suffered.

He smacked his lips as he stepped close to Logan and sucked blood through his teeth. “We’ll settle us later,” he said. He took the coiled rope and settled it around his neck.

Logan wiped the sweat off his brow. He wanted to kill the man now. If he grabbed the rope and shoved, maybe…. Maybe. It wasn’t worth the risk. He was too weak, too slow now. He should have tried this plan earlier, but earlier, Fin would never have come this close to him. Fin would have expected Logan to try to kill him any other time, and before Logan had regained the knife, trying it would have made him too vulnerable.

Bracing himself against the wall with his hands, Logan squatted. Fin edged close to him, sneering and swearing under his breath. He finally put a foot on Logan’s thigh, stepped onto his back, and then up onto his shoulders, walking his own hands up the sheer wall.

Surprisingly, the weight wasn’t that bad. Logan thought he could make it. He just had to lock his knees and lean on the wall, and he could make it. There was no way he’d be able to climb up the rope on his own strength, but maybe his friends would pull him out. If he went out last, he’d tie the rope around himself and Lilly and Gnash and Natassa could pull him out. If only he’d stop shivering.

“Hurry,” he said.

“You’re too damn tall,” Lilly said. “Can you squat down?”

He shook his head.

“Shit,” she said. “Fine. Ask Gnasher to help. You’re the only one he listens to.”

“Ask him what?” It should be obvious, he knew, but he wasn’t thinking clearly.

“To lift me,” Lilly said.

“Oh. Gnash. Pick her up. No, Gnash, not like that.” It took some coaching, but finally, Gnash understood, and squatted beside Logan while Lilly climbed up onto his back and then stood on his shoulders. Then she put the key in her teeth and started trying to transfer over.

Logan was much taller than Gnasher, so Lilly had to step up onto Logan’s shoulder, where Fin was already standing. The uneven weight made Logan sway.

“Stay still,” Fin hissed. He cursed Logan repeatedly as Natassa put a hand on Logan’s shoulder, trying to brace him.

Logan felt cold wash over him. “Go,” he said. “Just hurry.”

Lilly’s weight pressed down again on his left shoulder, then weight shifted back and forth above him as she and Fin tried to balance. Logan couldn’t tell what they were doing. He squeezed his eyes shut and held onto the wall.

“You can do this,” Natassa whispered. “You can do this.”

The weight shifted suddenly, hard to the right, and the Holers gasped. Logan sagged and then fought, his right leg shaking with the exertion.

The burden suddenly lightened and there were little gasps around the Hole. Logan squinted up and saw that Lilly was on Fin’s back, and she had grabbed the grate above her with one hand, stabilizing herself and taking some of her weight.