'I didn't say I'd kill anyone.'

'I know what you said. The blade's just to show Sajaam you mean business.'

He had to admit he didn't much care for a woman surprising him with a knife between his thighs. 'I didn't say I'd kill anyone.'

'I didn't say you did.'

'Right then. Just as long as you know.' He snatched the blade from her and slid it down inside his coat.

The knife pressed against his chest as he walked up, nuzzling at him like an old lover back for more. Shivers knew it was nothing to be proud of. Any fool can carry a knife. But even so, he wasn't sure he didn't like the weight of it against his ribs. Felt like being someone again.

He'd come to Styria looking for honest work. But when the purse runs empty, dishonest work has to do. Shivers couldn't say he'd ever seen a place with a less honest look about it than this one. A heavy door in a dirty, bare, windowless wall, with a big man standing guard on each side. Shivers could tell it in the way they stood they had weapons, and were right on the edge of putting 'em to use. One was a dark-skinned Southerner, black hair hanging around his face.

'Need something?' he asked, while the other gave Shivers the eyeball.

'Here to see Sajaam.'

'You armed?' Shivers slid out the knife, held it up hilt first, and the man took it off him. 'With me, then.' The hinges creaked as the door swung open.

The air was thick on the other side, hazy with sweet smoke. It scratched at Shivers' throat and made him want to cough, prickled at his eyes and made them water. It was dim and quiet, too sticky warm for comfort after the nip outside. Lamps of coloured glass threw patterns across the stained walls green, and red, and yellow flares in the murk. The place was like a bad dream.

Curtains hung about, dirty silk rustling in the gloom. Folk sprawled on cushions, half-dressed and half-asleep. A man lay on his back, mouth wide open, pipe dangling from his hand, trace of smoke still curling from the bowl. A woman was pressed against him, on her side. Both their faces were beaded with sweat, slack as corpses. Looked like an uneasy cross between delight and despair, but tending towards the latter.

'This way.' Shivers followed his guide through the haze and down a shadowy corridor. A woman leaning in a doorway watched him pass with dead eyes, saying nothing. Someone was grunting somewhere, 'Oh, oh, oh,' almost bored.

Through a curtain of clicking beads and into another big room, less smoky but more worrying. Men were scattered about it, an odd mix of types and colours. Judging by their looks, all used to violence. Eight were sitting at a table strewn with glasses, bottles and small money, playing cards. More lounged about in the shadows. Shivers' eye fell right away on a nasty-looking hatchet in easy reach of one, and he didn't reckon it was the only weapon about. A clock was nailed up on the wall, innards dangling, swinging back and forth, tick, tock, tick, loud enough to set his nerves jangling even worse.

A big man sat at the head of the table, the chief's place if this had been the North. An old man, face creased like leather past its best. His skin was oily dark, short hair and beard dusted with iron grey. He had a gold coin he was fiddling with, flipping it across his knuckles from one side of his hand back to the other. The guide leaned down to whisper in his ear, then handed across the knife. His eyes and the eyes of the others were on Shivers, now. A scale was starting to seem a small reward for the task, all of a sudden.

'You Sajaam?' Louder than Shivers had in mind, voice squeaky from the smoke.

The old man's smile was a yellow curve in his dark face. 'Sajaam is my name, as all my sweet friends will confirm. You know, you can tell an awful lot about a man from the style of weapon he carries.'

'That so?'

Sajaam slid the knife from its sheath and held it up, candlelight glinting on steel. 'Not a cheap blade, but not expensive either. Fit for the job, and no frills at the edges. Sharp, and hard, and meaning business. Am I close to the mark?'

'Somewhere round it.' It was plain he was one of those who loved to prattle on, so Shivers didn't bother to mention that it weren't even his knife. Less said, sooner he could be on his way.

'What might your name be, friend?' Though the friend bit didn't much convince.

'Caul Shivers.'

'Brrrr.' Sajaam shook his big shoulders around like he was cold, to much chuckling from his men. Easily tickled, by the look of things. 'You are a long, long way from home, my man.'

'Don't I fucking know it. I've a message for you. Nicomo demands your presence.'

The good humour drained from the room quick as blood from a slit throat. 'Where?'

'The usual place.'

'Demands, does he?' A couple of Sajaam's people were moving away from the walls, hands creeping in the shadows. 'Awfully bold of him. And why would my old friend Nicomo send a big white Northman with a blade to talk to me?' It came to Shivers about then that, for reasons unknown, the woman might've landed him right in the shit. Clearly she weren't this Nicomo character. But he'd swallowed his fill of scorn these last few weeks, and the dead could have him before he tongued up any more.

'Ask him yourself. I didn't come here to swap questions, old man. Nicomo demands your presence in the usual place, and that's all. Now get off your fat black arse before I lose my temper.'

There was a long and ugly pause, while everyone had a think about that. 'I like it,' grunted Sajaam. 'You like that?' he asked one of his thugs.

'It's alright, I guess, if that style o' thing appeals.'

'On occasion. Large words and bluster and hairy-chested manliness. Too much gets boring with great speed, but a little can sometimes make me smile. So Nicomo demands my presence, does he?'

'He does,' said Shivers, no choice but to let the current drag him where it pleased, and hope to wash up whole.

'Well, then.' The old man tossed his cards down on the table and slowly stood. 'Let it never be said old Sajaam reneged on a debt. If Nicomo is calling . . . the usual place it is.' He pushed the knife Shivers had brought through his belt. 'I'll keep hold of this though, hmmm? Just for the moment.'

It was late when they got to the place the woman had showed him and the rotten garden was dark as a cellar. Far as Shivers could tell it was empty as one too. Just torn papers twitching on the night air, old news hanging from the slimy bricks.

'Well?' snapped Sajaam. 'Where's Cosca?'

'Said she'd be here,' Shivers muttered, half to himself.

'She?' His hand was on the hilt of the knife. 'What the hell are you-'

'Over here, you old prick.' She slid out from behind a tree-trunk and into a scrap of light, hood back. Now Shivers saw her clearly, she was even finer-looking than he'd thought, and harder-looking too. Very fine, and very hard, with a sharp red line down the side of her neck, like the scars you see on hanged men. She had this frown brows drawn in hard, lips pressed tight, eyes narrowed and fixed in front. Like she'd decided to break a door down with her head, and didn't care a shit for the results.

Sajaam's face had gone slack as a soaked shirt. 'You're alive.'

'Still sharp as ever, eh?'

'But I heard-'

'No.'

Didn't take long for the old man to scrape himself together. 'You shouldn't be in Talins, Murcatto. You shouldn't be within a hundred miles of Talins. Most of all, you shouldn't be within a hundred miles of me.' He cursed in some language Shivers didn't know, then tipped his face back towards the dark sky. 'God, God, why could you not have sent me an honest life to lead?'

The woman snorted. 'Because you haven't the guts for it. That and you like money too much.'

'All true, regrettably.' They might've talked like old friends, but Sajaam's hand hadn't left the knife. 'What do you want?'

'Your help killing some men.'

'The Butcher of Caprile needs my help killing, eh? As long as none of them are too close to Duke Orso-'

'He'll be the last.'

'Oh, you mad bitch.' Sajaam slowly shook his head. 'How you love to test me, Monzcarro. How you always loved to test us all. You'll never do it. Never, not if you wait until the sun burns out.'

'What if I could, though? Don't tell me it hasn't been your fondest wish all these years.'

'All these years when you were spreading fire and murder across Styria in his name? Happy to take his orders and his coin, lick his arse like a puppy dog with a new bone? Is it those years you mean? I don't recall you offering your shoulder for me to weep upon.'

'He killed Benna.'

'Is that so? The bills said Duke Rogont's agents got you both.' Sajaam was pointing out some old papers stirring on the wall behind her shoulder. A woman's face on 'em, and a man's. Shivers realised, and with a sharp sinking in his gut, the woman's face was hers. 'Killed by the League of Eight. Everyone was so very upset.'

'I'm in no mood for jokes, Sajaam.'

'When were you ever? But it's no joke. You were a hero round these parts. That's what they call you when you kill so many people the word murderer falls short. Orso gave the big speech, said we all had to fight harder than ever to avenge you, and everyone wept. I am sorry about Benna. I always liked the boy. But I made peace with my devils. You should do the same.'

'The dead can forgive. The dead can be forgiven. The rest of us have better things to do. I want your help, and I'm owed. Pay up, bastard.'

They frowned at each other for a long moment. Then the old man heaved up a long sigh. 'I always said you'd be the death of me. What's your price?'

'A point in the right direction. An introduction here or there. That's what you do, now, isn't it?'

'I know some people.'

'Then I need to borrow a man with a cold head and a good arm. A man who won't get flustered at blood spilled.'

Sajaam seemed to think about that. Then he turned his head and called over his shoulder. 'You know a man like that, Friendly?'

Footsteps scraped out of the darkness from the way Shivers had come. Seemed there'd been someone following them, and doing it well. The woman slid into a fighting crouch, eyes narrowed, left hand on her sword hilt. Shivers would've reached for a weapon too, if he'd had one, but he'd sold all his own in Uffrith and given the knife over to Sajaam. So he settled for a nervous twitching of his fingers, which wasn't a scrap of use to anyone.

The new arrival trudged up, stooped over, eyes down. He was a half-head or more shorter than Shivers but had a fearsome solid look to him, thick neck wider than his skull, heavy hands dangling from the sleeves of a heavy coat.

'Friendly,' Sajaam was all smiles at the surprise he'd pulled, 'this is an old friend of mine, name of Murcatto. You're going to work for her a while, if you have no objection.' The man shrugged his weighty shoulders. 'What did you say your name was, again?'

'Shivers.'

Friendly's eyes flickered up, then back to the floor, and stayed there. Sad eyes and strange. Silence for a moment.

'Is he a good man?' asked Murcatto.

'This is the best man I know of. Or the worst, if you stand on his wrong side. I met him in Safety.'

'What had he done to be locked in there with the likes of you?'

'Everything and more.'

More silence. 'For a man called Friendly, he's not got much to say.'

'My very thoughts when I first met him,' said Sajaam. 'I suspect the name was meant with some irony.'

'Irony? In a prison?'

'All kinds of people end up in prison. Some of us even have a sense of humour.'

'If you say so. I'll take some husk as well.'

'You? More your brother's style, no? What do you want husk for?'

'When did you start asking your customers why they want your goods, old man?'

'Fair point.' He pulled something from his pocket, tossed it to her and she snatched it out of the air.

'I'll let you know when I need something else.'

'I shall tick off the hours! I always swore you'd be the death of me, Monzcarro.' Sajaam turned away. 'The death of me.'

Shivers stepped in front of him. 'My knife.' He didn't understand the fine points of what he'd heard, but he could tell when he was caught up in something dark and bloody. Something where he was likely to need a good blade.

'My pleasure.' Sajaam slapped it back into Shivers' palm, and it weighed heavy there. 'Though I advise you to find a larger blade if you plan on sticking with her.' He glanced round at them, slowly shaking his head. 'You three heroes, going to put an end to Duke Orso? When they kill you, do me a favour? Die quickly and keep my name out of it.' And with that cheery thought he ambled off into the night.

When Shivers turned back, the woman called Murcatto was looking him right in the eye. 'What about you? Fishing's a bastard of a living. Almost as hard as farming, and even worse-smelling.' She held out her gloved hand and silver glinted in the palm. 'I can still use another man. You want to take your scale? Or you want fifty more?'

Shivers frowned down at that shining metal. He'd killed men for a lot less, when he thought about it. Battles, feuds, fights, in all settings and all weathers. But he'd had reasons, then. Not good ones, always, but something to make it some kind of right. Never just murder, blood bought and paid for.

'This man we're going to kill . . . what did he do?'

'He got me to pay fifty scales for his corpse. Isn't that enough?'

'Not for me.'

She frowned at him for a long moment. That straight-ahead look that was already giving him the worries, somehow. 'So you're one of them, eh?'

'One o' what?'

'One of those men that like reasons. That need excuses. You're a dangerous crowd, you lot. Hard to predict.' She shrugged. 'But if it helps. He killed my brother.'

Shivers blinked. Hearing those words, from her mouth, brought that day right back somehow, sharper than he'd remembered it for years. Seeing his father's grey face, and knowing. Hearing his brother was killed, when he'd been promised mercy. Swearing vengeance over the ashes in the long hall, tears in his eyes. An oath he'd chosen to break, so he could walk away from blood and be a better man.

And here she was, out of nowhere, offering him another chance at vengeance. He killed my brother. Felt as if he would've said no to anything else. But maybe he just needed the money.

'Shit on it, then,' he said. 'Give me the fifty.'

Six and One The dice came up six and one. The highest dice can roll and the lowest. A fitting judgement on Friendly's life. The pit of horror to the heights of triumph. And back.

Six and one made seven. Seven years old, when Friendly committed his first crime. But six years later that he was first caught, and given his first sentence. When they first wrote his name in the big book, and he earned his first days in Safety. Stealing, he knew, but he could hardly remember what he stole. He certainly could not remember why. His parents had worked hard to give him all he needed. And yet he stole. Some men are born to do wrong, perhaps. The judges had told him so.

He scooped the dice up, rattled them in his fist, then let them free across the stones again, watched them as they tumbled. Always that same joy, that anticipation. Dice just thrown can be anything until they stop rolling. He watched them turning, chances, odds, his life and the life of the Northman. All the lives in the great city of Talins turning with them.

Six and one.

Friendly smiled, a little. The odds of throwing six and one a second time were one in eighteen. Long odds, some would say, looking forward into the future. But looking into the past, as he was now, there was no chance of any other numbers. What was coming? Always full of possibilities. What was past? Done, and hardened, like dough turned to bread. There was no going back.

'What do the dice say?'

Friendly glanced up as he gathered the dice with the edge of his hand. He was a big man, this Shivers, but with none of that stringiness tall men sometimes get. Strong. But not like a farmer, or a labourer. Not slow. He understood the work. There were clues, and Friendly knew them all. In Safety, you have to reckon the threat a man poses in a moment. Reckon it, and deal with it, and never blink.