Fenoglio let himself drop onto the bed, without – or so he hoped – any expression on his face. “I assume you mean Mortimer,” he said, slowly pushing his hand under the pillow.
“Quite right!” Basta smiled. “You should have been there when Mortola shot him. Just the way she used to shoot the crows who stole the seed from her fields.” The memory made his smile even nastier. How well Fenoglio knew what was going on in his black heart! After all, he had made up Basta, just as he had made up Cosimo and his angelic smile. Basta had always liked describing his own and other people’s abominable deeds in detail. His companion didn’t seem to be so talkative. He was looking around Fenoglio’s room with a bored expression. A good thing the glass man wasn’t there; it was so easy to smash him.
“But we’re not going to shoot you.” Basta came a little closer to Fenoglio, his face as intent as that of a stalking cat. “We’ll probably hang you until your tongue is sticking out of your poor old mouth.”
“How very imaginative!” said Fenoglio, moving his fingers farther and farther under the pillow.
“But you know what will happen then. You’ll die, too.”
Basta’s smile disappeared as suddenly as a mouse scurrying into its hole. “Oh yes!” he hissed unpleasantly, as his hand instinctively went to the amulet at his throat. “I almost forgot. You believe you made me up, right? And what about him?” He pointed to the other man. “That’s Slasher. Did you make him up, too? He sometimes worked for Capricorn, after all. Many of the old fire-raisers wear the Adder’s silver now, although some of us think it was more fun under Capricorn. All those fine folk in the Castle of Night. . !” He spat scornfully at Fenoglio’s feet. “It’s no coincidence that the Adderhead has a snake on his coat of arms. He wants you to crawl on your belly to him, that’s what our noble lord and master likes. But never mind, he pays well! Hey, Slasher!” he addressed his still-silent companion. “What do you think, does the old fellow look as if he made you up?”
Slasher’s ugly face twisted. “If so, he made a bad job of it, eh?”
“You’re right there.” Basta laughed. “I’d say he deserves a taste of our knives just for the face he gave you, right?”
Slasher. Yes, indeed, he’d invented Slasher, too. Fenoglio felt sick to his stomach when he remembered why he’d given the man that name.
“Out with it, old man!” Basta leaned so close that Fenoglio smelled his peppermint-scented breath. “Where’s the girl? Tell us and we may let you live a little longer. We’ll send the child after her father first. I’m sure she’s longing to see him. They were so fond of each other, those two.
Come on, where is she? Spit it out!” He slowly drew the knife from his belt. Its blade was long and slightly curved. Fenoglio swallowed as if to force down his fear. He pushed his hand yet farther under the pillow, but all his fingertips met was a piece of bread, probably hidden there by Rosenquartz. Just as well, he thought. What good would a knife have done? Basta would have run me through before I even got a proper hold on it, not to mention Slasher. He felt the sweat running into his eyes.
“Hey, Basta, I know you like the sound of your own voice, but let’s get going and take him with us.” Slasher spoke in croaking tones, like the toads in the hills by night. Of course, that was how Fenoglio had described him: Slasher, the man with the voice of a toad. “We can question him later. We have to follow the others now,” he urged Basta. “Who knows what this dead prince will do next? Suppose he doesn’t let us out of his accursed gate? Suppose he sends his soldiers after us? The others must be miles ahead by now!”
With a regretful sigh, Basta put the knife back in his belt. “Yes, very well, you’re right,” he said in surly tones. “I need to take my time with this sort of thing. Questioning people is an art, a real art.” He roughly seized Fenoglio’s arm, pulled him to his feet, and pushed him toward the door.