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where I come from, you’re the one who’s dead.” She rocked back on her heels and folded her arms. The overhead light twinkled across the frayed gold braid on her cuffs. “So, keeping that in mind, I want you to tell me about your boss, Doctor Nguyen. We know he’s at the Malsight Institute; I just need you to tell me on which floor to find his office.”
    Berg licked his lips, his tongue darting like a lizard’s, scenting the air.
    “Go to hell.”
    Victoria sighed. “Please, Mister Berg. This is your last chance to be helpful.” She looked around at the motley troupe of primates assembled around the bed. “Otherwise I’m going to have to ask my friends here to start getting creative with you.”
    She gave a nod to the capuchin. The little creature had a swollen head, deformed by the artificial processors crammed into its skull, and a row of sturdy input jacks protruding from its back like the spines of a dinosaur. At her signal, it inched forward, raising its cleaver above the captive’s forehead.
    Berg’s flat and expressionless eyes looked up at the blade.
    Then, with a roar of anger, he sat up. The leather straps at his wrists stretched and snapped. With the speed of a striking snake, he clamped a hand around the little monkey’s neck and snapped its spine like a used match.
    Aghast, Victoria threw out a hand.
    “Stop!”
    But it was too late. With an angry shriek, the rest of the troupe fell on him. Berg writhed and lashed out with his hands and feet, but they were too numerous, too close. Blades flashed. He used his forearm to block one sword, but two more skewered him through the ribs. He cried out, sounding more indignant than hurt, and tried to swing his legs off the table, but that only exposed his back, and a gibbon with patchy fur took the opportunity to sink a foot-long carving knife into the hollow between his shoulder blades.
    Victoria stepped backwards to the door, hands covering her ears.
    “Stop,” she cried again, but they couldn’t hear her over their own frenzied screeching. Horrified, she watched Berg sway to his feet. He had a sword stuck right through his chest, and she could see both ends of it. However, it didn’t seem to be slowing him down. With a single bone-crunching backhand, he slapped a Japanese macaque against the wall, crushing its skull.
    “Stop!”
    His smile turned in her direction and their eyes locked. The monkeys were just an inconvenience to him. He had promised to kill her, and he intended to make good on that vow. As if in a nightmare, Victoria drew her own sword. Berg moved towards her as if moving through water, monkeys hanging from his arms and legs, weighing him down. As she watched, he reached around and pulled one of the knives from his back. He held the red, slick blade by the point, and drew his hand back, ready to throw it.
    “Goodbye, Miss Valois.”
    Victoria flattened herself against the door. She didn’t have time to access her internal clock. She’d have to rely on her natural reactions. But he moved so fast ...
    Behind him, the howler monkey leapt from the bed. Still in the air, it swung its axe. Howlers were among the largest of all monkeys, and its arms were twin cables of elastic muscle. Hearing its cry, Berg glanced around, and the blade caught him across the bridge of his nose. The top of his skull came away like the top of a boiled egg, and he collapsed, dragged down and submerged beneath a tide of biting, clawing, stabbing beasts.

 
     
     
    CHAPTER SIX
    KISHKINDHA
     
    B ALI SAT CROSS-LEGGED on a sun-warmed rock, waiting for the leopard. His tail twitched. He knew the big cat was stalking him, and had been for some minutes now. He was at the upper limit of the jungle, where the trees grew sparse and petered out like a green wave breaking against the volcano’s curving flank. Below, he could see most of the island and, beyond its treetops, the narrow strait dividing the island from the rest of the peninsula. Sunlight danced on the