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nodded, trying to look modest. “There are few of us left. We don’t tend to be model citizens, according to the rules of other societies, so the Harwell Clan has been decimated in the last decade.”
    “Is there anyone who doesn’t want to hurt you?” Clovache asked.
    “Sure. You two.”
    “I’m not so sure about that,” Batanya muttered. She pulled her hood down and ran her fingers through her short black hair. “Okay, so how’d you get the conjuring ball into the barracks?”
    “They didn’t know I had it,” Crick said. “When I decided it was time to take my leave of the king—his demands got rather tiresome—I ran away, taking the conjuring ball with me. When it was obvious I was going to be captured, I concealed it.”
    “Where?” Batanya asked bluntly.
    “Ah, in the only available place.”
    “And they didn’t search you thoroughly?” Batanya was professionally astonished. “It wouldn’t get by us.”
    Crick half-bowed to them. “I have no doubt,” he said politely. “However, they thought I might have stolen one of Lucifer’s big pieces of jewelry or some of his coins, which could not be concealed in the same manner, and they didn’t think of checking me to see if I’d made off with anything else of value. I, ah, couldn’t tolerate the concealment anymore, so in a moment when no one else was in the room, I hid the ball. They’d parked me in a room in the barracks while the sergeant needed them to beat another prisoner, and that gave me ten minutes locked by myself in a room without a window. I took advantage of the opportunity.”
    “So you want us to take you back into the barracks, find the room where you were held, extract the conjuring ball, and get you out again alive. To return you to Spauling. Where you have to seek sanctuary because Belshazzar wants to kill you. Or perhaps you want to send the ball to Belshazzar in the hopes that he’ll honor his original contract with you. And King Lucifer wants you back in his playroom.”
    “I suppose all that’s true,” Crick said. For the first time, when he tried to sound cheerful, he failed.
    “Belshazzar is angry because of your tardiness and your loss of the ball, and Lucifer is angry because you ran away before he’d finished playing with you.”
    “That’s a fair summary,” Crick admitted.
    “How’d you get the fee for the witches at the Collective? I’m just curious,” Clovache said. “It’s not my business. But I know they don’t extend credit.” Batanya’s shoulders heaved with silent laughter at the idea.
    “Ah, well, I may have lifted a few things from the houses of various nobles in Spauling.”
    “A few things? Must have been more like a cartload, to have afforded us.”
    “You’ll be interested to know I got a price break as long as I specified the two guards I wanted to hire.”
    Both the women became very serious instantly. “Trovis,” hissed Batanya.
    “He really has a big hate against you,” Crick said. “When he heard where I needed to go, he jiggered around the duty roster so that your names came up.”
    Batanya and Clovache looked at each other. “When we get back,” Clovache said, “we’ll take care of him. This has gone on long enough.”
    “Why does he hold such a grudge?” Crick asked. The two turned as one to stare at him. “Oh, ladies, come on! We’re in this together. If I make it back alone, I’ll kill him for you.”
    “Good enough,” Clovache said. “My esteemed senior, here, turned him down so forcefully she broke his arm.”
    Crick whistled silently. “I take it a plain refusal wouldn’t suffice?”
    “He wouldn’t take no for an answer,” Batanya said. “He was waiting in my room when I came home one night. I tried being tactful, which doesn’t come easily to me. I tried being firm. I tried being rude. He persisted. The time came to try force.”
    “He broke her nose,” Clovache said to Crick. “He broke her collarbone. But she broke a major bone of his, so