at the insult. ‘Curb that savage organ you call a tongue, however, and I might be generous enough to share a notion of escape with you.’
‘You’ve been plotting an escape this whole time the rest of us have been fighting?’ Lenk didn’t bother to frown; Denaos’s lack of shame had rendered him immune to even the sharpest twist of lips. ‘Did you have so little faith in us?’
Denaos gave a cursory glance over the deck and shrugged. ‘I count exactly five dead Cragsmen, only one more than I had anticipated.’
‘We don’t get paid by the body,’ Lenk replied.
‘Perhaps you should negotiate a new contract,’ Kataria offered.
‘We have a contract?’ The rogue’s eyes lit up brightly.
‘She was being sarcastic,’ Lenk said.
Immediately, Denaos’s face darkened. ‘Sarcasm implies humour,’ he growled. ‘There’s not a damn thing funny about not having money.’ He levelled a finger at the shict. ‘What you were being was facetious, a quality of speech reserved only for the lowest and most cruel of jokes. Regardless,’ he turned back to the corpse, ‘it was clear you didn’t need me.’
‘Not need you in a fight?’ Lenk cracked a grin. ‘I’m quickly getting used to the idea.’
‘We should just use him as a shield next time,’ Kataria said, nodding, ‘see if we can’t get at least some benefit from him.’
‘I hate to agree with her,’ Lenk said with a sigh, ‘but . . . well, I mean you make it so easy, Denaos. Where were you when the fighting began, anyway?’
‘Elsewhere,’ the rogue said with a shrug.
‘One of us could have been killed,’ Lenk replied sharply.
Denaos glanced from Lenk to Kataria, expression unchanging. ‘Well, that might have been a mild inconvenience or a cause for celebration, depending. As both of you are alive, however, I can only assume that my initial theory was correct. As to where I was—’
‘Hiding?’ Kataria interrupted. ‘Crying? Soiling yourself? ’
‘Correction.’ Denaos’s reply was as smooth and easy as the knife that leapt from his belt to his hand. ‘I was hiding and soiling myself, if you want to call it that. At the moment . . .’ He slid the dagger into the leg-seam of the Cragsman’s trousers. ‘I’m looting.’
‘Uh-huh.’ Lenk got the vague sensation that continuing to watch the rogue work would be a mistake, but was unable to turn his head away as Denaos began to cut. ‘And . . . out of curiosity, what would you call what you were doing?’
‘I believe the proper term is “reconnaissance”.’
‘Scouting is what I do,’ Kataria replied, making a show of her twitching ears.
‘Yes, you’re very good at sniffing faeces and hunting beasts. What I do is . . .’ He looked up from his macabre activities, waving his weapon as he searched for the word. ‘Of a more philosophical nature.’
‘Go on,’ Lenk said, ignoring the glare Kataria shot him for indulging the man.
‘Given our circumstances, I’d say what I do is more along the lines of planning for the future,’ Denaos said, finishing the long cut up the trouser leg.
Heavy masks of shock settled over the young man and shict’s faces, neither of them able to muster the energy to cringe as Denaos slid a long arm into the slit and reached up the Cragsman’s leg. Quietly, Kataria cleared her throat and leaned over to Lenk.
‘Are . . . are you going to ask him?’
‘I would,’ he muttered, ‘but I really don’t think I want to know.’
‘Now then, as I was saying,’ Denaos continued with all the nonchalance of a man who did not have his arm up another man’s trouser leg, ‘being reasonable men and insane pointy-eared savages alike, I assume we’re thinking the same thing.’
‘Somehow,’ Lenk said, watching with morbid fascination, ‘I sincerely doubt that.’
‘That is,’ Denaos continued, heedless, ‘we’re thinking of running, aren’t we?’
‘You are,’ Kataria growled. ‘And no one’s surprised. The rest of us already have a plan.’
‘Which would be?’ Denaos wore a look of deep contemplation. ‘Lenk and I have rather limited options: fight and die or run and live.’ He looked up and cast a disparaging glance at Kataria’s chest. ‘Yours are improved only by the chance that they might mistake you for a pointy-eared, pubescent boy instead of a woman.’ He shrugged. ‘Then again, they might prefer that.’
‘You stinking, cowardly round-ear,’ she snarled, baring her canines at him. ‘The plan is to neither run nor die, but to fight!’ She jabbed her elbow into Lenk’s side. ‘The leader says so!’
‘You do?’ Denaos asked, looking genuinely perplexed.
‘Well, I . . .