Cime. Cime’s diamond-rods in her fine fine wealth of hair. ‘Yes. Did I?’
‘You did. And strange things are happening in Sanctuary. Those . were soreerous
weapons those hawk-masks used against you and me. A poor thief tried to snatch a
woman’s bracelet the other night, down in – never mind the street. She shouldn’t
have been there. The bracelet turned into a snake and killed him. I don’t know
what it did to him. He’s dead and they say he weighs about twice as much as he
did alive.’
‘It solidified his bones. It was obtained this morning. And when didn’t strange
things happen in Sanctuary, my friend?’
‘That is twice you have called me that.’ Hanse’s words had the sound of
accusation about them.
‘So I have. I must mean it, then.’
Hanse became visibly uncomfortable: ‘I am Hanse. I was … apprentice to Cudget
Swearoath. Prince Kitty-Cat had him hanged. I am Shadowspawn. I have breached
the palace and because of me a Hell Hound is dead. I have no friends.’
And you slip and call him ‘Kitty-Cat’ when you think of your executed mentor, do
you? Not seeking a father, eh? Do you know that all men do, and that I have
mine, in Vashanka? Ah Hanse how you seek to be enigmatic and so cool – and are
about as transparent as a pan of water caught from the sky!
Tempus waved a hand. ‘Save all that. Just tell me not to be your friend. Not to
call you friend.’
A silence fell over them like a struck banner and something naked stared out of
Hanse’s eyes. By the time he knew he must speak into the silence, it was too
late. That same silence was Tempus’s answer.