Are you Arik Siq?”
“Who else would I be?” the other snarled. “How many prisoners are chained down here besides me?” He paused, studying the old man’s face, not liking what he saw. “All right, I’ll say it. I’m Arik Siq. What does it matter to you?” He looked past him toward the open door. “Where are the guards?”
“Busy with other things. How would you like to get out of here and go back to your own people?”
The Drouj stared at him. “Who are you, old man? You didn’t say.”
The ragpicker shrugged. “Just a traveler, come through one of the passes that lead to the outside world. I came looking for a man. He carries a black staff. I’m told he’s dead.
I’m told you killed him. How did you manage that?”
Arik Siq hesitated, uncertain where this was leading. “Poison darts, from a blowgun.”
“Really?” The ragpicker could scarcely believe what he was hearing. “He must have been distracted not to have been able to defend himself. You are a lucky man. Lucky twice over, now that I’m here.”
“You’re going to set me free?”
“I am.”
The Drouj shook his head. “Why would you do that? What do you want from me in return?”
The ragpicker smiled. “I understand that the man you killed gave the black staff to a boy. Apparently the boy tracked you down, captured you, and brought you here. Is that right?”
“He tricked me.”
“But here you are nevertheless. If I set you free, I want you to find that staff and bring it to me. You can do what you want with the boy, but the staff is mine. Do you agree to this?”
He watched the Troll give him a quick look and then nod. “Why not? After I kill the boy, I’ll bring the staff to you.”
He held the old man’s gaze for just a second before his eyes shifted away. The ragpicker reached out so swiftly that he had hold of the other’s tunic front before there was time to react and had pulled him so close that he was breathing in his face. Arik Siq made a halfhearted attempt to break free, but then the other’s free hand closed down on his shoulder, and his features twisted as if daggers had been driven into his body.
Groaning, he dropped to his knees, where he remained hunched over and shaking, no longer big and threatening, no longer anything but terrified.
“Do not play games with me,” the ragpicker hissed, all pretense of civility gone. “Your life is mine to do with as I choose. You give me little reason to salvage it when you lie to me like that. If you intend not to give me the black staff, then you would be wise not to lie to me about it. I can sense lies, Troll. I can sniff them out!”
“I was just … telling you what you … wanted to hear!” the other gasped. Then, in a surge of mixed bravado and fury, he added, “Why shouldn’t I?”
The urge to break his neck was enormous, but the ragpicker managed to resist the impulse. “Look at me,” he ordered, dropping his voice to a whisper. “Look carefully.”
Arik Siq did as he was ordered, and the ragpicker let him see just enough of what he was that he could feel the Drouj shiver with recognition. He held him in check a moment longer, letting him feel his strength, giving him time to understand how helpless he was.
Then he released him and stepped back.
“If you lie to me again, I will kill you,” he said quietly. “Understood?”
The Troll nodded, unable to speak.
“Now tell me again that you will bring me the black staff.”
“I will,” the other promised, and this time the ragpicker could tell from his voice that he meant it.
“Answer this. Why are they keeping you prisoner here? Why don’t they just kill you and be done with it?”
Arik Siq shook his head. “The boy thinks to trade me for the girl we keep as prisoner.
Or perhaps for the lives of his people.”
“You intend to invade this valley? That’s who lays siege to it now, that army to the north? And you spied for them to find a way in?”
“They brought me here of their own free will. They were stupid. They betrayed themselves. They don’t deserve to keep this valley. We will take it away from them and make it our new home.”
The ragpicker grimaced. Idiots, al of them. “But you know the location of the passes now? You know how to bring your army in through either?”
“I know.”