Someone crashed into him from behind before he’d got halfway through. Ben went down under the attack, but caught himself, kicking out savagely. He wasn’t bad in a brawl, used to absorbing punishment on the rugby pitch, and he’d had a lot of practice in gaol. He could stall them long enough to get Jonah away.
He believed that for a fraction of a second, until an elbow jabbed his kidney, agonisingly painful, as a fist thumped into the back of his head. The momentary dizziness left him face down on the ground, arm twisted to breaking point behind his back, with hot breath by his ear.
“This one’s for the wife,” the manservant said, and slammed Ben’s head viciously on the floor.
“For God’s sake, Merrick.” Lord Crane’s voice sounded rather distant through the pain. “Don’t kill him till we’ve done with him. Where’s Pastern?”
“Where’s fucking Pastern?” Merrick repeated, and twisted Ben’s arm harder till he couldn’t hold back the harsh gasp.
Crane sighed heavily. “When I said don’t kill him, I also meant don’t break him too much. And since it sounds like Mrs. Merrick is making her presence felt out there, I suspect she’s got the bugger. Get him up.”
Merrick dragged Ben to his feet, taking hold of his hair and not loosening the crippling grip on his arm, and pushed him forward, through the back ways of the pub, out to the gardens. Ben blinked in the bright sunshine. His eyes adjusted, and he set his teeth against the despair.
Jonah, on his knees, head pulled back. A wild-haired blonde woman in boy’s clothes with blood running from her nose—the justiciar Saint—holding a knife to his throat. Stephen Day, arms folded, face impassive, looking down at him. And Dora, white-faced and appalled, with Agnes cowering behind her skirts.
“Don’t hurt them,” Ben croaked.
“I’ll hurt him as much as I fucking want,” Saint told him through her teeth.
“Language,” Day barked, and immediately held up a hand. “I beg your pardon, Jenny, I forgot.”
“I won’t have talk like that on my premises,” Dora said, trying to keep the shake from her voice. “And I don’t know what that young lady’s dressed like, and what’s going on? Who are you?”
“My name is Day, this is Lord Crane, and Mr. and Mrs. Merrick are in the role of guards. Do you know these men?”
“No, she doesn’t,” Ben and Jonah said, in chorus.
“Spenser was tending the bar,” Lord Crane put in. “So if he’s a customer, he’s quite a forward one.”
“Mmm. It looks to the untutored eye as though you’ve been hiding fugitives from justice,” Day told her. “Which could put you in quite an unpleasant position. Accordingly, madam, I will be giving the orders for the moment, and I recommend that you don’t get in my way.”
Dora’s mouth opened. Ben caught her eye and nodded, as much as he could. Do it, he mouthed.
“Right,” Crane said. “Congratulations, Stephen, you have your quarry. What, precisely, do you suggest we do with them? It’s past six now, thanks to these endless winding Godforsaken roads, and I am not driving through nowhere all night, any more than I’m sitting up watching the Amazing Escaping Gadfly there.”
“Fuck you,” Jonah said. “Sorry, Dora.”
Day ignored him. “I have an idea. Let me have a look around.”
Ben and Jonah’s own bedroom was chosen. It was, Day said, quite suitable.
“Iron.” Day closed the heavy cuff around Ben’s wrist. “I’m sure the lock wouldn’t detain Pastern long…” His pupils widened suddenly, and Ben felt something crunch in the lock mechanism of the cuffs. Next to him, held by Merrick and Crane, Jonah gave a sharp inhalation. “Right. That won’t be coming off without a hacksaw.” Day reached to the other cuff, the one around the hasp, to do the same thing. His ring, the mirror image of Crane’s magpie ring, glinted bright against the black imprisoning iron.
Ben was cuffed by one wrist to the iron hasp that stuck out of the roughly plastered wall. The chain was long enough that he could sit or lie on the bed, nothing more. Jonah, white-faced in silent fury, was not chained at all.
“Watch this, Jenny.” Day had placed four candlesticks around the bed, on the floor. He made a quick gesture, and all four wicks ignited at once. A moment’s concentration, then each flame streamed out sideways as if in a fierce draught, before returning to normal. He glanced at Saint, or rather Mrs. Merrick, who gave a quick nod of understanding.
“Right.” Day stepped back to assess his work. “Do you understand the situation?”
Jonah’s eyes were glowing blue, the sea with a storm coming. “You stunted ginger shit,” he hissed, and winced at Crane or Merrick, or both, applying force to his arm.
“I don’t,” Ben said.