Patience. Let him volunteer the rope for his own hanging.
"I can't tell you that. Professional discretion. Client confidentiality."
Another lie. Smugglers have no code beyond profit and survival.
I draw my belt knife, not to threaten, just to clean my fingernails while considering options. The soft scraping of steel against keratin fills the courtyard with menacing rhythm.
"Professional discretion." I repeat his words with the careful pronunciation of someone learning a foreign language. "Interesting concept."
Scrape.
"Tell me about this discretion. Does it protect you when clients abandon you to enemy interrogation?"
Scrape.
"Does it feed your family when you disappear into clan territory?"
Scrape.
"Does it heal broken bones?"
The knife tip finds a stubborn spot of dirt beneath my thumbnail. I work at it with surgical precision while he watches.
"I'm protected," he says, but his voice wavers. "My employer has influence. Resources. They'll come for me."
"Will they?"
I finish cleaning my nails and test the blade's edge against my thumb. A thin line of blood wells up, sharp enough for precision work.
"Your employer sent you through Ironspine hunting grounds during war season. Through territory where smugglers disappear like morning mist. Either they wanted you captured, or they consider you completely expendable."
Neither option bodes well for rescue operations.
"Which possibility offers better hope for your continued breathing?"
He stares at the knife, then at the bloodstain spreading across my thumb. His imagination does the rest.
"Look, I don't know names. Just descriptions, payment schedules, drop-off coordinates."
"Descriptions."
"Human. Female. Military bearing, maybe noble birth from the way she carries herself. Pays in Vaelmark silver."
My grip tightens on the knife handle before I catch myself.Vaelmark.
The name drags up memories of ash-covered stones and precise arrow shots. Of steady hands stitching wounds while storm-grey eyes catalogued weaknesses.
The woman who helped me. Who bandaged my injuries and asked nothing in return.
"Continue."
"She operates a mercenary company. Small but professional. Mostly takes contracts in disputed territories, border conflicts, clan skirmishes, that sort of work."
"And the weapons?"
"Destined for Bloodfang territory. She's planning something big up in the mountain passes."
Bloodfang.
