CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

The door opened and there stood Borrowdale, the thrip who Jane had met a few hours earlier before she went into the tavern with Trinket. Borrowdale stooped for the door, and when he straightened in the room his hair brushed against the ceiling. His eyes were flicking all over the place, like he expected to be attacked from any direction.

'Quickly,' he said.

Jane felt a surge of adrenalin. She kept her eyes fixed on Borrowdale, stopping herself from looking at the window, just in case Trinket wanted to remain anonymous.

‘What is happening?’

‘I am rescuing you. Put on a thrip cloak and follow me.’

He held out a cloak, and Jane took it from him. The cloak was light and grey and silvery and smelled like metal. She slipped it on and immediately felt warm, as though the cloak had its own heat source.

‘Borrowdale.’

This was Trinket, buzzing from the window.

Startled, Borrowdale swung around at though he was under attack.

‘Trinket. What are you doing at the window? I was told you were under house arrest.’

‘How are you going to rescue Jane? What is your plan?'

‘I have a … ‘

Borrowdale stopped talking.

Footsteps sounded outside the door that was still open from Borrowdale entering.

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An instant later the Governor stood in the doorway. He looked between Jane and Borrowdale, and he held a look of contempt. He walked toward Borrowdale, and Jane saw (too late) something heavy in his right hand, and an instant later she realised it was a hammer. Borrowdale also realised and was bringing his hands up at the same moment the Governor was circling the hammer over his shoulder. Jane lunged, but she was too late to stop the hammer bashing into Borrowdale's head, like an axe sinking into a log. Borrowdale’s eyes melted into glass and his mouth formed an O.

The Governor toppled beneath Jane, who had hit him with all of her body weight. For one second they were tangled on the floor, then Jane rolled away and sprang to her feet.

Still on the floor, the Governor shouted, ‘Sit down.’

Turning, Jane went to kick the Governor, but he held the hammer up, and she instinctively took a step back, lost her balance, and fell onto the bed.

The Governor pushed himself up into a crouch while holding the hammer in the air. He stood and immediately kicked Borrowdale in the side, around the kidney area. The kick made a meaty thud.

‘Are you dead, thrip bastard?’

Borrowdale didn’t move or answer and Jane knew that he was dead. She knew about killing with hammers: that is how she killed her father. She brought a foot up beneath her so that her legs were bent in a position to launch, left or right, depending on what happened next.

‘I know that the transport wagon is missing,’ said the Governor. ‘Which means that Elion has been taken to Rivertown, probably by a bounty hunter. Tomorrow he will be transported to Coronet to be executed.’

The words settled, then the green thrips thin lips came up at the edges, turning into a smirk.

'So as you can see, I Don't need you anymore.'

Jane was willing herself to not look at the window, where she hoped that Trinket was getting ready to intervene.

'What does that mean?' Jane asked the Governor.

'It means I am free to kill you.'

As soon as he said these words the Governor lunged, with the hammer coming up, and his shoulder rising.

An arrow embedded itself into the Governor’s throat.

The Governor put his left hand up to his throat, and opened his mouth to say something, only all Jane heard was a gurgling hissing sound. Then blood came gushing from his mouth.

He poked his tongue out, as though trying to eat some air.

Another arrow came flying across the room, and this went into the Governor’s eye. The Governor crumpled like a falling sheet, and fell onto Borrowdale’s body.