“When the second hand makes one full turn, you'll die. Hiss.”
clutching half a bloodstained razor blade, Night Owl spoke in a hoarse voice like a rusty saw scraping across bone.
Three years ago, he was the “Hundred-Win Butcher” of Rust Harbor's underground fight ring. Then someone slit his throat and left him for dead. He survived by sheer luck, but his vocal cords were torn, leaving him a mute whose every word came with a hiss.
Now the half-blade that had opened his throat had been sharpened into the deadliest edge of all:
The blood of Gold Watch, master of the Cage Quarter, splattered across the very gold watch on which he'd once bet on Night Owl's life.
The throat of “Throat Surgeon,” doctor of the Throat Quarter, was cut open with his own scalpel.
The body of “Tiger Keeper,” master of the Shadow Quarter, became dinner for the tigers in his cages.
They all said you couldn't listen to Night Owl's words. Hear them, and you'd die.
But they didn't know the words he most wanted to say were:
“On March 15, you owe me. Pay it all back, with interest. Hiss.”
