Instead, Iseul clenched her jaw. “Did Tenney ever tell you why the two of us went our separate ways?”
“No,” he answered, surprised. Iseul never brought up their divorce.
“He’d just hurt his knee, and he was lucky that was all he hurt. You’ve seen how he fights, the way he rushes into battle without pausing to think.”
“Because he has to. The other NDC officers all look up to—”
“No. Trust me, Domenic, I’ve known Tenney since the academy. He can call it duty, or destiny, or survivor’s guilt, but the only reason he fights recklessly is because he wants to.” She shook her head as she reached for her teacup. “After he got hurt, I told him it was time he retire. It was past time, really. But he refused. Even if that meant he was going to die on the battlefield.” She grimaced. “In his version of events, I made him leave, and he had no choice. But he’s the one who made the choice. Because he likes being a hero.”
Domenic frowned, unsure how such a word could be flung as an insult.
“What does any of that have to do with me?” he demanded. “Idon’thave a choice.”
“But if you did, you’d really choose her over the whole country?”
Domenic’s hands trembled, and finally, he tugged the blanket over his shoulders. “I don’t know. She’s one person. But everyoneelse I’d be saving—they don’t know me. They sure like your version of me, with my talking points and suits. They literally line candles up on our sidewalk. They buy stamps with my face on it. And I don’t give one shit about them!”
“You don’t mean that.”
“Don’t I? And the Order, it’s not like we’re some perfect institution! There’s so much we don’t know. Up North, there’s no scurges anymore. The land grows food, tons of food, without having to rely on magic. And all this time, there might’ve been two types of magicians!”
Though Domenic and Hanna had agreed not to expose Ellery’s meeting with the Winter magicians, what they’d learned still mattered, could changeeverything.
Iseul blinked. “Those conditions do sound better than in our reports. And as for types of magicians, it’s something to investigate, certainly. After tomorrow’s debriefing—”
“But will you even listen, then? You shut Ellery down before.”
“Do you realize how much you’ve asked us to reconsider? Until a few weeks ago, we’d never thought it possible to have one Winter magician, let alone… let alone many.”
“Yeah, well, you didn’t bother paying attention. You didn’t…” He didn’t know if that was fair. He didn’t know what he was saying.
Iseul returned her empty teacup to the tray. “Dom, I’m not going to claim the Order is perfect. But I didn’t join the Council to perpetuate its problems—I joined to help fix them. My parents were proud when we learned I was a magician. Even if magicians elsewhere don’t use wands, being one is still celebrated, and there are many methods for casting spells. But I had to convince my parents to let me enroll in Alderland’s national academy. When my father moved us here for his work when I was a toddler, my family didn’t intend to stay here, to put down roots. And at the time, the country saw the national academy as prestigious, butalso ruthless. And they were right to. Students went to extreme lengths to bond with Living Wands. We worked ourselves sick. And our classmates were rarely our friends—just our competition. After Smith and Hoover were found dead the week before Calynia’s vigil, and I was attacked… No one understood why I stayed, least of all my protective family. But Alderlandwasmy home, and I dedicated my whole career to helping change the Order’s culture and the country’s perception of it. I won’t pretend that solving that problem solves our every problem, but that change once felt impossible. And whatever feels impossible next, we can change that, too.”
Domenic couldn’t bring himself to argue. Even if the Order had virtues worth defending, even if its flaws could improve, that wasn’t enough to justify choosing it. Not for such a price.
The red bled out from the edges of his vision.
“Even if I’m destined to kill her,” he whispered, “it still doesn’t feel right.”
She squeezed his shoulder. “Tell me—after all this agonizing you’ve done over being the traitor, have you heard the next words of the prophecy? Has Ellery?”
He swallowed. “No.”
“Then what good is it taking yourself down such a dark path?”
He jerked out of her grasp. “Because isn’t this what I have to do? Follow every piece of the prophecy? Consider everything destiny has been trying to tell me?”
“Dom, I know to be a Chosen One is to heed the words of destiny. But even if thisiswhat destiny wants from you, please, don’t depend on it to rationalize your choices. Because if you do this believing destiny made the choice for you, then I’m scared you won’t be able to live with it afterward.”
“Would that be so bad?”
Iseul stared at him despairingly, but Domenic didn’t retract a single word. Ellery could tear out his heart just as he stabbeda knife into hers. Let destiny play semantics about who won or lost. What did it matter if they killed each other so long as they died together?
“You’re… You’re not in a good headspace to be making any decision right now, Dom,” Iseul told him cautiously.
“Oh, so you’re saying it’s not healthy to keep imagining what Floyd Wilder will say if my girlfriend kills me in a great, earth-shaking duel? ‘Book your one-way passages now, folks. Because the forecast today is fucking freezing with a chance of gigantic monsters, just like tomorrow, and the next day, and the next. Courtesy of Domenic Barrow, Chosen One, who we now know did actually spend his whole life thinking with his—’”
Iseul uttered an exasperated sound. “Can we not joke about this? Because I-I’m really trying to give you what you need, but I don’t know how to give you that.”
