“There was no deal,” I croaked, afraid to swallow against the pressure of the blade. I tried to keep my breathing slow and even, to cling to my mask of calm, but my palms were sweaty as fear crept up my spine, and my grip was slipping. “There was no militia involvement. Just Anders. Just fire.”
“Liar.”
She pressed forward again just as the door behind us creaked open and someone else stepped inside.
“Enough, Matina,” Levitt snapped. “This isnothow we conduct interrogations.”
A held breath rushed out of me when she sat back and the knife went with her.
Levitt came around into the space between us. He was dressed in his ceremonial robes, head to toe in black with half a human jawbone hanging from a cord around his neck. I’d never seen him in them before, and it was hard to look at him when all I could see was my father wearing the same.
If I looked too hard, I was afraid of finding the same bitter hatred in his face.
He held out his hand to Matina. “You’re done here. Give me the knife.”
She slapped it into his palm, then shoved out of the chair so hard it scraped across the floor and tipped onto its backlegs a moment before settling back with a clack. She bared her sharpened teeth at me as she passed, and the door slammed behind her.
Levitt’s shoulders rose and fell with a deep breath before he turned and bent over me to cut through the ropes binding my wrists.
“I thought you were dead,” he said, head down so I couldn’t meet his eyes. The commanding edge was gone, and his voice was weak with relief. His hand shook when he returned my knife to me and straightened. “When Anders said you’d been captured…”
Fury surged like bile in the back of my throat, chasing away the last vestiges of my fear.
“Anders,” I growled. “Where is he?”
Levitt finally looked up at me, and he grimaced when he saw the bruise on my cheek. “What’s this?” he asked, his own tone edged in anger as he reached for the mark. “Who did this?”
I slapped his hand away. “One of your guards.Where is Anders?”
His brows pinched. “At home, I assume. It’s getting late.”
It took every ounce of my willpower not to leap out of my chair and leave. To go stalk the streets of Ashpoint until I found the man in question so I could unleash my fury on him. Until all he knew was pain.
The desire to hurt him scared me.
“If anyone is to be questioned,” I said, “it should be that idiot.” I shook my head as if I could erase the violent thoughts that rattled through my mind. “No, not an idiot. He’s a criminal, Lev. Calculating. He stranded Penny and me in Wendwood and tried to burn down the mission with us inside.” My volume rose until I was all but shouting in Levitt’s face.
His frown deepened. “That isn’t what?—”
“Whathetold you?” I scoffed. “I’m sure it’s not. Will you be taking his word over mine? Over Penny’s? Speaking of, have you put a stop tohisinterrogation, too, or have you left him to it while you satisfied your need to see me alive?”
I didn’t wait for an answer before barreling on, each word more vicious than the last. “We walked here in the snow, in the cold. It took two days. If all of that leads to you doubting us, perhaps we should’ve stayed gone.”
Over those two days, I’d kept my head steady. Penny needed me collected, so I spent my time reassuring him that I knew the way back, that we wouldn’t be lost in the endless woods. That we wouldn’t freeze to death on the road. We’d huddled together in the tiny bed at the inn like it was another night at home, and I was calm.
But there was no space in this interrogation room for any sense of peace, not with the eruption of the quiet rage that had been brewing inside me over those long, cold days. It filled me up and spewed out in every sharp-edged word and accusation, and I hoped it scalded Levitt as badly as it was burning me.
Let him feel some of this.
Let him take the responsibility he never did after the third Oath.
I was tired of carrying it alone.
“What about the militia?” Levitt sounded more confused than hurt, and all that did was make me angrier.
“What about them?” I snapped.
“Anders said you were caught, that he barely managed to escape himself.”
