“It’s a beautiful morning!” Rolan smiled and scraped chopped potatoes into a sizzling pan.
“And you’re cooking? You cancook?”
“I’m not an idiot, you know,” he said cheerfully. “I’ve seen Evaine make these every morning.”
Anaya gave a suspicious look.
“You were right about my chopping skills though,” he said. “Chopped the tip off my pinky.”
He wagged his bandaged finger at her, and her eyes went wide.
“Let me see,” she demanded.
He let her inspect his finger, stirring the potatoes with his other hand. This cooking thing really wasn’t all that hard. Maybe if he wasn’t an Arcanist’s apprentice, he could have been a chef’s.
“It’s a clean cut,” Anaya said. “I’ll put some ointment on it to stop it rotting, but I can’t make it grow back.”
“Then it’ll just be a reminder to me to always chop more carefully.” That was true, anyway, even if he wasn’t thinking of potatoes.
Anaya’s eyes narrowed again. “You’re too happy.”
“First I’m too mopey, now I’m too happy?”
“I don’t like it. You’re up to something.”
“You bet I am. Breakfast!” He flipped a potato into his mouth, then yelped when it burned his tongue.
Anaya rolled her eyes. “I’ll get that ointment.”
She pushed through the beaded curtain to the apothecary’s shop, and Rolan wiped a drop of cold sweat from his forehead. She seemed to have bought the lie about his finger. He was pretty sure he could fool Evaine, but Anaya knew him better.
He would have to be more careful if he went out hunting again. More injuries would lead to tougher questions, and he doubted he could fool Anaya a second time.
If?Who was he fooling? He knew he would go out again, probably that very night. He hadn’t slept a wink after he got back, despite his exhaustion from the fight. He was too busy reliving everymoment of it in his head, thinking how he could have moved faster, attacked differently. He’dkilleda Cryptic, all on his own, and survived.
How many relics would it take, he wondered, for Luc to realize Rolan could be an asset, not a liability?
Anaya pushed back into the kitchen, her face lined. “Here’s the ointment. Sorry, but you’ll have to apply it yourself. I need to get Evaine.”
“What’s wrong?”
“There’s a line of customers outside the door, all with Cryptic wounds.”
Rolan stared after her as she sprinted up the stairs. He stood quietly as Evaine came hurrying down, Anaya on her heels. They went into the shop, and he heard the door opening and the shuffle of feet and the moan of pained voices as the injured came in, seeking truth salve and bandages.
Rolan’s cheer faded. Things were getting worse. Killing one little Cryptic wouldn’t make a difference. He’d have to be faster, stronger, smarter. He would have to hunt from dusk till dawn.
With a start, he remembered the potatoes.
Too late. They’d already burned.
The Cryptic hissed like a rat, its scales bristling as it circled Rolan. He had been hunting for a week now, finding the monsters all over Crisanth. But this was the biggest one he’d faced yet, easily a Rank Two, standing as tall as his shoulders when it rose on its hind legs. And it had six disgusting tentacles protruding from its snout, likean octopus stuck to its face. They snaked through the air, each one tipped with a dripping, scorpion-like barb. As far as Cryptics went, this specimen was particularly hideous.
Rolan struggled to control the panic in his belly. He hadn’t brought down one this size before, and the tentacles made him nervous. He was in a distant corner of Crisanth near the river docks, the darkest corner of the city. Here the lamps were not as well tended due to the fact there were so few houses this far out, and people avoided the area once dusk fell. He’d known the risk in coming out here, but he’d also heard of several nasty wounds and two deaths in this section, all due to Cryptic attacks.
He was pretty sure he was staring at the culprit.
“Let’s make a deal,” he murmured, keeping eye contact with the creature. This was a bit tricky, considering it had six of them. “You roll over and don’t give me any trouble, and I’ll make this quick and clean.”
