“I haven’t decided. Keep them alive for the foreseeable future, I suppose. They’re... worth something.”
Lance said nothing. Instead, he turned his goblet slowly in his hands and just stared at the contents as if they held all the answers to this game of pawns and kings.
“She had months inside Camelot’s walls,” I continued. “Months sitting at my table, training in my yards, learning about Camelot’s weaknesses...myweaknesses.” I let that sit for a moment. “She could have poisoned me six times over if that was what Merlin intended.”
“And yet she didn’t.”
I nodded and watched as I swirled the dark red wine in my glass, thinking about the conversation with her earlier.
If Merlin wanted you dead, you’d be dead.
The coals cracked and settled as a thin ribbon of smoke curled toward the flue.
“Regardless of the reasons she came here, the girl remains a direct line into Annwyn,” I continued. “Corvin is much the same.” I set my goblet down on the table. “Everything Merlin’s been planning: troop movements, alliances, whatever he’s building in that twilight pit he calls a kingdom... they both carry that information. All the names, the routes, the shape of Merlin’s intentions.” I took a breath. “I crack them open, and I have all of it.” I didn’t bother to tell him that I’d already attempted to crack her open but hadn’t gotten far.
“Torture?” Lance finally looked at me.
I shrugged, though I wasn’t sure which of them he was referring to. “Whatever it takes.”
He swallowed hard at that, and the scar along his jaw caught the dim red light. “Corvin will never bend under torture. You know that.”
I nodded. “And the witch?”
He cocked his head to the side. “Who’s to say?” He paused. “But could you torture a woman?”
I breathed in deeply. “In the past, I would have said no. But there’s a certain dark part of me that’s gleeful at the prospect of torturingher.”
He breathed in deeply, and his jaw was tight. “You don’t think you’ve tortured her enough?”
I frowned, irritated by his comment, because I didn’t fully understand what it meant. “I haven’t even started. Unless you’re referring to what happened in the Great Hall? That was hardly torture.” And he didn’t know about Corvin fucking her. No one did, and I’d keep it that way.
“Emotional torture, perhaps.”
“Do you think negatively of what I did?”
He swallowed hard, but he didn’t respond right away. Instead, his attention found the moonlight outside the window. “I believe I understand why you did it. Your motives.” He took a sip of his wine finally. “But it seemed... excessive in my eyes.”
I breathed in deeply as I wondered what his opinion would be regarding what I’d forced between her and Corvin. But then I wanted to laugh at the thought. I hadn’tforcedher to do anything. She’d clearly wanted Corvin as much as he’d wanted her. What a complete failure that had been. “Perhaps and perhaps not. But it was... necessary.”
“I’m not questioning your methods.” Lance’s voice was careful in the way that meant he wasabsolutelyquestioning my methods. “I’m questioning whether they worked.”
“Lance, it’s rather clear that I failed spectacularly.”
He looked at me and smiled. “Your words, not mine.”
“But you’re thinking the same. We both know the truth: she’s a fucking wild card who absolutely pulled the rug out from underneath me and continues to do so. And while I’m fucking livid about it... I’m also... caught off guard.”
“Because you didn’t break her.”
The image of her surfaced through my thoughts then without my permission. I could see her straight spine, those eyes meeting mine with contempt.
“No.” The word came out flat. “She wasn’t broken.”
She is so much stronger than you credit her.
I slammed my eyes shut against the voice of the beast, and it was all I could do to force it to the dark recesses of my mind. When I opened my eyes again, I watched as Lance leaned back in his chair.
“She’s a liability.”
