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“Shall I guess what you’re thinking?” Nerron trained his pistol at the jade-green brow. “That you killed the Dark One for nothing, right? Fool! As though this was ever about you. Is that what they told you? I’m sure you handed your glassy girlfriend’s master exactly what he needed. You could say the same about me. All’s well that end’s well. So will you get on that horse, or will I have to demonstrate how Goyl bullets can penetrate even jade skin?”
Sixteen groaned as she struggled to her feet. The pain made her draw blood as she bit her lips and straightened her back.
The Pup took her arm.
“I will find him,” he panted. Oh yes, this was pure Goyl rage. “He deceived me. Me and her.”
“He?” Stop it, Nerron. You don’t want to know.
“Yes. He. Whatever he is. Wherever he is. I will find him.”
“The only one we have to find is Kami’en.” Nerron cocked the pistol. “I won’t say it twice. Get on that horse.”
The Pup didn’t move.
The Pup was the Jade Goyl—the Fairy Slayer. “I’ll show you the mirror if you let me go. You still want to see it, don’t you? Come with me.”
Oh no. No, Nerron! He had the crossbow. He had the Jade Goyl. It was never good to want too much. And Seventeen’s warning had been quite clear.
Sixteen stood there looking at the Pup. Nerron couldn’t figure out what he saw in her wounded face. She looked…guilty? Yes.
“Do not look for him! Please.” She sounded as though the bark was in her throat as well.
“Why? I’m not afraid of him.”
“You should be.”
She tried to flex her stiff arm, groaning with pain. The Pup attempted to help her, but she pushed him away. With her wooden hand. The one that couldn’t harm him.
“Go with the stoneface. Why do you want to find him? You can’t wake your love. Not as long as Spieler doesn’t want you to.”
The Pup stared at her as though she’d just changed into a viper.
“What do you know about Clara?”
“Don’t be stupid.” Sixteen flexed her wooden fingers. “The Fairies can’t even see the mirrors. The thorn magic was never theirs.”
The Pup grabbed her arm, but she flinched like a wounded animal. She was still dangerous. But the pistol was no help. Could he set her on fire? Sixteen looked at Nerron as though she’d heard him. She ripped the bark off her fingers with her teeth.
“It was all Spieler’s plan. He’s smart. So much smarter than the others.”
The Pup looked at the dead Fairy.
That didn’t feel nice, did it? Used like a tool, pushed like a pawn across the gameboard, not knowing for whom or what. Nerron knew the feeling. His own brother had been the last one to make him feel that way.
“Spieler.” The Pup repeated it, giving a name to all the rage, the shame, the helpless pain Nerron could see on his face.
Put that pistol away, Nerron.
Who was he trying to fool? The Pup would never come with him, so what good would it do to shoot him? And it might not be so easy.
“Good,” he said. “I’ll come with you. Through the mirror. But I don’t want anything to do with that... What’s his name? Spieler? That’s your war.”
Sixteen smiled. It was a smile full of scorn—and pain.
“And how are you going to avoid meeting him, stoneskin? That mirror? It is his.”
She looked at her hands. A couple of fingers were still glass.
