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“Is it already too late?” Sebald asked. “Can we get a message to him before the snows start, and what will he do once they’ve started? Those mountain passes are completely blocked in the winter.”
“What about this rumored southern pass you mentioned on the boat?” Jace asked with a serious frown. “Could we give Conrad directions to get there?”
I shook my head and sighed, sagging against Hayk. “That’s another problem,” I said as Hayk subtly tightened his arms around me in support. “Dmitri confessed that the wolves who are trying to make the southern pass don’t have the skill, the tools, or the manpower to finish the job.”
That also came as a surprise to my friends.
“Then that’s it,” Lefric said. “We have to get a message across the mountains to Conrad, telling him to drop everything and come home at once.”
“He won’t like leaving his healing studies,” Neil said with a thoughtful frown. “That healing course in the Old Realm meant everything to him.”
We were all silent for a moment as we thought over the problem.
“Who is Conrad?” Billie asked in an almost apologetic voice.
“He’s one of the Sons of the Cities,” I said.
“We’re all the Sons of the Cities,” Lefric explained in more detail. “It’s our group of friends. We were all pups for the leaders of what became the Wolf River Kingdom when we met.”
“Well, some of us weren’t pups,” Peter added, making a point to get that right.
Lefric nodded, evidently not seeing the challenge in Peter’s look. “There are a few more of us who aren’t here, Orel, and Nikita and Efim, although we never really did establish whether they were full Sons or not.”
“If they can get away from Gerald and Avraam, they’re more than welcome to join us, as far as I’m concerned,” Neil said.
“We’ll talk about that later,” Jace said, shaking his head a bit and swishing Gennadi to the side in the water so that he could lean forward. “What we have to figure out now is what to do with the information Dmitri gave Anton.”
“None of you can tell Magnus,” I said, alarmed at Jace’s look. “You promised.”
“I hate to say it, but this is something he has to hear,” Peter said.
“I know,” I said, tensing in spite of how relaxing the pool was supposed to be, “but you heard what he said to me just now. I have until Jorgen and Hati arrive for the meeting. He doesn’t have to know right now. I have to figure out how to get Dmitri out of here so he can just go away and never bother us again before Magnus can learn anything.”
“Dmitri deserves to die,” Peter said in a quiet but still fierce voice.
I eyed him anxiously. Part of me wanted to be shocked that Peter could be so cold, but I didn’t know how I would feel about the man who had allowed something so brutal to happen to me if I’d been in his shoes.
“Give me a chance to get rid of him,” I said. I broke away from Hayk’s grip and waded across the pool to face Peter directly. “If I can make sure he leaves, and I mean really leaves, then you’ll never see him again. It’ll be like he’s dead to you anyhow.” But I wouldn’t have to carry around the guilt of causing his death for the rest of my life.
“Maybe someone on one of the trading ships from a kingdom across the sea would hire him for their crew,” Lefric said, blinking as though the idea had just come to him. “He could sail away and that would be the last of him.”
I snapped straighter, floating back to sit on the bench by Hayk’s side. “You know, I bet that’s where he was this morning.” I didn’t know why the thought hadn’t occurred to me earlier. “I bet he left our room before dawn so that he could go down to the docks to look for ways to flee from Good Port and the entire frontier by sea. He said he wants to start a new life away from the frontier, and that would be the only way to do it.”
“Let’s hope that’s what he was doing,” Jace said. “Because as nice as you’re trying to be to the man, he doesn’t deserve it.”
“I don’t know,” Neil said, coming to my defense in a way I didn’t expect. He glanced to Jace and said, “Do you want to be the one to go back to Gravlock and tell Mikal that his brother was executed?”
I suddenly remembered the night of the coronation. I’d been with Sebald and Lefric over at Mikal and Jakob’s house, drinking and fooling around, when the attack had started. Mikal was so different from Dmitri that I hadn’t made the connection between them at first. They were ostensibly identical, but Mikal was one of the best men I’d ever met, while Dmitri….
“Mikal is already dealing with the loss of his hand,” Sebald said, coming around to my and Neil’s view of things, I could tell. “Returning to Gravlock and telling him his brother was found and then killed would be a hard blow for him.”
“Mikal would understand,” Peter insisted, staring at the water.
I wasn’t so sure he would. I’d been devastated when I learned that my brother Dane was dead, even though he’d been horrible to me. Just because siblings didn’t get along didn’t mean that losing one wouldn’t hurt like hell. Especially when they were a twin.
I took a breath, gathering my thoughts and my courage, then said, “Magnus has given me until Jorgen and Hati get here. That could be a day or it could be a week. Please, just give me that time to convince Dmitri to disappear. It’s the merciful thing to do, and if we’re all going to be leaders someday, we need to learn how to be merciful.”
“We need to learn how to be strong and how to make hard decisions,” Jace insisted, shaking his head. “And Dmitri’s blood won’t be on your hands. We will all share the blame, since we all know these secrets now.”
