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Julita stirs in my head.Are they going to untie you already? You’re technically my guest—in any case, you’re doing me an immense favor. They really should show better hospitality.
My lips twitch upward of their own accord, and Alek’s eyes harden again. “Is something about this situation funny to you?”
I give a brief, humorless laugh. “Not particularly. But Julita’s concerned about your manners. She’s a little put out that you still have me tied to a chair.”
Something flashes across Stavros’s face too swiftly for me to identify, but my remark must sound like the Julita he knows. He strides forward, unsheathing his sword again, and severs the rope just below my shoulder so the whole coil falls away.
I shake the loops off and spring up from the chair, my nerves jangling with discomfort at the restraints. But I don’t move very far. This situation still feels far too volatile.
“You have to understand,” I say, before the conversation can become any more awkward, “I’m helping Julita because she made a good case, and I don’t want to see scourge sorcerers running rampant. But there’s only so much I can do. You needed to know that they killed her, and I’ll answer any other questions you have for her. Then I’m going to leave, andshe’sgoing to leave—like her soul normally would have in the first place.”
“That’s fair,” Casimir says softly, although he looks haunted himself.
Stavros clears his throat with a hint of a scoff. “You want to get back to your life. However much of a life you have if your ‘business’ happens in Slaughterwell. You’re obviously not noble-born. What’s your real name, and what exactlyisyour business, hmm?”
I itch to make up a story, to claim some typical fringe career. But the men have already shown they’ll go to great lengths to confirm my honesty.
If I want them to believe me enough to get through this conversation properly, I have to actually be honest.
I set my hands on my hips. “My name really is Ivy, and my business is mostly making sure I stay alive. I scavenge what I need.”
“Scavenge,” Stavros repeats sardonically. “That sounds like a polite way of saying you take what doesn’t belong to you. It doesn’t seem as if this is the first time you’ve posed as someone you’re not, either. If you’re planning on taking advantage of the situation and running some other con—”
“That’s not what I’m here for,” I interrupt, getting reacquainted with the desire to stab the infuriatingly arrogant man. “If I’ve ever lifted a thing or two to get by, it was only what was necessary and from people who could afford the loss.”
I’m not going to give him a full accounting of my activities in the fringes. For all I know, he’d find my wealth redistribution tactics nearly as offensive as my magic.
As it is, a mocking edge creeps into his voice. “So you’re a thief. Of all the people to find Julita—”
“Julita was cautious,” I interrupt. “I’m sure you all know that. She wouldn’t have shared her secrets with me if she’d seen any reason to distrust my motives.”
Casimir glances at the former general. “She’s right. Does what she did before really matter? She brought Julita to us—we should be grateful.”
Alek dips his head in a jerk. “We need to find out everything she can tell us from Julita about the people who came for her.”
Stavros sighs but motions for me to go ahead.
Finally!Julita mutters.
I suck in a breath, sharing her impatience. The sooner I’m out of this stuffy room, the better.
“The basics you already know. The knife I described to you at the last meeting—that’s the weapon that killed her. She didn’t see who did it. She says she felt a blast of wind right before she was stabbed, so it’s possible the murderer has a gift involving weather and used it to distract her.”
“And the temple you mentioned?” Alek says.
“She was on her way to check it for signs of collusion with the scourge sorcerers when she was murdered. So she assumes it is involved somehow, that the conspirators found out she was going there and decided it was better to kill her first.”
Stavros rubs his jaw. “I gave a friend on the Crown’s Watch an excuse to have someone keeping an eye on that area the past couple of days. So far they haven’t noticed any unusual activity.”
I shrug. “I can only tell you what I know. Maybe the would-be sorcerers warned the person at the temple who’s been helping them and they’re being extra careful now. Or maybe it was something else that made them worried about Julita.”
Benedikt ambles through the room, tapping his lips in an erratic rhythm. “Did she tell anyone where she was going?”
I pause to give Julita time to answer.
Of course not. But I was working my way through all the temples on the outskirts of the city. They might have been able to predict where I was going next.
“No, but they might have guessed based on where she went before,” I supply.
