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Like every upper class prick I’ve ever dealt with, the fastest way to win them over is to stoke their horrific egos.
I fix my attention back on the possible Torstem. “The nights I’ve spent out here, immersing myself in your teachings, are the most alive I’ve felt in my whole life. There’s so much more I want to learn. So much I can tell I could accomplish with your guidance. If I’ve failed you in any way—if I’ve given you any reason to fault me—then I’m not worthy of this opportunity. I’ll accept whatever judgment you’ll give.”
“Don’t listen to—” Benedikt says.
The other man cuts him off with a jerk of his hand. I feel his gaze on me. “I have only your word too, Ivy of Nikodi.”
I bob my head in a slight bow. “And whatever you’ve seen of my acts in service of your cause. But if that isn’t enough…”
Julita breaks in with an urgent whisper.I know! Borys and Wendos—when they couldn’t agree on a course of action—they’d call on their powers to decide who was right.
Hmm. I’m not going to invite my riven magic into the mix… but there is another, higher power I can appeal to.
My pulse stutters at the idea, but I don’t have a better one. The words tumble out, no chance to fully think them through. “Why not let the godlen show their favor? Everything we’re doing is to bring back their full glory and the world they’d want, isn’t it? Test us together, and let the gods support the one whose heart they know is faithful.”
Which would be me, wouldn’t it? Seeing as I’m the one who’s had a godlen talking to me, when he can be bothered to?
It’d better fucking well not turn out that Kosmel is playing a big prank and the lesser gods are all in favor of scourge sorcery after all.
Possible-Torstem is silent for several moments. When he speaks again, I think I can make out a pleased smile in his voice.
“That may be a reasonable suggestion. We’ll need to discuss exactly how to proceed. Both of you, come along until we can settle this matter once and for all.”
Twenty-Six
Ivy
The figure who prodded me through the woods strides along between me and Benedikt, a slim sword in their grasp. Whether they’re protecting him from me or me from him, I can’t tell.
Perhaps it’s a little of both.
With every step we take through the night-draped forest, I’m surer of my earlier impressions. With every loping stride of the man across from me, more quivers of stomach-churning recognition race through me.
I don’t understand, but somehow one of the men I counted as an ally has become my enemy.
He’s accused Stavros too, in an indirect way—saying the former general was conspiring with me to double-cross the scourge sorcerers. If the fiends believe him, they’ll attack Stavros without any warning.
But he’s kept Alek’s and Casimir’s names out of it. Because he does have some kind of conscience still, or because he didn’t know how to explain they were helping me without revealing thatheonce was as well?
It takes all my concentration to keep my expression impassive and my own strides steady. If our interrogators realize that I’ve identified my accuser, that I feel betrayed… then they’ll know I really did have secretstobetray.
The figure I think is Ster. Torstem marches between the trees ahead of us. I haven’t seen enough of the law professor to confidently recognize him from his gait, but nothing about his movements contradicts my suspicion.
I’m still vaguely aware of a handful of others tramping in their loose ring around us. Guarding against any attempt to escape.
Where are they taking us? What are they going to do with us?
My magic slithers through my chest like the snake I caught by the Quadring. I can almost hear it hissing in frustration.
It would like to knock Benedikt’s feet out from under him, to punch through his ribcage and wrench him apart. Even though I’m horrified by what’s happened tonight, the images that flash through my mind sicken me too.
I need to know more. I’ll be safer if I can play this cool and careful.
For now, I’m managing to convince my power of that. That the threat isn’t significant enough for it to punish me for not letting it loose. No one has a rope around my neck so far.
I doubt I’d have kept it as well contained if it hadn’t gotten that brief chance to exert itself a few nights ago. How much worse can this situation get before it sinks its claws into me, and the conspirators realize something’s going wrong beyond a squabble between their recruits?
I push down that worry, keeping my hands loose and relaxed at my sides. Mentally charting the distance to the knife in my boot, for the small comfort the thought provides.
