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“Gareth,” he answered.
I shook his hand, getting one last look at his face. Blue eyes and a jagged scar on his cheek. Then I drew my dagger across his throat.
“We need to leave. Now,” I ordered to the three behind me. Refusing to turn around to witness their horror as I stalked back to the horses and our still half-made camp. We couldn’t risk staying the night. Nikolai carried Syrra to his horse, hoisting her up on the saddle with him while Riven steered her steed. I didn’t turn around until we stopped to make camp again, long after the moons had risen over our heads, Gareth’s blood on my fingers shining in their light.
ILEFT THE OTHERS TOset up camp on their own and found a creek to wash the blood off my hands. I cut Gareth’s name into the flesh along my ribs. His life finished the crest of one of the waves that framed my chest. I found a strip of linen in my saddlebag to bandage the cut even though it had already stopped bleeding.
I lingered at the edge of the creek, listening to the water wash the blood downstream. I wasn’t eager to return to camp. They’d glimpsed the true nature of the Blade—mytrue nature. I knew whatever progress I’d made with Riven had been washed away just like Gareth’s blood. I just hoped if they saw me as a monster, they saw me as a necessary one.
I returned to find Syrra and Nikolai bickering over which rabbit should be roasted first.
No one said anything when I sat down on my bedroll. Relief pulled me into the thin cushion. I didn’t want to have to defend my choice to murder that man. I just sat and watched the smoke disappear into the branches above us. The leaves had already begun to fall, exposing the sea of stars that flooded the sky.
“Keera deserves first choice,” Nikolai said once the rabbits were cooked and the tea made.
“It’s fine,” I answered. I didn’t have the patience for his charm.
“It’s a thank-you, Keera,” Nikolai insisted softly, pointing a skewer at me. “You better move your ass and take it before Ithrowthe rabbit at you.” He lifted the rabbit Syrra was in the middle of carving and pretended to throw it. I laughed, but Syrra shot him a deadly look. I’d already learned not to get between that Elf and her food.
“Thanks,” I said as I walked over.
“Thankyoufor saving us today,” Syrra said, her face stripped of all sarcasm. On her neck was a paste to help drain the rest of the sleeping draught, though she would be lethargic for days.
I shrugged. “You would’ve done the same.”
“I am ashamed to say I would have hesitated,” Syrra admitted. Her dark eyes met mine, there wasn’t any laughter in them. “Leaving you to perish would have seemed like a solution in the moment. From what Riven and Nikolai have told me, you did not even hesitate to weigh your options. I will not forget that, nor the life debt I owe you.” She handed me a leaf of rabbit, including a large piece of leg. That alone was enough for me to know she was serious.
A shift had happened.
“I reckonIwould’ve helped,” Nikolai said with a sideways grin to Syrra. “But even if I had, there’s no way I could’ve taken on fifteen men by myself. And certainly not as spectacularly as you did.” Nikolai winked at me.
“Riven helped,” I reminded them, taking a bite of my rabbit. Whatever Syrra had managed to add to it made the meat so much sweeter. I took another mouthful, my stomach rumbling in satisfaction.
“Not very much from what I hear,” Syrra added between bites of her rabbit.
“I killed three of them!” Riven said. I thought he was offended but he shot Syrra a rare smile. It cut through my chest with its warmth. Riven was handsome when he wasn’t brooding. “And I don’t hear anyone thanking me for their lives,” he added, throwing another log onto the fire.
“You killed three in the time it took for her to fell... ten?” Nikolai shot a glance to me.
“Eleven.” I didn’t hide my smirk.
Nikolai barked a laugh. “You were just there for moral support, Riv.”
Riven crossed his arms and tried to hide his laughter.
“I prefer to think of him as an apprentice,” I quipped. Riven’s violet eyes darted to me, anger swirling behind them. He wanted to murder me, but I refused to look away. I’d meant what I said earlier that day. I would no longer entertain his judgement of me.
After a moment, Riven gave me the smallest grin and nodded.
“You’re not half as bad as I thought you were,” Nikolai admitted through his laughter. “I’m realizing you really could’ve killed us that day you barged through the window.”
“Easily,” I agreed, stripping a leg clean.
“Do all the Shades fight as you do?” Syrra asked. Her dark eyes studied me as if trying to learn where I hid my tricks. Always a warrior. In that way we were the same.
“We all receive the same training,” I answered diplomatically, tossing the leg bone into the fire.
“That’s a no then,” Nikolai said with a wry grin.
