“I. . .” he exhaled heavily. “I’m not mad atyou. I couldn’t control my magic for months, either.”
Shivers ran down my arms and shook me from within. Pulling my cloak around my shoulders, I tried to warm myself, but frigid air swept in on the breeze. “What came first?” I asked. “The assassin or the blessing of Haimyx?”
“The former, I suppose.” He said, eyes fogging.
“So you were an assassin first? Why are you judging me, exactly?” I said, face tightening in anger. “You’re a murderer.”
“Only to those who deserve it.” He snapped.
“How do you know?” I pressed. “How can you be sure? And what if their death invites the Empty and kills an innocent?”
“Innocents are being hurt either way. You agree with the lords, then? We should look the other way and let evil carry on atrocities because somethingmighthappen? Because it’s inconvenient to deal with the fallout?”
Swallowing, I broke his gaze. “Percy told me how you met. But he didn’t say much about the target he helped you find.”
“Tale as old as time,” Seth said in a clipped tone. “The madame ran a whorehouse where men could buy the girls as young as they liked and beat them until they bled, so long as they paid extra.” He paused. “I think that’s what broke Percy. What made him lay down his helm and fall out with his father: taking the hands of those little girls, and telling them it would be okay.”
Before Ainwir had found me, a man had tried to trap me in his brothel. I’d been too young to understand, then. A sudden stop from the Empty was a mercy in comparison to a life in chains, preyed upon by monsters.
How could anyone look a girl in the eye who’d been through that, and tell them it would be okay?
“What happened to them?” I asked. “The girls?”
“Girls don’t end up there because they have someplace to go,” Seth said quietly. “I hope we saved them, but I’m not so naive as to assume.”
I don’t know why I asked. I already knew the answer.
Frigid wind blew in again, showering us with a deluge of cold rain. Squeezing my eyes shut, I curled into a ball as the shivers grew into violent shakes.
“Great,” Seth muttered, “now you’re going to freeze to death.” Shifting closer to me, he extended an arm. “Here.”
“I don’t,” I chattered, “want to be warmed by someone who hates me.”
“Would I have carried you to safety if I hated you?”
Bereft of a good answer, I pursed my lips and shivered pathetically.
Slipping an arm behind my back, Seth pulled me against his chest and wrapped his arms tightly around me. Feeling thewarmth of another body, I instinctively pressed myself closer to him, inhaling the scent of rain permeating his clothes.
Noticing us, Whisper stood and curled up by our side, a pile of wet fur I’d need to wash again. Seth shrugged his cloak around both of us. The black fabric tumbled around my shoulders, sealing out the biting wind.
I could feel his heartbeat, slowing from a rapid thump to a steady beat. Strands of his hair brushed my face, and his chest rose and fell beneath me. It was far too intimate a moment for my liking, but such times were the perfect chance to ask questions otherwise ignored.
“When I saved Percy,” I said quietly, “You looked horrified.”
Seth’s muscles tensed, his arms tightening around me.
“Why?” I pressed. “That madman looked elated. Eleos was awed. So was Percy.”
I felt Seth’s chin brush over my hair as he looked away, but he remained silent.
“You’re very impassioned about what you do,” I continued, “And my magic proving to be false made you-”
He exhaled heavily. “People want a savior they can foist their burdens onto. They would martyr you in an instant to save themselves.” He laughed bitterly. “They’d martyr you even if you had no magic at all—just to see if it worked.”
Reading between his words, I twisted to face him. “You knew someone. Someone who supposedly-”
“Yes.” He barked harshly. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
