This was infuriating. Trying to make him talk was like pulling teeth. Two hours ago, she’d decided she didn’t want to have anything to do with him, but now she was reconsidering that strategy. Maybe if she learned more about him, she would understand why he was so contradictory.
“Tell me one,” she said.
“What?”
“A poem you wrote.”
“I... What I write... I don’t know if it’s any good.”
“It doesn’t matter, I want to hear it.”
“It’s not done. I’ve been working on it for a while.”
She let out an annoyed sigh.
“All right,” he conceded. “It starts like this.”
“Upon the road, sour winter’s time is cast.
Let peace that leads to Heaven now recoil,
And idly fill your mind with dreams that spoil.
From gaping graves, the hungry dead break fast.”
A chill ran up Seraphina’s spine. She waited for him to continue, but he didn’t. How could someone who wrote like that kill women?
“Rune, I need to ask you something. I’ve asked you before, and you were vague. I need you to tell me the truth. The answer can either be yes, or no.”
She wasn’t naïve, she knew he could lie. But she would listen for it, all her senses on high alert. If he lied, she’d be able to tell.
“All right.”
“Did you kill those women?”
He was quiet, of course. What else did she expect? She leaned forward and touched her forehead to the cold stone, then gently banged her head against it.
“Don’t do that,” he said.
“Then answer me.”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know if you killed those women?” A disbelieving laugh escaped her.
“The truth is...” He gulped. “You said you wanted the truth, and the truth is... I don’t remember.”
Seraphina groaned. “You can’t play the memory loss card every time it suits you.”
“I’m not.” He said it so quietly that if Seraphina’s hearing hadn’t been near supernatural, she would’ve missed it. “I know you don’t believe me. Do you think I don’t hear myself? How I sound? Sometimes it feels like my mind is made of tiny little pieces. Shards. Like bone shards, you know? Except they were cut all wrong and now they don’t fit.”
“Tell me what you remember.”
“About the women?”
“Yes, about the women!”
He dragged a breath in and pushed it out slowly, forcefully. It was his turn to bang his head against the wall, but she didn’t tell him to stop. She waited.
