“Can it control them?”
Reece threw up his hands and sat back down, shaking his head.
Shea ignored him. “No, at least not that we’ve found. As far as we’ve seen, it simply summons whatever beasts are in the area. If there was a way to control them with it, that knowledge has been lost to us since the cataclysm.”
“Share all our secrets while you’re at it, why don’t you?” Reece said.
Shea glared at her cousin, words coated her tongue but didn’t spill out. She had many things to say but couldn’t get them through the anger that had taken hold of her.
“They would have eventually forgiven you for abandoning your post, you know,” he informed her. “But not now. You’ve gone too far, Shea.”
“I already knew.” Fallon’s words fell between them like a blast of cold water.
Shea paused and looked at him. He’d known? How?
Reece scoffed. “So, you’ve already told him. I shouldn’t be so surprised.”
“I didn’t tell him anything,” Shea said, not taking her eyes off Fallon, who appeared calm and composed.
“No, she didn’t. Your secrets aren’t as well-guarded as you assume, pathfinder,” Fallon said with a quirk of his lips.
Reece’s face was arrested as he studied Fallon. “Impossible. Only pathfinders know about the call, and only a few of them at that.”
Fallon lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “Secrets have a way of coming out. For instance, if a single child survives after his town is inundated with beasts shortly after a fall out with the pathfinders, certain conclusions are drawn.”
Witt. Had to be. He was the only other person from the Highlands that Shea knew of. He and Fallon had some type of weird relationship that she still didn’t understand. The other man was sharp and observant. It didn’t surprise her in the least that he’d put that together. It made her wonder what other conclusions he’d managed to draw about the pathfinders’ guild and the secrets it held.
Reece’s expression smoothed out as he studied Fallon and Shea. His gaze shifted to Shea. “This doesn’t change things. You will find it very difficult to come back after this.”
She stepped closer to him and leaned down. “You assume I want to come back. My home is here. My people are the Trateri. There is no going back. I wouldn’t even if I could.”
Fallon’s eyes seared a hole into the side of Shea’s head. She didn’t look at him, keeping her gaze focused on Reece.
“You don’t mean that,” Reece said. His expression said he thought she was bluffing, that he couldn’t fathom a world where she didn’t want to return to the fold.
“I do mean it.” She let him see she was serious, because she was. She’d built a home with the Trateri, found a place to belong. As much as she’d tried, fitting into the Highlands was a lost cause. Even among the pathfinders.
His eyes widened slightly before his guard slammed shut. He looked away.
“Did you do this?” Shea asked again in a calmer voice than before.
“No, I’ve been here the entire time, and your friend there made sure I was thoroughly searched for weapons. His guards mentioned something about a relation to a ghost.”
Shea’s lips twitched. That would have been her fault. She’d surprised the Trateri when she first met them by her resourcefulness a time or two.
Shea looked at Fallon and received a nod saying that what Reece said was true. Her fingers tapped against her thigh. That didn’t mean he wasn’t responsible. She’d only seen the beast call once and wasn’t sure she could identify it if she saw it again. The Trateri who’d searched him could have very well missed it.
“I’ll have my men search him again,” Fallon said coming to the same conclusion Shea had.
“He could have left someone outside the perimeter as well,” Shea said, observing Reece carefully.
He’d recovered from his earlier surprise and was back to his smart-ass self. He made a gesture at his chest, as if to ask, ‘who me.’
She gave him a meaningful glance that said she wasn’t buying it. She knew her cousin, and he was as tricky as the day was long.
“It’s just me, Shea. Our elders thought you would be more inclined to listen to someone related to you.”
“I’ll have my men do a sweep of the surrounding forest,” Fallon told Shea. “See if there are any signs of his companions.”
