She let him guide her a few steps away from the crowd before she said, “You’re referring to your Elkati, I assume?” She snorted at his reaction. “Don’t look so surprised. Do you think tales of your exotic bedwarmer didn’t climb over the city walls? Do you imagine I wouldn’t ask some questions, once I heard?”
“I suppose I didn’t think you were interested in that sort of thing.”
“About you taking a slave? Iwouldn’tcare, normally. Well, I’d think it peculiar, and maybe a little pathetic, but I wouldn’t consider it my business.”
“And you think this is different somehow?”
“Don’t be slow, Theos. I know why you took him, and I know you’ve been told to stop pushing and to keep things calm. So the only thing Idon’tknow is why you’re here, apparently about to make a fuss when you’ve been clearly toldnotto.”
Theos stepped closer. “Things have changed. He tried to escape tonight.”
“Really? It was my understanding that part of your job with him was to prevent that sort of incident from occurring.”
“He had help.” This was the thing Theos couldn’t grasp. “Someone gave him a key to the prisoner pens. I expect he was going to try to fight his way past the sentries into the mountains.” He waited for her to react, and when she didn’t, he peered around to make sure no one could overhear, then hissed, “AToriangave him a key so he could get loose and attack our guards! So he couldkillTorians. We’re supposed to be pretending there’s nothing wrong while we’re all winter-stuck, but we’ve got people plotting murders. Is that really something we can ignore?”
She frowned at him as if he was the one who’d made all this happen, then sighed. “Where’s the Elkati now?”
“In your office.”
“Really. What an inappropriate place for him.”
“Where would bemoreappropriate? Should I have dragged him into the festival? Or left him down in the barracks to be freed again?”
“Enough theatrics, Theos. You’re Sacrati—aren’t you supposed to be stoic?”
“You’re the reeve—aren’t you supposed to care about the safety of your people?”
Her eyes flared. “You think I should show how much I care by igniting a civil conflict in an enclosed space? Really?”
“The conflict’sbeenignited. Or at least, there are sparks flying all around, and I seem to be the only person trying to put them out, so sooner or later one of them’s going to find tinder and blaze up.”
“How poetic.” She half turned. “Your absence was noticed, and now your agitation has surely been seen as well. The other side will be hoping you’re upset about a successful slave escape, but you would have gone to the captain about that, not to me. Right? So they’ll suspect something different. They’ll suspect you’ve thwarted the escape and are demanding answers.” She shook her head. “I hate it when the other side knows the truth. But what will theydo, now they know it?”
She whirled back toward him. “Were you discreet? When you left the Elkati in my office, did anyone see you?”
“I don’t think so.”
“But you don’t know for sure. Someone may have followed you as you charged up from the barracks, intent on vengeance.” She was energized. “Return to the Elkati and make sure he stays safe; if they’ve been unable to get him out of the valley safely, they may choose a more permanent method of silencing him. I’ll go find the captain and consult.”
She turned and strode away without waiting for his agreement. It was frustrating, but he didn’t have a better plan himself; he did as he was told. A few Sacrati caught at his arms as he walked past their festive tables, but he shook them off and kept moving. If Photina was right and peoplewerewatching him, he didn’t mind if they saw him being angry. Hewantedthem to see his anger, and understand that it was directed at them. He wanted them to be afraid.
But when he got back to the administrative building,hebecame the apprehensive one. He couldn’t say why the hair stood up on the back of his neck, didn’t know what his body had noticed, but he’d learned to pay attention to it at times like this. He slowed his pace and let his senses absorb clues from the surroundings, and when his heart rate picked up a little, he stepped out of the moonlight and into the shadows by the front of the building.
He eased the door open, moving slow and quiet, and wished he had at least a knife with him. But no one brought weapons to a festival. He could only hope that anyone else in the building had been dressed for the same occasion he had been.
And therewassomeone else in the building. Someone hiding in the shadows, waiting for him. He might not understand the rest of it, but fighting? This was in his blood, and he trusted his feelings even when he couldn’t trust his thoughts. It was a relief to be back to something familiar.
Still, he was too disciplined to charge forward. Did they know he was in the building? Any warrior worth the name would have noticed the front door opening, even as quiet as Theos had been. He’d let in a bit of a breeze, cold evening air washing in, and probably the shadows had changed a little as the solid door had opened and admitted the moonlight. Even without Theos’s sixth sense, any Torian—
And that was where he caught himself. AnyTorian. The people inside the building now, the people he was so eager to fight and kill . . . they were Torians. His fellows. His brothers in arms. There was no one else in the valley, besides the prisoners, and they were all locked up. Whoever was hiding in the darkness ahead was a Torian.
Whoever waswaiting for himwas Torian. What were their plans? Did they want to kill him? Did they have the same hesitations he did? Did theyknowhim?
He stopped in the middle of the corridor. “I’m coming in,” he announced, his voice ringing down the almost-empty halls. “If you’d like to discuss this peacefully, speak up now. If you stay hidden, I’ll assume you’re hostile.”
There was motion behind him. Smooth but fast. An attack.
Theos’s body took over and moved as it had been bred and trained to do. There was no room for doubts; one of his hands found the enemy’s wrist and twisted, the other grabbed the knife from the man’s weakened fingers. Everything happened quickly, instinctively, and before Theos’s drew his next breath, the attacker had taken his last, the blade in his throat ending him forever. It was too dark to see his face, and Theos didn’t drag the body into the light.
