Martin held a pistol.
Rami froze. He wondered briefly if his sister would hear the shot.
“I won’t even grant you a burial, boy.” The light caught the metal of Martin’s weapon, glinting in the thin mist that encircled them.
Rami sneered. “What does it matter? I’ve already ruined you.”
A smog of aimlessness had enveloped Rami ever since his father had been taken away. The only emotion that pierced through that smog was anger. He leaned into it now. “What will you do,MisterMartin? Will you crawl back to the Saint of Silence and reveal another secret in the hopes that he will save you? Just so you can continue play-acting nobility? You’re nothing but dirt to them.”
The pistol unlocked.
“I’ll take you back to Golborne in chains,” Martin vowed. “To decay in Newtorn Prison.”
Newtorn Prison.
That place followed Rami in his waking hours and in sleep.
Every migrant boy knew the contours of that place, felt its dreaded presence looming over them, like a voyeur watching their every move. To grow up always being the object of observation, every word accounted for, every move condemned. A part of Rami always knew he was a criminal before he’d even committed the crime.
Martin’s smile was slow and nasty. “You were always going to end up there, boy.”
Rami tightened his grip on the sword.
“Really, Martin, you cannot perform an execution in the middle of a courtyard. Very bad manners.” A smooth voice cut through the tension, and they both whipped around to see St. Silas leaning against one of the parlor doors. He still wore last night’s clothes, now uncharacteristically disordered—the cravat lost and the collar loosened. He held his own pistol in a relaxed grip. “Think of the mess.”
“This is not your fight,” Rami snapped.
“To my dismay, it is,” St. Silas replied easily.
Rami nearly groaned in frustration.
“My patience has frayed with this boy, Mr. St. Silas,” Martin growled. “You have all entered my estate uninvited, through sheer force and blackmail.”
Martin pointed toward Rami with the pistol. “Yourwardhas cost me an immense fortune—again.You cannot deny me the right to punish him as I see fit. Damn Newtorn Prison; I will hang him myself, here on the steps of Weavingshaw.”
“You forget yourself, Martin. The boy is under my protection and therefore cannot be touched.”
There was a loaded silence. Martin’s shoulders visibly tensed, his jaw jutting. “If your entire party is so inseparable, then you will all have to partake in this punishment. No one is leaving before I am recompensed.”
Martin’s words sent Rami’s heart pounding wildly in his chest. Never once had he thought that the retribution would touch morethan just him. Leena swam before his vision, face pinched with worry every time he left the house late at night and came back disordered and bruised. To think that she would be harmed because of his actions was a twisting knife.
St. Silas pushed himself off the door and started to make his way down the stone steps. He casually stood beside Rami, pistol still very much in sight.
“Do you know, Martin, a few days ago I had an inkling that it might come to this. Hence, I’ve taken the liberty of sending my man down to Golborne with a sealed envelope containing a detailed description of yourvery kindhospitality as well as certain other…facts about you.” St. Silas’s drawl never wavered, and Rami could not tell if he was lying or speaking the truth. “Should I not return as expected, thesefactswill be on the front page of every newspaper in Golborne.”
Martin stood arrested, paleness marking his brow.
The Saint continued, his smile deepening at the signs of the tradesman’s distress. “Well? What will it be, Martin?”
“I will not let him go, Mr. St. Silas.” Martin’s voice swelled with the wealth of wrath he was trying to tamp down. “Of course, sir, you are free to goafterthe boy’s execution”—he hesitated at St. Silas’s raised brows—“to ensure that you will not rally any outside help for this criminal.”
He was sealing them all in Weavingshaw. Suffocating them. Even though they were not all going to be put to death, they were all going to watch Rami die, and for Leena that would be another kind of death.
Rami’s grip on his sword was so tight it was nearly bruising. He hated how right Leena had been down in the crypts, begging him to be cautious, to think.
The smile on St. Silas’s lips was fixed, his eyes watchful.
With desperation, Rami’s mind filtered through options for another escape. “A duel, then, Martin. At dawn, to allow you the chance to take revenge upon me.”
