I could see the knowledge solidifying in her mind. “Who else have you killed?”
“For you?” It was wise to clarify this. “The two women working in the fortress kitchen who were poisoning your food under the commander’s direction. Farnoll told him to eliminate you.”
An alternate plan if the first didn’t work. “How far do the king’s wretched fingers reach?”
“Almost everywhere. There are so few holdouts left.”
“Have you killed anyone else for me?”
I lifted my chin, meeting her gaze. “Not yet, but I will if they cause you pain.”
“Yet here you stand before me, the perpetrator of almost all my pain.”
“I’ll do all I can to show you that you can still trust me.”
“What did you do to Drask?”
“Used him when I had need. He was once mine.”
“What does that mean?” she snarled.
“I raised him. I sent him away before Ivenrail could kill him. He found you all on his own, however, and he will always be yours. Never fear that.”
“You used him to spy on me.”
I grunted. “You’d do the same.”
“No, I wouldn’t.”
She would if seeing meant everything.
Sighing again, she paced back and forth. Was she finished asking questions?
I stiffened my spine. “Go ahead. Judge me.”
“We share a common cause, but that’s it.”
I jerked out a nod, watching her face, her eyes. Not intruding into her mind. The time for spying on her thoughts was over. She was right that I’d hurt her—too many times. I would do all I could not to do so again, though I feared I wouldn’t be able to keep that vow even with myself.
“What else are you keeping from me?” she asked.
As I’d seen immediately, this woman was not only powerful, but she was also clever.
I said nothing.
“Come on,” she said with a wry twist of her lips. “I know you’re still holding things back.”
“I’ll share everything when I have to.”
“You expect me to trust you after a statement like that?” she growled, her hands forming fists at her sides. “You want me to agree to a deal with someone who’ll lie even if it results in my death?”
“I will notallowyou to die.”
“And what will you do if your father figures out I’m trying to kill him and quirks his finger toward his dragon? Stand there while that beast turns me into a pile of ashes?”
“His dragon, Madrood, will not hurt you.”
“He’s an unpredictable dragon. You can’t control everything.”
