“Have you talked to Beatrix about this?”
“No,” she said, “because I have the feeling she’d tell me not to do it at all.”
He gave a humorless laugh. “You figure I would have no such compunctions.”
“I almost killed you.” Her words were soft. She glanced down at her hands. “Were the situation reversed, I would feel just as you do.”
He sighed and rubbed his temples, trying to stave off a headache. He didn’t want to have this conversation. Pity for her was creeping up on him against his will as he considered her situation—and remembered that she almost certainly saved Beatrix’s life twice over.
“It sounds as if it was your Vow that made you act as you did,” he muttered. “Trust me when I say that I know how very hard it is to resist that compulsion.”
Miss Knight looked up at that, blinking. “Are you … trying toabsolveme, Omnimancer?”
“Well …”
“Beatrix took the same Vow I did. She felt the same compulsion. And she managed not to kill anyone. There’ssomething seriously wrong with me that I went along with what the Vow wanted.”
“Maybe,” he said, “or maybe it’s just that your life experiences allowed the Vow to work on you in a way it couldn’t with her.”
She snorted. “I’m just a poor, traumatized victim, is that it?”
“No,” he said. “I mean you knew down to your marrow that what Garrett was doing was wrong. You knew what I’d done to Beatrix was wrong. The need to do something would have felt overwhelmingwithoutthe Vow, but with that added on top …”
She made no reply for a moment. Then, sounding as if it cost her something to say it, she muttered, “I really misjudged you.”
That should have felt like a victory. Instead, he felt tired and sad. He might have won her over long before, had he talked to her frankly like this. Instead, he’d bristled at her jabs and reasonable distrust of him. He’d given her few opportunities to change her mind.
“Look,” she said, eyes welling, “even if I wasn’t fully to blame, even if the Vow played a big role, I have to pay for my crimes.”
“I can’t tell you what to do,” he said. “I’m not even close to impartial. But as far as punishment goes, it seems to me that you’re already serving a type of life sentence.”
A tear spilled over and raced down her cheek. Her lips quirked—a brief, ironic smile. “This is no good at all,Omnimancer. Who am I going to find to be my implacable voice of conscience now?”
“Try Rosemarie. She didn’t let me get away withanythingin grade school.”
Miss Knight looked nearly as surprised to find herself laughing as he felt for prompting it. A moment later they were both chortling—helplessly—at the flabbergasted look on Beatrix’s face as she walked back into the room.
“Well,” Miss Knight said, getting to her feet, “on that note, I think I’ll say good night.”
Beatrix turned to him as soon as her friend dematerialized. He expected questions, but instead she kissed him.
“You’re not going to ask me …?” he said a moment later, gesturing to where Miss Knight had been.
“I don’t need to know the contents of your private conversation.”
“Well—talk to her later. She needs … She really needs a friend.”
She kissed him again, pulling them both onto the couch this time.
“If I’d known six months ago that I would have gotten this response just for saying one half-decent thing about her…”
“No,” she said, laughing breathlessly, cheeks flushed, “it’s mostly that I couldn’t wait a moment longer to do that. We’re free. We’realive.”
“All thanks to a woman who charges into lion’s dens to save her husband.”
“And a man who pulls rabbits out of hats when all seems lost.”
“Well, to be fair, it was your magic I was borrowing.”
