“What were you saying, Sevro?” Quinn asks.
“Nothing.”
“Come on.”
“He said nothing.” Cassius chuckles.
“Cassius.” My voice alone shuts him up. “Sevro, please.”
Sevro sighs and looks up at me, cheeks flushed with anger. “Just thought we should not pick our butts here while the Jackal does whatever he wants.” He shrugs. “Send me south. And let me cause trouble.”
“Trouble?” Cassius asks. “What you going to do, kill the Jackal?”
“Yes.” Sevro looks quietly at Cassius. “I’ll put a dagger in his throat and then carve a hole till I see his spine.”
The tension is enough to make me uneasy.
“You can’t be serious,” Quinn says quietly.
“He’s serious.” Cassius’s forehead creases. “And he’s wrong. We’re not monsters. Not you and I, at least, Darrow. Bellona Praetors aren’t knives in the night. We have five hundred years of honor to guard.”
“Piss and lies.” Sevro dismisses him with a wave.
“It’s in the breeding.” Cassius elevates his nose ever so slightly.
Sevro’s mouth twists cruelly. “You’re a Pixie if you buy all that. Think your papa cut his way up to Imperator by being honorable?”
“Call it chivalry,Goblin,” Cassius sneers. “It wouldn’t be right trying to murder someone in cold blood, particularly not at aschool.”
“I agree with Cassius,” I say, breaking my silence.
“Small wonder.” Sevro stands to leave very suddenly. I ask him where he is going.
“You obviously don’t need me. Have all the advice you can handle.”
“Sevro.”
“I’m gonna search the ditches.Again. Bet Bellona wouldn’t do that. Wouldn’t get his precious knees dirty.” He bows mockingly to Cassius before leaving.
Quinn, Cassius, and I remain in the warroom until Cassius yawns something about catching a bit of REM before the dawn hits in six hours. Quinn and I are left alone. Her hair has been cut short and jagged, though the bangs hang just over her narrow eyes. She slouches boyishly in her chair and picks at her nails.
“What are you thinking on?” she asks me.
“Roque…and Lea.” I hear the gurgle in my mind. With it echoes all the sounds of death. Eo’spop. Julian’s silence as he twitched in his own blood. I am the Reaper and death is my shadow.
“Is that all?” she asks.
“I think we should grab some sleep,” I reply.
She says nothing as she watches me leave.
33
APOLOGIES
Cassius wakes me in the middle of the night.
“Sevro found Roque,” he says quietly. “He’s a mess. Come.”
