Will landed on his butt again. I sucked in a breath in sympathy.
“It’s good for them,” Gort said, still examining the weird-looking tool in his fingers. “Knowing that even though you’re big and strong, a smaller, older opponent can still kill you.”
I nodded at the tool in his hands. “What is that?”
“A lockpick for Kaiden. I need to make six more. He gave me drawings.” Gort smiled.
I glanced at Kaiden. He slouched on the wall, the lock forgotten, watching Reynald. His face looked grim. Almost haunted.
“How did you find out he was a locksmith’s son?”
“Reynald told me,” Gort said.
Kaiden followed Reynald around like a devoted puppy. He should’ve been excited watching this fight. Instead, he looked like he was at a funeral.
I had two younger cousins on my mom’s side. I remembered visiting them a few years back, when they were twelve and eleven. They were borderline feral and bouncing off the walls. Kaiden was usually so quiet, half of the time I forgot he was even there and right now he might as well have been a ghost.
Our stares connected. Kaiden looked down at his lock and started fiddling with it.
“What about from the Southerner’s Guard?” Lute asked.
Reynald moved into a stance, sword in both hands, the blade resting over his left shoulder. Lute mirrored him.
“Got it?” Reynald asked.
Lute nodded.
“Come on,” Reynald said.
The younger man charged, his sword raised for a strike. Reynald parried and turned around Lute, somehow grabbing his opponent’s arm and locking it in the bend of his elbow. His sword slipped around Lute’s blade, as if it were liquid. Lute’s sword went flying and clattered onto the stone. Half a second, and Lute was on one foot, off-balance, bent forward, with Reynald controlling his arm and the blade of Reynald’s sword touching his neck.
Gort raised his thick eyebrows.
How did he do that? Did he catch Lute’s sword with his cross guard and pry it free? It was so damn fast.
Reynald let go. Lute fell and cursed.
It was beautiful and so controlled. Reynald never stumbled, he never missed. He owned his battlespace. Everyone else was just a guest in it.
Watching Reynald was dangerous for me. When he took a blade into his hand, he transformed into a different man and that man pulled me like a magnet. It wasn’t just his muscular body and the way he moved; it was the eyes. Cold, calculating eyes. Merciless. Powerful.
I needed to have my head examined.
Seven days until the Butcher displayed his next kill. Thinking about that was like pouring cold water over my head.
“What’s bothering you?” Gort asked. “Is it Drugh?”
“No.”
A messenger from Taryz had come first thing in the morning. One of Drugh’s mercenaries had stopped by asking about the Magnars. Tonight Reynald and I would go to the teahouse and try to settle things.
“Then what is it?” Gort asked.
“The Butcher is good enough to kill Eliarde.”
In the courtyard, Reynald thrust past Will’s swing and stopped the tip of his sword an inch from Will’s throat.
“Reynald knows his limits,” Gort said. “He won’t throw his life away or ours. If he says he can do it, it’s because he’s calculated the odds.”
