Kaylin tried to fill it, which was beyond awkward. “Have you tried to fly since the—the attack?”
“No. I could barely lift my wing.”
Kaylin swallowed. “Evanton doesn’t think you’d have been injured at all if you weren’t carrying the netting. It’s—”
“I know what its function was. I know how important it was—that’s why I was carrying it. You’re a Hawk.”
Kaylin nodded.
“You’re proud of the fact that you’re a Hawk. Your job is effectively the only life you want.”
“I hate writing reports.”
“Every Hawk hates writing reports. Except maybe Hanson. If youlikedwriting reports, they’d probably keep you off the streets because they’d question your sanity. But you’re a Hawk. Does it surprise you to know that I’m not that different? This job wasmine. Is mine. It’s not about the Caste Court. It’s not about dar Carafel. It’s useful. I have a function, a role. I know what it is.
“We needed that netting. We knew the risks. Those spells tookDragonsout of the sky. But Dragons are a larger target than Aerians. And there are a lot more of us. Did I love the injury? No. Of course not.
“But I got it doing something that needed to be done. Don’t tell me what I should or shouldn’t have been doing. I’m a Hawk. I’m a sergeant. I know my own job.”
Kaylin lowered her head, although she did keep walking. After a silent block had passed, she said, “Sorry. I mean it. I’m sorry.”
“You should be.”
“...For how long?”
Moran’s laugh was both genuine and frustrated. “About that long, I’d imagine.”
“You don’t believe him.”
“I don’t, but not in the way you mean. I have a lot to think about, and I don’t want to test his words just yet.”
* * *
Moran headed to her room the minute she entered the house; she said hello to Helen, but avoided everyone else.
Everyone else was in the dining room, except for Annarion.
“Nightshade’s here?”
“Yes, dear,” Helen said. She was standing in the doorway, or rather, just to one side of it.
“You don’t like him?” Mandoran asked.
“She doesn’t trust him,” Kaylin countered. “I think she’d be willing to like him if he wasn’t causing so much obvious pain.”
“Annarion’s causing his share of pain,” Mandoran replied, brooding. “You know, I used to envy him. I used to envy his relationship with his oldest brother.” He sat half-sprawled across the table, his elbows propping up what little of him remained upright.
“Less envy now?”
“My father,” Mandoran replied, shifting into the High Barrani he so rarely spoke, “could cause pain simply by opening his eyes. We—the children who were chosen to go to the West March—were supposed to be the best, the strongest, the brightest. My father, however, did not entirely believe that the investment of power would be successful.
“He therefore chose to sacrifice—his words—his weakest, most disappointing son. That would be me. They died when I was gone, victims of the war. Different victims than we were. My brothers had no love for me—and I had three, Lord Kaylin. It was rare, among the Barrani line, to have four sons.”
“Daughters?”
“One. Adopted. I believe our father had hopes that she could be trained to withstand the tests the Consort must take, survive and pass. He was an ambitious man.”
Kaylin frowned. “But if you hated him—”
