“Just one. The throat slashing. And we all know at least one person who’s done that at least once in their life.”
“Uncle Maksim,” we both said at the same time, me with a sigh, and Dax with too much pride.
“I’m sure your Commander was forced to kill an enemy at one point, too,” he said. “It’s Clan life.To protect is to endure.”
My mind whirled back to Orion and the cold hatred with which Ryker had slashed his arm to save me.
He’d hidden his dagger that night as well.
A fresh wave of fury rolled through me.
“Dax?” I looked at him, unwavering. “I need you to keep an eye out for anything that seems amiss while you’re here. Sneaking around, whispers, strange glimmers on the rim.”
The more I thought about that glint, the more it bothered me.
“Setting me loose on the fortress?” He whistled. “What did your Commander do to annoy you this much?”
Something I wasn’t ready to face, but I had to nonetheless. “One or more people in this crater want to hurt it and us. Help me find out who.”
Who had stolen that dagger to kill my father. Who’d let the attackers inside Solkar’s Reach after I’d arrived.
He cracked his knuckles gleefully. “It will be my absolute pleasure.”
At least I could count on one person in this frozen land.
“Replica aside, you know what else bothers me?” His face turned sharp, gaze calculating. “Evie said her friends were frozen. Sound familiar?”
It did, unfortunately.
“The Commander was here yesterday,” I said.
He didn’t deserve me protecting his reputation right now, but fact was fact.
“As much as I dislike him, he doesn’t seem like the type to sneak up on someone, knock them out, andstranglethem. Fightthem until they wish they’d never been born, yes, but face to face.” Dax leaned back further in his chair, until it balanced on two legs. “But if he knows how to do it…”
I inhaled sharply. “He knows how other people can.”
Chapter 22
Allie
Ifelt him before his grunts vibrated through the hallway.
Oh, he was set on destroying things, alright. Metal things, judging from the vicious clanks resonating from behind the massive double doors which had seemed so foreign and intimidating on that first night.
Now they were just another obstacle.
I ripped open the doors to the precious armory.
My eyes instantly honed on him.
His muscles shifted beneath the skin, tensing in the shards of light as he swung a mighty sword at a mannequin that turned into nothing but splinters.
Sweat glistened on his back as he righted himself. The sunrise crawling in through the tall, slender cathedral windows encased him in an otherworldly glow.
He turned, the brutal spark in his eyes vanishing instantly as they met mine, only to be replaced by a glimmer that sucked the breath out of me.
Hope, reservation, and longing all battled to rule his gaze.
