Then, all was finally, blessedly, quiet.
“… will be with you shortly, Magus Supreme.”
A nod against her hair. She blinked. A ceiling of thick, red fabric came into focus.Cassandane’s tent?It was bare but for a pallet that she and Kadra were sitting on. Groaning as every limb decided to protest being alive, she sleepily turned her face to Kadra’s exhausted one above her.
“Good evening.” Depthless eyes searched hers. “How do you feel?”
“Much better.” She sat up in his lap, wondering why her eyes felt swollen. Her burns seemed to have been healed. “How long has it been?”
“Six hours.” There was a bleakness to him that she had only seen at Sidran Tower when he had admitted to walking away from her and at the Unraveling. She flinched in preparation of the blow.
“I’m sorry,” he said quietly.
Heart plummeting, she disentangled herself from him and rose. “Would you have told me eventually? Or…” She swallowed, blood pounding in her ears as she voiced the fear. “Was there something I did that made you not wish to tell me?”
“No,” he ground out, air sawing from his chest. “You deserved the truth. This isn’t your fault.”
She released a shuddering breath, pressing the heels of her hands to her eyes against the ache building there.Of all the things to cry over. People were dead, and Noceo had all but overthrown the Tetrarchy. She was being foolish.
“Sarai,” a flinch ran through Kadra’s pale features when he attempted to stand—her only indication of how much pain he was in. He offered his palm. “Please come here.”
She took it to ease the lines of strain tightening his face. But her throat felt too thick. On any other day, her hurt might have stayed quiet, until she was able to marshal herself enough to express it without tears. But she’d been scraped raw by too much. The fears she normally fought alone burst free.
“I thought… perhaps you didn’t tell me because I was—” Her voice choked. “Cassandane isn’t wrong about your overblown sense of responsibility. Sometimes, I wonder if you only ever look at me with guilt. The Aequitas was crumbling, and there I was. Running. Not strong enough to help you. Not strong enough to bear your secrets or your burdens.”
Kadra turned to iron. “Never.” His voice was a scarred rasp now. “I—” He stilled, emptiness entering his eyes when she released his hand.
“Let me take a breath.” Turning away, she spoke past the lump in her throat. “My insecurities are my own. I shouldn’t force your secrets from you.”She raked a hand through the tangled mess of her hair. “I’m sorry. Gods, I shouldn’t be acting like this at the site of a tragedy—” Kadra’s arms closed around her, pulling her hard against his chest, breath rough in her ears.
“You have nothing to apologize for.” Voice tight, he pressed a kiss to her temple. “The shame is mine. Eleven years ago—”
“Magus Supreme Kadra, it’s an honor to serve you.” The curtain to their tent parted. Cassandane’s healer, Destus, dashed inside. His jaw dropped. “I can… leave,” he finally squeaked.
“It’s alright.” She squeezed Kadra’s hands reassuringly. He released her with palpable reluctance and sat down so that Destus could work, grave eyes watching her all the while.
“Whereabouts is the damage?” the healer looked exhausted.
“My spine.”
Destus cast a dubious glance at Kadra’s ramrod straight posture that quickly turned aghast upon seeing the wound. Cutting away the torn fabric of Kadra’s robes from where they had fused to his back, he placed both hands there and closed his eyes.
It had to burn. She was painfully familiar with a healer’s white-hot magic repairing her spine and setting vertebrae back together like salt blocks. But other than deepening his exhales and a furrow creasing his brow, Kadra showed no signs of that agony.
The pain tolerance of a mountain.
Conscious that Destus could still hear them as he worked, she filled Kadra in on what she had seen in the farmer’s memory and during the strike he had made her watch.
“I didn’t think two people could cause this much harm,” she said with a shake of her head. “Dalvia doesn’t even seem to want to.”
“If matters come to a head, it’s because they were boiling for a long time, and no one noticed,” Kadra said. “I spent years focused on Aelius and his scuta. I should have done more for the north.”
Were you avoiding your brother?“You did everything you could.” She recalled their sleepless nights arguing with Guilds over amendments tothe Distribution Act and passing mandates that northern mines and quarries could only be owned by collectives where at least fifty percent were northerners.
Why did you work so hard?The question Noceo had asked returned.Why become a Tetrarch at all?Her gaze traveled his tired face. Stubble laced his jaw, the stern line of his mouth drawn tight.There’s so much I don’t know.
Destus suddenly paused in his ministrations, then stepped back from Kadra’s back with a bewildered expression. “Magus Supreme,” he began carefully, “have you noticed any irregularities in your spine prior to this injury?”
Nothing moved in Kadra’s depthless eyes, but she felt the air around them grow colder. “Are there any?” he asked pleasantly.
