“Haven’t you gotten it through your thick head yet?” Fell spat. “You will always be my responsibility. Anything you do reflects back on me. Sure, it was the King who made you his heir’s Crown and then a captain, but I’m the one who brought you to this castle. Your success makes me look good. Any failures and people begin to whisper—what the hell I was thinking, why I chose you. Never mind I didn’t choose you, Toran. You were just the lost puppy who followed me home.”
Fell was wrong. Toran didn’t remember much of his life before Gadore—he’d been so young—but he did remember how Fell had been the one to take his hand and lead him away from that mountain village. Not the other way around.
“Are you finished?” he asked. “I have things to do.”
Like making sure Nes didn’t back out of their deal.
Fell folded his hands in his lap. “Are you going to accept my help?”
“Surely you’re smart enough to know the answer to that.”
Fell’s face was as razor-edged and deadly as a blade. Even the olderman’s emerging wrinkles seemed to sharpen the longer he glared at Toran. At last, Fell stood and left the table, hoarding an uncharacteristic silence that made Toran wary.
He thought of what King Harkett had said about how Fell changed after killing the first Witch. He didn’t understand how killing the Witch—saving his entire country—could make Fell what he was today.
“Want me to keep an eye on him, too?”
Toran turned to find Quint at his back. “No, you’ve got your hands full as it is.”
Quint slid into the seat Fell had just vacated. “She’s still here.”
“Didn’t try to leave?”
“She stayed in the Ditch all night,” Quint said. “She has a room above a gambling den called the Siren’s Hair.” Quint pulled a key from his jacket pocket, setting it on the table and sliding it across to Toran. “Now you do, too.”
Toran picked up the key, noting the flourish of a fish tail on the end. “Thanks.”
Quint nodded and waited. Around them, guards continued to eat, their conversations flowing between mouthfuls.
“Do you think I’m making a mistake?” Toran asked at last. “Not accepting Fell’s help?”
“I think you’re wise not to trust that man,” Quint said.
He stirred the remains of his stew around the bottom of the bowl. “Despite the fact that he’s the only person in the world with experience capturing the Witch?”
“He’s the only person with experience killing the Witch. There’s a difference.”
A difference Toran had been trying not to think about. The Witch was indirectly responsible for Loriana’s death. She deserved to die. He wanted to be the one to kill her.
Setting his spoon down, he leaned over the table and lowered hisvoice. “Even if Nes manages to sniff out the Witch, I have no way of capturing her as the King wants. It’s not like she’ll come quietly.”
Quint’s eyebrows drew together. “Then we find a way.”
“Easier said than done.”
“No one said this was going to be easy, Toran. But the King trusted you with this mission. He expects you to give it your all.”
“I will.” And he meant it. Despite his feelings about the Witch, the last thing he wanted to do was disappoint King Harkett again.
Quint glanced around, eyes pausing on the nearest occupied tables. “You know,” he whispered, “we aren’t the first ones to try to capture the Witch.”
Toran stared at his best friend and found the answer in his eyes.
“Aeos,” they said at the same time.
Quint nodded again.
“They’ve been after the Witch to harvest her power for centuries,” Toran mused aloud. “Surely they’ve found some way to capture or bind her.”
