While his stomach set to churning, he fanned through the sparse pages. “Is there a way to undo it?”
“No.”
Sean’s gaze lifted toward David. “What does it mean for us?”
“You should read the book.” David’s tone came out even and controlled. Almost bored.
“Maybe I don’t want to know.”
He shrugged. “Eventually my memory of reading it will make its way to you.”
A cleansing breath did nothing to dispel Sean’s rising tension.
“It’s illegal, what she did, and it’s illegal to know she did it and not say anything.”
Sean massaged his temple as a headache bloomed. “What does that mean?”
“It means we have some decisions to make. Because either everyone is going to have to know or no one is.”
“If everyone knows, they won’t trust me anymore.” Sean paused. All the religious overtures, the bowing and fawning, would disappear. “That might actually be kind of nice.”
“If people find out, they’ll ask who did it. Bel will be punished.”
Maybe she deserved it. “You seem mad enough to want her punished.”
David snorted. “They believe wholeheartedly in corporal punishment. I’m furious, but I don’t hate her.” He paused. “That much.”
Sean leaned back. “Then maybe we say we don’t know who did it.”
David’s eyes slid his way, glinting in the dark. “Everyone would think it was me.”
“Why the hell would you do this to yourself?”
The empty expression remained, but David’s bitter feelings gleamed beneath the mask. “After today? They’ll think I was protecting myself. No one will harm me if it might hurt you.”
Sean sighed at the truth in that statement. “The Council isn’t going to punish them,” he said.
“I didn’t expect they would.”
“They wanted to kill you today. They were screaming for it.”
David nodded. “I’m very aware. That wasn’t the first time someone’s wanted to kill me. Murderous emotions are not subtle. They burn like acid.”
What must it be like, to experience the world like that? To feel every ounce of directed hate or anger? It was no wonder David preferred to hide in solitude.
Sean gazed down at the book. “So we don’t tell anyone, then. Only six people know—I told Cole, by the way—and I trust us all to keep the secret.”
David’s voice grew curiously soft. “People will figure it out, Sean.”
“How?”
“You need to read that book.”
Sean fingered the worn edge of the book’s binding. “Where did you even find this?”
Something sparked in his chest. No, in David’s chest. No—between them?
“Anna found it for me,” David said. “For us, I guess.”
