Chapter 28 #2
“Hm,” is all he says. An impossible-to-decipher grunt of some kind.
“Hm?”
He rolls his lips together, and I’m pretty sure it’s an attempt to smother a smile. “Just not what I expected.”
“What’s your proposition?” I change the subject, my impatience clear in my tone, but he doesn’t react to it at all. Isn’t threatened by it in the slightest.
Inclining his head in my direction, he says simply, “I will help you free your people if you help me with something in return.”
I snort. “Something in return? Do I look stupid to you?”
He slowly shakes his head.
“And what makes you think I need your help?”
“Aside from where I found you this evening?”
I can hear the sarcasm in his voice, but I choose to ignore it. “Yes. Aside from that.”
My response renders him speechless for a moment, and for what feels like an insanely long stretch of time, he just stares at me.
Mindful of his game now, I school my features into neutrality, locking away any emotion he might try to decipher on my face.
“You’re trying to take down the ward, right?” He says finally, and it takes momentous effort to keep my expression blank.
“That’s okay. It was a rhetorical question. You’re here to free the Captures and to do that, you have to take down the ward. You know that much. But what you haven’t figured out is how to do it. Am I right?”
There’s no hiding the deflation of my shoulders, or the deep breath I inhale as I swallow my pride—as much of it as I can muster—and nod.
Happy with my confession, he rocks back on his heels, taking one long step around the chair in front of him. One long step towards me. “That’s a problem.”
I grit my teeth. “And I’m guessing you know how to fix my problem.”
“I do.”
Moonlight hits his back as he crosses the small sitting area. I take another step towards the door, but he doesn’t stop. His pace is slow enough that I don’t feel the urge to run just yet, but I do have a strong desire to stay as close to the exit as possible.
“And as a gesture of my goodwill,” he comes to a stop before me, “I’ll tell you.”
Goodwill? Doubtful. “What’s it going to cost me?”
“Nothing.”
“Bullshit.”
“I don’t…bullshit…Lucina.” His voice curls around the curse as if it’s foreign to him. “All wards are powered by a source, yes?”
I remain skeptical as I nod.
“Their source is what keeps them intact,” he tells me. “So, you take away the source—”
“The ward stops working,” I finish for him. “I know this already. But it was forged using the blood of the Rogue Disciples, and all five of them are in Onyile.”
“Who cares? You don’t need them.”
There’s something about how casually he says it that makes me pause. Do I trust that what he’s telling me is true? Absolutely not. But he seems so…certain. So sure about it all.
I fold my arms across my chest, leaning against the door behind me. “What are you talking about?”
He leans against the chair behind him. “You don’t need the Disciples. You need their direct descendants.”
I’d actually proposed this theory to Easton, but he didn’t want to entertain it. Didn’t think it was probable as some of the other theories we came up with.
“And these direct descendants are…here?” I ask. “In Streatham?”
“The ward wouldn’t be as strong as it is if they weren’t.”
My head tilts, eyes narrowing on his. I’m pretty good at spotting liars, and nothing about his body language or tone suggests that he’s one of them. It isn’t his words I don’t trust—it’s him.
Why would he go through the effort of lying about all of this? Why would he go through the effort of telling me at all?
“So you’re saying that all I need to do is find the five direct descendants that make up the source, get rid of them, and then the ward will fall?”
“It’s not really as simple as killing them,” he replies.
“And what does that mean?”
He shrugs, the smug shift in his expression confirming that he knows the answer, but he just won’t reveal it to me.
I pretend that doesn’t grate on me, continuing with a different question instead: “How do I know who the direct descendants are?”
Another shrug.
I fucking knew it. I knew there was a catch.
Sure, he’d given me useful information, but he was only leading me to this.
To acknowledging that I needed help. And while that might be true, I’m not yet desperate enough to ask a stranger for it.
Especially not a stranger who is of a species I don’t even recognize.
“You know what? Don’t tell me. I don’t need your help.” Confident with my decision, I push off the door, but the twinkle of something mischievous in his stare halts my momentum to leave.
“Unless this is an ultimatum?” I straighten. “Are you going to interfere with my plans if I don’t accept your help?”
“You mean rat out your disguise?”
“Yeah.”
He smiles then, huffing amusedly to himself. “No.”
Then he straightens to his full height and silently crosses the room, coming to a stop beside the chair I’d woken up in. Bending down, he snatches something off the floor, the unmistakable glint of metal catching the moonlight as he walks back over to me.
Pinching the blade between his two fingers, he holds the hilt of my knife out for me to take. “I won’t interfere,” he says.
I take it without hesitation, feeling slightly embarrassed that it had been there the whole time—feeling worse that I’d internally accused him of taking it.
After tucking it into my waistband, I turn towards the door.
“Just to be clear.”
I pause.
“My proposition stands.”
Something about the arrogance in his voice has me spinning back around to face him. “Why?” I blurt, throwing my arms out in defeat. “Why do you want to help me?”
He seems pleased by my question. Glad that I finally asked something specific.
“At this current moment, Lucina, I care an awful lot about freedom.” A line forms between his dark brows, and something about the way he says it makes me feel like it’s the most honest thing he’s said all night.
“But there’s only one thing I care about more than freedom. ”
“Philanthropy?”
His eyes meet mine, swirling with an emotion that stuns me to silence. It’s dark, deep, and charged with an energy I’ve never felt before.
“Retribution,” he says.
I’m not sure how, and I’d still like to deny it, but I sense nothing but truth in his statement. I feel more confident about that answer than about anything else he’s told me.
He wants revenge. But for the Captures? For the Sol?
I have about a million follow-up questions, but they all lead back to,“Who are you?” I ask again, foolishly hoping he’ll give me a straight answer.
“My name is the only thing that belongs to me,” he says, nodding in my direction. “I don’t share it with strangers.”
Curiosity sinks its teeth in me, gripping my train of thought for a fraction of a second before I rip myself free. “Well, I don’t make alliances with strangers,” I reply.
There’s no room for argument in either of our statements. No room for compromise. That should have been the end of it, the severing of this entire interaction, yet I hesitate at the door.
I stare at him, and he stares at me.
There’s finality in my glare and an amused look in his.
Frustration simmers within me, and I use the momentum of it to turn on my heel and pull open the heavy door behind me.
“Lucina.”
My blood boils at his use of my name when he won’t give me his. “What?” I snap, whirling back around.
He gestures to my appearance, and my face heats in embarrassment.
Digging up as much magic as I can muster, I turn myself back into Alesi, cursing myself for having almost forgotten the disguise.
Illusion in place, I don’t bother shutting the door behind me as I take off down the dark hall, pretending that I know where I am or where I’m going.
I feel eyes on me the whole way.