Page 21 of Ties of Frost

Sajen lifted a bushy eyebrow. “Kyr looked troubled when he left.” He pointed at my wound. “Seems we were right to be worried. What happened, Zee?”

I winced. Only Kyrundar and Sajen called me that, and Sajen had picked it up from Kyrundar. “Ilifir happened,” I muttered. “Look, I’m exhausted, so I’m going to get changed and go to sleep.”

“Hm.” Sajen closed his eyes and inhaled deeply through his nose before looking at me again. “You reek, wyveri. Like you traipsed through a sewer, used antiseptic, and then cuddled with an ice elf.”

“Excuse me?” I exclaimed.

“You smell of ice elf magic. What happened at Grivolen?”

For several long moments, we stared at each other. Me willing him to give up, Sajen returning my glare without budging. Finally, I groaned.

“You’re not going to let me sleep until I tell you, are you?”

In response, he just grinned.

“Fine. But I wasn’t joking about being exhausted.” I snatched up the lamp and went to my pack. While I pulled out my nightclothes and changed behind the dressing screen, I explained the evening as succinctly as possible. Still, I had tucked myself into the top bunk before Ifinished the awful tale.

“Now I don’t know what to do. I should inform the governor about Castle Grivolen being a den of iniquity, and I have to find Gautindar Rouven, but as for the rest… The three attackers, the corpses being retrieved so quickly, it has to mean I was right. Magistrate Nevros’s death was no accident. Worse, whoever is behind this must have a long reach. Yet I have nothing solid to go on, and I can’t shift until this ice curse is removed. By the time that’s done, the trail will be too obscured to follow.”

I threw my arm over my eyes. “Will you douse the lamp?”

The cots shook as Sajen got up to put out the lamp and then settled back into bed. “I’ll speak to Governor Cline regarding your concerns about Grivolen. If you give me descriptions of your attackers, I can look into it while you and Kyr deal with the ice curse.”

I removed my arm from my face. “I can’t ask you to—”

“You don’t need to ask. I’m offering.”

Pressure rose in my chest. “Thank you, but I can’t accept. I started this. I can see it through without help.”

Sajen was silent for several moments. “Do you need to, though?”

I was so offended I almost sat up, but thankfully I remembered I would hit my head. “What kind of rengir would I be if I didn’t?”

“A normal one?” Sajen chuckled. “I’ve been telling you since Harcos, Zidra. Accepting help doesn’t invalidate your hard work.”

Of course it did, but I’d never won this argument at theAcademy. I had proof now, though. “If that were true, I wouldn’t have been humiliated today.”

“Humiliated?” I could hear Sajen’s frown. “All of us get hit now and then—”

“At the ceremony.”

“The…ceremony.” Sajen’s bed creaked. “You felt humiliated while receiving the highest honor in the empire because you had to share the moment with Kyr?”

“Not because I had to share!” Well, a little bit, but that wasn’t the point. “Kyrundar even told me he doesn’t believe I could have earned the Emperor’s Merit on my own, well, merit. If I had never allowed Kyrundar to keep attaching himself to me, maybe I would have been awarded the Merit by myself. Or maybe I would have been watching him receive it on his own. Either way, it would have been because that was what I, on my own, deserved. I should fly or fall on my own. Now I’ll never know if I’m worthy.”

That was the real reason this heartbond couldn’t remain. I couldn’t live forever in Kyrundar Ilifir’s shadow.

“Oh, Zidra,” Sajen said with a sigh. “You are worthy of your accomplishment. And working with others is a strength, not a weakness. We all need others. Rengiri were never meant to perform our duty in isolation. Iskyr made all people for friendships and connection, for mutual help and community.”

“Rengiri also swear not to burden the Order or the empire,” I reminded him. “And Iskyr does not approve of slothfulness.”

“Zidra Eilmaris.” Sajen’s tone took on a warning edge. “There is a difference between refusing to do a task that you have the ability, opportunity, and calling to do because you simply don’t want to do the work, and accepting help with a task you do not have the ability or opportunity to do or have not been called to.”

That was logical, I supposed, but I didn’t like it.

“Furthermore, there is an independence that comes from resourcefulness and maturity, and there is a stubborn independence born of pride. The first kind accepts help when needed. The second places your own need for validation over Iskyr’s will and others’ betterment.”

He moved again, and the stacked cots vibrated. His decision to take the bottom cot had been wise. “What is the calling of the rengiri?”

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