Page 99 of Coerced

He met my eyes for a long moment, and I could tell that was a new concept for him. To hold himself accountable to a standard he’d set rather than trying to meet everyone else’s.

Maybe it will give him food for thought. Or at least distract him a bit.

“I promise to try,” he said at last, “if you promise you’ll do what I asked if I can’t.’

“All right, all right!”

“If there was something I coulddoright now!” He plowed his hands through his wet hair. “I have too much time to think. I’m useless!”

I understoodthatfeeling all too well. I didn’t want to tell the story, but I could share enough that it might help him.

“Last year, one of my team members started dating a guy who stank of taint. Turned out he was working with a black magician. A necromancer. Long story short, they ‘accidentally’ turned her into a zombie and sicced her on us.”

Kerry grimaced. He already knew what came next, but I said it anyway.

“I had to destroy her.”

“That’s rough. What was her name?”

“Zoe Becerra.” I rubbed a hand across my face. “The point is, it’s hard for warriors to accept that we can’t fix everything. It’s drilled into us that we can, or we develop that way of thinking ourselves because we’re so powerful and almost always leaders on missions. In the end, though, we can only do the best we can do. And right now, the best we can do is look for a lead.”

“Yeah. Still hard to do.” He hung his head and was quiet for a moment, then looked at me. “About Zoe being turned into a zombie. You said ‘accidentally’ in a way that makes it sound like you think it wasn’t.”

“I don’t.” I had never thought it was an accident. “Something more was going on there, but the wardens are a tight-lipped bunch during an investigation. It was a closed trial, so we weren’t privy to all the information. I know the boyfriend’s in The Box on a life sentence and that’s about all we were told.”

“I would have killed him outright, and you’re enough like me that you would have done the same. Does that make us wicked?”

“No, it makes us ruthless.”

“I don’t know that word.”

He flushed a little, and I wondered if he was embarrassed to admit it.

“Without mercy.” I shrugged to show it was no big deal.

“Oh. Gemma told me that mercy was a virtue. I’ve been thinking about that for a while, but I still don’t get it. Ruthless, though, that I understand just fine.”

Again I was struck by the dichotomy of Kerry’s mind. On one side, he was a child seeing the world for the first time and striving to gulp in as much knowledge as he could as fast as he could. On the other, he was a feral killer - and the only person in the world he loved was in his enemies’ hands.

Yep. About what I figured. Bad head space.

“What was Zoe’s power?” he asked.

“Bibliothecary, and she had a side talent for transmuting.” I could see he didn’t recognize the term and elaborated so he didn’t have to sink his pride again to ask. “Changing things on an elemental level. A simple transmute turns rocks into mud. A harder one would make steel transparent. The most difficult would be transmuting something alive. Like turning a bird into—”

“I know what it is now,” he interrupted. “Where I’m from, we call it a tailor. What about the black magician? The necromancer.”

“Clem volunteered to hunt him down after the Council rendered a death verdict.” I shrugged. “I think the old man gets bored. Or he wants to feel like he’s doing something. Like us right now.”

Kerry frowned, but said nothing.

“Want to get showered while I’ll wake everyone up?” I tried to stretch and winced as my ribs started to throb. “You and I could get the shopping out of the way, at least.”

“Do you feel like getting outta bed?” He toed off his sneakers and kicked them into a corner.

“Not really, but I need to walk to keep my lungs clear. You’ll have to do any heavy lifting. Maybe driving, too.”

“Sure.” He nodded and headed toward the bathroom, stripping out of his sweat-soaked clothes as he walked. Then he stopped at the sink.

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