Page 71 of Needed in the Night
Isla’s expression took on a faraway look that I had learned indicated she was communicating telepathically with Brae. I held her hand in mine, watching for any sign of trouble until she blinked and focused on my face.
“Nubo wants Kona dead,” she said, her voice and expression grim. “For letting us get from the perfume shop to here last night. He’s sending someone now to get her out of the market and out of sight.”
She did not say that Brae had given her the news, likely because she did not want Atlath to know about her shadowbat.
Isla’s gaze searched my face. “What do we do?”
I did not want to care what befell Kona. She had threatened me, threatened my mate, taken pleasure in the thought of Nubo breaking Isla and putting her in chains. She had spat in my face and tried to stab me. She had been a mercenary raider and likely killed in cold blood.
And yet…
“We have to warn her,” Isla said. Her shoulders slumped. “I know she means us harm, but I can’t just sit by and let him kill her. I can’t.”
“You are too tender-hearted,” Atlath croaked before I had a chance to reply. “Too merciful.”
His tone was not sharp or unkind, but my spines bristled. I would not hear criticism of my mate.
“Maybe I am.” Isla did not appear angry or resentful at Atlath’s disapproval, but her mouth compressed into a stubborn line. “But there’s too much cruelty in the universe already. I’d rather be too kind than not kind enough.”
Part of me—perhaps the more rational part who had undergone military training and served in war—argued Kona’s fate was not our responsibility. She had opted to work for Nubo knowing what kind of person he was, and her death would not be our fault.
But all that did not make what Isla said untrue. And had I not just considered how ripples of kindness created effects as much as acts of evil did?
Isla rose. I stood as well and touched her hand. “I will tell her,” I said quietly. “Please stay here. She is more likely to listen to me, and it is safer inside.”
“All right.” She brushed my fingers with her own. “But if anyone so much as looks at you wrong, I’m coming out there with all my daggers.”
I caught her hand, kissed her knuckles, and glanced at Atlath. “Do you have anything I can use to write on my skin?”
With a disapproving burble, Atlath waddled to a shelf and found a stylus. He slid it across the bar to me.
If I spoke to Kona, someone was likely to overhear, and Nubo would immediately attempt to find out how his security had been breached. That might put Brae in danger. I needed another way to warn her.
Across my palm, in the coded language of the Cludian Corps, I wroteNubo has sent someone to kill you for not preventing us from finding refuge. It was not impossible for someone to see the message and interpret it, but I could not think of a better solution.
I had no proof of what I said, of course. She might think it was a ploy to get her to leave the market. If she did not believe me, there was little I could do. We could only try.
“Can you open the front door enough for me to step outside?” I asked.
Atlath accessed a control panel behind the counter and tapped on it. One of the front doors swung open about a meter. The noise of the market spilled into the shop along with a slant of mid-afternoon daylight.
I strode to the door and stepped outside.
At a glance, I noted five watchers I recognized as Nubo’s agents—and Kona, who stood to the right of the doors, hands on her daggers, her dark gaze fixed on me and fury blazing in her eyes.
Moving slowly so she did not interpret it as an attack, I held out my palm. Her gaze dropped from my face to my hand, then flicked back up. I dropped my hand to my side.
For a beat, she studied me, her eyes narrowed almost into slits. I could well imagine she was reading my body language and expression and weighing the odds of whether I was tellingthe truth or simply trying to trick her. Would I believe me if I were in her place? I did not know.
My gaze on hers, I stepped backward through the doorway. The moment I crossed the threshold, the door swung closed again.
Isla was waiting just inside. She wrapped her arms around my waist and rested her head on my chest. “That was the longest fifteen seconds of my life,” she said, her voice muffled by my shirt. “Did she believe you?”
“I do not know.” I kissed the top of her head and glanced at Atlath. “Is she still there?”
“She is leaving,” the Prylothian croaked, all his eyes fixed on his control panel. “I do not understand why you warned her or why she would take your word, but it is done.”
The rear doors to the shop slid aside. Madame Ycari entered, followed by Pioni. Both smiled at the sight of Isla in my arms.
