Page 121 of The Warrior
I slowed our pace and gave her a puzzled expression. “The man was a traitor who tried to kill Khan. He’s not worthy of her mercy.”
Pearl gave me a reproachful look. “Laura, you Northlanders can be so hard. I will never approve of the death penalty.”
“You’re not alone. Many here consider death too easy a way out. They think it would be better to let the criminals rot in a cell.”
“That’s not what I meant. A society should always try to rehabilitate. No good has ever come from harsh punishments.”
I gave her an incredulous look, silently askingAre you serious?
Pearl sighed. “Laura, surely you can see that punishing people only pushes them further into the abyss. What they need is to be invited back into the light.”
I rolled my eyes. “You Motlanders are so naïve.”
“Would you rather have me speak like Erika? Once she recovered from the initial denial of Mr. Zobel’s betrayal, she declared that she would kill himherself.”
I gave a firm nod. “Of course, and I would be glad to help her.”
“Laura,” Pearl exclaimed. “Don’t say that. You couldn’t live with yourself if you took someone’s life.”
“Yes. I could.” My tone was pragmatic. “If they wanted to hurt me and my family, I’d rather kill them first.”
Pearl shook her head with a sad expression. “Sometimes it feels like we’re decades apart.”
I snorted. “Let me guess; you think you’re more evolved than us?”
“When you speak like people from medieval times, then yes. An eye for an eye never worked for any society. All it did was blind people.”
We’d hit a cultural wall that neither of us knew how to climb. Still hooked at our elbows, we walked back to the mansion in silence.
When we reached the building, a knock on a window made us look up to see Khan waving at us from his office with a serious expression on his face.
Waving back, I commented, “He looks exhausted.”
“Told you.”
He signaled for us to come inside, and we walked into his office. Khan had lost weight, his olive skin didn’t have its usual glow, and he had prominent black circles under his eyes.
“Do you have an update for me?” he asked and kissed Pearl.
“Yes, and I’ll give it to you after you’ve slept.”
“I don’t have time to sleep, sweetheart.” He gave her a tired smile and turned to me. “Laura, could I ask you to check in on my mother? She’s not taking Magni’s disappearance well and with the loss of Zobel she’ll need our support.”
“Of course. I promised Mila that I’d come to see her later and that she could sleep with me in Magni’s cabin tonight, but I have a little time before that.”
“Good. And what did you decide about the first matching?” Khan trailed off and lifted his head when loud voices were heard outside the office.
My ears stiffened as well. “It sounds like someone is fighting.”
“Get into the saferoom,now!” Khan was quick to press a point on the underside of his desk, and a part of his book cabinet popped out, revealing a room behind it. He was pushing Pearl inside it when the door swung open and four soldiers stormed in.
“Oh, thank God, it’s you – what’s going on?” Khan asked Lieutenant Franklin, one of Magni’s trusted Huntsmen. “We heard fighting – are we under attack?”
Franklin and the other three men surrounded us and raised their weapons.
“What the fuck?” Khan pushed Pearl behind him. Fury raged on his face when Franklin stepped closer and kicked the bookshelf closed.
I didn’t think but acted on instinct when I attacked the soldier holding a gun on me. Instinctively, I knew he wouldn’t shoot a woman, but I should have known that he was trained for combat. I fought with everything I had learned and quickly got the feeling that he was only defending himself but doing nothing to hurt me.
