Page 26 of House of Embers
To Fordham and Wynter, she said, “Tieran and Netta are goingto speak to the dragon, Henrley. He’s not a flight risk. He sounds adamant that this is a mistake.”
“It sure didn’t look like a mistake in the middle of the fight,” Wynter observed.
“No, it didn’t.” Fordham clenched and unclenched his hands.
Kerrigan reached forward and put hers over his. “I’m all right.” She glanced around the room. She wanted him to be seen as fearsome. For her to seem that way too, to be honest. That was definitely working in their favor, but if they wanted to have a real conversation, they needed to do it elsewhere. “Let’s go interrogate our prisoner, shall we?”
Fordham leaned forward until his lips brushed against her earlobe. “Don’t think you’re getting out of a conversation about you using my powers.”
“I’d never expect that,” she said. “But maybe somewhere more private?”
“Assuredly.” He gestured for her to begin walking. “Wynter, you too.”
“Excellent,” she said with a dangerous smile. “I have a set of knives with me. Hopefully, he’ll let me play with them.”
“You’re a bit of sadist,” Kerrigan said.
“And?” Wynter strutted forward. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
Fordham shrugged. “You get used to it.”
Kerrigan followed the siblings through the cavern of Ravinia Mountain until they came to a series of rooms. Wynter ran her nails along the walls as they walked, explaining that these were their father’s interrogation rooms, but the prison was lower, darker, and deadly. Kerrigan had never wanted to see the interrogation rooms.
“Wynter, wait here,” Fordham said in a voice that brooked no argument. Then he grasped Kerrigan’s hand and dragged her into an empty room.
“What?” Kerrigan gasped.
But as soon as the word left her mouth, Fordham shoved herback against the closed door and towered over her, one arm above her head, caging her in. Her mouth went dry at the sight of him and all his deadly power. Her broody princeling turned king, all sinister energy and unbridled fury.
“Are you completely out of your mind?” Fordham demanded.
“Fully in use of my faculties,” she assured him.
“You used my shadows,” he snarled. “You were going to use them to jump. I couldfeelit, Kerrigan.”
“That was the plan, yes.”
“Do you understand how dangerous that was? How fucking terrified I was for you when that hit me?”
“Ford…”
“No,” he growled. “Listen. I spentdecadestraining my shadows, Kerrigan. We’re stronger together. It won’t take you that long to figure it out. I can show you how instead of you fumbling through it like I was forced to do by my father, as Wynter was forced to do. But you will not jump into them unaided.”
She dropped her bravado at the serious look on his face. “Okay. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“You think of nothing but what is right in front of you.”
She pushed against him. “I was in the middle of a fight,” she snapped. “I did what I had to do.”
“You have enough of yourownpower.Use that. That jump could have killed you. You could have simply ceased to exist without proper training. I wasn’t there to keep you safe.”
She put her hand to his cheek. “I can keep myself safe.”
“I’m serious, Kerrigan. At least let me train you so it doesn’t send me into a blind panic in the middle of a meeting with Barron Laurent, who has made it clear he wants to see me dead.”
Her anger deflated, and she let her hand drop. “You were in a meeting with Barron?”
“He was there, yes. And he called my ability to lead into question.I could barely contain how much I wanted to kill him so I could get to the door to you.”
