Page 94 of The Second Death of Locke
He shuffled through papers on his desk. His Hand stood resolutely behind him. Grey couldn’t help her gaze flicking back to him, thinking with some grief of Mare Concord. How resigned they all were to being devoted and used.
But wasn’t she the same? Here she was running into more danger after Kier. The difference, she supposed, was that Kier hadn’t asked her to do it. In fact, he’d explicitly asked hernotto do it. If he had his way, she’d be halfway to Lindan by now.
“Yes, well. Where did you go the other night? I haven’t received Captain Seward’s report.”
“Commander.”
Reggin looked at her, then narrowed his eyes. “What happened to your face, Fastria?”
Oh, what a tangled mess they’d gotten themselves into. They’d be lucky, Grey thought grimly, to be granted an audience, let alone get out of Grislar without visiting the prison first.
“Flynn,” Eron corrected.
“Sorry?” Reggin’s eyes flicked up, already impatient, like he didn’t have time for them.
Grey sat heavily in the chair in front of his desk. She felt Ola and Brit move to flank her, Eron behind her. One of them touched her very lightly on the back, where Reggin couldn’t see. She was grateful for this, that they stood by while she found the words. They let her lead in her own way. It was all or nothing—there was no backing down now.
“Captain Seward has been taken by a combination of Luthrite and Eprainish forces. I believe the two nations are allied, and they are convinced that Kier is Severin of Locke.”
She’d managed to stun the commander, who blinked at her owlishly. “And why would they think that? He’s a mage, yes, and a powerful one at that, but…”
Grey stretched her hands out on her knees, twisting the silver ring on her thumb. “They’re not exactly wrong. Kier is a powerful mage, but it’s only because I’m a powerful well.”
“But you’re not a well,” Reggin said. His own well’s hand tightened on his shoulder. “Flynn?” he said, looking at Eron.
Eron smiled grimly. “I’m sorry. I’m not Hand Captain Flynn—she is.”
Reggin blinked at them, confusion clouding his face, turning quickly to anger. They wouldn’t have his attention much longer before they were all punished for insubordination.
Grey pressed on. “The issue is, Kier is not Locke. I am. And I request an audience with Scaelas under the banner of my nation.”
“If you expect me to believe…” Reggin started, that anger brewing.
Grey, hours removed from breakbloom and restored to her full power, shook her head. “Believe me or don’t. If you refuse, I will go to Cleoc, whowillbelieve me. And unless you want to be at war again, I suggest you listen.”
He regarded her distastefully for a long moment, long enough that Grey started to doubt the merit of this idea. “All I can do is ask. I cannot guarantee he will accept, Hand Captain Flynn.” He spat her name as if it was an insult.
For the first time since Kier was taken, Grey smiled, all teeth. “He will.”
You don’thaveto marry her, you martyr. You could come home again, return to my side; we can continue like adventurers across the nation. If she’s as fearsome as you say, then surely that’s a better option.
Letter from Vearn Torrin to Isaak Masidic, 18 yearsAD
twenty-two
OLA INSISTED GREY WASHher face before the meeting with the High Lord, because it was not meet for the High Lady of a nation to present herself while crusted in old blood, so she washed her face. She also brushed and braided her hair, but there was nothing that could be done about the angry bruise around her eye, or her split lip. She dressed in clean clothes offered to her shyly by one of the younger guards, and let Ola fuss over her with salves as Brit and Eron watched. Ola undid all her work on the braid and arranged her hair so it fell over her shoulders (“It brings out the flecks of brown in your eyes, and besides, you look more like a lady and less like a soldier like that,” which was something Grey couldn’t argue with). At least it hid some of the bruising.
“You have to look impressive,” Ola said, pacing back and forth across the small office they were installed in.
“I just have to look like me,” Grey said. “Like… my mother’s daughter. My father’s.”
“And that will be easy?”
Grey thought of the way Scaelas kept peering at her the other night at dinner, and her belly clenched with the pain of an old familiar wound. “Yes,” she said.
She was acutely aware that every moment they spent doing this was another moment Kier was imprisoned, or worse. They were in one of the tower offices, reserved for high-ranking officials visiting Grislar, and she felt her gaze going to the sea more often than not, searching for a boat in the distant expanse of the bay.
To her surprise, when the door opened, it was not only Scaelas and his guard. Cleoc accompanied him, Sela on her arm.
