The mage fire fol owed. Lara watched, anxious and uneasy, as the stone wal s swal owed the descending light.
“Where are you . . . Aren’t you taking him back to the infirmary?”
“He’l be safe here.” Simon’s reply was muffled by the ground. “Quiet.”
She scrambled through the canted door, ducking her head to avoid the rough-timbered ceiling. There was a nasty moment going down the steps when she thought about snakes and spiders and things that lived in holes underground. But then the passage opened into a smal room, cool and musty, with shelves along one wal and a couple of bunks on the other.
Simon was already lowering Justin’s body onto the bottom bunk. But she had time to notice—just before his head hit the pil ow—that it was already dented. His shoes were under the bed.
She sucked in her breath.
Simon turned at the sound.
Their eyes met.
He must have seen her working things out. The bed. The shoes. The heth. The knife. And Justin, sprawled across the threshold to the cel ar, half in, half out.
She wet her lips. “He didn’t walk out of the infirmary.”
Not on his own. They’d brought him here, Zayin or Simon.
She saw that now. He must have woken alone, in pain, in the dark. No wonder he’d tried to escape.
F o r g o t t e n s e a 63
And she’d dragged him back like a barn cat with a bloody mouse and deposited him at the headmaster’s feet.
“How,” Simon asked softly, “did you discover he was gone?”
Her mind stuttered. She raised her chin, forcing herself to hold his gaze. “I couldn’t sleep.” He would know why, he’d found her, he knew everything about her. “So I decided to check on him.”
“Your sympathy does you credit.” A pause, while they both looked down at the man on the bed. “Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of your judgment.”
Pain squeezed her head. She could not think. She could not breathe. “He shouldn’t have been left by himself.”
Simon’s lips thinned. “Apparently not.”
“I found him,” she said. “I can stay with him. Let me help, we have a connection, I—”
“Your
“I know you’re disappointed in my performance as Seeker,”
she said through stiff lips. “But please, I have the cal ing. If you give me another chance . . .”
“Seeking is a gift,” Simon said. “Even if I wanted to, I could not deprive you of your vocation.”
She exhaled in relief. “Then—”
“However, I can and wil determine your other duties at Rockhaven.”
Her
She worked for him. In his office.
Adult nephilim remained in the community, under the Rule that governed every aspect of their lives, that brought 6 4
V i r g i n i a K a n t r a
them closer to their un-Fal en perfection, that unified and defined them. The younger ones lived in the dorms as proctors. A few qualified as teachers at the school. Most graduates, however, went to work in the settlement’s glassworks factory. Rockhaven Glass had been in operation for a hundred and thirty years, providing exquisite stained and textured art glass for designers al over the world and a steady income for the nephilim.
Lacking any other skil s, Lara had expected to put her business education to work in the distribution center. But Simon had found a place for her in his own office. She’d always liked to imagine that the headmaster took a special interest in her, in her future.
“I can look after him and stil do my job.”
“You are mistaken,” Simon said with icy calm. “From now on, you cannot see him, cannot speak to him, cannot visit him, is that clear?”
A direct order this time, Lara thought dul y. He was taking no chances on her disobeying him again.
“Until I can trust your judgment, you cannot work for me,”
Simon continued. “Tomorrow morning, report to the raptor house. For the time being, you may assist Keeper Moon.”
Crazy Moon, the mews mistress, who preferred her injured birds to people.
Lara’s hands shook. Her throat constricted. “You’re banishing me to the birdcages?”
“By your own actions, you have endangered the community we are sworn to preserve. You leave me no choice.”
“But I’m wasted in the mews. At least . . .” She floundered for a compromise that would leave her pride intact.
“Send me to the glassworks.”
