“If you have to, you will,” Teer said numbly. The numbness was back now. That was handy. “Would you rather Ma mourned me or mourned everybody?”
The jail cell was silent again.
“I never told you enough how proud I was of you,” the rancher finally said. “That I loved you like a son and every skill you mastered made my heart burst. It shouldn’t have come to this. I owe you better.”
“If you owe me anything, you owe me your word that you’ll keep everyone safe,” Teer demanded. “Afore anything else, you keep ’em safe, all right?”
There was another long silence.
“Your word,” he repeated.
“You have it,” Hardin ground out. “I’ll do what I can, but you’re right. I won’t risk anyone else, I promise. There’s got to be something I can do.”
“Ask Komo,” Teer suggested. “For something legal.”
Instead of trying to bribe the Wardkeeper. Teer wouldn’t have expected that to work—and it sounded like his mother’s husband had already tried that one.
5
Stone walls were, Teer guessed, at least more interesting than plain wood. There were patterns to the stone that he wasn’t familiar with, and examining the carved rocks kept him from complete boredom for a candlemark or so.
After that, boredom started to war with his numb fear. He didn’t really believe that there was anything Hardin could do. He was going to spend the next fifty days or so in this cell, and then he was going to die.
His mind tried to shy away from that thought, but there was nothing else to think about. He could hear people moving about and talking in the street outside the Wardkeeper’s office, but he didn’t have the urge to listen in on their conversations.
What was any of it going to matter to him?
Early in what he thought was the afternoon, Niles and Atara came into his cell with another tray of bread and soup. Niles was the one stuck with the tray and the replacement bucket for Teer’s “toilet” while the older woman stood by the door with her weapon drawn.
“Could I get a book or something?” Teer asked plaintively as Niles put the food down. “Staring at the wall is only so much fun.”
“Not sure how nice we should be to folks who try to kill others,” Atara told him. She glared at him as he wilted, but then nodded sharply. “I’ll ask Komo. See what he says.”
The two Wardwatches withdrew from the cell and Teer looked at the food. It was the same soup as the last time. It was better than he’d have expected as a prisoner everyone seemed to regard as already condemned.
He finished the bread and soup and knocked on the door to let the Wardwatches know he was done. He might be guilty of everything they accused him of, but he saw no reason to make Komo’s people’s lives harder.
They couldn’t change his fate. No point in blaming them—and maybe being a model prisoner might buy him some of Magistrate Lysus’s notoriously lacking mercy.
“I’ll take that,” Atara said, opening the door just enough to grab the tray. “Here.”
She passed him a heavy-looking tome.
“Komo said it would be educational,” she said drily. “Enjoy.”
“Thank you,” Teer replied—to a closed door. He looked down at the book and chuckled.
A History of the Spehari Unification, Volume I: Landings and the Merik.
A few of the books he’d read for his limited formal education had referenced A History but he’d never seen a copy of one of the actual books himself. It was not known as an easy read…but he had fifty days. Something that took effort and time to get through was actually appealing.
Teer settled down on the cot and opened the book. He didn’t have anything else to do, after all.
“I will speak with your Wardkeeper.”
Something about the voice cut through Teer’s focus on the book like a knife. He looked up, trying to place it. There was a lilt to the tone he’d never heard, and a formality he was unfamiliar with to the words.
“Of course, Lord Karn,” Atara’s voice replied and he realized who had entered the building. “I will get him.”
Teer’s focus was entirely on the conversation outside his cell now.
“I am capable of walking down a hallway, Wardwatch,” the Spehari stated. “Which office is his?”
“The first on the right, Lord,” Atara replied, her voice quailing. Teer could barely imagine the hard-bitten veteran Wardwatch showing fear, but it was clear in her voice.
Who would not be afraid of a Spehari? They were the magic-wielding demigods who’d brought machines and gunpowder to the continent of Aran. The few chapters of A History Teer had stumbled through made it clear that the Merik tribes had barely mastered forging iron spearheads when the Spehari had arrived on their shores in entire ships built of iron.
This was the being that Teer had drawn a gun on. No wonder the stranger had been barely fazed by the bullets.
He heard the thumping of a fist landing heavily on a door.
“Lord Karn!” Komo greeted the Spehari. “This is an unexpected surprise. How may I serve you?”
“We must speak, Wardkeeper,” Karn growled back. “I have declined the Right of Retribution, and yet I am told you still intend to execute the boy.”
There was a long silence.
“If you do not claim your rights, Lord Karn, then his fate falls to the law and the law requires Magistrate Lysus to judge him,” Komo finally replied. “I do not know what the Magistrate will decide, but the Unity sees little value in those who attack your kin, my lord.”
There was a thunk as the door closed behind Karn, and the rest of the conversation was lost to Teer. He stretched his focus, trying to hear anything through the two closed doors, but he couldn’t pick up anything.
Sighing, he turned back to his book—and then Karn shouted.
Hardin shouting had been inaudible, but either Karn was louder or Teer
