My father’s study was now my study. I hadn’t been in here since he died. It was a room for both contemplation and condemnation—a place of privacy. When he wanted to speak alone with one of us, this is where we were invited. Two overstuffed leather chairs faced each other in a dark corner of the room.
Jalaine sat across from me in one of them, trembling, screaming, still not understanding.
I jumped to my feet. “Look at me, Jalaine! I’m covered in blood! And I got the best of it! Samuel may never be able to use his hand again!”
“But Jase—”
“That’s it! My decision is made! I’m pulling you from the arena!” “It was one time! One mistake—”
“But it was a huge one! They nearly killed us all!”
“Are you sure it wasn’t your mistake?” she yelled, trying to fling the blame back at me. “Did you even ask him before you killed him?”
“Let me see, when should I have done that? Right before he came at me with his sword? Or while he was choking Kazi?”
“It wasn’t just me! Gunner was telling everyone about the queen coming!”
“But Gunner didn’t tell everyone about the message he sent for me to come home, or the trail I’d be riding on! They knew exactly when we would be there!”
A new thought hit me—were they the same group that had posed as Ballengers in the attack on the Vendan settlement?
“What about the shorthorn? Did you mention to Fertig about us going out to the settlement for payment?”
Her eyes grew wide and then she sobbed, “I didn’t know, Jase. He loved me. He swore he loved me.”
I threw my hands into the air. “When did you become so stupid, Jalaine?”
She lunged at me, striking out with her fists, her nails catching my jaw. I grabbed her, pinning her arms to her sides, and held her tight against my chest. She shook with sobs.
When she finally calmed I whispered, “Did you know he was fond of dice?”
She nodded.
“You’re going to give me a list now, of everyone you ever saw him talking to. I don’t care if he was talking to his horse, I want to know.”
I stood over her, watching, as she wrote at the desk. Her tears fell on the paper. When she was finished, I looked it over, then folded it in half.
“You’ll be at dinner tonight,” I said, “and you won’t say a word. You’ll sit there and take a good long look at everyone at that table. You’ll look at every scratch, bruise, and bandage, and at the faces of those who could have been hurt next, like Nash and Lydia. You’ll reflect on all the things that might have been lost, just because you didn’t think.”
Only pieces of Before are left, scant memories that don’t add up to anything whole. Before doesn’t matter anymore but I tell the pieces to the crying children, anything to make them quiet.
Once upon a time …
Gaudrel’s mother told me the stories because my mother was already dead. Sometimes I was too afraid to listen to her. I wish she was here. I fill in the empty spaces with my own words now.
A great fortress stood on a hill …
The scavengers bang loudly on the gate demanding entrance. They say they will kill us, maim us, torture us, but we do not let them in. Greyson springs a lever and we hear screams. The pikes he set have done their job.
I look over the gate and signal him as the rest run away. He pulls another lever, and there are more screams. The few who still live will not bother us again. We outnumber them now.
—Miandre, 16
