“Jonah and Kellan—they’re good at hiding their feelings,” Karl continues quietly. “They always have been. I think the few of us who ever saw anything just assumed that they were stressed from work. Eighteen is a really young age to have so many responsibilities laid on your shoulders, even when you’re as talented as they are. And the better they did their jobs, the more the Council and Guard expected of them.”
I’m pretty sure the diner just lost most of its oxygen from me sucking it all in at once.
Will clears his throat meaningfully, which prompts Karl’s eyes to widen. “Shit. Sorry, Chloe. Obviously you would know that best.”
An uncomfortable silence encloses the table until Karl’s phone rings. Six months of actions crowd my mouth and send panic shooting through each and every vein in my body. When he pulls it out of his coat pocket, time slows down until all I see is that phone, in his hand.
“It’s Zthane,” he tells me, his voice tilting upward at the end in silent question.
Time to face the music, Chloe. And yet, he doesn’t answer it, making the moment I wait for the ax to come down on my head stretch out for eternity.
“What bloody kind of name is Zthane?” Will asks during the third ring.
Karl’s hazel eyes hold mine until the phone goes silent. “It’s a fairly common name from a particular country on the Goblin plane.” He mercifully looks away so he can regard Will. “Sort of like John here.”
“Zthane is . . .” I swallow and force myself to sound business-like. “He’s on the Guard.”
“Head of the Guard now.”
My focus flies back to Karl. “Since when?”
He rubs at his chin. “Since Paavo Battletracker couldn’t find you and the Council deemed him incompetent. Zthane is on his last legs right now for the same reason.”
Well, hell. “Is it Jonah who’s threatening to fire him?”
Karl laughs a little, but there’s no humor in it. “He was certainly one of the people behind Battletracker’s ouster; there was no love lost between the two of them. But the truth is, as much as Jonah respects Zthane, he’s also frustrated that you . . .” He motions towards me and Will. “Let’s just say that Jonah’s legendary patience isn’t so legendary anymore.”
Double hell. I have so many bridges I need to mend that I don’t even know where to begin. “Surely Kellan is defending Zthane?” I mean, Zthane is Kellan’s mentor and been outwardly vocal for some time about wanting Nightstorm to head the Guard.
“If you think that Kellan has taken any other position than his brother’s in the last six months regarding the issue of finding you, then you truly are delusional, Chloe.” While his words sting, his voice is surprisingly gentle. “But let’s not talk about that right now. Why don’t you tell me instead why the two of you look like you do.”
As if this is an easier conversation. I sigh and shove my plate away. “Last night, we had a . . .” I slide a glance toward Will; he’s stone-faced, arms crossed. “Let’s just call it a skirmish with one of the Elders.”
Karl actually spews his recent sip of coffee all over the table. “WHAT?”
I grab a napkin and mop the mess up.
He reaches across the table and stills my hand. “Chloe—seriously. What happened to you two?”
“It’s as she said,” Will says flatly. “One of those beasties tried to kill us, so we killed it first. As it did not want to die, it made sure it did its damndest to tear us to shreds. It’s not a complicated story, mate.”
Karl’s eyes grow so wide that I fear he’s going to have a stroke.
So I take another deep breath and I tell him everything that happened yesterday, down to the littlest detail.
And he listens.
“So how is this going to play?” Will sets a bottle of wine down on the table. We’ve retreated back home so we could bring Cameron into the loop and introduce him to Karl. And now here we all are, drinking wine when all of our lives are once more being turned upside down. “What are the ramifications of Chloe going back to Annar after running off like she did?”
Talk about a buzz kill. I draw my hand back from reaching the wine and lean back in my chair, sighing. How is this going to play, indeed.
Karl takes the bottle instead, unscrewing the cork with a bottle opener Cameron passes over. “I honestly don’t know. Being a first tier Creator is certainly in her favor, though.” His hazel eyes pin me to my chair. “I’ve put off talking about this with Zthane for the time being, saying I’m still searching Anchorage, but Chloe—I need to talk to him sooner rather than later. Especially in light of what you guys have told me about what went down with the Elders.” He sets the cork down on the table. “There are people searching for you as we speak. It’s not fair to let them keep spinning their wheels, possibly putting themselves in danger, when you’re safe.”