“Love?” She says the word like it’s poisonous, and something on my face must give me away because the disgust on hers morphs into shock. “Oh, no. You’re in love with him, aren’t you?”
“You can’t possibly know that just by looking at me,” I counter, my spine stiffening.
“Ugh. Let’s go throw knives at shit.”
Brennan is alive. Brennan is alive. Brennan. Is. Alive. It’s all I can think as we empty our sheathes into the wooden targets that line the back of the outpost’s small sparring gym on the north side of the first floor. It’s a far cry from the pit on the south side of the fortress I first found Xaden fighting in.
Keeping secrets from Rhiannon is loathsome, but not telling Mira that Brennan is alive might just make me the worst person on the Continent.
“I’m the last person to judge who you sleep with—” Mira starts.
“Then don’t.” I flip my next-to-last dagger, catch it by the tip, and throw it, hitting the neck of the target.
“Regulations aside, because yes, what you’re doing is fraternizing”—she throws her next dagger without even looking and hits the target mid-chest— “with an officer, I’m just saying that if it goes badly, you’re stuck with each other for the rest of your careers.”
“But you’re not judging.” I throw my last dagger, hitting her target in the neck.
“Fine, maybe I’m judging.” She shrugs, and we walk to the targets. “But you’re my only sibling. I’m allowed to worry.”
I’m not, though. She and Brennan were inseparable as kids. If one of us should know that he’s alive and healthy, it’s her. “You don’t have to worry about me.” I yank my daggers out of the wood one by one and sheathe them along my thighs and at my ribs.
“You’re a second-year. Of course I’m going to worry.” She retrieves her own knives and looks over her shoulder at a pair of riders sparring on the mat behind us. “How is RSC going?” she asks, lowering her voice.
“We lost a rider in the first exercise. Two maps?”
“Yeah, it’s a mindfuck.” She presses her lips into a thin line. “But that’s not what I meant.”
“You’re worried about the interrogation portion,” I guess, sheathing the eleventh dagger at my ribs.
“They’re going to beat you black and blue just to see if you can take it.” She plucks my dagger from the throat of her target. “And the way you break—”
“I can handle pain.” I turn toward her. “I live in pain. I practically built a house there and set up a whole economy. I can take whatever they dish out.”
“After War Games, RSC is when the most second-years die,” she admits quietly. “And they take one or two squads at a time for exercises, so you don’t really notice the increase in the death roll, but it’s there. If you don’t break, they can accidentally torture you to death, and if you do break, they’ll kill you for it.” Her gaze drops to my dagger, and she looks concerned.
“It’s going to be a shitty few days, but I’ll be all right. I made it this far.” Breaking bones is a Tuesday for me.
“Since when do you use Tyrrish daggers?” She holds mine up, examining the black hilt and the decorative rune at the pommel. “I haven’t seen runes like these in…a while.”
“Xaden gave them to me.”
“Gave?” She hands it back.
“I won them from him during a sparring match last year.” I sheathe it at my ribs beside the others as she lifts a skeptical eyebrow and chuckles. “So yeah, he pretty much gave them to me.”
“Huh.” She tilts her head to the side and studies me, seeing more than I want her to, like always. “They look custom.”
“They are. They’re harder to knock out of my hands than the traditional length and not as heavy.”
She doesn’t look away as we walk back to the throwing line.
“What?” I feel my cheeks heat. “He has a vested interest in keeping me alive.
I know you don’t like him. I know you don’t trust him—”
“He’s a Riorson,” she says. “You shouldn’t trust him, either.”
“I don’t.” I look away after the whispered confession.
“But you’re in love with him.” She heaves a frustrated sigh and throws a dagger. “That’s… I don’t even know what that is, but ‘unhealthy’ is the first word that comes to mind.”
“It’s us,” I murmur and change the subject. “Why did they station you here, anyway?” I choose a spot on the target in the upper abdomen, then hit it. “Samara is warded, and you’re a walking shield. Kind of a waste of your signet.” She’s a shield.
Why the hell didn’t I think of asking her about the wards sooner? Maybe the answer isn’t in a book. Maybe it’s in Mira. After all, her signet is the ability to extend the wards, to tug the protections with her even where they shouldn’t be able to stretch.
She glances back at the sparring pair. “I think they’re worried about attacks here because this outpost has one of the biggest power supplies for the wards. If this place falls, a giant portion of the border is vulnerable.”
“Because they’re set up like dominos?” I throw another dagger, wincing when I’m not as careful as I should be on my aching knee.
“Not exactly. What would you know about it?” She throws another without looking and hits the target true.
“Fucking show-off,” I mutter. “Is there anything you don’t excel at?”
“Poisons,” she answers, flicking another dagger at the target. “Never had the aptitude for them like you and Brennan. Or maybe it’s just that I could never sit still long enough to listen to Dad’s lessons. Now tell me what you know about the wards.” She shoots a sideways look at me. “Weaving isn’t taught until third-year, and anything beyond is classified.”
“I read.” I shrug and hope to Zihnal it looks nonchalant. “I know that they originate from the wardstone in the Vale because of the hatching grounds located there, and that they’re boosted with a power supply along our border outposts to expand their natural distance in places and maintain a strong defense.” All common knowledge, or at least researchable.
She flings another knife. “They’re woven to the ground out here,” she says quietly as the pair behind us continues sparring. “Think of an umbrella. The wardstone is the stem, and the wards take the shape of a dome over Navarre.” She motions with her hands, forming the shape. “But just like an umbrella’s spokes are strongest at the stem, by the time the wards reach the ground, they’re too weak to do much without a boost.”
“Provided by the alloy,” I whisper. My heart starts to pound.
“And the dragons.” She nods, two lines appearing between her brows. “You know about alloy? Are they teaching that now? Or did Dad—”
“It’s the alloy stored in the outposts that tugs some of those umbrella spokes forward,” I continue, flipping my dagger in my hand by pure muscle memory. “Extending the wards twice as far as they’d normally reach in some cases, right?”
“Right.”
“And what’s it made of?”
“That’s definitely above your clearance.” She scoffs.
“Fine.” It stings a little that she won’t tell me. “But how do you weave new wards? Like if we wanted to protect places like Athebyne?” Flip. Flip. Flip. I keep moving the dagger and hope she sees it as casual.
“You don’t.” She shakes her head. “The extensions are what we weave. It’s like continuing a tapestry that’s been stretched too far. You’re just adding threads to something that already exists, and we can’t extend the wards to Athebyne. We’ve tried. But who told you—”
“Is that how your signet works?” I stop flipping. “Because you’re basically a ward, right?”
“Not exactly. I kind of pull the wards with me. Sometimes I can manifest on my own, but I have to be close to an outpost. Kind of like I’m just another thread. What has gotten into you?” She flicks another dagger, and it lands dead center.
“Do you know how the wardstone works?” I ask, lowering my voice to a whisper.
“No.” Her eyes flare. “Keep throwing before curious ears start listening.”
I dutifully throw another.
“That information is way beyond my rank—and yours.” Her next dagger lands right next to the first. “Why are you asking?”