“I don’t see any other reason for someone to avoid us except to move through the barrier,” Ilyan answered in Czech, his voice growing deeper as he switched to his native tongue. “I don’t see how they could know how to move through the barrier unless they were.”
I nodded, knowing he was right. I heard Wyn ask some question about motive, but I stared into the dry and cracked bottom of the mug, silently wishing I had the ability to fill it myself, that the next question would never come.
“—and he’s one of us,” Wyn finished her thought, her voice drifting away as she avoided the obvious.
Too bad I wouldn’t.
“You believe this cloaked man to be Sain.” It wasn’t even really a question.
I didn’t often get nervous, or I hadn’t for all my life until a few months ago. Right then, as I sat with a dozen eyes on me, the solitary sound in the room that of Wyn’s heavy breathing and Ryland uncomfortably shifting his weight, I was positive my heart was going to explode out of my chest and do some sort of twisted tap number for them all to see. Nerves and anxiety were a new addition to a life without sight, it seemed. Much like Black Water.
Luckily, Joclyn understood my need for the latter. Her hand extended toward me in a silent request for the mug. Her face was torn between sympathy and anger that I had already made the connection about why our father wasn’t here, not that it was hard to miss. Sain had never missed a war meeting before; I was just the first one to put voice to it.
“In some ways, having our culprit be Sain would be the lesser of two evils,” Ilyan announced, his voice cutting through me and awakening an anger I hadn’t felt in quite a while.
I didn’t like the idea that my father would somehow be a lesser evil than something else or, worse yet, the greatest evil of all.
“Being double-crossed by your own man is the lesser of two evils?” Wyn asked, her voice rising to its haunting history, each word so reminiscent of our connected past that I couldn’t help shivering. “If that’s the case, then I think I want a do-over. Let someone else take the fall for my ‘lesser.’ “
“Being double-crossed by a condescending, old man would be much better than having Edmund’s entire army knowing how to move through the barrier.” Joclyn handed my now full mug back to me as Risha gasped, the sound so loud I jerked, almost missing the mug and spilling the liquid gold over the blankets that covered me, something that probably would have been quite painful judging by the way the delicious fluid had started to burn inside of me.
“Edmund’s entire army able to move through the barrier at will, attacking us in a cage?” Risha’s normally sweet voice had dropped, the heavy strain accompanying that side of her increasing. “As if they don’t attack us enough on our normal raids. We lost three people this morning.”
“Okay, yeah,” Wyn conceded before leaning against the headboard of the bed opposite mine, obviously ready to watch the show from where she sat, squished against Thom’s endlessly sleeping frame. “That would be worse.”
“I can’t believe he would do that,” Ryland muttered from where he leaned against the wall. “He has the same goals as we do; why would he work for someone he wants to kill just as badly?”
Ilyan looked to Ryland with a snap, his eyes narrowing as he took a slow step forward. “But do you know that he does, Ryland? I know what you two have been through. I know you have become very close to him. Regardless, we have to keep every possibility open, and his behavior with Joclyn as of late, with our queen, has been highly inexcusable.”
Ryland cringed a bit as Ilyan spoke, his bulldog stance sagging as the strength of Ilyan’s words sunk in.
“No, I will give you that,” Ryland sighed, running his hand through his hair. “I find it hard to believe he would be working with Edmund after everything he put him through.”
Even Ilyan remained silent. It was obvious Ryland had a point.
Grumbles and groans and whispered agreements moved through the small group as instances and possibilities and facts about Sain were thrown around. Everyone was trying to find their own answer. I wished I could feel as comfortable as easily as Ilyan and Joclyn seemed to be with accepting that my father—the first of our kind—would work with the man who had called the order for the entire destruction of our race. Yes, he had been unruly recently, but like Ryland, I couldn’t accept this.
“What makes you think it is Sain?”
Ilyan turned toward me at the question, my shoulders tensing from the dangerous look in his eyes. The mug in my hands was so warm I knew I needed to drink it soon, although part of me was too scared to do it. I was beginning to understand how the others felt when they sought sight. Black Water burned. If it didn’t taste so good, it might have been easier to avoid it.
“Joclyn saw him within a sight in the cloak, running through the city. She’s seen the same figure a few times. After what we saw this morning—”
“She saw him in sight? Or she saw him in real life?” Risha interrupted, her voice quivering uncharacteristically.