“It wasn’t like the one in Pavan. There were too many guards, too much danger to keep the market in one place. So, it rotated around the city. He paid me and a few other boys to keep watch. My sister begged me to stop. She insisted we would find another way, even when the few coins I brought home were barely enough to clothe and feed us. She begged on the streets and did odd jobs for anyone who would have her, but I brought home more from one night than she could bring home from a week of working herself ragged. So I kept going back. One night, she followed me, tried to convince me to come home with her. We fought, and I sent her off. I was distracted, so I didn’t notice the guards until it was too late.
“The military raided the market, and I barely got away, hiding behind a cart until I could squeeze through the crowds and run. They rounded up everyone they could get their hands on. Even innocent bystanders who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. I ran all the way back home, but at dawn when my sister still had not come home, I knew something was wrong. I got to the square just in time to see them lining everyone up. I was so small, I had to climb up the gutter of a building to see. She was eleven, and they hung her there with mercenaries and thieves and men that she would have been scared to stand beside, let alone spend her last moments with. I don’t remember much. But at one point, I think she saw me in the crowd. Tears were streaking down her face, but she did not make a noise. She smiled at me. One of those, supposed to be reassuring, everything-will-be-okay kind of smiles. And that’s all I remember. I lied before. I don’t recall the moment it happened. Maybe I looked away or ran. Or maybe I’ve just blocked the memory. But she died that day. Because I dragged her into something dangerous.”
Roar did not answer, and he could not blame her. It was a depressing story, not exactly the kind of thing you say to cheer someone up. When he looked up, she was standing in the doorway.
She asked, “Is that why you never took on any apprentices?” His brows lifted. “Duke told me.”
Of course he did. “That’s part of it, yes. I entered this life because I had no other choice. I hated that city. I hated the streets and the guards, most of whom were exactly like those men we just encountered. I hated the royals and the people who cowered in their homes rather than speaking out. I hated everything. And Duke offered me the chance to get out, so I took it and never looked back. Honestly, I think I was hoping I would die. That it would just end. I had lost my parents and my sister, and for some reason, despite ample opportunity, I could not seem to follow them. Before Duke found me, I was becoming more and more reckless with my behavior in the black market, associating with dangerous men, taking risky jobs that were bound to go wrong; but no matter what kind of peril I threw myself into, I always seemed to crawl out of it still breathing. Still do, I guess. I’ve grown to love this life, but I still would not recommend it to anyone who has another option.”
She moved closer, and then sat beside him with her legs crossed. She ran her hands over the smooth fabric of her pants, from her knees to her ankles and back again. With her head down she asked, “Is that why you fought to keep me from joining?”
He swallowed. And there was more emotion in his voice than he wanted there to be when he said, “I would fight it still if I thought it would work. But I find now that I am loath to part with you. I’m sorry for all the times I pushed you away, for all the times I made you angry. It’s only, after I met you … for the first time in a very long time, I had no desire to throw myself into death’s path because I could, to see if I could survive. Because death meant leaving you, and that was unthinkable. Is unthinkable. Feeling this way, the way I do about you, Roar, it’s scarier than any storm I’ve ever faced.”
She made a soft, hurt sound and burrowed closer to his side. She turned her face against his shoulder, and he felt the dampness on her cheeks. He let his hand fall to her uninjured hand resting on her knee. He would have been content just to touch, but she laced their fingers together, squeezing tightly.
“Why go by Locke if you hated it so much?”
He sighed and huffed out a halfhearted laugh. “You are determined to make me spill all my secrets, aren’t you?”
She pulled away, eyes wide and head shaking, and he immediately wished he had never opened his mouth. She said, “No. Not at all. You don’t have to—”
He pulled her back against him and said, “My secrets are yours. Every one of them.” She swallowed, and the answer didn’t please her as much as he thought it would. He continued: “When Duke took me on, I did not remember my real name. It had been so long since someone used it. Mostly I just got called kid or boy. There was a hunter on the crew then named Bear. He was tall and skinny and bald, not a speck of hair on his face. To this day, I still don’t know how he got the name Bear. Anyway, he got tired of calling me boy and started calling me Locke, since that’s where they picked me up. I was too young and intimidated to ask for a different name, so I let it go. It was maddening at first, but eventually … I did not mind it so much. It was a reminder of where I came from and the mistakes I made. A reminder to do better in the future.”
“Oh. Poor thing.”
He frowned. “You don’t have to feel sorry for me. That’s not why I told you any of this.”
“I don’t feel sorry for you. I feel sorry for that little boy who lost everything, including his name.”
When she leaned her head against his shoulder, her cheek against his biceps, he did not feel like someone who had lost everything.
“Give me something else to call you,” she murmured. “The name Locke doesn’t deserve you.”
“I would accept handsome, strong, superior male specimen—”
She pushed him hard enough to send him sprawling over onto his side. But she was laughing. And she could push him as many times as she wanted if he could hear that.
“I’m serious. You’ve never thought of going by something else? You could choose anything.”
He levered himself back up to sit beside her, then shrugged. “I’ve been Locke for nearly half my life.”
“And you don’t think everyone who knows you would gladly call you something else if it was what you wanted?”
“There’s no point. None of us use our real names.”
“So choose another nickname.”
“I can’t choose my own nickname.”
“Fine, I’ll choose one.”
He smiled. “Really? Let’s hear it then.”
“Not right now. That’s too much pressure. I need time to think and choose the best option.”
“My whole future is in your hands here, my very identity.”
She laughed. “Thank you, that certainly reduces the responsibility,” she said and leaned her head back onto his shoulder.
They were still leaning on each other, hands entwined, when the others came back in. He expected her to pull away, but instead she leaned in a little closer, held his hand a little tighter. Ransom’s expression was grim as he approached, and Locke asked, “How bad?”
“It got the whole north wall and about two dozen homes. And … all the soldiers. Minister Vareeth has people searching the rubble to see if there were any more casualties. He was very grateful for our service. He offered to let us stay as long as we needed.”
“Well, that’s good at least.”