Chapter 86: What A Bastard

They dragged me into the tent like a sack of grain.

It was small and cramped and smelled faintly of smoke and old boots, and the five of us plus one very tense stranger made it feel like a coffin with opinions. Lee shoved a bedroll aside, dropped to one knee, and reached into his coat.

He pulled out a dagger.

Then another and then another. He kept going until eight blades lay in a neat row across the canvas floor, each one clean, each one sharp, each one gleaming with the quiet confidence of a weapon that had seen use.

"Who carries eight daggers?" Theodore whispered, and Lee, without looking up, answered in a flat voice, "Someone who’s been alone out here for a while."

That shut everyone up.

"Hold out your hand," he said to me.

I did, because there was nothing else to do. He took my wrist, pressed the edge of a dagger to my fingertip, and made a tiny cut. A bead of blood welled up, dark red in the dim light, and he tilted my hand to let it drip onto the floor in a slow, careful line.

It didn’t hurt. That was one of the small perks of being an Inferior Awakened. My pain tolerance was far above that of an ordinary human, my body healed faster and the sting of a shallow cut on my fingertip barely registered.

He worked quickly. The circle he traced was neat and wide, its edges shimmering faintly where the blood soaked into the canvas.

At each of the four points, he laid two daggers in a cross, blades interlocked, and above every cross he set a candle, fat and squat and slightly bent, pulled from somewhere in the mess of his supplies.

"What’s your name, by the way?" Theodore asked, leaning against the tent pole with the air of a man attending a play.

The young man hesitated. "Lee."

There were two reasons we trusted him, even a little.

The first was that he stood at the same level as us, an Inferior Awakened just like the rest of us, someone who understood exactly what it cost to survive in a place like this.

The second was that he spoke Minkz, the language of Valemont.

"How are we going to light the candles?" Sera asked, eyeing the four wicks.

"Don’t worry about that," Lee said, and for a second he almost smiled, a real one, quick and boyish. Then his face went blank, and I could practically see the thought cross it: these aren’t your friends, they might still kill you. He rearranged his expression into something hard and serious, the look of a man who had promised himself not to be charmed by anyone.

He leaned toward the first candle and exhaled.

Scarlet fire poured from his mouth.

It wasn’t a spell.

It wasn’t a trick.

It was a breath, pure and bright and unmistakably alive, and it lit the wick in a soft, roaring whoosh before he turned to the next one, then the next, then the next, until all four candles burned in a ring around me. The little flames were yellow at first, quivering like nervous animals.

"What’s your affinity?" I asked, before I could stop myself.

He glanced at me, briefly, warily. "Dragon."

"Woah," I said. "That’s so cool. Can you take me out of this now, please?"

"No."

I sighed. Fair enough.

Lee pressed his palm to the edge of the circle and poured his spiritual power into it, a slow, steady stream that made the air taste like copper.

The candle flames surged, roaring up high, then dropped again as the yellow bled slowly to red, deepening into the color of fresh blood.

A cold, heavy pressure settled over my chest, closing around me like a hand around a bird. My own spiritual power went quiet, muffled and distant, and I understood, with a small, creeping thrill, exactly what was happening.

He had made a Spirit Barrier. And I was inside it.

He had also, I noticed, been very careful about where everyone else was standing. Sera, Arthur, and Theodore had been pushed to the far side of the tent, well away from both of us, and Lee was keeping himself at a careful arm’s length from the circle.

’Smart. He isn’t taking any chances.’

"Do you know Culex?" he asked.

I shook my head, slowly and clearly.

He nodded, satisfied, "Will you kill me?"

I opened my mouth to say no. I’m not a killer. I’m not a murderer. I’ve never wanted to hurt anyone who didn’t deserve it.

The word wouldn’t come.

Something in the barrier held my throat shut, whispered that I couldn’t promise that, not out here, not with the things I had already seen.

I closed my mouth, swallowed, and lifted my shoulders in a small, helpless shrug.

I don’t know. 𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

Lee’s eyebrows twitched, but he didn’t seem particularly bothered by my answer. That, in a strange way, worried me more than a reaction would have.

"Was your intent to harm me when you came here?" he asked. "Will you kill me if I don’t do anything bad and stay loyal to you people?"

I shook my head. Once. Twice. Three times, just to be clear.

The tension in his shoulders eased a fraction.

"Can your teammates be trusted?"

I shook my head.

Behind me, Theodore made a strangled sound. "Excuse me?"

"I am being truthful," I said, or rather I would have, if the barrier had let me. Instead I stared at the wall of the tent with an expression of serene innocence and let the betrayal sink into the four people currently glaring holes in my back.

Lee tsked. "Can your teammates be trusted with someone’s life? Would they kill an innocent person for their own gain?"

I nodded. Then I shook my head.

"Phew," said Lee, and slumped visibly.

Lee turned and looked at the others. Theodore, Sera, Mary, and Arthur were all leaning forward, barely restraining themselves, their eyes bright with the shining, hungry look of people who had been waiting a very long time for this exact moment.

"Ah," Lee said, glancing at me. "Do you want them to question you?"

’What a good person,’ I thought, with real warmth.

I smiled and shook my head.

Lee nodded, turned to the others, and said:

"Yes. You can question him now."

’WHAT A BASTARD!!!’