Sacrifice (The Snow Queen #2)(35)

“What?” Rakel asked.

“Perhaps we could dispatch a few people to search for magic users outside of Verglas who could help. There are plenty of enslaved and repressed magic users. Any of them would jump at the chance for freedom, and I’m sure there must be some with the kind of powers we need.”

Something about the idea made Rakel uneasy, though she couldn’t put her finger on it. But Phile has the right idea. Recruitment would help us greatly. Rakel thought of Farrin, and she frowned. I wonder…why did I not think of this previously?

“We do not have to journey outside of Verglas to recruit,” Rakel said.

“Oh really?” Phile eyed Rakel. “Because I would love to know where you are going to dredge up a magic user with powers comparable to Farrin’s.”

“I don’t have to find anyone. I will, as you put it, poach him.”

Phile stood up and almost flipped her plate. “What?” She looked around and realized her sudden movements had caught a lot of attention, so she smiled and plopped back down on the chair. After a moment she leaned across the table and growled. “You want to poach Farrin Graydim? How do you intend to do that? Waltz up to him and say ‘I beg your pardon, Colonel Graydim, loyalist and top military officer of the Chosen Army, I have decided I want you for my army. Would you come with me?’”

Rakel thought for a moment. “That sounds about right.”

“And you think he’ll agree?”

“There’s a good chance he will.”

“Why?”

“Because he has feelings for me.” Rakel sipped her apple cider. “I feel ashamed for not thinking of it sooner. I wondered, but it hadn’t occurred to me to push.” Perhaps telling me his background was a cry for help? She winced. I should have stopped him from leaving. If Tenebris learns he spoke to me, I imagine the consequences will be even worse. When she realized Phile hadn’t said a word, she looked up from her drink.

The Robber Maiden was slack jawed, caught in a rare moment of shock. “He has feelings for you?”

Rakel blinked. “I thought you knew. You made enough implications about our friendship that I assumed you did.”

“Of course I knew! But I didn’t think you would recognize his affection for at least a thousand nights!” Phile thrust an accusing finger in her direction. “How did you—a socially awkward exile who barely understands the meaning of friendship and lived like a mountain man in the hills for twelve years—realize that Farrin Graydim fancies you?”

Rakel frowned at the backhanded compliment. “I have a tolerable understanding of what friendship is.”

“Now you do! When I first approached you to practice fighting in the morning, I had to drag you kicking and biting into it.”

Rakel sniffed. “I would never do something so low as biting another person.”

“How did you figure it out, Rakel?” Phile’s voice was solemn, and her dark eyes were crinkled with confusion.

She is serious. Rakel settled her hands on her lap. “It was not as difficult as you seem to think. I was aware of the concept of love—it’s a theme often presented in fairy tales, and I owned several volumes of those when I first arrived on Ensom Peak.”

“That means you knew such a thing existed. You had no way of knowing Farrin felt that way about you. How did you figure it out?”

Feeling uncomfortable, Rakel knit her hands together. It felt traitorous to share Farrin’s heart—though he had done little to disguise his feelings. “It was the way he acted. No one—not you nor Oskar nor Halvor, no one I have ever met—looks at me the way he does. You, Kai, and Greta embrace me without thought. Farrin often touches me and is slow to move away—as though he treasures the interactions. I did not have a category for the way he treated me, so for some time I assumed it was because he saw us as enemies. It took me a shamefully long time to categorize his actions and realize what they meant.”

“I’m shocked.” Phile hunched over her plate. “I didn’t think you would ever get it. I was saving up that tasty tidbit of information to launch on Halvor and Oskar when we needed an edge to win an argument.”

Rakel, no longer feeling badly about holding out on her effervescent friend, raised her eyebrows. “I see.”

Phile removed her kerchief and ran her hands through the fringe of her ponytail. “You think he will be convinced that easily to leave Tenebris?”

“Farrin Graydim is more similar to me than you know,” Rakel said, thinking back to the beginning of her acquaintance with Phile. “He longs for someone to accept him in spite of what he is and what he has done. If we offer that and do not ask him to slaughter, I am almost certain he will join our cause.”

“Will you pretend you love him?” Phile said.

Rakel blinked in surprise.

Phile used Foedus to point at her. “You can’t fool me, Little Wolf. I know you don’t love him, yet. Will you mislead him to assure that he will join us?”

“No,” Rakel said. “If I did that, I would be no better than Tenebris.”

“What?”

“Farrin has a painful history—as I suspect most of the high-ranking officers in the Chosen possess. Tenebris freed Farrin and used his gratitude to recruit him.” Rakel paused, realizing that Phile’s earlier recruitment suggestion had been similar. We would have freed the magic users from their oaths. We are nothing like him.