The Traitor Queen (The Traitor Spy Trilogy #3)(42)

Suddenly he wanted to kill her, just to spite them.

No, I don’t, he told himself quickly, shuddering at the thought he might be turned into a murderer so easily.

“Kill me,” came the whisper again. It sent a shiver down his spine.

Was there a way he could kill her that would leave no evidence he had done it? If the injuries the interrogator gave her are bad enough … No, he would have made sure they weren’t. Yet from the sound of her breathing something inside her chest was damaged. Perhaps a rib was cracked or broken. If he could manipulate it …

But that would be using Healing power to kill. Healers were supposed to heal, not harm.

Well, that’s always been a complicated philosophy. Cutting open a body to remove a tumour involves harming in order to heal. And then there’s the argument for helping people die. And my mother used Healing in defence, to kill some of the Ichani invaders.

“Www …”

A soft scraping noise came from the girl, and he reluctantly turned his head to look at her again. She was reaching toward him. No, he corrected himself, she’s reaching toward my legs.

“Wwwater,” she gasped.

Relief came as he realised that now she was only asking for something to drink. He pushed himself up into a sitting position. The food-bearing slave had brought a meal. Lorkin had tried to share it with the slave woman but she’d refused to eat. He reached for the jar of water and froze, remembering the warning glyphs that had indicated it was unsafe.

I wonder how unsafe …

He shrank from the thought, but it sprang straight back into his mind. If the water was poisoned and she drank it, she might gain the death she wanted without anyone but him knowing it was his fault. Well, except for the Traitors who left the warning. He felt a shiver go up his spine.

If the slave woman was a Traitor, she might know about the warnings. She might know the water would kill her. He turned to look at her. She gazed back at him, her eyes seeming to say, Yes. Free me.

If she was a Traitor, they must know she was here. Had they provided her with a means to kill herself?

But would the water kill her? He dropped his arm. The Ashaki must be the one adulterating Lorkin’s food. Surely they weren’t trying to kill him? He was of no use to them dead. Most likely the poison in the water was meant to make him sick, or force him to use up more strength by Healing himself. Still, they might reason that the stronger the toxin, the more magic he would be forced to use. It could be a lethal dose.

The woman made a low noise and stretched her unbroken arm toward the bottle. Outside the cell, the watcher eyed them both.

Kill me. Free me.

Lorkin looked from her to the water. He had to make a choice. And there was no right one. No matter what he decided, the consequences would be shocking. No matter what he decided, afterwards he would never be the same person again.

By the way Lilia had admitted to telling Sonea’s aunt that Cery, Gol and Anyi were living under the Guild, it was clear she thought they would be angry. Which is amusing and endearing, considering that she is a magician and we are mere commoners, Cery thought. She had paced a little as she explained how the servant had followed her and the discussion it had led to. Now she looked surprised that nobody was concerned by the news.

“Better that Jonna knows, than anybody else up there,” Anyi said. “In fact, she could be useful.”

“Jonna never liked me,” Cery told them. “But that was back when I was a youngster and she thought I was leading Sonea astray. She knew I was slipping into Sonea’s room now and then these last twenty years, but she never told anybody about it. Good odds she can be trusted.”

“If Sonea trusts her, I reckon she’s all right,” Gol agreed.

Lilia’s eyes had lit up with a peculiar light. “You’ve been seeing Sonea for the last twenty years?” she asked Cery.

He shrugged. “Of course. You didn’t think some rule about associating with criminals would stop her talking to her old friends, did you?”

“No, I can’t see that stopping either of you. I wonder what people would say if they knew. It would be a scandal, I’m sure.” Lilia smiled and sat down next to Anyi. “They’d also finally know why Sonea never got married.”

Cery frowned as he realised she had assumed his visits had been romantic. “Wait. I didn’t … that’s not what I was visiting her for.”

Gol began to laugh. “You certainly made it sound like it was. For a moment there I thought you’d managed to hide something from me all this time.”

Anyi shook her finger at Lilia. “My father was happily married for most of the last twenty years,” she said indignantly. Then she grimaced. “Well, during the second marriage, anyway – but he was married to my mother before that, even if it wasn’t exactly what you’d call ‘happily’ married.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to suggest he was unfaithful,” Lilia apologised.

Gol chuckled in a knowing way.

It was time to change the subject, Cery decided. “I’ve been thinking about what we should do next,” he said. Immediately all eyes turned to him. Anyi looked eager, Lilia relieved and Gol narrowed his eyes, no doubt ready to find the holes in whatever schemes Cery thought up. “What we should do is obvious, once I started thinking less about how we are stuck here and more about how we can turn being here to our advantage.”