Ter Luniel was huge, but it was another port city, which gave Ruan a solid sense of where to start looking for Varajas. A correct sense, it turned out, when Ruan found him near the water, just north of the city’s edge, on a small hill looking out onto the ocean.

Even from a distance Ruan could see the tension in his stance and the blood on his shirt.

“What did you do?” Ruan asked as soon as he was close enough Varajas would hear him.

Varajas didn’t turn around, but his voice carried clearly over the sounds of breaking waves. “This is how you greet me?”

They didn’t have time for games. “Did you kill brother Eldred?”

Now Varajas did turn, and Ruan could see the evidence of the fight. Lots of blood—most of it probably Eldred’s. There were a few tears in Varajas’s clothes, but most of them superficial. Only one spot on Varajas’s side where blood and tear lined up to make it look like Eldred had scored a hit. “So your first question was purely rhetorical. You already know what I’ve done.”

Ruan knew this mood, this tone. Varajas still on edge, still angry, still—whatever had driven him to confront Eldred. Varajas was looking for another fight.

He had to stay calm. He had to focus on what he’d come here to do. “So it’s true.”

“Who was so quick to run and tell you?”

“Father Donatien. He sent me to find you, to bring you back to him.”

That brought some focus back to Varajas’s face. “Donatien is here?”

“I called him.”

Varajas’s voice dropped to a low, dangerous tone. “And why would you do that?”

Ruan held out his hand in a steadying gesture, like he was trying to soothe a wild animal. In a way, he was. “We needed help. We needed guidance. We knew something was wrong. You knew something was wrong. And Eldred—he must have—” Ruan couldn’t find the words, couldn’t come up with any logic that would have led Varajas to kill him. “What happened?”

“He was helping Sidaine. He was on her side.”

“Are you sure?”

“Are you questioning me?” Varajas snapped.

This was dangerous ground. Ruan knew Varajas, knew his every mood, every temper, and had never before seen him this volatile. At least, had never had so much of that anger directed squarely at him. Ruan’s every instinct screamed that he should walk away, give Varajas more time to calm down, but that wouldn’t go well for either of them.

Varajas’s best hope—their best hope—was to go back to Donatien now, and explain the situation. The longer it took for Ruan to bring Varajas back, the more time the High Father had to solidify his belief that Varajas was some sort of traitor.

Ruan had to stay calm. One of them needed to be calm. “I’m only trying to understand what happened.”

“So you can report back to Donatien.”

“And so I can understand. I’m on your side. Always. You know that. But you need to come back with me to the High Father.”

Varajas shook his head. “I’m not sure that I do.”

“If you just explain to him—”

“Explain? Really? You believe he’s going to listen? Do you honestly think any of them are going to listen?”

That wasn’t a question Ruan could answer, so he ignored it. “You have to come back. It’s your duty.”

“Duty. That’s your argument? Duty? Where was duty when it came time to protect these wizards? Where is the duty in all of us being dragged to the south to carry out Donatien’s personal vendetta?”

“You can’t say that.” Ruan was still thinking through the damage control. The way to get Donatien to understand what Varajas had done. The path to keeping Varajas from being thrown out of the order.

“I’ll say what I damn well please, and it’s about time.”

“No.” Why couldn’t Varajas see this wasn’t the time to make everything worse? “No.” Ruan tried to inject his voice with all the confident authority he could muster. “You’re going to keep those thoughts to yourself. You’re going to come back to Donatien with me and you’re going to convince him you had to do what you did, and that you’re as penitent as you can be.”

So we can stay together, he didn’t say.

“Am I?” Varajas’s voice smoothed to a dangerously reasonable tone. “Who exactly is going to make me?”

Of all the stupid, irrational… “You’re going to come back with me. I’m not leaving this spot without you.”

“I see.” The words almost sounded reasonable. Until Varajas drew his swords. “So after everything, you take his side. Blind obedience. It’s what they demand, after all.”

“I’m not taking anyone’s side.”

Varajas leveled his left-hand blade at Ruan. “Then get out of my way. I’m not going back to that man. Not now. Not ever.”

“You’re not being reasonable.” Ruan ignored the sword pointed at him as he stepped forward. Varajas wasn’t going to—

A slicing sweep and Ruan had his own swords in hand purely by instinct before it registered that Varajas was swiping at his arm with the flat of the blade—nothing that would have done harm—but Ruan couldn’t stop his own body’s response as he blocked the attack, twisting Varajas’s strike down towards the ground.

“What are you doing?” Ruan demanded.

“Maybe what I should have done a long time ago.” He swung at Ruan again, a clearly half-hearted gesture trying to get Ruan to move aside.

Ruan parried the blow, refusing to move. “You’re angry. I understand.”

“No you don’t. Not if you want me to go back to Donatien. It’s corruption. Can’t you see that? Eldred was at the heart of it, but the whole order—they look away. Even Donatien. We’ve talked about this.”

“Yes we have.” Ruan blocked another half-hearted strike. Varajas working out his energy with swords, and Ruan could stand here and let him. “But the answer isn’t walking away. The answer is going back to the High Father, apologizing for what you’ve done, and just getting through this. Then after…” Okay, he didn’t know the answer to that. But he did know nothing was going to change if there weren’t people in the order trying to change it. “If you leave, it doesn’t fix anything.”

“It fixes me.”

Ruan couldn’t believe that was true. “If you walk away with Eldred’s blood on your soul, you’ll regret it for the rest of your life.”

That had been the wrong thing to say. The anger flared back to life in Varajas’s eyes. “You think? Let’s put it to the test.”

An answering anger reared up inside Ruan. Varajas wanted to walk away. From everything they were. From everything they had. And all because he’d made a mistake he wasn’t willing to own up to. All because he was pissed.

Well so was Ruan. “You don’t get to just walk away!”

Please don’t walk away from me.

“You’re not going to stop me.”

This time, Varajas’s strikes were serious. Ruan parried, sidestepped, then returned his own blows because he wanted Varajas to listen. “You can’t just throw your life away!”

“No. You can’t. Because you’re afraid. Because all it takes is a sharp word from Donatien and you’re cowering at his feet with your tail between your legs.”

Somehow, they were fighting in earnest now. Every time Varajas tried to disengage, to get around him, Ruan stepped back in fight. He wouldn’t let it end like this. He just needed to run off all that wild energy, to make Varajas think again.

Except.

Ruan wasn’t in control. He’d misread Varajas. Underestimated the anger, the frustration that was driving him and what he was willing to do. Ruan was just trying to work through things. Varajas was trying to end them.

A lance of pain ran up from his thigh as Varajas ducked under his guard and stabbed deep. Ruan’s leg crumped, and as he fell, Varajas punched him hard enough the world grayed.

Everything was spinning. His leg had bloomed to overwhelming agony. Ruan couldn’t get up. Couldn’t at this moment, figure out which way “up” was.

Varajas stood over him, looking down. He said nothing, but reached up to his own throat and ripped the prophet’s cross from around his neck. He dropped it on Ruan and walked away.