Shatter the Earth (Cassandra Palmer 10)

“Wouldn’t see me.”

It still cut deep.

“What else were you to do?”

“It wasn’t my idea,” I said, because I wanted him to understand that. I didn’t want this to come between us. “Gertie offered, after seeing how crap I was at going after Jo—”

“Crap enough to kill her.”

“Barely! Gertie said she’d wondered why I’d used such a limited skill set in Wales—”

“Whilst also outplaying her.”

“I didn’t outplay her. She caught me, repeatedly—”

“And you got away, repeatedly.”

“Do you have a point?” I asked, because he kept interrupting.

“Only that, perhaps, she didn’t choose to train you because you weren’t good enough, but because you were. You killed a fey assassin without even being able to see him—something I wouldn’t have believed possible if I hadn’t witnessed it.”

I fidgeted some more at that, because I’d had help there. Help that I also couldn’t talk about. Or maybe I could. Maybe I’d been hiding all these secrets and it wasn’t even necessary.

But what if it was?

Pritkin was part of the Corps and he was here all the time, especially lately. What if he accidentally slipped up and said something? I didn’t think it likely, but anybody could make a mistake, even someone as smart as him. And a little slip to somebody like Jonas . . .

What would the head of the Circle say if he knew I was sharing my power with a master vampire?

Or would he say anything? Would he kill him? Would he blackmail him? Or would he blackmail me?

Jonas had resented losing the influence he’d enjoyed with Agnes. I didn’t know how far that had actually extended; how much he’d really influenced her versus how much she’d let him think he did. But he believed that he’d had a Pythia in his pocket and now he didn’t.

What would he do to get that advantage back?

Damn it, I hated this! Hated that I had to think like this. I loved Pritkin and I trusted him; I just didn’t trust all of those around him. And I was right not to. The Pythia couldn’t be a puppet of the Circle and still do her job, I knew that.

But it still hurt, so much. He used to be the man I told everything to. When had that changed?

I looked at him miserably. I wanted to come clean more than I’d ever wanted anything. I wanted to talk and talk: about Jonathan, and how afraid I was of ending up like Jo; about all those people at court, waiting for answers that I didn’t have; about my worries over Rhea, and what would happen if I died without an heir; even about the mess with Mircea. I missed my best advisor, missed getting his feedback, missed feeling like somebody understood . . . hell, I’d missed that more than the sex!

And now he was sitting there, waiting for an explanation, but I didn’t have one.

He looked at me for a moment, and then got up and held out his hand. “Come. There’s something I want you to see.”

Chapter Thirty-Six

Dessert came just as we were leaving—of course. I boxed it up and took it with us. Along with the rest of the bread—because I did not have some weird kind of problem with bread! And a new bottle of wine since we’d drunk most of the last one.

Pritkin had gone to see Tobias again while I was busy. He came back with a thermos of coffee, because he’d gone too long without a fix, and a set of keys. Like normal, if slightly old-fashioned keys, the kind mages didn’t use because they had wards.

“What are those for?” I asked.

“Your suite for the night.”

“My suite? You mean . . . we’re not sleeping in the hobbit hole?”

Pritkin paused. “I think that’s the nicest way I’ve ever heard Corps’ housing described.”