The Burning White (Lightbringer #5) - Brent Weeks Page 0,296

the worst idea militarily, but there are a lot of us who think it’s the best idea. Naturally, there have been some compromises on the parade route and the disposition of drafters. It will be the least, shall we say, lavish Sun Day celebration in many years.”

“Worst Sun Day ever, you mean,” Ben-hadad said, shooing them forward to walk once more, silently counting out his paces.

“On the contrary,” Quentin said.

“How so?” Ben asked. “Fourteen more paces, I think.”

“A pagan invasion, on Sun Day itself? Where we have scant hope of victory?” Quentin asked.

“Yeah,” Teia said. “We’re agreed on that much.”

“It seems to me such a time is precisely when Orholam must show His power.”

“Or else we’re fucked,” Ben-hadad said.

“Yes! So He will show His power.”

Teia and Ben both looked at Quentin like he was out of his mind. Ben shook his head.

“Three more paces.”

Quentin said, “I’m not saying I’m eager for the—”

Ben said, “I don’t know where you found this guy, Teia, but—”

“What do you mean, where I found him?!” Teia said, and then stopped at an unfamiliar voice.

“Teia?” a girl repeated, looking straight at Teia. In front of them was a discipula, carrying a mop and bucket. She wore her hair in a bun with flyaways everywhere, was maybe fourteen years old, and looked even younger.

They had never met, Teia was sure of it.

“Teia Darksight?” the girl said.

“Huh?” Teia asked. A flash of fear shocked her like a flash grenade. She’d thought herself quite nondescript.

“You’re Teia Darksight,” the girl said, wide-eyed.

“Oh dear,” Quentin said.

“O’s itchy bung!” Ben-hadad said. He flowed forward just as the girl squeaked and brought her hands up to her cheeks, dropping her bucket.

Ben-hadad snatched the mop bucket out of midair and popped the handle of the mop back up into his hand with a dextrous flick of his cane. Teia had almost forgotten that for all of his technical genius, Ben-hadad had made it through Blackguard training, too.

“It is you!” the girl said, paying no attention to Ben-hadad or the impressive feat of dexterity he’d just performed.

Maybe not fourteen yet, then, part of Teia thought. Ben-hadad was annoyingly handsome.

But another part of her was already doing what was necessary. Paryl shot from Teia’s fingertips and into the girl’s chest. In a moment, Teia had the knot ready to slam home to sever the nerves that told the heart to beat.

She’d loused up. She’d let herself feel at home here, in the building that had once been her home. And now she had to kill this girl. This pale, wispy thing, all knees and elbows and big baby eyes and crooked teeth, mopping the halls as punishment for some mild transgression—this girl had to die. An hour ago she’d probably been jabbering complaints about this harsh magister or that reading that was way too hard.

That was just and right; it was as it should be.

Every painful stage of life is dictated by nature to make a woman. But nature’s abortions are frequent and rude. Today, this girl would be one more civilian dead in a centuries-long war that only Teia could end. A necessary corpse. One innocent, who had to be killed because you couldn’t trust an entire war’s outcome to the discretion of a fourteen-year-old. An innocent, murdered because Teia had loused up. Teia had killed innocents before, but those had been innocents she’d been forced to kill. This was forced only by her own error. She’d let down her guard.

A woman like her could never, ever let her guard down.

This girl was innocent, but was her life worth so much more than a slave’s life?

“Teia Darksight?” Ben-hadad asked. And Teia realized it had only been an instant that she’d stood paralyzed with the killing threads in her hands.

“Don’t you know?” the girl asked. “She’s the first paryl drafter in centuries!”

“No, she’s not,” Ben-hadad said, puzzled. “There’ve been a doz—”

“But everyone knows her! Mistress Teia, will you show me—”

Flaring her eyes to their fullest spooky black, Teia roared aloud at her. It was a cry of a damned soul. It was every old warrior’s plaint, every penitent’s wail.

But she did what had to be done.

The young girl squeaked and bolted.

“Subtle, T,” Ben-hadad said. “I’m sure she won’t tell any of her friends about meeting you now.”

But Teia barely heard the jibe.

Ben-hadad didn’t know.

He didn’t know how bad this was. They hadn’t had that long together. She hadn’t gone into specifics. He didn’t know the stakes. He thought they were just messing around in areas where