The Burning White (Lightbringer #5) - Brent Weeks Page 0,34

a time to choose life, Conn, and you’re taking too damn long to make it,” Kip said. “You’re in a pit, so I’m throwing you a rope, but I ain’t gonna fuckin’ climb for you. You dyin’ today? It hurts me more than you. But if you choose to live, I want you to live for one reason—because you’re going to make yourself useful. You’re worried it hurts our traditions for me to let you live? Yes. It does. People will think you got preferential treatment? Yes, they will. Because you are. Not because I love you, but because I think you can do what others can’t for this people, this satrapy. I think you’ll be more help than harm. A lot more. If you climb out of this pit, you’re on the hook to prove me right. You’re on the hook to work every day to show you’re worth the third chance I’m giving you, and someday, when it’s your turn, when it’s wise, you’re on the hook to give that chance to someone else.” Kip blew out a breath in exasperation. “Look at your fucking shoulders, man. You were made to bear burdens. You are strong as fuck, and you’re not acting like it. So, if you want to stay and curl up and die? Then fuck you. You’ve already wasted too much of my time.” Kip turned away, but then paused.

He pulled a knife from his belt and stared at Ruadhán, eye to eye.

“It’d tear up the men to hang you,” Kip said. “So you want to die? Have the goddam decency to think of someone else a bit, would you?”

Kip dropped the knife and the key, outside the cell. Ruadhán would have to strain against his chains to get either of them.

Kip gave Sibéal the signal to get out of the longhouse. Stony-faced, silent, she went, not daring to look at Conn Arthur, who was still staring at the ground anyway.

Then Kip strode out as if it weren’t tearing out his heart not to offer soft words to his suffering friend.

But Kip knew all about the slimy, steep-sided pit of self-pity. Sometimes, a hard kick in the ass can do what a soft word in the ear can’t.

Or so he hoped.

Outside, the men searched his face for any clue of what they must do, but none dared ask him anything. Kip found Sibéal. “You’d already said your goodbyes?”

“Yeah, I didn’t know how soon you’d hang us. It was like he was already d—”

“You know it’s better for you if he takes the knife.”

A guilty look flashed over her face, then was hidden by anger. She knew. “Why the hell would you say that? He’s my best friend.”

“You could finally move on.”

She moved to angrily deny it, but words fell dead with no spirit to give them life.

“Is it so obvious?” she asked.

Kip suddenly remembered glances he’d seen others exchange about the two. He’d never spoken of it to anyone. He’d only realized Sibéal loved that big idiot minutes ago. Others had, he saw now, known it for much longer. He said, “Obvious enough to a few who love you.”

Her people’s uncanny smile on her lips twisted bitterly. “I’ve made myself a laughingstock.”

“No one’s laughing.”

Sibéal got quiet. They breathed the forest air together. “I’m pretty sure he loves me, too, and just hates himself too much to see it.”

Kip said nothing. It was a poison that had to be drained, that she’d held in for too long, and that had spurred her to actions that could well have cost her her life.

“It wouldn’t all be so bad if I didn’t want kids,” she said. “I mean, we have ways to know when not to take a man to bed, to avoid his seed taking root. But . . . all that effort to fix the problem doesn’t fix the problem when you want the problem, does it? I want a child. Hell, I want lots of them, if this war ever ends. I want loud, shrieking, giggling, climbing-over-me-and-clinging-to-my-legs life everywhere. A house bursting at the seams with life after all this . . .” Her voice fell off. “But I want him.”

Kip hesitated, but then said, “Do you think it’s a coincidence that you’ve chosen to fall in love with a man in an impossible situation that he himself created?”

“What do you mean? What do you mean I’ve chosen to—”

“You’ve done exactly the same thing he has. You’re in a pit, too, Sibéal. And if you want