Dead Man's Deal The Asylum Tales - By Jocelynn Drake Page 0,98

we were far enough from the view of the witches and the warlock. He shoved one hand through his dark hair as he paced away from me. “Things are bad in the Towers. We haven’t gotten a lead on the elf and there are a number of occupants screaming to destroy another city.”

I pushed aside the twinge of unease and guilt and focused on the rampaging assholes. “But no one here knows what the Towers are looking for! Hell, people don’t understand why this is happening at all. How can they help if they don’t know?”

“Help? You think people would turn in the person who knows the locations of the Towers?” Gideon stopped his pacing and pointed back toward the street. “Those people are going to protect that elf and raise him up as a hero. And then they’re going to take that information and try to destroy the Towers.”

“But they can’t. No one has the power to destroy the Towers.”

He closed his eyes for a second and he looked ten years older. This life was wearing him down to an angry nub, leaving him with nothing. “I know that, but they can’t let themselves believe it. You convince those people of it and you will have taken away their last hope.”

“Fuck,” I said as I turned to stare down the alley, back the way we had come. “Fine. So the Towers are terrified that people will find their secret locations and do . . . something. Why come to Low Town and wreak havoc?”

“They have to blame someone. They don’t know where the elf is, but several members of the Towers have been able to figure out that you’re in Low Town.”

“And they thought that by killing a bunch of people, they’d draw me out?”

“It’s working,” Gideon said in a low voice, his eyes narrowed on me. “You nearly charged out to meet them, unarmed. Since we’ve been talking in this alley, you’ve edged back down toward the street and I doubt you’re even aware of it.”

I looked around as he spoke to discover that I was now standing near the mouth of the alley, several feet away from where we had stopped just moments earlier. Smoke was clogging the air and darkening the sky. I could still hear the screaming mingled with the high-pitched cries of terrified and hurt children. There was a slight tingle of magic in the air, but I couldn’t tell if the warlock and the witches were still in the area or if they had left to search for me elsewhere.

“I’m supposed to just hide back here? Let those people die for me? That’s bullshit!” I shouted before I turned and started to walk out of the alley. I didn’t know what the hell I was going to do if I did encounter the trio, but it was going to be more than just hiding in some goddamn alley like a coward while the people of the Low Town suffered for my presence.

Gideon’s quick footsteps echoed off the pavement a second before he grabbed my shoulder. His fingers tried to dig deep but I shrugged him off. He wasn’t using magic and I could only assume that the reason for it was that he was afraid of catching the attention to the assholes one block over.

“What are you thinking?” Gideon demanded in a harsh voice, sounding like he was straining not to shout. “You’re going to march out there and let them kill you. What’s that going to solve?”

“It’s going to stop them from killing anyone else,” I said, turning back to face him.

“No, it’s not! You die and they might continue killing people in Low Town. Nothing’s solved. We both know they’re going to kill people in the future because that’s what the Towers do. Only thing that would be accomplished would be that you’re dead.”

“Then go out there with me. Between the two of us, we can take them.”

Gideon’s earnest expression disappeared and he straightened, his spine becoming a steel rod before my eyes. “No.”

“What?”

“No. It’s too risky.”

“What do you mean? We can take them. End this.”

He shook his head. “And what if one of them escapes before we can kill them? The Towers will know that I’m helping you. I’m dead. There will be no one to protect my family. I won’t leave them defenseless. Not for a bunch of strangers.”

“Gideon—”

“No. I’m sorry people are dying, but I’m not willing to risk the lives of my family for them. At least,