though there had been a slight chance that Esom’s spy theory was true. But Rift had formulated that objection too fast for an innocent person, as if he had already thought about what he would say if he was accused. “Esom was the only groundling nearby, and he says it wasn’t him. It could have been one of Ardan’s men, who managed not to get washed away by the flood, but I don’t think so.” He watched Rift thoughtfully. “He was hit on the head so whoever found him would think a groundling did it.”
Rift showed his teeth briefly. “And none of your friends are smart enough to think of that?”
“None of my friends would have bothered to hide it.” All the Indigo Cloud Raksura could have killed Ardan to protect the seed, but none of them would have thought of concealing the act. Moon shook his head. “Ardan helped you. He took care of you. You could have left when he took you back to the Reaches to look for the seed. He could have chained you up, put spells on you, but he didn’t. He didn’t need to. He’d made you his friend, and that was the only chain he thought he needed. But he didn’t really know you, did he?”
“You’re wrong. He would never have let me leave.” Rift leaned forward urgently. “He would have made me take him to steal another seed.”
“Maybe.” But something about his expression told Moon that Rift had just thought of that convenient excuse. “He wasn’t afraid of you. He had his back to you.”
Rift hissed, glaring at him. “So you’ve never killed anyone by stealth? You’ve never had to, to survive?”
Moon snorted. It was almost funny. “I killed a Fell ruler by stealth. But that was a Fell.” It had made him a target and eventually brought the Fell to Indigo Cloud, but that was beside the point. “What’s it like to kill someone who trusts you?”
Rift snarled silently and looked away, but there was something false about the emotion behind it. Moon realized at that moment what had bothered him all along about Rift. Rift had been playing a part for him, just like the groundlings who acted out plays for the festival crowds in Kish. Just like Moon had pretended to be a groundling for all those turns. You saw through him, because he’s not any better at it than you are. That story that Rift had told, about being thrown out of his court because of a fight with another warrior, had been calculated to engender sympathy. Moon hadn’t believed it at the time, and it seemed less and less likely the more he spoke to Rift.
Groundlings had always been wary of Moon because somehow they had sensed he was lying to them, even if they weren’t sure why or what about. Now he knew just what that elusive sense of wrongness felt like.
For Moon, Rift had been playing the part of a poor lonely solitary who needed help, probably just a variation on the part he had played for Ardan, but more geared toward Raksuran sensibilities. The part he had played for the guards and the crew of the Klodifore, the groundlings he had been free to terrorize, was probably a lot closer to the real Rift. With considerably less patience, Moon said, “Just tell me why you did it.”
“I’ve told you why. He wouldn’t let me go.” Rift sounded more sulky than angry.
“After you told him I was a solitary, he offered to let me stay on the leviathan, if I didn’t want to go back with the court,” Moon said. “What did you tell him, about why you left your court?”
Rift tensed up again, his spines trembling. “I didn’t tell him anything.”
“If you’d lied to him to make him feel sorry for you, that wouldn’t have mattered. I lived with groundlings; everything I did and said was a lie. But what if you told him the truth, and you couldn’t take the chance that he’d tell us.” It was a guess, but Moon saw Rift’s whole body go rigid.
Rift bared his fangs. “You’re assuming I was planning to beg to join your court. From what I’ve heard, it’s so close to dying off, they had to take a solitary as a consort.”
Moon didn’t take the bait, but it made him more certain he was on the right trail. “No, I’m assuming you want to find another group of Raksura to get close to, because you’re