Cara. Then Cara’s fist slammed into my jaw.
I staggered sideways into the cliff. One hand darted to the boneshatter charm hidden in my belt, before I caught myself. “What the fuck?”
She advanced on me with a murderous look in her eye. “Glorious? I saw that slip of yours. It’s only by Khalmet’s choice you’re standing here at all! You think I want to scrape your bloodsoaked carcass off the rocks, the way you did with Sethan? Did you forget how glorious that was?”
Blood pouring black from Sethan’s mouth, gleam of bones poking through his side, and I didn’t want to look lower, oh mother of maidens, how could he still be alive? I clenched my jaw, and welcomed the white-hot stab of pain where Cara’s fist had landed.
“Leave it, Cara.” She hadn’t watched Sethan die. What the fuck would she know about it?
Cara jabbed a finger at my chest. “The hell I will. Accidents are one thing; we all feel Khalmet’s touch in the end. But this! You’d be dead through your own gods-damned stupidity. At least Sethan’s death wasn’t his fault!”
“No, it was your father’s,” I snarled.
Cara’s head rocked back. Hurt flared in her eyes, before they went hard as granite.
My anger died to ashes. Shit. Clearly I hadn’t learned a thing from my fight with Jylla. I scrubbed a hand over my face, praying I hadn’t just destroyed a years-long friendship.
“Cara...I didn’t mean that. Truly. Denion made the best call he could. Nobody could’ve predicted a rockfall that big, after such a brief storm.” My buoyant energy from Kinslayer leaked away, leaving me weary and a little sick. I knew how bad it had burned Cara when no convoy would hire her father again, despite his forty years of experience. How she’d flinched when tavern gossips proclaimed Denion’s incompetence had killed all those men, as if they knew anything about weighing risks in the mountains. Gods damn me, why couldn’t I rule my tongue? Jylla had deserved every harsh word, but Cara was only doing her job.
My apology made all the impact of a pebble thrown at a glacier. Cara eyed me with a frozen disdain that was worse than any of her anger. “Maybe money’s the only language you’ll understand, Dev. I’m docking half your pay for this run. If I catch you jeopardizing your safety or that of the convoy again, you’re out of a job.”
“Fine.” My pay as an outrider was a pittance compared to what Bren had promised me. She could dock it all, if it’d thaw the ice in her eyes.
“One more thing,” Cara said, still in a voice colder than a snowmelt stream. “Hand over those carcabon stones.”
“What?” Damn it, she might have let the stones slide, if I hadn’t ripped her so hard. “You dock my pay, that’s fair. Taking my property, that’s not.”
“You think I’m going to let you profit from this?” She folded her arms. “If you want to stay on with this convoy, hand them over. Or head back to Ninavel. Your choice.”
Behind Cara, Kiran was twitching like he’d stepped on a fire ant nest. He opened his mouth. I scowled at him. Last thing I needed was for him to stumble in and make things worse. Thank Khalmet, he took the hint and subsided, although the glare he directed at me nearly matched Cara’s.
I slapped my belt pouch into Cara’s hand, and prayed she wouldn’t search my pack. “There. You happy?”
“Not in the least.” She opened the pouch and checked the contents. Aimed another freezing stare my way, then rounded on Kiran. “You want to be an outrider, kid? Then learn this lesson well. The lives of everyone in the convoy depend on us. If you can’t put that responsibility over your own desires, do us all a favor and stay home. Got it?”
Kiran’s mouth tightened to a thin line. He stared at the ground and jerked his head in a nod. Khalmet’s hand, you’d think he’d been the one caught climbing Kinslayer. He’d better learn to control that face of his before we faced the guards at the Alathian border.
“Crews are almost done clearing the trail. I’d better see you two back on station at the convoy before we move.” Cara stalked off down the talus.
I blew out a breath. “Well, that could’ve gone worse.”
Kiran raised his eyes to give me a disbelieving look. “I don’t see how. You risked your life and our cover in the convoy, and we don’t even have a stone to