quiet.
“I only used my Gift on you because I thought things might get out of control,” Celia says. “The trainees don’t know you like I do. They might have thought you were going to hurt me. But I trust you, Nathan.”
I remember her face when she was frozen in time and she’s being honest, as she always is. She looked calm, like she was making a calculation.
I nod over to the trainees sitting across the fire from us and say, “I get the feeling everyone else expects me to rip their heart out and eat it for supper.”
“The question is, what would you do if you saw Annalise?”
“I hate her and want her dead. I want to avenge my father but I want to see her stand trial. I want justice. I want her to be found guilty. I want her punished. Severely punished. I’m thinking that being shot in the stomach and left to die slowly and painfully would do it.”
“But you won’t try to kill her the minute you see her?”
“Not that first minute. But if she’s found not guilty, or let off . . . I don’t know.” I shake my head. “What will they do to her if they find her guilty?”
“I think she’ll be imprisoned. Probably for years.”
“She killed Marcus. She should die. She should be shot.”
“I doubt the court will want to shoot her. And if you were to do that, or take the law into your own hands in any way, then I’d have no option but to arrest you. It’s the way the Alliance must work, Nathan. Fairness to all.”
“Fine.” I smile at her. “You’d have to catch me, of course.”
“Let’s hope it won’t come to that.”
* * *
It’s dark when I finish talking with Celia and I can’t see Gabriel anywhere. I ask Nesbitt and he says, “Try his tent.”
I didn’t even know Gabriel had a tent. Nesbitt nods to the one at the end of the row and I can see a green light coming from it.
I go over and drum my fingers on the canvas, saying, “Gabriel?”
He doesn’t respond but I’m sure he’s in there so I stick my head in. The tent is full of a green haze from the bowl of nightsmoke that’s on the ground near Gabriel’s head. Gabriel is lying on his side on a mat on the ground, a book open beside him. He doesn’t look up.
I say, “Hi.”
He doesn’t reply and still doesn’t look up.
“I hope you’re just pretending to read,” I say. “And really you can’t concentrate on the book because all you can think of is beating the living shit out of me.”
“I’m not sure what living shit is, but you’re not far from the truth.”
Gabriel looks at me now and I can see he’s serious. He really would like to beat me up. I’m stooped over into the tent and it isn’t very big and I feel awkward, so I kneel down.
“Do you want something?” Gabriel’s voice is full of poison.
“Um. Yeah . . . I think we need to talk.”
“Ha! Coming from you, that’s almost funny. But strangely enough I’m not in a humorous mood.”
“I wish you’d told me that you thought Annalise had been caught.”
“I wish you’d told me about your attacks on the Hunters.”
“I did tell you.”
“You told me some things, afterward, when you had to; when you couldn’t hide them anymore.”
“But you were hiding stuff about Annalise. The Hunters didn’t affect you.”
“Didn’t affect me? A group of eight Hunters that close to our camp? That close to Greatorex and the trainees?”
“But—”
“You could have got killed by them, or wounded, and I would have gone looking for you and probably got killed myself.”
“But I was—”
“I haven’t finished,” Gabriel interrupts. “I admit I hid my thoughts from you. I didn’t tell you my suspicions about Annalise being a prisoner, because I was trying to protect you. You know I hate her. I’d love to see her dead. Part of me would love to see you rip her to pieces, but another part of me knows that would be wrong, not for me or for her, but for you. You’re not yourself at the moment, Nathan. I didn’t want you to kill her and regret it after. Everything I did, I did for you. You hid your thoughts and actions from me because of what you wanted for yourself. You were only thinking of yourself. As usual.”
I think I’ve lost at talking with Gabriel.
“You should go now,” he says.
I