by Megan Derr
"Then what? He decided she wasn't to his tastes? The fortress drove him mad?" Roark demanded, louder than normal just to see Cos flinch.
"She died," Cos said, shrinking down on the sofa slightly. Roark crossed his arms, doing his best to loom over the sofa. "When I—when she—"
"When what?" Roark growled when Cos couldn't finish the sentence, barely suppressing the urge to shake Cos until the words tumbled out.
"Giving—having me," Cos finally spat out, looking even more miserable at that pronouncement. "If—if it weren't for me, she'd—he'd have never—"
"Stop babbling," Roark ordered, moving closer then stepping away indecisively. Cos shied away a little, and that decided him; he'd keep his distance until Cos spilled what he knew.
"He wanted to bring her back," Cos said, quietly enough that Roark had to lean closer to hear it. He looked up at Roark, speaking louder. "He was trying—he thought he could make another woman—put her memories and feelings into another woman's body."
"That's impossible," Roark said flatly, his stomach turning at the thought. It made a certain sort of sense, however; Amara had said that the women who returned to the village all had gaps in their memories and some of them remembered things that hadn't happened to them. "If that's true, what did he need Kiran and the other men for? Unless he wanted a real man instead of a woman."
Cos shook his head, glancing down at his hands as he said, "The men were sacrifices. To bring back... her life?" Cos tried, then shook his head. "She was dead, is dead, so there had to be some life given to bring her back. Or, at least, her memories."
"Why not kill you?" Roark growled, taking a step forward before he could stop himself. "Why keep you around?"
"Power. I have—I'm a wizard," Cos said the last three words quietly, like he was admitting to a great sin. "He used me for power, like the witch used my mother for hers."
"Your mother was a wizard?" Roark asked skeptically. He had to run this by Bralin, to see if any of it was plausible. It sounded like Cos was telling the truth, but he'd concealed his true nature for so long that Roark wasn't sure he could trust him.
"No, just—she had power she couldn't use but other wizards could?" Cos explained, looking less than sure about it. "The tower is a conduit—it can draw—could draw—power from anyone inside. If they could give power."
"So you lived here, too?" Roark asked, then scowled as he remembered something Cos had said. "I thought the wizard had a daughter."
Cos blushed, nervously pushing his hair back again despite how it was already tucked neatly behind his ears. Roark stared at him expectantly, raising his eyebrows as Cos stammered something out—but it was more fragmented than the rest of Cos's explanation had been so far, and Roark rolled his eyes.
"Stop," Roark snapped, amused when Cos immediately shut his mouth, his teeth clicking together loudly in the silence. "Try again."
The color in Cos's cheeks intensified, but he sounded more composed when he started to speak again.
"My mother wanted a girl," Cos said, the words half-question. "So—I was?"
"You don't look like a girl to me," Roark drawled, giving Cos a slow perusal where he sat. Cos had filled out a little working on the farm, but he was still scrawny—certainly thin enough to pass off as a woman if he wanted to.
"I—he knew she wanted a girl, so he... I dressed as one, and learned—and my hair was long—he wanted to believe I was a girl, because my mother wanted one," Cos said, the words tumbling over each other once more.
"You don't know how to talk, do you?" Roark asked conversationally. Cos sighed, looking down at his hands. "So, let me get this straight. You expect me to believe that you are the son of the wizard who lived here and his power source of a wife who he was trying to resurrect at the expense of the village?"
Cos nodded minutely, and Roark scowled at the bleak and hopeless expression on his face—like Roark was the one who'd betrayed Cos's trust.
"You have proof? No? And why not say something sooner? What the fuck was the point of dragging us all the way up here just to discover graves?" Roark demanded, aware but uncaring that his voice was growing louder as he spoke.
Cos just stared at him silently, slouching down into the sofa like he'd give anything for it to swallow him whole.
"And what were you doing while those helpless people were being killed? Or molded into new wives for your father?" Roark demanded, grabbing Cos's chin and forcing his head up so he would look Roark in the eyes. Roark dropped his voice, tightening his grip on Cos's jaw until he flinched. "Did you watch him work? Did you ignore their pleas for help?"
"I didn't," Cos whispered, the words barely audible as he stared back at Roark. "I couldn't—it wasn't—I did what I could."
"I bet," Roark said, roughly realizing his hold on Cos. "Of course you wouldn't admit it now. Next you'll tell me you killed the wizard."
Cos stared past him, at the fireplace with the crumbling mantle behind him. He mumbled something, lifting his hand to rub at his jaw.
"What was that?" Roark demanded, drawing Cos's attention back to him by smacking Cos's hand away from his face.
"I wasn't supposed to live," Cos said flatly, as though it was a normal thing to say. "The tower—the chain reaction was supposed to take out everything but the prisoner's room."
"How convenient it didn't take out your tower," Roark snapped. He ignored the matter-of-fact way Cos had spoken about his death—that was probably just another ploy to try and rattle him.
Cos laughed a little hysterically, shaking his head back and forth a few times more than was necessary. "I was trying to kill him and he used the last of his power to keep me safe."
Roark opened his mouth—the shut it. What did he say to that?
"Why didn't you run?" Roark asked after a long moment where Cos's shoulders shook but he didn't otherwise move or make a sound.
"I couldn't," Cos said, then his eyes widened like he'd revealed a huge secret. "At first, because I was bound to the tower. Then, because—" Cos hesitated, looking up to meet Roark's eyes. "Someone in the village was helping my father."
Roark swore loudly, cursing everything from the ruined castle to Cos's lineage.
"Who?" he demanded, wondering at what point he'd bought into Cos's story. But he had been living and working with Cos for the past few months—that made the decision to believe him easier.
"I don't know," Cos said, twisting his hands together fretfully. "I never saw him. I only heard him once. He told my—he knew who to pick and he stopped word from getting out."
"Great," Roark muttered, a surge of anger flaring in his stomach. Whoever this villager was, he'd picked Kiran to die. Roark was going to kill him, slowly and painfully.
Which reminded him of the matter at hand—what was he going to do with Cos?
He could kill him. Amara would never know, and there would be one less variable to deal with.
Except that Cos could still be useful, and if his story was true, he might not be as guilty as Roark wanted him to be. There were still questions, too, that only Cos could answer. Roark would just have to keep a close eye him to make sure he didn't try to run for it or use his magic in a malevolent way.
"Why the protection spells?" Roark asked gruffly, when he realized he'd been quiet for too long.
"I don't—it was all I could do to protect them," Cos mumbled, glancing past Roark and out the window behind him to the left. "They might know who it is, or he might think they know."
"Only the villagers who returned, then? What about Amara's? Why the house and not the stable?" Roark demanded, narrowing his eyes at Cos speculatively. If Cos's story was true... well, he probably felt he was at least partly to blame. So the protection spells—and the spells on the fields to help them grow—were a penance for him.
"Just the villagers who returned," Cos said, but he didn't answer either of Roark's other two questions, just slouched lower on the couch. He looked incredibly small and miserable and Roark almost felt a little guilty
about pressing him so much—but Cos had lied and stayed quiet about too many things that Roark needed to know, with the dead wizard's conspirator at the top of that long list.
"You need to look after yourself, too," Roark said, when Cos continued his small-and-quiet routine. "You're a resource I don't want to lose, not until after we've caught and hanged this bastard."
Cos looked up sharply, staring at Roark in surprise. He visibly swallowed back whatever he wanted to say and Roark didn't even try to guess.
"You're going to help," Roark said, a plan already forming in his mind. "You're going to help, whether you want to or not."
"I will," Cos said loudly, startling himself with the noise. He continued more quietly with, "Just tell me what to do."
"Good," Roark said, smiling slowly. It was a decent plan, and it should work, never mind that it had been months since the wizard's fall. He just had to convince Bralin of that, since he'd have to help.
Speaking of Bralin, what was he doing, leaving Roark up here alone with Cos? Turning away from the sofa, Roark headed back over to the window he'd climbed in through. Leaning out, he glared down at Bralin, who was lounging and looking distinctly unconcerned as he watched the tower.
"The hell do you think you're doing?" Roark shouted. Bralin just grinned and waved cheekily, not even bothering to get up from where he'd sprawled on the ground.
"Cos!" Roark yelled, turning on his heel to come face to face with Cos. Roark started, surprised that Cos had followed him, but he recovered quickly, gesturing to the window. "Lower your damn ladder."
Cos nodded, hesitating a second before slipping past Roark to the tangled bundle of silk. At his touch, it unraveled and unwound itself, uncurling down the side of the tower.
"You first," Roark said, watching Cos closely until he climbed over the side of the tower and began his slow descent down the ladder. Once he hit the halfway point, Roark followed, fighting his own way down the silk ladder.
"Where the hell were you?" Roark demanded as soon as he reached the ground. He barely noticed when Cos sent the ladder scurrying up the side of the tower, though Bralin's eyes followed the movement curiously.
"You're a big boy." Bralin shrugged lazily, giving him a sharp grin. "I figured you could take care of yourself."
"And if he magicked me to death while you were sitting on your ass down here?" Roark asked, casting a significant glance at Cos, who looked unthreatening and the exact opposite of dangerous as he tried to disappear into the stone wall behind him.
"I'd tell Amara you were crushed by falling debris," Bralin said easily. "He didn't kill you last night after you hit him, so I figured you were pretty safe."
Rolling his eyes, Roark stalked away from them both, grumbling under his breath about idiotic wizards and curse breakers who didn't have the sense of a rock. Bralin and Cos followed and Roark listened to them with half an ear as Bralin tried to draw Cos into conversation on magic, apparently unobservant enough to think that Cos liked to talk.
*
*
*
Part Six
"For god's sake, sit down before you kill yourself," Roark snapped crankily, wiping at his sweaty forehead with the back of one dirty hand. Cos straightened, leaning heavily on his hoe. He looked incredibly stubborn and Roark thought for a moment that he was about to talk back.
Then the expression faded and he simply nodded, heading slowly for the giant oak tree at the end of the field. Roark watched until Cos sat down—practically collapsed—before turning back to his own work.
Amara thought Cos was distressed at having to dig up everything he'd gone through at the fortress. Roark didn't bother to dissuade the idea—Amara didn't need to know that Cos was a wizard or that he'd had a very small part in Kiran's death.
And she was right on one count—Cos was noticeably more strained than he'd been before Roark had tracked him down and made him talk. He was pushing himself harder, in both the day-to-day work of the farm and in his spell casting. Roark never saw him do it, but Bralin detailed all the changes Cos made at least once a day and all the power Cos was pumping into the spells.
He was pushing himself harder and he'd retreated right back into his shell and Roark honestly liked it a great deal less than he'd thought he would.
Roark actually missed the companionable silences they'd shared, listening to Cos sing while he worked or during Roark's imposed breaks, and seeing Cos more relaxed. He almost wanted to go back to that, but he didn't know how. Besides, the information Cos had shared was much more important than some half-imagined friendship.
Dropping his hoe, Roark scowled briefly at the oak tree where Cos had taken cover. He didn't understand Cos, and that was driving him crazy.
Deciding it was time to take a break himself, Roark left his tools where they were and headed towards the oak. Maybe it was time to try Bralin's ambiguous advice of 'talk to him'.
Moving through the waist-high wheat stalks, Roark tried not to think how much of their health was because of Cos's spells. Probably quite a bit, and Bralin said there were spells like that on every one of Amara's fields. How much energy did that take?
Cos was sitting with his back against the oak tree's trunk, looking distant as he watched a pair of crows circle in the distance. Roark watched them for a second too, before noisily clomping over to the water and food they'd stashed in the cool shade of the oak tree that morning.
Cos glanced at Roark quickly, looking faintly alarmed but mostly exhausted. Roark felt a little guilty—but he wasn't making Cos work himself ragged and he certainly wasn't keeping Cos awake at night. When Roark woke up in the middle of the night, Cos was always fast asleep nearby.
Perhaps Roark's proximity while he slept was making Cos's sleep less than restful? But Roark wasn't about to leave Cos alone, not after he and Bralin had worked to make such a target of him.
"Did you drink something?" Roark asked suspiciously as he helped himself to the water. Cos nodded, and Roark wondered crankily what the hell he was supposed to talk about with Cos.
Sitting down heavily a few feet from Cos, Roark stared at the lush, green fields before finally asking, "How are the lessons with Bralin going?"
Cos winced, shoving a lock of sweaty hair out of his face.
"That well," Roark muttered, stretching his aching shoulders.
"I don't," Cos began, then hesitated before continuing. "I don't understand most of what he's trying to teach me."
"Bralin's usually pretty good at explaining things simply," Roark said, a little taken aback. Cos didn't seem stupid—well, not too stupid, anyway. "Or at least he was with the trainee curse breakers we were teaching."
Cos nodded, his eyes slipping shut for a minute before he opened them slowly.
"Or maybe you'd take it in better if you were better rested," Roark said, slightly reprimanding. He still wasn't sure he approved of Cos learning how to better use his magic, but Bralin was firmly convinced Cos was a victim and on their side.
Cos's only response was to shrug. Roark glared briefly—he didn't like being dismissed.
"You're going to work less and sleep more," Roark said firmly, wondering if he could get Bralin to help him enforce that. "You need more rest than you're getting, and I won't have you collapse out here one day because you refuse to take care of yourself out of guilt."
"Okay," Cos said shakily after a moment. He was staring at his hands, refusing to look at Roark, which just wasn't right. Roark wasn't the enemy.
He probably came off that way, though, Roark reluctantly conceded. That was good, in some respects. Having Cos cowed and malleable made his life easier, and it gave him a small measure of satisfaction to know that someone involved was taking penance for Kiran's death.
On the other hand, if Cos's story was true—and Bralin had confirmed it was possible and verified what little he could—then was it really fair to punish him for a situation he had so little control over? And that after he'd taken out the wizard—his father—and stopped further de
aths.
"Do you think it will work soon?" Cos asked, breaking into Roark's thoughts. Roark shrugged, glancing over at Cos. What would Cos do after they caught the bastard who'd helped his father?
"Probably," Roark said, following Cos's empty stare to look at the distant cluster of houses that made up the village center. "Bralin's been spreading rumors for almost a week now. If anyone is going to act on them, they'll do it soon."
Cos nodded, nervously tugging at the patch of grass in front of where he was sitting. He'd already pulled up a small pile of grass Roark noticed, and he scowled at it. Cos was nothing—he was no one, and Roark shouldn't give a damn how well he was holding up under the strain of acting as bait.
Except he did, and even as confounding as that was, it was worse that he couldn't figure out any way to alleviate it.
"Why didn't you say anything?" Roark asked, the question slipping out before he thought about it. Cos glanced at him curiously, and Roark mentally cursed himself for noticing how bright Cos's honey-gold eyes seemed in the sunlight.
"About what?" Cos asked, shoving his hair out of his eyes to give Roark a quizzical look.
"Everything," Roark said impatiently. "Obviously you weren't spelled right up until Bralin got here—why didn't you tell me everything sooner?"
"Oh, um," Cos stammered, shrugging a bit. "I couldn't. At first, the spell, and then I couldn't—I didn't know how."
Roark rolled his eyes, but he could believe that. Cos wasn't very eloquent, and besides, how did you go up to someone and say, 'my father was the wizard who killed your brother'?
"You should've figured it out," Roark said grumpily. "Then we could be done with finding this bastard."
"I'm sorry," Cos said quietly, the words heavy and solemn. He still wasn't looking at Roark, but neither was he fidgeting with his pile of grass or anything else.
Roark didn't reply to that, ignoring the way his chest tightened at the apology. Instead, he stood up, ineffectually brushing at the seat of his work pants.