Page 36 of The Black Table
“That’s what I thought,” she finishes. “Porter’s. Get down here.Now.”
A sharpcrackand a flash of blue light sends the phone from my fingers and thudding onto the table.
I pause only a moment, then stand. Not allowing myself to feel the reluctance.
She’s right. This is my duty.
It’s all of ours.
Minutes later,outside Porter’s. I roll my shoulders, release tension. Unneeded wear on the muscles.
I start walking. Footsteps at my side: Lanz.
“You all right?”
I nod, eyes front.
I don’t like interfering like that.
No, correction: I don’t likehavingto interfere like that.
I don’t like that this kind of confrontation is happening on campus. My campus—our campus.
Not when what we need is peace. Concentration. Absolute focus.
Lanz drops away, and the four of us make the walk back to Camlann in silence, nothing but our footsteps on the gravel.
I certainly have nothing to say.
The house is dark when we step back in. A dramatic sigh from my left—Kai. My jaw clenches against my will.
“Well, now what?” he says, throwing himself on a couch.
“Everyone to bed.” I answer without looking at him. Because as soon as I lock him in my sights, I can’t be held responsible for my actions.
Instead, I head for the staircase to the salle.
Kai snorts and mutters something I don’t allow myself to hear.
“What about you?” Callahan asks me.
“I’ll sleep later.”
I flick on the lights, the walls white against the stark black of the window glass looking out on the night, and unrack my blade. Take to the strip.
En garde. Parry 4. Riposte. Recover. Again.
No opponent. No mask, even. Only myself.
Minutes pass, or hours. The balls of my feet ache and my calves are taut with fatigue, shoulder and forearm burning.
Still, I persist.
Because now, especially now, there is something inside me, a burgeoning sense of dread I can’t shake, not with prayer or magic or drill after drill after drill.
That girl is going to be a problem.
NINE
