Fire - Kristin Cashore [113]
Quislam? Brigan offered. Lord Quislam from the south?
Yes, Quislam.
But isn’t Quislam Gentian’s ally?
Fire strained to remember. Yes, Quislam is Gentian’s ally. But it makes no difference, other than to explain why Gunner stopped fighting once he entered the room.
But, Brigan thought, if Gunner thinks himself safe in the room of an ally, then perhaps he’ll be easier to handle. Perhaps her mistake had been fortunate.
Fire was turning hysterical. It isn’t. It’s not fortunate. It creates countless problems.
Fire—
Her concentration was fracturing to pieces and she grasped wildly at a thing that seemed, suddenly and senselessly, to matter. Brigan, your mental control is as strong as anyone’s I’ve ever encountered. Look how well you’re able to communicate - you’re practically sending me sentences. And you don’t need to explain why you’re so strong. You made yourself that way of necessity. My father—Fire was impossibly drained. A fist in her head was punching at her brain. My father hated you more than anyone.
Fire—
Brigan, I’m so tired.
Fire.
Brigan was saying her name, and he was sending her a feeling. It was courage and strength, and something else too, as if he were standing with her, as if he’d taken her within himself, letting her rest her entire body for a moment on his backbone, her mind in his mind, her heart in the fire of his.
The fire of Brigan’s heart was astounding. Fire understood, and almost could not believe, that the feeling he was sending her was love.
Pull yourself together, he thought to her. Get yourself into that room.
She climbed out from under the cart. She opened the door to the room.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
BOTH GENTIAN AND Gunner sat in chairs facing the entry. As she shut the door, Gunner rose to his feet and edged sideways against the wall in a direction that brought him slightly nearer to her.
A shield with Quislam’s colours was propped against a footstool. Fire saw that the carpet was a patchwork of squares in rust, brown, and red; the curtains red; the sofa and chairs brown. At least they wouldn’t have to worry about bloodstains. She soaked in the feeling of these two men, and knew immediately where the trouble would lie in this room. Of course it would not be with Gentian, so charming and so blitheringly happy to see her, so easy for even her torpid mind to invade that she would have wondered how such a man could ever have risen to a place of power, had the answer not stood scowling before her in the form of Gunner.
He was a bit like Nash used to be: unpredictable, confusing, too much for her to control, but not entirely under his own control either. He began to prowl back and forth along the wall, his eyes always on her. And though he was not a big man or imposing, something tight and smooth in his movements caused Fire to see suddenly why the others had been worried. He was a calculating creature with a capacity for strong, fast viciousness.
‘Won’t you sit down, Gunner?’ Fire murmured, moving herself sideways, away from both of them, and seating herself calmly on the sofa - which was a mistake, because more than one person could fit on a sofa, and the sofa was where Gunner now seemed inclined to sit. She fought him with her mind, which felt puffy and stiff, pushed him back toward the seats nearer his father, but he would not sit if he couldn’t sit with her. He retreated to his wall and resumed prowling.
‘And what can we do for you, darling child?’ Gentian said, slightly drunk and bouncing in his seat with happiness.
How she wished she could go slowly. But her time in this room was borrowed from Lord Quislam.
‘I want to join your side,’ she said. ‘I want your protection.’
‘You’re not to be trusted, looking like that,’ Gunner growled.
‘Never trust a monster.’
Gentian chided his son. ‘Gunner! Did she not prove her trustworthiness when we were set upon in the hallway? Mydogg wouldn’t wish us to be rude.’
‘Mydogg does not care what we do, as long as it’s to his advantage, ’ Gunner said. ‘We shouldn’t trust