Chapter 11 · The Boy's Already Gone

"Say it again."

Vittal's sword pressed into Rhys's throat before the word finished echoing off stone.

"Say my son's name again, mercenary, and tell me how you know it."

Rhys didn't move. Moving got you killed with a blade that close. He'd learned that in loop three. Loop three had been short.

"Bren," he said. Slower this time. "Seventeen. Left-handed. You sent him to the eastern watch six days ago. Not because the watch needed him. Because you wanted him a day's ride from this keep before the siege closes the roads."

Vittal's jaw worked. The sword didn't waver. Something behind his eyes did.

"That's public knowledge. Anyone who watches the gate rosters—"

"Is it public knowledge you didn't tell his mother where he went?" Rhys kept his voice flat. "That you told her he was at the mill?"

The blade pressed harder. Heat opened under his jaw. He felt the first drop of blood slide into his collar.

"Who sent you."

"Nobody sent me."

"Then how—"

"I watched you die telling that lie," Rhys said. "I watched Bren come back through the east gate three days after the fall, looking for a father who wasn't standing there anymore.