End him - Aksala growled and retreated to the back of my mind, waiting. Her excited rage rang through me.
I strolled to my father's desk, which he had the nerve to sit at. My finger brushed the familiar, polished wood, and p.ain clawed at me. This was the last part I silently promised my mother and father.
Grief had no place here, not yet.
I focused instead on the sheets of paper strewn over the wood. They started out legible, numbers that might have been accounts, a list of names, but then scribbles drowned in black ink marred the rest of the pages.
I didn’t give Miles the satisfaction of watching him even out of the corner of my eye. It was an insult to not even glance at your opponent. But I didn’t see him as one, and he knew that.
When I looked up, he wasn’t afraid anymore. He w
