“I could not,” he replied, his eyes open and entirely focused on Ybelline. “You know why.”
“I was not yet born.”
“You were, but you were an infant. You were not even under consideration, and Ybelline, there was no one else. You know the Tha’alanari—you are familiar with all of their number. Could they do what I have done?”
“No—but that is to their credit.”
“Could they keep what I have done a secret? Could they carry that burden, and the guilt of it, on their own?”
She was silent.
“Do you believe that that knowledge would be of benefit to the Tha’alanari?”
“You are no longer my teacher,” she said. “Nor my master. I will not play these games with you again.”
Severn looked at them both. To Adellos he was barely in the room. But he thought his presence was more significant to Ybelline. And he understood what had happened, what was happening, even now.
“No, she does not. She does not believe that this would help the Tha’alanari in any way.”
Her eyes opened; they met Severn’s. He hated the color green in that moment. He thought he might hate it forever. The green of her dress. The green of her eyes.
“You went to the Oracular Halls,” Adellos continued, as if Severn had not spoken. “You spoke with the Oracle. You understand what Tessa was offered. I do not believe the Oracle herself understood it—not at the time.”
“But you did.”
“I would not have understood it had I seen it myself—not when the children were younger. There are laws for areason, even be they Imperial Laws.”
“There were no laws to forbid the interaction of two mortals. Master Sabrai broke no laws in allowing the visit.”
“It is his lack of oversight that led, in the end, to everything that happened afterward.”
“No.”The single word was a study in fury, in rage. “It was fear that led to everything—your fear. Barrani fear.”
“Which would not have existed were it not for that visit.” This time, when Adellos rose, he was not ordered back to his seat. “They were young—all of them. They understood the world they wished to build, but did not see with any clarity the world in which they lived.
“The justice you desire, and the desire which led you to take part in this unearthing of past atrocities, has already been accomplished. It was accomplished long ago, when I was a younger castelord. I ask you to leave it now. I will offer you everything that I have kept from any of our people.”
“You will offer that anyway,” she countered. “You will have no choice.”
“And will you now turn your experience with the Imperial Service against me? Will you force me to surrender my thoughts and my experiences without agreement? Will you take from me what the Emperor commands we take from his citizens at his whim?”
“Will you force me to do so?”
“Yes, if that is necessary.”
Severn closed his eyes. Opened them again. “Ybelline.”
She stared at Adellos.
He tightened his hand around her elbow, demanding, in silence, her attention. She struggled to break not his grip but the grip of her own anger.
Severn bent his head; he did not remove his hand. “Ybelline Rabon’alani.”
As if the words were a key that could unlock the grip of pain and grief she did not choose to share, she turned to Severn. “He tried to murder you,” she finally said. “That act is against the law—of both your kin and mine. He cannot be castelord.”
“No one else knows.”
“The Tha’alanari know,” she said, her voice softening slightly as she met Severn’s gaze.