“Nic was sure.”And that was all Gabriel needed to know.
Alise craned her head up at the towering edifice.“If Elal is working with both Sammael and El-Adrel…” She leveled her wizard-black gaze on Jadren, fury in it as she spoke to Gabriel.“You’re right.This is a trap.”
“Not of my doing,” Jadren ground out.
“We have no reason to trust you,” Selly put in coolly.“In fact, we have every reason not to.”
Jadren clenched his jaw, a muscle there bulging as he met Selly’s accusing eyes.“I helped save your life, at great risk to my own health and sanity.”
“The perfect subterfuge to gain trust,” she countered.
Han, who’d been listening in stoic silence, spoke up then.“It does look damning, Wizard El-Adrel.”
Concentrating on his restive mount—and likely attempting to compose himself—Jadren finally offered a response.“I don’t see how I can prove a negative.I signed your bloody NDA, your bizarre contract, but I’ll be seen as a person of suspicion until I commit a crime against the house.”
“Yes, well, we’ve seen how well that NDA worked to control Laryn,” Gabriel bit out.
“Only because you weren’t awake to enforce it,” Jadren countered.“You can take retribution against me at any time, should I fail to observe its strictures, and the contract’s.You have the power.”
“By the time I discover you’ve betrayed me, it might be too late,” Gabriel noted.
Jadren opened his mouth.Closed it.Then shrugged.“Clearly only my death without incident will absolve me.”
“I can live with that,” Selly observed.When Gabriel glanced at her in question, startled by Selly’s cold assessment, she shrugged.“I haven’t been clear-headed for long, but it occurs to me that supposedly stepping in to heroically save your sister is the perfect way for Wizard Jadren to ingratiate himself in your confidence.It should be noted that he waited until you were incapacitated before he acted.If the plan had been to see you comatose or dead, as has turned out to be quite convenient for our enemies, it worked perfectly.”
Gabriel couldn’t help considering all the incidents where Jadren was nearby when trouble erupted.By the look on the El-Adrel wizard’s face, the same had occurred to him.“I won’t pass judgment on Wizard Jadren in the absence of firm evidence.I am, however, not taking suggestions from you,” he added to Jadren.“Therefore, we’re abandoning this approach.”Wheeling Vale around, he urged him back the way they’d come.
“But we can’t desert Nic!”Alise nearly wailed in despair.
Gabriel swallowed the urge to bite her head off for suggesting he might.“We’re not abandoning her.We’re simply not doing this the Convocation-approved way.I’ve succeeded in the past because I’m not of the Convocation.We’re doing this my way.”He flicked a glance at the still-fuming Jadren.“A way our enemies won’t expect, in the eventuality that they have been forewarned.”
“I tell you, I didn’t—”
Gabriel cut Jadren off with a sharp chop of his hand, then raised it and pointed for the group to follow.As if obeying the command, his magic responded, rising up with the power he’d been familiar with before.
Good.For what he had in mind, he’d need it.