Page 106 of Silver & Gold

“I’m so glad to see you again,” Julian said, his young face eager. “I didn’t think I would.”

“I’m not that easy to kill.”

“Oh, I didn’t think you’d be killed. I thought you’d disappear. With Raider.”

Had he been that obvious? “I meant to. It didn’t work out.”

“Things never work out like we plan, do they?”

Seth started pacing again. “Unfortunately, no.”

“I wouldn’t say unfortunately. If things had worked out according to your original plan, you would’ve hauled me back to Masir—and you and Raider wouldn’t have each other like you do.”

“Stop acting like a wise old man. You’re what, seventeen?”

“Eighteen actually.”

“Still a kid. And even if you were a wise old man, I wouldn’t have the patience for it right now. Keep it to yourself.”

Julian gave him a petulant look that Seth felt proved his point.

“Can I at least share what I’ve been working on?” Julian withdrew a syringe from his pocket.

Seth halted his pacing. “What the fuck is that? And don’t let Raider see it.”

“It’s actually for Raider. Just in case.”

Seth strode toward Julian with such aggression that the young arcanist plastered himself to the wall. He had that startled rabbit look on his face, but that wasn’t enough to make Seth check himself. Every ounce of his control was going toward not smacking that syringe from Julian’s hand.

Seth gritted out, “Fucking explain that.”

“Um … you know I spent a lot of time with Kahzir’s book?”

“Obviously. What about it? And don’t tell me what you actually read. I’m not putting myself in that position again.”

Frustration flitted through Julian’s eyes. “I can’t tell you about this without telling you about the book.”

“Then no. Don’t tell me.”

“Seth. Let him.”

At the sound of Raider’s voice, Seth spun to see him emerge from the dungeon. His face was pale. His eyes were haunted. But he was himself.

And yet, when Seth rocked toward him, Raider put up a hand, asking him for space. It just about killed Seth to give it to him, but he did.

Raider said to Julian, “Tell him. Tell me.”

Julian’s eyes darted between the two of them, much as they had that night when Seth and Raider had caught up with him in the vineyard. “Are you sure?”

Raider settled back against the wall by the dungeon door. He crossed his arms over his bare abdomen. He nodded.

Julian cleared his throat. He tucked the syringe back into a pocket of his green robes.

The young arcanist said, “I wanted to figure out a way to neutralize Kahzir’s neural intrusion. Once something like that exists in the world, it exists. It doesn’t vanish, so there must be a counterbalance for it. That drug—”’

“Wait,” Seth cut in. “I came across that phrase, neural intrusion, when I looked in the book that night in the theater, but I don’t understand it.”

Seth glanced at Raider, but he shook his head. He didn’t understand it either.