“Are you worried?” Ezo asked.

“Why would I be worried?”

“Because he isn’t here.”

Kammon sat across from Ezo in the Beaten Brag tavern. It was the only place of any size north of Mountain View for two days. He’d expected Voth to be waiting for them there, but the man had disappeared.

“He’ll show up somewhere,” he said to Ezo. In truth, he was worried. Voth wasn’t the man to take a defeat lightly. It wasn’t a question of if he’d show up. It was how many people he’d bring with him when he did.

“What happened between you two?” Ezo asked.

Dinner had been roasted fish and vegetables, and Ezo was now snacking on leftover cheese and bread from earlier. Remec was better than the local cook, but the meal sufficiently filled them and it hit the spot after their departure from Mountainkeep.

Kammon didn’t like to think about his years at the university often. Or his time as one of the War-Sworn. Or his childhood. This, right here with Ezo, was the best his life had ever given him. They might be on the run, but he wasn’t alone. And for the first time in his memory, he wasn’t surrounded by those who feared him.

“Voth was a student. That’s all.”

Ezo rolled his eyes. “You can be a pain in the ass, but he really thinks you refused to teach him.”

Kammon took a long drink of his ale and leaned back in the booth. “I told you I was seven when they found me and forced me into the university.”

Ezo nodded, but remained quiet. Kammon hadn’t shared much of his past with Ezo. As much as he didn’t want to talk about it, though, he’d been walking through Ezo’s worst nightmares lately. It wasn’t trust that kept his lips sealed. He owed Ezo more than a brusque response. Especially considering they were in this mess because of him to begin with.

“The problems I had at the university weren’t just because of my strength. And it wasn’t that my talent was fire. Those were issue enough, but I didn’t trust anyone, and I absorbed knowledge faster than my teachers wanted to teach me.”

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“They wanted to slow you down, so you wouldn’t hurt yourself,” Ezo said.

“They were keeping me from learning,” Kammon answered. “Or that’s what I thought. I’m still not sure which is true. In retrospect, I was doing things I shouldn’t, far too young. But instead of guiding my learning, they set specific lessons and never allowed for my curiosity. So I learned without them.”

“They didn’t like that,” Ezo smiled at Kammon.

Kammon had to still the desire to reach across and run his hand through Ezo’s long, dark hair. It would surprise Ezo to know just how that thought comforted him. That Ezo was within reach.

“No. I began to hide what I was doing. As I got older, they had no idea of what I could do. At fourteen, I made a mistake and fought with another student and revealed just how far along I was in my studies. They tried to hobble me with students of my own then. At fourteen, most of the people they sent to me were older than me, and no one was willing to learn from a youngster.”

“Age has nothing to do with what you can teach.”

Kammon smiled. “You would have done horribly at the university. You’re too open.”

“One of us has to have faith in the world,” Ezo said, raising his mug and drank.

Kammon shook his head, but continued. “When I turned seventeen, I was preparing to take the Vow and they sent Voth to me.”

“And he hated you immediately?”

“No, actually. Voth worked hard in the beginning. He was strong with his element, and he wanted to learn. But I did the same thing to him that they did to me. I tried to slow him down because he was adamant that he had to study the most dangerous magics first. He was determined to join the War-Sworn. It was a family legacy, and he was going to be the best among them.”

“Why would anyone want that to be their legacy?” Ezo asked.

“Jacob taught you to mistrust the War-Sworn and the university, but many people see it as their duty. Jacob himself felt it at one point in his life.”

“Alright. Putting that aside. You tried to protect Voth.”

“I did. But when he demanded I teach him more, I tried to prove that he wasn’t ready by showing him how dangerous it could be. Our relationship became very adversarial, with him throwing attacks at me randomly to catch me off guard.”

“He never did, did he?”

“No. I didn’t trust anyone. I was always on guard.”

“That pissed him off.”

“Yes. When I turned 18, I took the Vow and left him behind. I never looked back, and I never saw him again. Until we visited the university.”

Ezo nodded. “You became the legend he could never be, and then you showed up using all four elements. And he thinks you hid that from him on purpose.”

It was problematic just how attractive Ezo’s intelligence was. “Apparently. I’ve said it before. I wasn’t a good teacher. I wasn’t patient, and I wasn’t interested in it. But Voth was like me in that he learned on his own. I just wasn’t paying attention to notice.”

“So he’s still out there somewhere,” Ezo said.

Kammon nodded. “He’ll find us, eventually. We need to be ready when he does.”

Ezo slipped his hand under Kammon’s where it lay on the table. “Let him try. There’s nothing he can throw at us that we can’t handle.”