Chapter 17

“I..” Titus began awkwardly as Snow continued to stare at him, “I wanted to know what your plans were.”

“To order a bath for Lia,” Snow replied coldly before stepping forward, forcing Titus to step back into the narrow, dark hallway. He then closed the door behind him though he knew it wouldn’t keep Lia from hearing the whole conversation.

“No, I mean, are you going to be moving on now?”

“Why do you want to know? I think it’s quite obvious now that this partnership is done,” he gestured between the two of them.

Titus’s shoulders drooped, “would you have taken me on if you knew the whole truth?”

“Do I know the truth now? Is this all of it?” Snow shot back sharply with a scowl to match.

Anger was starting to creep into Titus’s features as well. His brows snapped together, and the corners of his mouth turned down into a stony grimace. It made him look so much harder and colder. “Since when are you owed my entire life story? What I confessed was true, I thought I was helping people, but then-”

“But then you realized those idiots are becoming as corrupt and evil as the supposed monsters they hunt,” Snow cut in with a mocking tone. “And what now? Hmm? What’s the point in staying with me?”

Titus looked as if he might bark his response but then forced himself to let out a frustrated breath before replying. “To know better.”

Snow quietly weighed whether that reply was true. “Or to put a collar around me when you realize just what I’m capable of.”

Titus opened his mouth to argue but again seemed to stop himself from saying something. His hands balled up into fists for a brief moment before relaxing.

“Your powers are … frightening. I can see that. But I stand by my first impression of you. You’re not a villain. You never were. It’s been harder to think that way about some other monsters, but Lia proves that some should be given a chance.”

Snow’s sour scowl didn’t lift with the confession, but the tightness in his shoulders started to ease enough to be seen in the dim light from the candles in his room. He looked back at the door and wondered if Lia believed him. If she would truly trust Titus with her life rather than gently enthrall him.

“Stay with her,” Titus broke in to his thoughts with the gentle suggestion, “I’ll go downstairs and order the bath. Old fella might need help bringing the tub up anyways.”

Snow watched Titus turn and head down the dark stairs without a glance back. He normally had no trouble when it came to riddles, but Titus was turning out to be something far more difficult. At first blush, he was an idiot, would-be hero, rushing headlong into some ‘wrong’ that needed to be set right, but there seemed to be in him an uncommon compassion that Snow rarely saw in others.

He told himself it could still be an act; the act of a man whose cover is blown and is now trying to minimize the damage. If their roles were reversed, Snow would be doing the same. He would be making up excuses or stories, whatever dissuaded his target from figuring out his true intentions. And even if Titus’s intentions were true now, another strange circumstance could throw doubt on the man and turn him back towards the misguided doctrine of those militant idiots.

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An ambush could still be waiting for him somewhere in the future, and Snow could not afford it. He could not let anyone put a collar on him.

Cicero suddenly came to mind and Snow wondered if he should warn him or if contacting him would lead the Saviors right to him. If there was one thing worse than a collar on Snow’s neck, it was a collar on Cicero’s. While the young man had denied his gifts and ran from them, Snow did not berate him for it. Cicero’s gifts were far more horrendous in scope and (thankfully) he had no desire to use them. Snow had always thought it a strange twist that such terrible power bloomed in one with such a tender heart, but he couldn’t deny that it gave him hope… for himself.

✵✵✵

Jorn and Titus soon arrived in the room with a large copper tub, buckets of water, and some generous-sized, heated ingots to warm the water. Snow heard the floor groan as the set up was arranged with extra linen sheets waiting off to the side. Jorn gave him an annoyed side glance, but it wasn’t as chilly as Snow expected – likely because Titus had done the bulk of the lifting.

All the time, Lia hid under the narrow cot as Snow stood before it. When the door was finally shut and the men gone, she was grateful to be able to sink her dirty, burnt body into the waiting water. Snow turned his head to set a fire ablaze in the narrow fireplace.

“Oh, what I wouldn’t give for a little soap,” she sighed as she began lifting cupfulls of water over her arms and chest. Snow then reached into his saddlebag and pulled out a small wooden box. He brought it to her and opened the lid with eyes still gently averted.

“Here. You may use mine,” he said. Lia looked at it in disbelief and gratefully took the pale pink bar that smelled of wild roses. It was only then that Lia noticed how red Snow’s palms had become.

“Is that… from taking off the collar?” she asked in surprise.

“They’ll heal,” Snow replied.

Silence crept in between them again as Lia slowly went back to washing off the black flakes of burnt skin to reveal dark pink flesh beneath – the same color as Snow’s half-baked hands. Snow was thankful much of it was coming off. The dark pink looked more explainable than charred black and he still didn’t know how long she might be with him.

While he continued to debate where she might be safest, his mind kept returning to Titus and what was revealed about the Saviors. He didn’t know if anywhere was safe anymore. If this business of armies and collars was all true, then the Saviors have finally made themselves into a true threat spurred on by a menacing rumor.

“Do you believe him?” Snow spoke up from where he sat on the cot behind her. He watched Lia’s back as she paused. Though he couldn’t see her face, he imagined a thoughtful look in her eyes as she stared at the thin suds floating on the water’s surface.

“Do you?” she asked in reply.

“I can’t risk it.”

“Why?”

“Because he’s not the first to come to me wishing to right wrongs and it has always led to trouble – even with the noblest heart.”

“What happened before?” she asked curiously.

Snow sighed. “Once, when I was searching for my place in this world, I thought I could solve murders for the local law. An open-minded, noble-hearted officer approached me and asked that I raise the recently murdered so we might know the true criminal rather than persecute innocent men.

“And it worked… for a few months. Until a man with power was fingered as the mastermind behind a string of murders.

“With the ear of the people, he accused me of manipulating the testimonies of the dead. He claimed that because I controlled those souls, I could put any name in their mouth. And while that was true, I trusted the officer, the man who encouraged me to do this, to know me better.”

“But he didn’t,” Lia added.

“No. He began to question me too, and I soon found they had issued a warrant for my arrest.”

“And you fear Titus will be the same?”

“He’s human isn’t he?” Snow said with a touch of sad humor.

“So are you,” Lia countered gently.

“Not the same though. Far from it.”