Gray planted his feet, not giving a shit if the Major broke his face for it, his heels dragging in the carpet.

Gray tugged free, swaying to get his balance.

‘Sit, kid,’ said the Major.

The Major reached into his pocket and offered him a handkerchief.

Gray stared at it, dazed.

‘You’re bleeding,’ said the Major, shaking his handkerchief.

Gray refused to reach for the handkerchief, didn’t care if his head was on fire.

The Major jerked his eyebrows and stowed his handkerchief back in his pocket.

‘How old are you, really?’ said the Major.

There was no way the Major was asking Gray this, not with the view they were looking down on from that window, with the fresh carnage and chaos just below them.

‘I’ll say something, and you tell me if I’m getting warm,’ said the Major.

The quiet pounded in the air between them. Gray could barely understand the words coming out of this man’s mouth.

‘You weren’t fed properly,’ said the Major. He waited and waited for Gray to reply. Then, ‘Your guardian is ignorant of the diet required for a mage or a sorcerer. You guys need a lot of food. That’s why you’re small. Really, you’re almost sixteen. Yes? I’m getting warm?’

Gray said words, said cold, and no, or perhaps he just mouthed them, because there was a ripple of hard impatience on the Major’s features before he shuttered his expression. He walked to the desk and flipped through a stack of books there. They were burned and curled around the edges from fire, long ago.

‘Codder found these in Longwark’s home.’ The Major tossed them at Gray’s feet, one by one. ‘Property of Ryan Griffin. Property of Wynn Griffin. Aiden Griffin. Rory. Tyler. Which one was dad, kid?’

Gray rubbed his jaw, blinking sweat and blood out of his eyes, slowly dawning horror opening in the pit of his stomach. Longwark’s home. That couldn’t be right. Elona had taken him and Alistair up to Krydon. Longwark had nothing to do with anything.

When Gray didn’t answer, the Major looked up. ‘You can speak now. When I ask you a question. Which one of the Griffin brothers was your father?’

‘I don’t know,’ Gray whispered.

For a second the Major stilled, glancing at something that had darted past the window.

A crow.

‘It’s clear to me,’ the Major said, ‘Longwark took you from the Griffin home. He was there at the sight of the Griffin and Wilde duel. And so were you.’ He nodded at the books. ‘You’re not some random bastard mage born out of wedlock.’

‘I’m not - I swear -‘

‘There’s about a one in a billion chance of a bastard mage happening. You creepy motherfuckers nearly always need to be carefully bred to happen.’ He fixed Gray with his careful gaze. ‘You came from the Griffin home. You’re not illegitimate.’

Gray’s lips parted silently. He was unsure what the hell he was supposed to say to such a thing, but he got the feeling if he didn’t respond, the Major would knock him flat, get mad, do something-

’No,’ said Gray. The word sounded so tremulous and was so obviously a lie, even to Gray’s own ears, that he hurried to cover it up with more words, ’No, that’s not - right. No, I’m not mage, so …’

But he couldn’t keep just saying words, words with no feeling or strength behind them. The Major’s eyebrows were creeping higher and higher up on his forehead as he watched Gray.

Gray was digging a deeper hole for himself and he needed to shut up.

Gray’d always known his papers were false. Elona had organised it herself, to hide him. But, she’d always refused to answer Gray’s questions. She didn’t trust him not to let information slip to the wrong person. Alistair - Alistair had known, too. But, Alistair hated talking about it, how they came to live in Krydon. Alistair’s traumatised ass remembered everything, whereas Gray remembered nothing.

‘Longwark took you from the Griffin home,’ said the Major. ‘After the duel. Nine years ago. It wasn’t Wilde, was it?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Gray softly. ‘No. I’m not …’

There was a horrible silence, and Gray tried to rein in his fear, his breath.

‘Sit, kid, before you faint.’

When Gray stayed frozen, the Major broke eye contact and began poking around the office, opening drawers and lifting papers from the desk.

‘I’m seeing a lot of family resemblance,’ the Major said, eventually. ‘I worked with some of the Griffins. They all had your dark hair and grey eyes.’

Gray chewed the inside of his lip.

‘That thing you’re doing with your mouth,’ said the Major, his thumb tracing the corner of a stack of paperwork on the desk, ‘that’s telling me you’re scared, Wynn - did you know him? Wynn Griffin? - he’d do that, too. Every time before a fight.’

Gray stopped chewing the inside of his lip.

‘You’re untrained, yes?’ said the Major.

Gray couldn’t speak, couldn't move.

‘When I ask a question, you answer. You’re not trained? Branbright, Longwark, they taught you nothing.’

‘No.’

‘I can tell.’

The Major examined a quill from the drawer and then dropped it back.

‘No wand,’ he continued. ‘No mastery in your voice. We have laws for registration and training for a reason, kid. Other than you being a chaotic magic-bomb waiting to go off when you wave your damn hand the wrong way, you’re a sitting duck for poachers and the black market. You’re lucky you haven’t been torn apart and had your blood, sweat, hair, and tears bottled and sold.’

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‘Poachers?’ Gray said, numbly.

‘Yeah. Poachers. Clochaint, how protected have you been here?’

Gray pressed his hand to his sore jaw, staring hard at the string tying his boot together.

‘You Wynn’s boy?’ said the Major, eventually.

‘I don’t know - I don’t know him.’

‘Knew him,’ corrected the Major. His eyes were dark. ‘You Ryan and Faye’s child?’

Gray shook his head.

‘No, hm? No sorcery blood in you, course not. That wouldn’t be why you’re hiding out in this shithole, covered in Branbright’s scent, unregistered and untrained, and your boot tied together with string, instead of living in the ridiculous luxury of the mage guild. Where Wynn’s boy should be. He should’ve been there for two years, now.’

The Major’s voice, his stance, was neutral. Casual even. ‘Sit.’

He nimbly unbuttoned his jacket and flung it over a rack by the fire. It slipped off and tumbled to the floor.

Gray stayed rigidly still, his eyes on the fallen jacket.

The Major moved in closer, slow and deliberate. ’Sit down, answer my questions, and you’ll walk away just fine. But if you make me -‘

‘You don’t have to execute them,’ Gray said.

‘Sit down.’

‘Harriette’s just a little girl. She’s only ten.’

The Major twitched his eyebrows, his gaze watchful. ‘You should’ve been down on the mage register, regardless of if you have magic or not. Even mage bastards need to be registered. Everyone knows the penalty for harbouring an unregistered mage. I’m just following the law.’

‘Please-’

‘Sit.’

‘You don’t have to -’

‘Are we still going over this? Sit down.’

The door, Gray thought. It couldn’t be so far behind him. He stepped back.

The Major reached out a hand so fast Gray didn’t see it. Gods, Gray’s cheek was on fire so hot it was beginning to numb.

‘Sit,' said the Major. 'Answer my questions. Understand?’

‘You’re making a mistake-’

‘You’ve made a mistake. They’re going to die, because they’ve been hiding you. Don’t blame me for following the law.’

Gray trembled. Tried to push down his panic. He couldn’t breathe. ‘Harriette’s had nothing to do with anything-’

‘Harriette will lose her head.’

‘You can’t-’

The Major backhanded him so hard, Gray gave an involuntary cry.

‘Sit down,’ said the Major.

Anger erupted inside Gray’s gut, spilling out to his fingers and toes. He started hissing words, so hot, so full of rage, they carried power like a curse. Like Sorena had done, that night outside the stables.

Like a damned idiot.

Because he didn’t have wandless magic.

Because his curses landed no punch.

Because it was confirming to the Major that Gray was what he thought he was.

The Major clamped his cold hand over Gray’s mouth, stemming the flow of words.

His breath huffed against Gray’s cheek. He shuddered. There were goosebumps on his arms, the hair on his hands standing on end.

‘Gods,’ said the Major. ‘Fuck. I knew it.’

Slowly, he peeled his hand off Gray’s mouth.

‘One more curse out of you, kid, and I’ll throw you back into the cells. I’m a king’s soldier. You could be put to death for throwing your magic –‘

Gray made a mad bolt for the door.

His fingertips barely grazed the handle when pain burst in his ankle. His leg buckled and he crashed to the floor, palms grazing against the carpet and chin smacking hard enough to make his teeth clack.

He cried out and rolled away, but a hand clamped down on his leg, dragging him back across the rough carpet like he was nothing.

‘No,’ Gray gasped, the agony in his ankle overwhelming. He’d never felt pain like this. ’No!’

The Major grabbed a fistful of Gray’s sweater, yanking him up and shoving him into the chair. Gray swung at him, a weak, desperate punch barely landing on the Major’s eye.

‘Did you just try to hit me?’ the Major said.

‘Go to hell.’

‘Aggressive,’ he said, ‘for a mage.’

The Major grabbed Gray’s injured leg. He was too close to Gray – Gray could smell him, his sweat, and something wilder, something animal.

‘Stop struggling,’ the Major said coolly. ‘Stop struggling, answer my questions, and the pain stops. My word.’

Gray gritted his teeth. ‘Your word doesn’t mean shit to me.’

The Major’s grip on his leg tightened. ‘You got zero sense of self preservation, kid.’

Gray’s hands hovered uselessly over the Major’s, trembling. The threat of more pain hung heavy in the air. He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to block it out. But when he opened them again, the Major’s gaze was fixed on his face, steady and cold.

The Major considered him for a moment. He stood up and ran his hand over his jaw, his dark hair hanging in his eyes.

‘Are you going to calm down and answer my questions?’

‘If you – promise not to hurt anyone,’ Gray said. ‘Don’t execute them.’

He raised his eyebrows. ‘You don’t get to call the shots, kid.’ He paused. ‘When did you last see Longwark?’

Gray curled his fingers into a fist. Stayed silent.

The Major stayed silent, too.

Waiting.

It was the sort of silence that hung in the air like a black storm cloud, the sort of silence that happened in the moments before lightning lanced onto baked earth, silence so complete it almost clapped and dragged like too-close thunder.

The muscles around the Major’s mouth tightened. His jaw clicked. ‘Fine. I’ll go attend to Barin Haxley and … Harriette.’

He bustled through the drawer of the desk and pulled out and examined a phial.

Gray needed to stall him, he needed to convince him-

‘Wait,’ Gray said, his voice coming out hysterical. ‘Just wait before you-‘

The Major held Gray’s face and forced the tonic down his throat. Gray sputtered and struggled, and his magic came to his skin, like it rarely would when he was utterly panicked, lighting up the room. Gray thought, the Major mustn’t have known he didn’t have enough power to perform wandless magic – but Branbright would’ve known.

Branbright could’ve told the Major that Gray posed no threat.

Branbright wasn’t there, though, he was locked in a dingy cell somewhere beneath them. The Major tipped the rest of the bitter tonic down Gray’s throat, swearing a string of swear words Gray had never heard before in that particular combination.

Dull calm swept through this body.

Gray slowly stopped blathering and struggling. His magic dimmed. The room seemed strangely dark in its absence.

‘I’m not going to execute them, kid,’ the Major said, as though from a great distance. ‘I’m not a monster.’

He hoisted Gray up and threw him easily over his shoulder. Gray’s ankle screamed.

‘Thanks for showing me you are, though,’ the Major said. ‘A monster. That was sorcerer level magic. You just raised my bounty from one million ardents to two.’

They were barely out of the office before Gray was dragged into a heavy sleep.

—

Fuzzy carpet brushed Gray’s lashes. The carpet pressed into Gray’s cheek with a certain heavy quality that told Gray he’d been lying on it for some time. Loud, clipped Lismerian jolted through the fog in his head, in a tumult of crowded voices. The argument was hot. Fierce.

It was too fast for Gray’s groggy mind to keep up with.

Gray tried to open his eyes.

Couldn’t.

Tried to move.

Couldn’t.

With a huge effort, he tried to wrench himself into consciousness, and only halfway made it, his eyes opening a slit.

Polished boots were in front of Gray. His sight was too blurred, he couldn’t tell how many pairs there were.

He couldn’t keep his eyes open.

But, he had to.

He had to.