Page 25 of Phoenix's Fire

For a long moment, we ate in silence. The other guy gathered his plate and headed towards the wash area. When he was finally gone, Tobias sat up a bit and glanced around. Now, we were alone. No one was close enough to listen in.

"If I'm courting you," Tobias said, all hints of his slower and simple speech gone, "then we can walk together. Alone, with no one to listen to us." He lifted a brow.

"Oh."

Slowly, he nodded. "Yeah, and I thought you'd like to know Merienne is not on the tree."

That had my immediate attention. "What?"

"The tree," he said again. "When someone is banished, they're chained and removed from the compound, right?"

"Yes." Because I'd seen that twice now.

"But they aren't just turned loose outside," he explained. "Hunters hang their chain from a hook on a tree. It's up high enough they can't unhook themselves. I've heard most people die like that, then the body is dragged away and the manacles are returned."

"But Ayla got away?"

"Clearly, since she seems to be with the Dragons," he said. "And the gatherers who just went out said the tree is empty. Your friend isn't there."

"What does that mean?" I begged.

"It means she got away without dying there," he assured me. "Callah, this is a good thing."

I felt my shoulders soften, so I bent to take a polite bite of my meal. "Do you think she found Ayla?"

"I don't know, but I'm going to find out," he promised. "See, the trade for me courting you? I am now a hunter."

My body stilled, yet my eyes drifted to the long table filled with women in black. "A lot have died," I whispered.

"Trust me, I know," he said. "But the Phoenix is out there, Callah. She needs to know Merienne is looking for her. If I'm a hunter, I'll have the chance to talk to her."

"How?" I asked. "Have youseenthe arrows they use?"

"I kept the tip of that one," he admitted. "Four blades. They carve up the body as they spin. Yeah, that's exactly what I'm worried about, but I have to do something. Don't you see? She got out. That means there's a way for you to get out - and maybe me too."

"Why do you want out?" I shot back. "You're a man. Do you not get everything you want? Even me, evidently."

"Look," he said, glancing around again to make sure no eyes were on us, "women have one set of issues. Men have another. If we live long enough - and I'm stressing that 'if' part - we will see everyone we care about die. That's also the least of our problems. Callah, things might be hard for women, but they're a different kind of hard for men."

"Because you're going to give your life for your children, hm?" I asked.

"Probably." Those unique eyes of his held me. "Nearly fifty dead hunters in the last two months. Men who are just as dead as their wives."

"Oh."

I'd never really thought about that before. Then again, most hunters didn't die. Well, they hadn't until recently. Normally, we lost one to five men each hunt. Five would've been considered a lot. Yet since Ayla had been thrown out, the numbers had completely changed.

"She's doing something," I realized.

"She must be," he agreed. "That's why the hunters are talking about the Phoenix now, not the Wyvern."

"But Mr. Cassidy keeps talking about the Wyvern in our classes," I countered. "Well, and how Ayla was blasphemous and forsaken."

Tobias leaned in, propping his elbow on the table so his fist could support his cheek. "Think about it," he said, flashing me a smile. "And Mr. Myers is looking at us. At least try to act as if you don't hate me?"

So I ducked my head. "I don't hate you, Tobias. I just don't want to be a wife. I'm not ready."

"Not really ready to be a husband either," he assured me. "This was simply the only way I could think of for us to talk."