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And Sebastian hated him for it.
The thought twisted itself like a knife into Leon’s heart, right next to the knife twisted there by the thought that he hated himself for it too.
He was responsible for the losses and misery of dozens, if not hundreds, of people. And he was set to be responsible for the misery of dozens more, with no guarantee that it would all be worth it in the end. He didn’t know if they’d be able to drive out the Klah’Eel. He didn’t know if they’d finally win their freedom. He didn’t know that anything would even be better if they did.
All he knew was that he carried the speech that Farlon had worked on for decades, and he had to give it. He had to do whatever it took to give it. He had to try. Hundreds, thousands of people counted on him to try. They believed in him. They knew that he would do whatever had to be done to win them their freedom and make all the suffering worth it.
The irony was that even Sebastian believed in him; he just also hated him for it.
Leon turned and kept walking, and Martha growled after him. “You have to let him go.”
“I can’t let him go. I don’t even have him.” Leon didn’t want to stop. He wanted to get as far away from that damn bar where Sebastian was throwing darts at his face. But Martha took two long steps after him and grabbed his arm.
She yanked him back around to face her. “Don’t be fucking glib with me, Leon.”
“What the hell do you want from me, Martha?” Leon ripped his arm out of her grasp and waved back down the hall they’d come. “You saw him back there. I don’t have him.”
“But I know how you feel about him.” Martha stepped in close, as though ready to fight him about it, but Leon couldn’t deny it. She’d seen him in Kaston, and she had known him too long to be fooled anyway. She jabbed her hand into the center of Leon’s chest. “And I need you to harden your heart.”
Leon frowned and resisted the urge to rub the sore spot she’d just hit. “What are you talking about?”
“Stop caring about him, stop listening to him, stop pining for him. You can’t have him, Leon!” Martha thrust her finger back toward the cantina. “You can’t have him.”
You can’t have him. The sentence rang in his ears, but it sounded so familiar that it settled into his mind with barely a ripple. He’d been saying it to himself for years. He took a step back, his hands shaking. “I already fucking know that.”
“Do you?” Martha matched him step for step. “Do you know what’s at stake?”
Leon clenched his fists. He’d never forgotten what was at stake a day in his life. “I always know what’s at stake.”
“Then listen to me.”
“I am listening to you, Martha.”
She grabbed his shoulders in a firm grip, but Leon could feel her trembling through her grasp. “You and I don’t have the luxury of loving people.”
Leon pressed his lips together, his instincts fighting what already felt like a losing battle against that thought.
“Sebastian can care all he wants. He can feel all he wants. But you and I have to do better because you and I have fucking responsibilities.” Martha’s eyes shone, and Leon suddenly remembered her face when she had found out Sheila, the protégé she’d taken a chance on, had sold them out to the enemy.
Leon grasped one of her wrists, grounding them there in that hallway. “I know that.”
“You can’t afford—Southern Tava can’t afford—for you to be distracted by him, Leon.”
“I know.”
“I wish it could be different.” Martha softened her grip and smoothed her thumbs over his shoulders. “You deserve to be happy, Leon. And so does Sebastian. You both deserve to be happy, but—”
“But we don’t all get what we deserve,” Leon finished for her. It was one of the first hard truths he’d learned as a child, stumbling, terrified, and newly orphaned in Ralscoln. “I know.”
Martha sighed and finally let her hands fall to her sides. For a moment, she looked as old as she really was. A weary woman of over fifty, with graying hair, who had spent half her life in a war she had lost all her family to.
Leon let his shoulders sag. “Is there anything else, Martha?”
She shook her head. “No.”
They looked at each other for a few more moments, then Leon pulled his shoulders back again. “You should go back in.” Leon nodded back to the door of the cantina. “Tell Garrett I’m fine. He’s probably starting a fight with Sebastian already.”
Martha snorted a tiny laugh. “Not with the nice doctor sitting right there.”
