He opened his mouth to respond, then closed it and shook his head. “You’re right. It’s not fair.”

She blinked. Never in her life had a Steel admitted the situation wasn’t fair.

“So, do you follow Kalaan and Isar?” she asked after a pause.

It was odd to meet someone her age who was faithful. When people turned faith into money and prayers into bullets during the war, most people began believing the Mothers had abandoned Sumerand. Only a few hundred Inosen remained, and most of them were older.

Ryuu gave a half shrug, half nod. “My parents stopped praying when I was really young, once the war started, so I don’t know too much about the Mothers. But I’ve never been against it. How could anyone in my family be? After all, most of our original fortune was first made from Inosen purchasing diamonds, before magic was banned and we turned to exporting the diamonds as jewels instead. Even people in my family who weren’t faithful themselves never wanted to ban the religion.”

“So, your family were Steels, but they still didn’t turn against magic once the war started,” Aina observed. “Did they ever ask their workers to pick a side?”

He shook his head. “They stayed neutral. Even now, there’s a secret worship center near the mines. We have our private security keep the Diamond Guards’ attention away from it. And while we don’t aid in the illicit sales of diamonds, we also do nothing to stop it. We do favors for the Sentinel when we can, like mining high-value diamonds or selling them jewels and construction materials at a discount, to keep them from looking too closely. I can’t help that I was born rich, but I’ll do what I can to even things out a bit. My parents never did anything to oppress the Inosen and neither will I.”

Her face twisted into a scowl as he spoke. She couldn’t let a rich boy with a heart distract her. She had to get the information from him, then kill him.

“What happened after you saved your brother?”

“I reported that he’d been killed,” Ryuu continued, “gave the Sentinel a sketch of you, and paid off a mortician to pronounce him dead. We didn’t want anyone finding out the truth and coming back to kill him, or looking into things and figuring out we used magic to save him. The Sentinel probably thinks his body is at the morgue right now.”

“So, where is he really?”

Ryuu shrugged. “When I woke up this morning, he was gone. He’s nowhere in Amethyst Hill. He might not even be in Kosín anymore. If he’s afraid someone will come after him again, leaving might have been the safest option. My guess is someone saw him, and the truth got out that he survived … which I suppose is why you’re here.”

“Could someone have taken him? Kidnapped him? Tried to kill him?” Since I failed, she didn’t add.

“No, a servant saw him leave this morning with a few guards.”