He further did not like it that the creature seemed to listen to Marian. Take her advice.

Jellan would not admit it was good advice, say, sharing with Daemon that he might not wish to leave a string of bodies in their wake. Not after what they had left behind at the Ancient Ritual Grounds. What Daemon had done to that family at that farm. Telling him that all of that would eventually be found, and questions would be asked, and they would be sought, and they didn’t need to leave a trail to make it easy to find them.

Daemon had, rightly, argued it mattered not if they found them as he had much power, so let them find them.

“You have work to do, do you not?” she’d queried cuttingly, causing Daemon to look chastened. “Do you wish to delay in that by having to murder investigating constables or angry townspeople? Only in doing so, having more seek you, causing further delays?”

Daemon had seen the wisdom of this and thus his short killing spree had ended.

Which was what Jellan suspected Marian wished.

And Jellan had further suspicions Marian wished them to be lost.

Indeed, with some of the routes Daemon selected (about which, Jellan was not finding it surprising, Marian gave no guidance), that took them nowhere, he suspected she was making them lost.

For, as the days passed, even though it was clear Daemon was seeking something, and it was clear she still had his ear and he listened to her, she did not make that first effort to discover what he wished to find or where he wished to go which meant she did not put herself in a place where she would need to assist him in getting there.

At least not that Jellan had heard.

Then again, they excluded him much of the time and he could not hear most of their whispers.

What concerned Jellan most of all, however, was this “work” Marian referred to.

What work?

In the legend of the Beast, he had ravaged the continent haphazardly. He killed. He raped. He pillaged. He destroyed. He tortured.

There was no rhyme or reason to it. This being one of the varied reasons he was terrifying.

Evil with a purpose was ugly. But understanding that purpose, tempering it, eradicating it, gave hope.

Evil run amuck with no purpose was chilling.

Of course, that was many years ago and there was no true and accurate accounting of it, and although there were numerous mentions of him, this deficit of knowledge included what was recorded in the tomes of the Go’Doan.

So perhaps there had been some purpose to it.

Some purpose that, when the Beast was imprisoned under the earth and his reign of terror halted, did not come to fruition.

Jellan wished to know.

Jellan needed to know.