151. Bartering

Lying in the Medical Pod, Lelith Hesperax calmly peered through the transparent, glass-like surface at Sicarius's face.

"What are you looking at?" the Second Captain suddenly asked, clearly not unaware of her scrutiny.

"I wasn't looking at you. I was thinking."

"I didn't ask why you were looking at me. I asked what you were looking at, Aeldari." Sicarius lowered his head and looked back at her sternly. "Now tell me. What were you looking at?"

"I was looking at you."

That was what Lelith Hesperax said.

"No. You were just thinking," Sicarius replied, hard and cold, like a stone. "And I hope you had better arrive at an answer—an answer as to why you provoked Lord Frank."

"I didn't provoke him, Astartes," Lelith said. "Until just now, I didn't even know who he was."

"Now you do."

Sicarius adjusted the Medical Pod's settings, making her recovery a little faster. But as the Second Captain made those movements, his brow remained tightly furrowed, because he found that Lelith Hesperax had been staring fixedly at him the entire time.

"What exactly are you looking at?" he finally asked in a low voice.

"I was thinking."

Lelith said, "He said I was deliberately damaging your reputation—I wanted to ask whether you had noticed that."

"Of course I noticed." Sicarius answered calmly. "But the methods you used were far too crude. No one would believe an Astartes would be so close to an Aeldari. Although it did cause some effect, it amounted to no more than a few good-natured jokes."

"Then why didn't you stop me?"

"Because there was no need."

Sicarius shook his head. "Everything you did had a purpose. I'm certain of that. Anyone who could survive in Commorragh could not possibly be a naive lamb, so you must have been