For a long moment, Nostrand considers him.
And then he says, “You know, for anyone else, I might actually consider it. But not for you.”
All at once, something crumples behind Chester’s sternum.“Whydo you hate me so much?” he snarls. “What did I ever do to you? Why?—?”
“I don’thateyou,” Nostrand snaps back. “Hating would imply a certain level of caring. But mentoring you was just an assignment. A job. The worst one of my entire career, actually.”
Chester’s eyes sting. Frustration at Obie for leaving him, fear that he’s not clever enough to save Maggie, anger at Nostrand for beingNostrand,and?—
And a little bit of self-hatred, too.
Because, even after all this time, part of him still thinks he could’ve earned Nostrand’s approval if he’d just tried harder. “What did I do wrong?” he asks, and the words feel brittle in his mouth.
Nostrand’s jaw works. “Nothing, Locke. That was the entire problem.”
“That doesn’t make any goddamn sense.”
“It does when you factor in that I spentyearstrying to get you reassigned.”
And that?—
Thattakes Chester off guard. “What?”
“I’m going to tell you a secret, Locke. Something the Council doesn’t want you to know.” Nostrand leans forward, his eyes dark and bottomless. “When they chose me as your mentor, the first thing I did was look at your vocational aptitude scores. And you never should’ve been an interrogator. You weren’t cut out for it. You didn’t have the disposition that you need to survive in this job. The Council set you up to fail.”
Chester knows that already, he realizes dazedly. It’s exactly whatSawyer said two months ago, exactly what he and Obie deduced once Chester realized the truth.
He just never would’ve thought thatNostrandknew it, too. It seems like the type of thing his former mentor would’ve thrown in his face before now. “Why?”
“My best guess? The Council didn’t want you and Jackson to have the same vocation,” Nostrand says. “They wanted to prove that their precious neophyte hunters could be successful anywhere in the Sanctum, including the prison. They didn’t listen when I told them you’d be better off somewhere else—anywhereelse—and you were clearly too desperate for approval to request a reassignment. So I had to force you into failing, instead.
“But you—” Nostrand scowls. “You took whatever I threw at you. You managed to weasel your way past every roadblock I put in your path. And wheneveryoucouldn’t, Sawyer Solomon smoothed them over for you. Because it wasn’t just your reputation on the line—it was hers, too. If the Council had to reassign you, then that meant she failed.” He scoffs. “And her grandfather wasn’t about to let that happen. Somyreputation got tanked, instead.”
Chester’s throat feels thick. He swallows hard, trying to breathe past it.
So that was it. His years of struggling and suffering under Nostrand’s mentorship weren’t just a matter of bad luck and bad teaching. Nostrand didn’t emphasize Chester’s every mistake to try and make him the perfect interrogator—he did it to try and show the Council that Chestercouldn’tbe a perfect interrogator. To get him reassigned to another vocation, one that might’ve even been a better fit for him.
In the most warped, twisted way possible, Nostrand was actually trying to help Chester.
After all these years, it feels good to finally have a reason.
Nostrand sighs, and for the barest hint of a second, Chester sees the mentor he could’ve been. “Look, you weren’t a bad kid. You just never had a chance. The Council threw you in the deep end to watch you drown, and they let you drag me down with you. That’s really all there is to it,” he says, and he turns away. “Like I said, make sure you’re around to clean Khan’s room after the spellcasters are done with her. Our turnover rate isn’t getting any slower, and?—”
Abruptly, a loud ringtone blares through the room, nearly making Chester jump a foot in the air. Nostrand twists around to glare at him. “Phones onsilentin the prison, Locke. I know I taught you that much, at least.”
“That wasn’t me,” Chester argues, looking around. He homes in on the source of the noise—a pile of confiscated prisoner belongings on a side table—and grabs the cell phone, glancing down at the screen.
His eyes widen.
Call from O. Smith.
O. Smith?ObadiahSmith? But how did he know to call this phone? How did he?—?
All at once, horror surges through Chester.
Of course. This isMaggie’scell phone. She was brought in at the tail end of the overnight shift, so the interrogators on duty didn’t have the chance to lock up her belongings. Chester should’ve realized that, should’ve looked for a phone sooner, should’ve known Maggie would have Obie’s number?—
Damn it, he could’ve called Obiehoursago!
