“And if I were to tell you the rumors of his death had been grossly exaggerated?” The inquiry is quiet as it is ferocious, “If I were to tell you exactly where you could find him – where he has been hidden all this time on the orders of his late father – what then, McGraw?” Graham knew that if nothing else, this man knew that information would not be drawn out through torture – it would be granted at a cost, or not at all. “Would you accept pardon then, and stop this nonsense?”

intolerablexsacrifice:

_{His voice left him, at first. Flint simply stared, pupils like pinpricks and mouth twitching into a snarl, looking for all the world more demon than man. He wanted to snap Hume’s neck, for daring to lie to him like this. For calling up that awful glint of hope in James’ chest, for sparking it when Flint knew, when he knew that Thomas could not be alive- Peter’s letter-} 

_{Flint’s mouth pressed into a thin line, nostrils flaring as he fought both his temper and the constricting silence lodged in his throat.} 

_{If this is a fiction, he thought, staring hard into those bright, blue eyes, there isn’t a fortress in the world that will keep you safe from me.}

_{But the Hell of it was that this was Flint’s Achilles heel: the one thing he would have risked everything for no matter how unlikely it was, no matter how much his rational mind believed that Thomas could not be alive. If there was even a chance, he had to take it. He had to.}

He thought of Nassau. Of the schedule, of the gold. Of seeing Thomas’ plans breathed into life, finally, after nearly a decade. 

_{And then he thought of Thomas, hidden away somewhere but alive, and that he and Miranda might see him again, and the emotions that surged up in him–and the fear that it might not be true–were agony to bear.} 

_{“You,” Flint rasped, eyes flicking over Hume with a sneer, “would offer this to me?” The distrust was plain in both his voice and expression. Flint’s hands were twitching, like he wanted to hit something. Offers like these did not come without a cost: they did not come without a debt.} 

_{(And? It’s Thomas, McGraw hissed at the back of his mind, And you would burn in Hell for him.)}

_{“Even if,” (he still could not say the name) “He was alive, as you say- why?” Flint’s eyes narrowed. “Why not hang me?”}