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Because who all was near the top, these days? Just him, Gohvis, and Vanderberk.

Which reminded him.

“Do you know Vanderberk’s current status?”

“Dead,” said Gohvis.

Well, fuck. “How?”

“The Hawk got to him.”

Graves, huh? Damn that bastard.

Truthfully, a part of Jercash had been expecting this. It was only a few years ago that the Hawk had been hunting the Weasel down--and not being very subtle about it, either. Jercash had to go to great lengths in order to protect Vanderberk, which eventually deterred Graves. Or seemed to.

With the death of Gunther and Dunhouser earlier in the year, Jercash’s plan had been to keep Vanderberk close to him while he taught him a few things. But with Morgunov starting this war out of nowhere, Jercash had been forced to let Vanderberk go off on his own.

He’d told the stubborn son of a bitch to head for one of the Melmoorian fronts, but did he listen? Of course not. He wasn’t afraid of Graves. The idiot never got it through his thick head that Jercash had been protecting him during their previous encounters with the Hawk.

Agh.

So much effort wasted.

Not that this was the first time.

“I have a feeling that you will see Vanderberk again, however,” said Gohvis. “So if you do, do not be fooled.”

“Hmm? What do you mean?”

“Already, it appears that the Hawk is pretending not to have killed him. He even tried to convince me that he would just capture him, instead.”

“Why would he do that?”

“Because he intends to make use of his corpse in some way. As some manner of puppet, perhaps.”

Double fuck. “That’s some of the worst news I’ve heard in a long time. Are you sure about that?”

“Moderately. It is an educated guess. You do know that Graves is an illusionist, yes?”

“No. I did not know that. I would’ve warned Vanderberk about that ahead of time, if I did.”

“Ah. Mm." A beat passed. "Too bad.”

Jercash shook his head and sighed. “Gohvis... while I’m grateful for all this sudden assistance, I also can’t help noticing that it’s just a bit late. Is there a particular reason why you’re only telling me all of this now?”

“Yes.”

And when the Monster offered no further elaboration, Jercash deduced the rest on his own. “But you’re not going to tell me what it is.”

“Yes.”