Ben's stomach pitched nervously. He didn't want to hear this, no matter what she was going to say. The only thing he'd wanted to hear from her was that she had no idea at all why Macmillan would have made such a comment about her, and it was clear that she couldn't tell him that. Not without lying about it, anyway.

He held up a hand to stop her from talking, though it was maybe unnecessary — she didn't seem to have the strength to continue anyway. "I don't need to know about it," he said. The anger had faded from his voice by now. He was tired, vaguely nauseated, and filled with a displaced sense of existential dread either over the duel or over this new reality he had to contend with regarding his sister, one of the two, but he wasn't angry any more. "You don't have to tell me. What's important now is that it's over."