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“It is currentlyeveryone’sconcern,” I countered.

Patrick smiled carefully, in a way that was meant to cover the anger in his throat, and I was immediately reminded of him as a boy spitting in the dirt. “If it’s idium you’re worried about, I’ll ensure you have what you need, when you need it. Past that, I won’t be discussing alchemy.” He turned to stake me again with his stare. “Andyouwon’t be askin’.”

I looked away instinctively, but I wasn’t done. “What I want to know is, if you have the Alchemist, then why haven’t you made yourself an entire army of Artisans?”

He stroked Isaiah’s head as he answered. “Do you know how much terranium is needed to make one dose of idium?” he asked.

I realized I didn’t. I hated that I didn’t.

“Three pounds,” he said in the wake of my silence. “The Lords’ Army is currently fifty-thousand strong, and a fifth of them are swanks.” He looked over at me. “We’d need—”

“Fifteen tons of terranium,” I said quietly.

Patrick’s eyebrows rose, impressed. “And that’d only match them in magic. Not in number.”

I sighed. “The mines wouldn’t yield even half that.”

“And whatcouldbe mined is already heavily guarded by the House.”

The thought brought me comfort, though I’d never tell him that outright. I quailed to think of what so much unregulated idium could do in the midst of a war. I let out a breath. “So,youhave the Alchemist, and the House has the terranium. A stalemate.”

“For now,” Patrick said rigidly, as though a bolt were tightening his jaw.

And therein lay those future plans, after he’d delivered Tanner a bullet.

“If you have no stores of terranium,” I said carefully, sensing a looming end to the conversation, “then where did the idium come from? The dose you gave me when you thought me too dumbstruck to refuse?”

Patrick’s eyebrows rose. “Would you have refused?”

I pressed my lips together. Shook my head reluctantly.

He grinned wryly. “I didn’t mean any coercion by it. I only meant it to quell the aches and pains. I hear idium has wonderful healing properties—”

“How did you get that terranium, Patrick?” I asked once more, and for a moment, it seemed as though he wouldn’t answer.

But he clicked his tongue. “By doing terrible things,” he said. “But you already knew that, I’m sure.”

I rolled my eyes and turned away from him, imagining him stealing into mines and smuggling lumps of ore out in his pockets. It was better than the truth he alluded to, which probably involved blades and guns.

For a moment, we sat in tense silence, a bevy of questions still sloshingaround my mouth. When I next looked over, Isaiah had settled his great head on Patrick’s knee. Patrick looked near asleep, head tipped back once more, the sun turning his skin golden. He was ruinously handsome. I’d be a fool to deny it.

I said what had perched on the tip of my tongue since the conversation began. “We’d all be better off without it.”

Patrick’s eyes opened slowly, though he did not look at me.

I continued. “If it were up to me, I’d take all the terranium on the continent and I’d blow it to pieces.”

A short laugh escaped him, then another. In the intervals between, he seemed to expect me to take it back. When I didn’t, he said, “You can’t possibly think so.”

I shrugged. “Terranium—idium—it divides us. It’s a guillotine. Those in power will always use it to exploit the rest.”

“And what of those sick or injured?” he asked. “You’d deny them bluff as well?”

“It’s a plight on thousands of households across the Trench,” I countered. “There are other, less toxic medicines. Besides”—here, I gave him a pointed look—“are Craftsmen not the strongest among us? The hardiest?”

He smiled ruefully. “That’s what they taught us, didn’t they? When we were kids. Artisans were the thinkers, but the Craftsmen?” He gave a low whistle. “They were the people of action. No one more capable of toilin’ than a Crafter: the only one with the bones and muscle to withstand the hardship.”

It was the creed of the House of Lords. The mantra of my Scurry schoolroom teachers.