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“Something is very wrong with that gold,” he said.

Grace nodded. “Yes.”

He considered for a moment more. “Are you sure it’s safe for you to take that?”

She bit her lip.

What should she say? Was he really concerned with her safety? Or was this a ploy to keep the mystic metal in his own possession?

“I thought you liked me,” she said. “I’d have thought you'd say, ‘You’re just the person to handle this, Grace. You are as intriguing as that gold.’”

Garrick smiled and gazed directly into her eyes. “You’re just the person to handle this, Grace. You are”—he searched for a word—“fascinating.”

She quirked an eyebrow. A hint of teasing tinged his mimicry.

Garrick closed his eyes and sighed. “I won’t tell my father. Whatever you think of me, I don’t enjoy seeing people receive consequences beyond reason, but”—he looked at her—“be careful, Grace. If something happened to you… Just be careful.”

He turned and headed toward the square. Grace waited a moment, watching him, then followed her parents. She didn’t know if she could trust Garrick. He was a Clairmont, whatever he said. And the shift in his demeanor had taken a fraction of a moment… Could she believe someone who could change like that?

The revelation that he was interested in her, rather than disapproving, felt unsettling. She hadn’t reacted to the information the way she would have expected. Much as she’d wanted to end the sensation both times his hand had touched her, it hadn’t been unpleasant. That fact had spurred her resistance as much as anything. She still felt a burn in the shape of a handprint where he’d taken her by the arm.

Then again, she’d reacted to the touch of his skin as far back as the night at the Kavanah home. Brushing her hand over her arm did nothing to change the sensation.

Grace shook her head.

It was a game, a tactic. It had to be. Gustav Clairmont had flirted and wooed her mother, but that hadn’t changed the man he was.

Grace was allowing herself to fall into a trap her mother had already evaded.

No, she would not be trusting Garrick. She would not be softening toward him.

He was a Clairmont, and he was dangerous. Perhaps as dangerous as the Zerudorn gold in the wheelbarrow her parents pushed homeward.

Chapter 15

Grace and her parents made the dangerous journey through Sherwood Forest to the fortress and back home that night by the light of the waning gibbous moon, despite the danger of running into a patrolman.

Every bit of training was put to use. They brought one of their verdure cloaks, not for wearing, but for covering the load they carried. It was easier to use trails, but more dangerous. Still, it was worth the smooth ground, which allowed for pushing the wheelbarrow at least some of the time.

When they heard signs of patrolmen, Grace’s father would dash into the forest, making noise intentionally to lead the men away from the Robbins women before circling back around silently to rejoin them.

As she and her parents passed through the wards, Grace couldn’t help thinking of her recent journey with the Rogue,and the chastisement her parents had never gotten to deliver concerning her choice to put their safe haven at risk.

Once at the fortress, they dumped everything into the crater—the wheelbarrow, its contents, even the verdure cloak since one corner of the green cloth had brushed the gilded lock. Where it had touched, the cloth had been coated in a strange, reflective gold. The ice sat in a pile at the bottom of the pit, temporarily halting the liquidation of the gold. But since the freezing magic was weak unless it surrounded something, eventually, gold caved in on the frozen chunks, sucking them into the depths of the metal like everything else.

The entire journey saw them home around midnight, and each took a seat at the kitchen table by tacit agreement. So much needed discussing.

Russell snored from his room upstairs, having been sent to bed the moment Willa came for her parents in the hope he wouldn’t ask any questions about their plans. Grace was surprised he hadn’t sneaked out to follow them. He must have been more tired from the harvest than Grace realized.

“So, it’s loose.” Mother’s voice was hollow. She’d always been the most concerned about such a possibility, but then, she had lost a brother to the gold.

“He must have found it. The gold Maddox stole.” Father’s fingers tapped silently against the table, evidence he felt the anxiety of their situation intensely.

“But who did this?” Mother asked.

Mother and Father looked at Grace. It took her a moment to realize they expected her to answer the question.

She swallowed. Now they wanted her thoughts, when she wasn’t even sure herself.