Page 37 of Quicksilver

His eye. Thatwas his lasting reminder? It had to be. The filaments that marked his jade iris were actually remnants of quicksilver. Gods. It was inside him, always there, always whispering in his ear, pushing him toward madness. The relic reallywasthe only thing keeping him sane.

Nausea rolled in the hollow where my stomach used to be. I did my best to swallow it down as I collected another set of pitted tongs and dropped them into the bucket. The iron clanged loudly, sending up a puff of rust into the air. “Then...why did you givemethe relic? Back in Zilvaren?”

He held up his hand. The thick signet ring flashed on his finger.

“Ah, right. Yes. You have a ring, too,” I said.

“If I hadn’t given you the relic, you’d have died.”

“And why didn’t you? Just let me die? You could have left me there.”

Kingfisher dumped the armful of faded, dog-eared papers he was carrying onto the workbench, his expression blank. “You haven't been paying attention, human. Yvelia is at war, and war machines are hungry beasts. They require constant feeding. Food. Clothes. Gold. Building supplies. Weaponry. Before Madra drove that sword into her pool, stillingeverypool ineveryrealm, Belikon used the pathways for supplies. It was the only way to trade in many magical items. When the pathways closed, the door to our supply trains slammed closed, too. You shouldn't have been able to touch that sword, let alone draw it. And the silver responded to you. You activated it. You did what only an Alchemist can do. So, no. Human or not, I couldnothave just left you there to die.”

“Great. So, you brought me back so you could save your people and win the war.”

Kingfisher ran a hand through his ink-black waves again, his eyes cold as chips of ice. “You think very highly of me, human. Ina way, I suppose what you say is true. But don't mistake me for some kind of saint. I don't give a shit about Yvelia, and I don't give a shit about Belikon's war. You are a bargaining chip. I saw my only avenue to freedom, and I took it. Ask me what I would have done had I found you in that condition under any other circumstances.”

I stared at him. At the unfriendly set of his jaw, the tension in his shoulders, and the cruel lift to his mouth, and a body-wide shudder ripped through me, leaving panic in its wake. “I don't think I want to know,” I whispered.

Kingfisher's suggestion of a smile grew wings and took flight.“Clever girl.”

It took hours to finish clearing the forge, and we did so in silence. I didn't ask any more questions, too afraid to hear the answers, and Kingfisher kept his thoughts to himself.

Every so often, I found myself watching him. With his sleeves rolled up to his elbows and his cheek streaked with soot, he looked so normal. But then he'd snarl under his breath or meet my gaze with those silver-streaked eyes, and I'd be reminded that this male was not human. It was neither safe nor smart to let my gaze linger on him. The wisest thing I could do was figure out how I accidentally activated that pool and hightail it back to Zilvaren as quickly as possible.

The sky was darkening out of the window—sucha bizarre sight—when Renfis came to find me. He looked tired, though the bruise beneath his eye and his split lip had miraculously healed themselves over the past few hours. Standing in the doorway, he surveyed thenearly cleared floor and the bucket of rusting tools I'd collected and sent a confused look Kingfisher's way. “What's this? You haven't even started working.”

“The place was a disaster!” I cried. It was easy for him to come along and criticize. The forge looked so much better than it had. And he hadn't seen it before.

Kingfisher sighed. The chill in the air grew to icy degrees as shadows leaped up the walls, conjured out of nowhere. They spilled like wet paint across the floor, darting up the legs of the workbench, blossoming in the air until everything went black.Everything.The forge itself became a pit of ink. It felt as though the shadows slipped down my throat and into my lungs when I drew in a gasp. This was true dark. Even deep in the underground tunnels that formed a network below the Silver City, the darkness wasn't this absolute.

“Oh, gods. What's happening?”

“Fisher,” Renfis scolded. “Enough now.”

The darkness snapped back like a rubber band. What was left of the day's light flooded back into the forge, and the forge was immaculate. The window was fixed, a fresh pane of glass glinting in the frame. The shattered vials and beakers that we'd swept into piles all over the place were gone. The hearth was brushed out, the bricks bright red and brand new. The shelves were stocked with all kinds of fantastical pieces of equipment that I'd never even seen before. The plant life that had claimed the forge for its own was still there, though tamed back into pots and a small planter that sat beneath the window. And it was warm. All day, I'd been freezing, my teeth chattering while I'd cleaned and picked up with numb fingers, andnow it was warm?

I spun, searching for something to hurl at Kingfisher. The closest thing that came to hand was a brightly shining, beautiful set of tongs. I snatched them up and stabbed them at the dark-haired warrior. “You! We broke our backs cleaning this place! What'swrongwith you? What happened to, 'our abilities are sacred gifts to be used for righteous purposes,' or whatever the hell it was you said?”

“Him? Righteous purposes?” Renfis stifled a cough that sounded a lot like laughter. “The male standing before you isn’t shy about using his gifts to complete mundane tasks.”

I glowered at Kingfisher. “Youmonster.”

There wasn't a scrap of remorse to be found on the warrior’s face. He scooped up his armor and his sword, then paused beside me on his way toward the brand-new door that now hung in the doorway.

“I just wanted to see if you knew what hard work was. Itoldyou I was magic,” he whispered.

And then he was gone.

10

CRUMBS

The next morning,Everlayne brought a breakfast of fresh fruits and yogurt—foreign delicacies I'd never tasted before. She sat with me and ate in my rooms, subdued and silent. I wanted to ask her about what she'd said back in the hallway yesterday. She'd called Kingfisher her brother, and not in the same way Kingfisher and Renfis called each other brother, like warriors who'd fought alongside each other. She'd meant it in a more literal sense, as if she and the evil bastard shared blood.

I didn't bring it up, though. I'd made a choice when I'd decided to go with Kingfisher to the forge rather than chase after her to see if she was okay, and by the way Everlayne kept sniffing indignantly as she spooned her yogurt into her mouth, I'd hurt her feelings in the process.

She forced me into yet another dress with voluminous skirts—shimmering purple this time—and fashioned my hair, winding the thick braids she'd plaited so that they trailed down the center of my back.