Page 66 of Quicksilver

He had me there. I'd done a lot of unconscionable things in the past to get what I needed. I'd never needed to kiss anyone the way I'd kissed Kingfisher, mind you. I hadn't meant to kisshimlike that. That had been an accident. One I didn't feel inclined to investigate too closely at this specific moment in time. “So, you're saying I did distract you, then,” I fired at him.

He just laughed. “And here I was, rankled at the thought of having to drag around a helpless, useless human who'd be nothing but a burden. But it turns out you've got jokes! At least I can count on you for some entertainment.”

Honestly. He was such a piece of work. Where did he get off, treating me like this? I'd been there back in the forge. I'd felthis hands on my body. In my hair. How urgently he explored my mouth with his tongue. He'd been distracted, all right. “You're so full of shit. I felt how hard your—” I slammed my mouth shut. Heat nipped at my cheeks, very close to becoming embarrassment.

Kingfisher halted his horse, forcing Aida to stop, too. Carrion wobbled on the horse's haunches, almost toppling off, though Kingfisher didn't seem to notice or care. He twisted around in his saddle, a ruinous smirk dancing at the corners of his mouth. “How hard mywhat,human?”

“Nothing!” I answered far too quickly to come across as casual. “All I mean to say is that—that—you were distracted, okay? You were all over me. Your hands—”

“My hands have a mind of their own.Mymind was fixed on what yours were doing, and let me tell you, human. You are nowhere near as light-fingered as you seem to think you are. You nearly dislocated my finger, tugging at that damned ring—”

“Howdareyou!” Aida had pulled up alongside Fisher's horse, crab-walking, keen to get moving again, which brought me too close to the Fae warrior for comfort. I used our close proximity to lash out at him with my foot, but he nudged his stallion out of the way, sidestepping the blow.

“Easy there, human. Kick Bill and he'll bolt. You want to find yourself alone in this forest? In the dark?”

I wouldn't give him the satisfaction of answering that. Instead, I pulled a childish face while retracting my foot and shoving the toe of my boot back into the stirrup. “Bill? Who calls their horseBill?”

“I do. Now. Would you like to lead the way?” He gestured with a gloved hand toward a path that I had to assume was there since I couldn't see it.

“No.”

“I didn't think so.”

We came across a road soon after. Though it was deserted, as far as I could tell, a fair amount of traffic clearly used the road because the snow hadn't stuck here. Deep gouges cut into the churned mud, along with hoof prints, paw prints, and footprints so massive that I shivered to think what might have created them. Our horse's hooves sucked at the stinking black ground as they plodded onward.

Our destination was a rundown two-story stone building situated right on the banks of a wide, frozen river. Its roof was covered in a layer of straw two feet thick, atop which rested only a fine dusting of snow. Light poured out of small windows. When the door to the front of the building opened, laughter and chatter and half a stanza of an off-key song spilled out into the night, along with a tall, broad figure who took five lurching steps and collapsed face-first into a snowbank.

Kingfisher had slowed his horse when the building had come into view. He sat staring at it for a moment, lips slightly parted, an unfamiliar, wistful expression on his face. I frowned at the building, trying to see whatever it was that he was seeing. You'd think he was taking stock of one of Yvelia's finest architectural wonders, but from where my aching ass was sitting, it looked a hell of a lot like a pub.

“We're sleeping there?” I asked, jerking my chin toward the place. The figure who'd stumbled out of the pub was on his hands and knees, now, vomiting into the snow.

“Maybe. Maybe not.” Kingfisher kicked his horse on, gesturing for me to follow. “We'll see how long it takes Ren to catch up.”

A scruffy stable hand took the horses when we dismounted. I attempted not to stare at the curved ram's horns poking out of the holes torn in the top of his woolen hat but did a piss poor job. I couldn't stop myself from wondering how they connected to his skull. The stable hand didn't seem to mind. He was all toothy smiles until I opened my bag up and tipped a sleepy Onyx out into the snow at my feet.

“Oooh, that's a good one! Rare. Never see the black tips on the ears and tail like that anymore. I'll gi' yer two cröna for it.”

“What?”

Onyx darted behind me, hackles up, as if he understood the stable hand and would take a finger if the stranger tried anything funny.

The stable hand eyed me shrewdly. “All right. Four cröna. That's all I can do, though. My wife'll kill me if—”

My hand reached for the hilt of the dagger at my thigh. “He's not for sale.”

“The human's gotten it into her head that the flea-ridden thing is a pet,” Fisher said, collecting one of the bags from his saddle. He moved quickly, retrieving the long, wrapped object he'd tucked under my saddle flap.

Onyx jumped into my arms, nestling into the crook of my elbow and hiding his face. “He does not have fleas.”

“That you know of,” Kingfisher said.

“What about this one, then? Is this one for sale?” The stable hand thumbed a hand in the direction of Carrion.

“What's your best offer?” Fisher asked.

“No!”

Kingfisher had the audacity to look bored when I slapped his arm. “No, the human isn't for sale either,” he said in a flat, annoyed tone. “Put him in a stall with some hay and cover him with a blanket. If I find out he's been harmed in any way...” Kingfisher's hand rested suggestively on Nimerelle'shilt, drawing the stable hand's attention to the menacing black sword. The fawn paled beneath his auburn beard. He recognized the action for what it was—a promise of pain—and acted accordingly.