Page 79 of Quicksilver

“I told him he needed to have dinner with you tonight.”

“Oh.”

“And I think he agreed.”

“Youthinkhe did?”

He grinned sheepishly. “You've met him. It can be tough to tell what he's agreeing to sometimes.”

“He's the slipperiest bastard alive,” I grumbled.

“Right. But...please. Just go. Have dinner with him. Tell him about yourself. It'll be over quickly, I swear.”

If“it'll be over quickly, I swear'had to be said in order to convince me to attend an event, it was not an event I wanted to go to. I couldn't imagine anything less fun than having dinner with Fisher. But Ren was looking at me so pleadingly.He genuinely, sincerely wanted me to go. And what else was I going to do? Hang out with Carrion back in oursharedroom? On second thoughts, maybe dinner with Fisher would be less painful than that.

“All right. I'll go. But only because you asked. And only if you swear there'll be alcohol.”

The dining table was a league long.

All right, all right, it was maybe only thirty feet long, but still far too big for two people to sit at and share a meal.Alone. Fisher sat at one end. I sat at the other. In between us, a mountain of food had been delivered by an army of fire sprites led by Archer. A massive floral centerpiece with purple and pink blooms sat in the dead center of the table, and it was beautiful, it really was, but I couldn't evenseeFisher around it.

Maybe that was the point.

Carrion had been gone when I got back to the room, which was a blessing since I still wanted to bathe and wash away the sweat from the forge. I hadn't even bothered to look at the dress that had magically appeared at the end of my bed while I was in the tub. All I knew was that it was black. I'd found a clean pair of pants and a fresh shirt in one of the drawers that were my size (obviously meant for me), and so I'd worn those instead.

I was comfortable enough in the pants, but I got the feeling from Archer's sidelong glances that I was underdressed to have dinner with his master, and he disapproved of the fact. Stabbing a piece of fish with my fork, I grabbed the empty wine glass thatsat to the right of my plate and held it up. “I don't suppose I could get something poured into this?” I called down the table.

I saw a flick of Fisher's wavy hair around the flowers and not much else. When he spoke, he sounded close, as if he were standing right behind me, not at the other end of the table. “Tell me how you fared today, and I'll consider it.”

The proximity of his voice and the way he spoke felt...intimate. As though his lips were so close to my ear that his breath should have stirred my hair. “How are you doing that?” I whispered.

“Magic runs through this place the same way your blood runs through your veins. It lives in the very air. The things you've already seen here are surely enough to suspend your disbelief...and yet you're shocked by something so small as me casting my voice?” Amusement dripped from every word. I had no retort for him, though. I had seen so many remarkable things. In comparison, this wasn't that impressive. It was the way it made mefeel,having his voice so close, that had me on the back foot.

I cleared my throat. “As you might expect, I fared very badly. I made four attempts, all of which resulted in failure. I wasted nearly all of the scrap metal I found. I'll need more if I'm going to be able to run more trials tomorrow.”

“Can it be refined? The silver you used today?” he asked.

“Yes, but that'll take even longer. I'll waste a day between experiments...” I huffed, setting down my fork. “But let me guess. You don't care about me wasting a day to purify between experiments, do you?”

“I do not,” he confirmed.

“Y'know...” I dropped my fork; it hit my plate with a clatter. “You just love contradicting yourself. One minute, you're kidnapping me because it's urgent that I make these relics for you. And then, the next, you're throwing up obstacles and doingeverything you can to make the process as difficult and as time consuming as can be. You really need to make up your mind. What's more important? The relics for your people, or whatever sick pleasure you seem to derive from keeping me at your beck and call?”

From down the other end of the table, I heard the scrape of a knife against a plate. At least he wasn't letting my annoyance ruin his dinner.Asshole. “I assure you, our need for those relics far outweighs how fun it is to mess with you. But I'm not refusing you more silver to toy with you. Resources are tight at Cahlish. The regular silver can't be spared.”

“What are you talking about? This place is dripping in finery. There's gold—” I glanced around, gesturing to the wall sconces that held the candles lighting our dinner, and the serving platters on the sideboard, and the picture frames. Even the cutlery on the table. “There's gold literally everywhere. Half the knick-knacks in this place are plated in it, and you're telling me resources aretight?”

“If it were gold you needed for your trials, we wouldn't be having this conversation.” I saw the bottom of Fisher's wine glass around the side of the cursed flower arrangement and my temper spiked. Ducking to one side, I peered around the centerpiece and scowled as I watched him sip from his glass.

“Ifyouhave wine,Ishould have wine,” I growled.

“Oh, is that what you think?”

My skin broke out into goosebumps, the tiny hairs on the back of my neck standing erect. His voice was even closer this time. His words felt like a caress against the skin of my neck. I did my damnedest to shake off the shiver that chased up my spine. “Ren promised me—”

“Renfis knows better than to make promises on my behalf. But...if you're so desperate for a drink, feel free to come and pour yourself some.”

Had he poured his own wine? I doubted that very much. Archer had probably done it. But I wasn't some stuck-up High-Born asshole like he was. I had no problems pouring my own wine. I got up, grabbed my glass, and was about to storm down the other end of the table but then I paused and grabbed my plate and my fork while I was at it. Whatever game this was, seating me so far away from him, blocking our view of one another, then using magic to speak into my ear like he was whispering sweet nothings to me? Yeah, I wasn't playing.