“Of course,” Rissa purrs before turning, and I follow beside her as we begin a slow circle around the saddles’ tent, the shadow of night giving us a pretense of privacy.
I’m brimming with worry, practically shaking with it while we walk in the snow side by side, her finger trailing lightly over the leather tent as she goes. I can hear the muffled voices of the saddles inside, already picking up on another argument.
“You know what I’m going to ask,” I say, breaking the silence.
“Do I?” Rissa replies coyly.
A breath of frustration winds out of me, a tight spiral that springs up in my throat. She’s not going to make this easy on me. I knew that as soon as she made me wait.
We may have gone through a traumatic moment with Captain Fane, but that doesn’t mean she’s my ally now.
I pitch my voice low, our slow, meandering footsteps matching in pace. “Did you tell anyone?”
The only light we have is a milky moon amidst ashen clouds, like cream poured over slate.
“Did I tell anyone what?” she says breezily.
My jaw tightens. “Did you tell anyone about what I did to the pirate captain?”
My question falls slowly, like the snowflakes drifting down around us. Once again, she’s silent, letting me squirm as we walk, her blonde hair going ginger as we pass by a lantern hanging on a nearby tent.
She finally answers me. “I didn’t tell anyone.”
I sag, hand over my thumping chest. “Thank Divine,” I breathe, condensation puffing out of my lips like smoke.
She turns to me and stops, cutting me off. “Yet.”
My short-lived relief stutters and stumbles, a newborn calf falling on the ground.
I watch her face, her eyes. Sparkling blue to distract from the darker depths within. “You promised not to tell,” I remind her.
“I have to make a lot of promises. Doesn’t mean I keep them.” Her tone is a bite, frothing in warning. “How does it work, anyway?”
An incredulous frown drops my brow. “You just admitted that you might be going back on your promise to me, and yet you think I’m going to tell you anything?”
She shrugs a dainty shoulder, flicking snow off her hair. “I want to know how it works.”
“How what works?”
Rissa smiles, like me doing the same thing—purposely being difficult—amuses her. “Never mind. It’s obvious that King Midas transferred some of his powers to you when he gold-touched you, and he doesn’t want anyone to know,” she says quietly, making my heart stop.
She studies my face, and I don’t know what she sees on my expression, but it makes her lips tilt up in victory.
“That’s why he refuses to gold-touch anyone else. Not because you’re his one and only favored, but because he doesn’t want to accidentally give anyone else his magic too.”
She’s speaking more to herself than to me, a confirmation that she reads from the lines on my face.
I glance around to make sure no one is around, terrified despite her hushed words. A hard lump has lodged in my throat, a graveled pebble that won’t move.
If Midas ever caught wind of this conversation...
“How often can you tap into his power?” she asks thoughtfully.
“You need to stop asking those kinds of questions, Rissa. You can’t tell anyone what happened with Captain Fane. It needs to stay a secret,” I say in a rushed, desperate whisper, eyes darting left and right.
She tilts her head, wheels churning, mind working. “You want my silence?”
“Yes,” I say emphatically.