“Great Divine...”
Slade’s arm wraps around me and tugs, and this time, I let him pull me away, my steps unsteady as he leads me further down the tunnel. When I feel a breeze of air, I turn my head in that direction, taking in great gulping breaths.
“I didn’t want you to see that,” he says as I brace a hand against the wall of the cave.
I look up at him. “Who is that?”
“Didn’t you recognize the clothing?”
“I was too busy noticing his fingers rotting off his hand.”
Slade’s lips press together, and he looks away, his sharp-jawed profile bathed in warring shadow.
Breathing out, I take a second to think past the shocking parts, to remember the rucked up clothing, and my eyes go wide. “His coat was gilded.”
He turns back to look at me, his face grim as he gives me a nod. “Yes. He was a spy for Midas. Sent here to get information after we made the Deadwell deal,” he explains. “They tried to flee when I arrived, but Ryatt tracked them all down.”
I swallow hard. “They found Drollard.”
“They did,” he confirms. “Ryatt took care of the others, but he saved this one for questioning.”
Everything he’s saying makes sense. I know this is the real world, where people have to be ruthless to protect their own. But to see it...
“Did you get whatever information out of him that you needed?” I ask, though my voice doesn’t quite sound like my own.
His head tips down. “I did.”
“And the village is protected?”
“It is.”
“So…it’s finished.”
Slade’s brows pull together. “What do you mean?”
I gesture toward the cell door. “Your questioning. It’s finished. So you can put the man out of his misery.”
There’s a pause. A pause that’s far too long.
My hand snags out and I grip his arm. “Slade. You can’t keep him like that.”
“Why not?” he asks, shoulders stiffening. “He’s a spy. He was going to report everything back to Midas. All of my carefully kept secrets would’ve been destroyed.”
I see the anger in his face, the way the skin around his eyes tightens. “I know. But you and Ryatt stopped all of that. So you need to stop this too. He’s obviously unable to talk anymore. What you’re doing is cruel.”
His eyes flicker. “I’ve done things far crueler.”
Instantly, all the memories of putrid corpses and rotted land spring back to my mind, and nausea crawls up my throat. “I know that too.”
“Do you?” he challenges, the fierce glint in his eye flashing. “Because I’m not sure you do.”
My hand drops, like his words have weighed down my limbs. “I’d like to go back to the Grotto now.”
His gaze sweeps over me, but my own keeps drifting back to that door, back to the buzzing noise I can still hear. The noise of tiny flies infesting the flesh of a rotting man.
“I’ll walk you,” Slade rumbles.
He places a hand on the small of my back, and we leave the cracked mountain, my arms scratching against the fissure as we go. It feels like it takes even longer to get out than it did to get in.
Finally, sounds of the villagers begin to trickle in, and a moment later, we step back into the pavilion. All is as it was. Drinking and mingling, the man in the other corner still playing his instrument. It seems like I stepped out into a different world. I wonder what they’d think if they knew there was a person just inside this mountain whose tongue had begun to disintegrate right there in his mouth.
The walk back is quiet, and no matter how many breaths I take, I swear I can still smell the stench.
When we get to the cave, Slade stops me with a hand on my arm. “Tell me what you’re thinking.”
Too many thoughts at once.
Slade’s plunged in blue light, though there’s no missing the apprehension in his eyes. “I’m King Rot for a reason, Auren.”
“I know,” I tell him. And I do understand. I know he’s gotten his reputation for a reason, just as I know that he does things to protect his people and his secrets.
But he’s right—there is a difference when you see it firsthand. Just like when I crossed out of Sixth and saw the bodies trussed up like meat on a skewer. Just like I saw those guards in Ranhold, collapsing on the floor as their organs began to rot. It’s different to see it, and it’s different when I know a man has been left to suffer just to appease whatever it is inside of Slade that drives him to do it.
Because he’s King Rot.
And I...
I have a piece of that rot inside of me.
CHAPTER 35
AUREN
When Slade and I reach the Grotto, I come to a grinding halt. Because I’m not doing this. I’m not going inside and stewing in questions. The old Auren would’ve done that, would’ve been too nervous to bring the subject up. But that’s not me anymore, and Slade isn’t Midas.
He stalls next to me. “What’s wrong?”
“We’re not going inside,” I tell him, chin tilted up, steel in my chest.
“We’re not?”
“No. Turn around and lead the way,” I say, hand gesturing toward the outside.
“Lead the way...to where?”
“To her.”
“Auren, what you heard...” His words shred into frustrated scraps.
“I know what I heard. And you and I...there are still a lot of secrets. So many things we don’t know. But I’m not going to just go inside and fester, waiting around until you think I’m ready to hear what you have to say. So take me to her. You said past, present, and future, right?”
He sucks in a breath, but I look him in the eye without faltering. Because the only way to walk a new path is to stop yourself from using the same stumbling stride.
Even if his present is as shocking as a living corpse.
Even if his past might break my heart.
Even if his future isn’t guaranteed.
Emotion drips thickly down my throat, clinging to the back of my tongue. “I won’t ever again give myself to someone who doesn’t give himself back to me. So if there’s someone else here…I need to know about it.”
I see his throat bob, his eyes flicker. This is a split in the path. He knows it, I know it. If this were Midas, he’d pick one way.
But Slade...
Slade picks another.
“Okay, Goldfinch. Let’s go.”
Instead of heading back toward all the villagers’ homes that I passed by on my way to the pavilion earlier, Slade turns outside of the Grotto, veering right, toward the Perch and the gold-splattered training cave. I shoot him a wary look but stay at his side as he leads me up the snowy slope, the heart of the village disappearing behind us.
We go past the Perch that Lu mentioned, and then, when I practically run into it, I spot a set of short, rickety stairs made of white wood and shallow steps. I crane my head up, gaze following them to spot the Mole high above us, stuck to the side of the mountain like a bulbous lookout.
Its structure is camouflaged with snow and rock, some sort of tarp weighed down with snowfall that seems to cover the entire thing and hide the view of it from above. All I can see from here is the barest glow of firelight, which means someone is probably up there right now, keeping watch.
Turning back around, I continue to follow Slade, neither of us breaking the silence. I’m so nervous that my stomach is riled up tension with acidic nausea burning a path up my throat. Meanwhile, Slade seems like he’s wound tight enough to break in half, his arms so stiff at his sides that his stride is wooden.
His unease only adds to mine.