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.
The clouds have clogged the moonlight, so the landscape isn’t as bright as it was earlier. Now, as we curve around the base of the mountain, shadows are like specters, while dingy light stretches against the snow. My legs grow tired the further we walk, and it feels like the temperature plummets in a matter of minutes. Even with my hands buried in my coat, the frigid thief sweeps through the air and snatches any sort of warmth I try to hold onto.
Then, the training cave appears ahead, but instead of going straight through, Slade takes a sharp turn, disappearing into a smaller opening almost completely obscured by the sharp rise of a slanted rock that blends into the rest of the mountain. I would never have noticed the gap there if I hadn’t seen him disappear through it.
Hesitantly, I follow him, my body slipping behind the rock and then immediately turning left to disappear inside the mountain.
My mouth drops open at how big it is. Even larger than the Grotto, this cave system reaches so high I can’t quite tell where the ceiling actually is.
“Why are we here?” I ask, but I wince as soon as I do. Because although I spoke quietly, my voice seems to echo in the hollow, grand space. “Why aren’t we back at the village where the houses are?”
Slade turns to me, cloaked in sapphire light. “She doesn’t live with the villagers.”
A snag catches in my lungs, the cords of apprehension laced around my ribs, not letting me take in a full breath. “And…who is she?” The question spoken out loud sounds so quiet compared to the way it screams in my head.
His troubled gaze is turned away, eyes buried in the depths of the cave. The trepidation on his expression does nothing to ease me. “She…” His mouth shifts and wavers, and then his eyes bolt to mine. “I wish I could’ve prepared you more, but just…be calm, okay? It’s important.”
Be calm?
“How do you expect me to be calm when I don’t even know what situation I’m walking into?”
“I know,” he says with some sympathy. “But now that we’re here, it’s just best that I show you.”
That doesn’t make me feel better at all.
Still, Slade turns, and I go with him, deeper into the cavern that seems to never end.
Yet as we walk in further, I keep thinking of the things Ryatt was saying. Of that man back at the cell, the memory so fresh in my head that I can actually hear the buzzing flies all over again.
But then, the cavern veers off, and right there in the middle of the space is a house. It’s a miniature version of the one back at the Grotto, except this is practically glowing. There are thick stretches of fluorescence that curve and curl, like waves in a sea. They sparkle against the lightless parts of the cave, a swirling galaxy in a moonless sky.