Page 33 of Silver in the Bone

“Feel better now?” I asked.

“Better? No. Radioactive? Yes.” Emrys gave me a look of deep disbelief. “Do you ... actually enjoy drinking that?”

“Yes,” I said. “Though I take it black, without a spoonful of whining.”

“It’s not whining,” he said. “I’m genuinely wondering how you still have internal organs at this point.”

I rolled my eyes as he took another sip and shuddered.

“Sorry it isn’t up to your usual standards,” I groused. “Not all of us have a personal barista at our beck and call.”

“Not all of us would be stupid enough to try basilisk venom to induce the One Vision,” he shot back. “So you at least have me there.”

My jaw set. “I’m alive, aren’t I?”

“Barely,” he said. “You’re welcome, by the way. I used all of my cooling salve, and I don’t have the herbs to make more.”

My mouth dropped open.

After years of tormenting me with innuendos and clues and forcing me to chase rumors ... he had revealed his ability, the one granted to him through a long line of Cunningfolk ancestors.

Emrys was a Greenworker.

“Ah, she finally figures it out,” Emrys said.

I let out a sardonic laugh. “Your dear papa must have been so disappointed his only son turned out to be a flower whisperer. No wonder you both kept it secret from the guild.”

Having the ability to commune with and nurture plants wasn’t exactly useful in our line of work, at least when compared to some of the other magic gifts out there.

His expression hardened. “That’s one ability more than you have.”

If I’d had anything other than instant coffee in my mug, I would have thrown it at him. “Oooh, someone has some petal-soft feelings about it, huh? Noted.”

“You have a funny way of showing gratitude, Bird,” Emrys said. “Drink this before you pass out, please. You’re extremely dehydrated.”

I took the water bottle as resentfully as I could.

“I’m not going to say thank you,” I told him between sips. “I didn’t need your help, and I didn’t give you permission to come in my tent.”

“Forgive me for being concerned when I heard you screaming,” Emrys said. “You had a hundred-and-seven-degree fever. Your brain was on the verge of boiling itself and would have without my help. It’s called empathy—you should try it sometime.”

I bit the inside of my mouth to keep from snarling at him again when he was only trying to get a rise out of me. Instead, I studied him out of the corner of my eye, my bitterness gaining a new edge when I saw his top-of-the-line gear, including a collapsible axe.

Emrys wore an expensive-looking navy turtleneck sweater, loose slacks, a baseball cap, and polished leather hiking boots. Maybe because of the chill, he’d already pulled on his thick Hollower gloves—made of the finest dragonscale and passed down through generations, no doubt. They were meant for repelling light curses, not hiking.

“I was fine,” I said after a while, stupidly self-conscious of how bad I must look—still wet, and now covered in dirt and ointment.

“Did it even work?” he asked, exasperated. At my uncertain expression, he added, “There aren’t little greenlings or other Fair Folk around to test it on. Step outside the curse wards. You should be able to see everything inside them now.”

Botheration. I should have thought of that.

I rose stiffly, clutching my mug of instant coffee for moral support.

“Turn around,” I told Emrys.

“What? No.”

“Turn around,” I ordered. “Or shut your eyes.”

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