Chapter 9: Silver Fog

I sat up on the tarp with my robe clutched to my chest.

"Then I won't be drawn," I said.

Rook stared at me.

"That's your answer?"

"There are two more trials. If I'm never the lowest, the Well has no reason to pick me."

"It doesn't work like that."

"Then tell me how it works."

He rubbed his face with both hands.

"The trials don't decide it. Delphine can change a rank card with a pen."

"Then I'll make sure a pen isn't enough."

"How?"

"I don't know yet."

I stood and tied the robe around my waist.

My legs were still weak, my skin still humming, and I was furious in a bright, clean way I hadn't felt in years.

"You should have told me the first night," I said.

"I did tell you. I whispered it in front of four million people."

"You told me half. You told me I'd been sold. You didn't tell me you were lying about the claim."

"I lied so they wouldn't draw your name early. It bought us time."

"Next time you decide something about my body, you ask me."

He was silent.

"You're right," he said at last. "I will."

I looked at him standing in the lantern light with his shirt hanging open, ashamed, and my anger cooled by a degree.

"Good," I said. "Now find me my shoes."

In the morning a courier delivered a sealed envelope to my room.

Inside was a printed page with Delphine's signature and a date.

The day after the finale, one inmate at Blackwater Prison would be released.

It didn't list a name.

Tilly was still in the infirmary, sleeping.

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