I’ll bet you do. “You promised us safe passage.”

When his lips compress the tiniest bit, I wonder if I’ve made a misstep. A knot forms in my stomach. Insulting the Spider King would be a grave mistake.

His lips relax, and one corner of his mouth curves up. It’s wholly unnerving to have the full attention of a man whose name is only ever uttered in reverence or fear.

“I wanted to know if you could do it.”

I frown, a spark of anger releasing my tongue. “You let the trees attack us? Because you wanted to see if we’d survive?”

“But you did.”

He hadn’t lost control over the Dead Wood. He’d allowed it to nearly kill us. My hands curl into fists beneath the table, but I relax my face so that I don’t betray my anger. With Ronin, I must tread even more carefully than I had at the Company.

“So we did,” I say evenly.

On the table between us, a silver tray holds a porcelain tea set. The teapot steams faintly. I don’t lean back like I want to when he lifts one pale hand. But nothing happens except a door swinging open to our right. A servant hurries across the polished floor, pausing only to bow deeply to Ronin, before reaching for the teapot. He pours us each a cup, then bows again and scurries out as quickly and silently as he entered.

Ronin spends the entire time scrutinizing me. I give him as little as possible. The tea smells sweet with a dash of warm spices, but I make no move to drink it. I worry that my hand will shake.

“Tell me what happened the night before yesterday.” He speaks with a poise that I recognize in many of the lords who’ve passed through Vos Talwyn. Yet his fingers that rest on the rim of his saucer are those of a soldier’s, dry and roughened by work.

My anger with his manipulation aside, we still need his help. So I tell him about how unusual it had been for three Nuvali shamans to attack a teahouse in Evewyn. With hesitance, I force myself to also tell him about how Saengo had died.

“But I did something to her, and when I woke up again, she was alive with only an old scar to show for it.” Saying it out loud for the first time makes my chest constrict.

He listens without comment, his expression one of keen interest. When I finish, he looks down at his untouched tea, contemplative. I rotate the talisman around my wrist, trying to find answers in the angles of his face. Even though he gave me permission to meet his eyes, doing so still feels insolent.