“You fed me an egg with a dead duckling fetus in it and said it was a luxury food,” I said dryly. “How did you possibly think I’d take that well?”

“To be honest I probably wasn’t thinking,” Soren said.

Lydian shrugged. “It’s okay, Janneke. I don’t have a taste for raw meat either.”

An awkward silence cast over us like a raincloud. Other than Lydian, who didn’t seem to see anything wrong with the comment, the others had dark looks on their faces at the casual comment. As if he were part of our friend group and could join in the conversation, especially when it was targeted at me.

“Let’s get going,” I said, scooping the uneaten pemmican back into the bowl I got it from. With a quiet click, the lid was closed and I shoved it into my knapsack.

It was silent then, except for the noise that came with shoving things back into jars or other containers, organizing the knapsacks so they could hold more without being overbearing. Seppo and I switched knapsacks—his had been considerably lighter than mine. I frowned, slightly offended. Did he think I was too weak to hold a regular bag? I shot him a sharp look.

“You’re more important than I am in this mission. So, you should have the lighter bag in case we need to run,” he explained, rubbing the back of his neck.

“I appreciate the thought, Seppo,” I said, “but you’re just as important as I am. However, if it keeps you asleep at night, I’ll use the lighter one.”

When we finally climbed out of the den, Lydian was standing there glaring at us. I rolled my eyes, not particularly caring if we abided by his personal schedule, and asked, “So, where to next?”

Lydian pointed north. “The line goes that way. Be careful, there’s a certain stretch of ice that’s impossibly thin. I’ll point it out because otherwise we’ll all drown.”

A roll of hostility went over me. Lydian managed to say these things in the voice of trail guider—informational, conversational, pleasant—as if he were any of those things for real. I knew by now, not all monsters wore ugly skin and the most terrible creature could look beautiful, but it still made my stomach clench at the way Lydian spoke and moved; everything about him that came off as normal made it feel like bugs were crawling all over my skin. But if you knew nothing about him and just looked at him, you’d see a normal goblin. I didn’t want to see a normal goblin.

Soren’s hand found mine. “You okay?” he said. “After last night?”

“Yeah,” I said, breath creating a cloud of frost in the air. “I’m not hurt. I guess it goes to prove that it’s dangerous out here.”