Page 262 of Blade of the Nightking

I glanced behind me to the marshes. Nothing there.

I joined him at the boulder and slipped off my boots. Rolling my trousers to just below my knees, I glanced sideways at him.

“I don't like it here.”

He didn't answer.

I waited, foolishly hoping for something—a glance, a sigh, even the smallest acknowledgment—but his expression remained carved from stone as he bent over his work. He might as well have been alone.

Biting my tongue, I turned away and stepped into the water. Cool waves curled around my ankles, taking the cruel edge off the heat. Wet sand shifted beneath my feet, squeezing between my toes with every step. Sunlight shattered across the surface, scattering into a thousand dancing fragments that glittered so brightly I had to squint.

The sea was crystal blue, impossibly clear beside the stagnant marshes scarcely a stone’s throw behind me. It was as though the Tidelands had surrendered every ounce of its beauty to these waters, leaving the land barren in exchange.

I hissed as something sharp bit into my foot. I winced and bent to retrieve it from the water.

A shell.

I rinsed away the clinging sand, rubbing my thumb over its surface. The outside was a soft, chalky white, delicate ridges fanning outward from the hinge like the rays of a rising sun. Curious, I turned it over.

I couldn’t stop my delighted grin.

The inside shimmered with iridescence, pale rose melting into blush pink and pearly ivory. The colors were as soft as dawn breaking over the horizon.

There seemed to be no end to the beautiful things in the Fae realm. Little treasures lay scattered everywhere, so commonplace that no one seemed to notice them. A few months ago, I wouldn't have stopped to admire it. I would've been calculating what it might fetch in Midland instead. A little meat. A length of wool. Another day or two of survival.

Now… I simply wanted to hold it.

And I could.

Turning back toward shore, I waded through the shallows until I reached the boulder once more. Rìan still hadn't moved. It was as though the sea, the sun, and I were all equally unworthy of his attention.

I climbed onto the rock and held out the shell. “It’s pretty, don’t you think?”

He glanced at it briefly, but said nothing.

Something inside me wilted beneath his silence, at the way he'd walled himself off again. Clearing my throat against the tightness gathering there, I set the shell on the sun-warmed boulder between us, leaving it to dry in the late afternoon light.

He tested the edge of his blade with his thumb. A thin line of crimson welled across the pad of his finger. He sheathed the knife and selected another. I watched in silence, his hair falling into his eyes as his forearms flexed with each measured pass of the whetstone. Whatever thoughts occupied him, he seemed intent on grinding them into the steel.

"Did I do something wrong?"

His hands stilled. A long sigh escaped him. "No, Eidra. You didn't."

"Then what is it?"

He opened his mouth, the answer seeming to catch in his throat. For a heartbeat, I thought he might actually tell me. Instead, he looked toward the marsh.

"There are Brinnekin in the reeds."

I frowned. "What?"

"Brinnekin. That's why you're uneasy." His attention moved back to his blade. "They've been watching us since we arrived."

I glanced nervously toward the swamp, searching for some sign of movement. Nothing.

"How do you know?"

"I sense them."