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Cormac scoffed. “And allow you to trample on any clue we might find? If there is anything to find after you asked loud and obnoxious questions.”
Rainn rolled his eyes. “The King’s favored might have known something.”
“Even if they knew something, they were unlikely to tell you.” Cormac kept his eyes forward as he studied the corridor before them. Their group fell silent as a guard walked across the junction between hallways.
Maeve’s rooms were further into the castle than he would have liked. Hidden. Slowly, the polish dissolved with each step. Algae and lichen claimed the stone. More fish swimming in the water, carried in through gaps in the window without care to chase them away.
Maeve was the king’s niece, but she had been the Mad Queen’s daughter before that. She was a Cruinn of royal blood.
Yet, Cormac wouldn’t have housed his servants in such a hovel. Even the barracks of Tarsainn were infinitely better.
The guards didn’t look their way, no doubt aided by the kelpie’s magic. Tor specialized in mental manipulation and once told Cormac that the ‘Don’t look at me’ spell was one of the first that kelpies learned as younglings.
When they reached the top of the tower, the water was somehow chillier than before. Rainn went first—in case it was a trap.
As Cormac took in the stone bed and the scant furniture, he felt ill.
The room looked just like the cells of the Tarsainn dungeon. Thick slime clung to the stone, marred only by hundreds of lines scored into the wall.
A countdown? But to what?
They began their search, but everything Cormac touched made his chest ache in a way he didn’t like.
The wardrobe, with a few threadbare dresses. The box of beads and other knick knacks—worn and with little value but treasured and taken care of.
“She isn’t here,” Shay growled, rubbing his chest.
Cormac swam to the bed, sinking down onto his scaled ass and sighing. He didn’t want to tell them about his deal with Lady Elaine. He had been desperate, and she had been persuasive.
But he hoped that wherever Maeve was, she was alive. He couldn’t very well marry her if she was foam.
They searched the room but came up empty, just like every other room in the castle.
Cormac was ready to give up and throttle Lady Elaine for answers when Maeve’s door burst open, revealing Liam Cruinn, breathless and wide-eyed.
Spooked. Cormac decided.
Cormac knew Liam was not his biggest fan. Torture and imprisonment usually put a wedge in any budding friendship. Whatever seemed to have shaken Liam to his core was more significant than his dislike of the Mer-King.
“Maeve... she... the High Throne. My mother...” Liam panted. “You have to save her.”
As Liam explained, Cormac didn’t say a word, trembling with every word.
The males listened, chilled to the bone. After a minute, Liam excused himself as he had to return to Maeve, unable to gather his panicked breath.
Tor pinched the bridge of his nose, breaking the silence. “I have an idea, and it’s the most foolish, dangerous thing I can think of.”
Chapter Eighteen
Finding my body was a lot like swimming through syrup. My thoughts were too thick and sludgy to wade through easily.
I had no idea what the High Throne had done. What I had been made to see. But my body was mincemeat, my blood leaking from the wounds at my wrists. My head hung, chin against my collarbone, as I struggled not to be sick.
Elaine was long gone, though I knew in the back of my mind that was not her real name. Elaine Cruinn was no more than a fiction. Someone created to ensnare my uncle and give Balor access to the High Throne.
Balor of the Deep. Balor, the keeper of monsters and the abyss.
It seemed that gender did not matter to the gods. Just as Belisama was no more of a man than I was, Balor was a female. A mother.
