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As Batya and Davido sipped their tea, Quinlan told his side of things in as much detail as he could recall.
Since he remained standing, his audience looked up at him while he spoke.
“Could you see her face?” Davido asked.
“No. Just a powerful glow but I could smell her, like something that had been rotting for a long time. I remember the smell from Sweet Gorge.”
“Sounds like an herbalist of some kind,” Davido remarked. “And the quality of her smell might be an effect she created on purpose, like a dramatist. After all, a pleasant fragrance wouldn’t incite fear, would it?”
“No. But what’s her game? What does she want with your daughter?”
Davido’s brows rose, which in turn deepened the lines between his three forehead ridges, typical troll features. “Nothing. She wasn’t here for Batya. Vojalie was very clear about that.”
“You’re mistaken, Davido, or your wife is. I can remember the ancient fae stating, ‘He wasn’t supposed to be here’, meaning me.”
“Then we have a mystery.” Davido sipped his tea.
“Did Vojalie say anything else, some detail you might have forgotten?”
“No, that was it. Wait, there was one more, small thing, but it didn’t exactly make sense. Maybe it will to the two of you. She said, ‘speak to the siren’. But what could that mean? Were the police here?”
“’The siren’? Are you sure?” The stone in Quinlan’s heart sank farther still because he thought he understood, which meant that Batya wasn’t the object after all.
“No,” Batya murmured, shaking her head. “No, no, no.”
“What’s going on, my children?” He looked from one to the other.
At that moment, Lorelei appeared in the doorway, only she wasn’t walking, her soft brown eyes were now almost lavender in color but darker, her limbs had lengthened and thinned, and she now wore a long flowing black gown made up of gauzy strips of fabric. She floated several inches above the floor. “Your wife meant me. I’m what the ancient fae wants. I’m what she’s after. I’ve hidden all these decades, but she’s finally found me. I just don’t know how and I don’t know what to do.”
“Lorelei.” Batya’s large hazel eyes widened. “You’re a wraith. But that’s impossible.”
Chapter Three
Batya knew she stared at a wraith, but she couldn’t believe her eyes, couldn’t believe that sweet Lorelei was a wraith. On the other hand, given that so many wraiths had chosen to become Invictus pairs, she wasn’t surprised that the woman hid the truth of her DNA.
Yet not all wraiths were bad. She knew that a large portion of the wraith population had long ago either gone into hiding or now lived on an island colony off one of the eastern realms.
Whatever the truth about the location of the wraith community, Batya had been living side-by-side with one all this time. Unbelievable.
In her wraith form, Lorelei’s skin was the color of chalk, her lips a dark hue, the whites of her eyes pale yellow, and her irises violet. Her long hair floated around her as though moving underwater, almost weightless.
She drifted slowly into the room.
Batya’s cup had frozen halfway between her mouth and the saucer she held in her left hand. Two other cups hung midair as well.
“You really are a wraith.” Batya still couldn’t believe her eyes.
“Part of me is.” Lorelei frowned, a pained expression crossing her face. Then suddenly, the wraith became a blur, transforming into a lean white wolf that leaped high in the air, landing on the coffee table to snarl in Batya’s face.
The tea tray and pot slid over the edge, clattering to the carpet below.
Lorelei howled.
Batya dropped her teacup and saucer and covered her ears, not because the sound hurt but because the emotion behind the plaintive cry pierced her heart. She felt Lorelei’s pain, an old wound fitting for a wolf’s howl. Batya wept because of the pain.
She didn’t know what to do. She squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head back-and-forth. She needed the sound to stop.
Suddenly, it did.
She opened her eyes, and saw the cause. Her father had embraced the wolf, from the side, softly around the neck and spoke into Lorelei’s ear.
Batya recognized the cadence of the old language. Davido had used it to calm her more than once when she was a child.
When Davido drew back, releasing the wolf, Lorelei whirled through another transformation, resuming her fae form. She sank down into a chair across from the table, her feet turned in like a child as she shaded her face with her hands.
She’d finally unveiled her secret, but Batya still didn’t understand. “You can shift, but you’re a wraith?”
Lorelei nodded.
“Yet you’re also fae.”
“Yes. My mother was…is…fae and wraith. I carry all three strains.”
“That’s not possible.” Quinlan, still standing, flared his nostrils. “No such thing exists in our world. You can’t exist. The wraith gene can’t exist with more than one other strain.”
Lorelei chuckled bitterly. “And yet, I do. A product of extensive experimentation.”
“How old are you, child?” Davido remained nearby.
“Ninety.”
“And who is your mother, though I believe I already know.”
Lorelei lifted her gaze to Davido. “Do you? I’ve always wondered if you or Vojalie or some of the mastyrs had ever known her.”
“Yes, I knew her but she disappeared from the realm world for several centuries. Now it would seem she has decided to make a reappearance. And for your sake, I’ve very sorry my dear.”
“Who are we talking about?” Batya glanced from one to the other, but got a sick feeling in her stomach as though her body already knew what her mind did not want to accept.
“Fuck.” Still standing, Quinlan set his cup on the table and turned his back to Lorelei. He shoved his hands through his hair, dislodging the woven clasp.
The sick feeling worsened. Batya turned back to Lorelei and held her gaze. “Who’s your mother?”
“Quinlan knows. So does your father. Can’t you guess?” Tears now rolled down her cheeks.
Batya once more shook her head over and over. “It can’t be.”
“Her name is Margetta, the ancient fae, the one who smells of a land fill, the one who enlisted Mastyr Ry, turning him against Bergisson Realm, who caused all that misery at Sweet Gorge six months ago.”
