Beneath his breath, she heard Bash mutter, “He’sabout to be in need of mending.”
“You’re welcome,” replied the healer and grinned at Bash as if he’d heard the threat and found it wildly entertaining. Then his glance slid sideways. “Lennox.”
“Durant.”
Alora looked at her friend and blinked, taken aback that Lennox kept her gaze upturned to the ceiling.Hmm.What history did she not know?
Alora could hardly wait to ask.
“Well, being as it’s gone suddenly cold in here, I should take my talent outside and see if I can put it to any use.” His bow caught Alora off her guard, and she laughed. A laugh she then cut at noting Lennox’s sneer.
When he’d gone, Alora said, “What did he do to you?”
“I’ll tell you later,” Lennox replied, staring after him.
Which was fine; Alora could be patient. She stepped out of Bash’s grip to slip her arm around Lennox’s shoulders. “I’d best see to the rest of the rooms. Retrieve the mermaid from the pool before I have nothing left to climb.”
“Let me help you,” said Bash. He pulled the mask from his mouth and made to toss it onto the pile formed beside his boots.
“Wait,” rushed Alora. She blushed. “Keep it.”
“Keep…” Bash looked from the mask to her, his eyes narrowed and so deeply green. Slowly, he shook his head, but he didn’t toss the mask as he’d meant, tucking it into his pocket instead. “As you wish.”
Red as apples now, Alora looked to Lennox, meaning to ask if she’d want to stay with Alora now that she was free. But her friend had eyes only for what happened behind them, at the pieces of gold being hauled away. “I’ll help you chip off a step, if you’d like.”
At that, Lennox sniffed, returning her attention to Alora. “It’s not that, though maybe. Now that you’re offering,” she said, her smile unsteady. “It just doesn’t seem real. That not a day ago, I was in the middle of another night of another routine, and now I am free. Oh, don’t look at me. I’m a mess.”
At once, Alora’s eyes snapped away.
Oh hell.
Alora had forgotten she was still entranced.
Chapter Forty-Eight
Anew moon rose over deep-blue ocean waters that night. How fitting.
Alora lifted the latch of the glass enclosure from where it rested in the sand. These were not like the beaches she’d read about in other places of the world: all black cliffs and black sands, rugged and dangerous, the water cold. These beaches were white and yellow sands, warm and soft and inviting.
And there were flowers. All colors, growing from cracked logs and creeping over dunes. It looked so well together, the delicate and vast, that Alora knew she would come back to visit often, now that she didn’t fear for her and others’ lives.
The mermaid climbed from the enclosure, its eyes closed, nose upturned to the salt on the breeze and starlight. Alora watched the deep inhales and prolonged exhales of the creature’s chest, her own tight.
She swung the lantern in her grip. “I’m sorry it took me so long to come back for you after we first met.”
“I understand.”
“Will you be all right on your own?”
“I am home. I will be well.”
Alora nodded. She’d not been gone a full day and already she yearned for home. How must it have been for the mermaid, entrapped for nearly two decades? For once, she could not imagine.
A particularly large wave crashed across the beach, its pull reaching the mermaid and grasping hold. A sound much like relief left the creature’s lips. It didn’t fight the water’s retreat but leaned into the drag.
“Thank you.”
Alora stared back into those familiar silver eyes above the surface.
