Page 95 of A Dark and Drowning Tide

She trudged glumly in the back of the group. Her hair was slicked against her face, and her fine boots now seemed to be made more of mud than leather. She radiated a powerful misery that was trying the very last of Lorelei’s delicate patience.

“Surely there is some data you can collect,” Adelheid said flatly. “Make yourself useful instead of complaining.”

“On second thought, walking through this wasteland isgreat.” As if on cue, the top of Heike’s backpack snagged on a low-hanging branch. She wrenched herself violently free with asnapof wood. “What is wrong with him?”

Out in front of them, Johann marched like a man pursued. Sylvia stumbled to keep pace with him as he tugged on her tether.

“I can’t imagine,” Lorelei said dryly.

“Nothing, I am certain.” Adelheid shot Lorelei a reproachful look. Her next step landed her in a puddle that soaked her to the knee. Adelheid gave an undignified full-body shudder. She yanked her boot out of the mud with an obscenesquelch.

Heike snorted.

With an exasperated sigh, Adelheid said, “Right. Tread carefully, then.”

They followed the river until they reached a waterfall. It tumbled off the lip of a limestone cliff in a perfect white curtain and emptied into a vast pool. Johann stopped dead in his tracks when it came fully into view. Sylvia collided with his back, letting out an indignantoof!It took no more than a moment for Lorelei to realize why.

Rocks jutted from the water in an eerie, circular formation. The sun had broken through the cloud cover and glimmered on the pool’s surface like a golden ring. A horde of nixies had installed themselves on the stones, sunbathing and humming and braiding their hair. There were more than she’d ever seen congregated in one place, likely driven upriver by the iron poisoning their water. The chain around her neck burned in warning.

“Brilliant,” Heike said sharply. “A great plan,Johann—andflawlessly executed. Now what do we do?”

The nixies turned and regarded them. It was difficult to attribute any human traits to them, but they looked quite displeased to see them. Their gills flared, as did the gauzy fins that fringed the bottoms of their tails. There was nowhere to go, unless they backtracked through the woods.

Adelheid turned to Sylvia. “What would you advise?”

Sylvia, no matter how embittered, apparently could not help offering her knowledge when asked. “Ah,well...Lastnight, I said the nixies didn’t look particularly aggressive. However, these ones are presenting much differently.”

“Is that right?” Heike asked impatiently. “How would you characterize these ones?”

“Hostile!” Sylvia rounded on her. “If you had listened to me in the first place, we would not be in this predicament at all.”

“Then fix it,” Heike hissed.

Adelheid interjected with a genteel cough. “Perhaps it would be wise to turn around.”

“No,” said Lorelei. “Why don’t you sing to them, von Wolff?”

Johann looked nauseated at the very suggestion. Sylvia regarded her suspiciously.

“She can speak to them,” Lorelei continued. “I have seen it firsthand.”

She did not know the extent ofSylvia’s...fluency,if it could be called such, in the nixie tongue. But if she could somehow convince them to distract the others or compel them into stillness, perhaps the two of them could escape.

Lorelei stared at Sylvia with an expression she hoped said,Go with it.

Sylvia stared back blankly. Disappointment dropped into Lorelei’s gut like a stone. Sylvia hadn’tunderstood—orperhaps she truly had resigned herself to her fate. Then, a smile broke across her face. Glimmering bright in her eyes was something painfully, beautifully familiar: hope.

So she hadn’t lost herself yet.

“That,” Sylvia said, “is an excellent idea.”

“This ought to be good,” Heike muttered.

Unease splintered Adelheid’s cool mask, but she did not object. The five of them made their way down to the pool. While Sylvia approached the edge of the water, the rest of them huddled a safe distance away. Her wrists were still bound behind her. Lorelei tried not to look too closely at the bruises spreading beneath her pale skin, or the way her fingers swelled from the pressure.

Agreeing to this plan was either staggeringly brave or staggeringlystupid—maybeboth. One misstep, and she would be gone, dragged to a watery grave or torn to ribbons. But for perhaps the first time in Lorelei’s life, worry seemed a faraway thing. How could she possibly doubt Sylvia? She had watched her defy death time and time again. While Sylvia did not channel aether, she possessed another, more potent sort of magic. Every wildeleute they encountered fell hopelessly under her enchantment. For the longest time, Lorelei could not figure out how she’d managed it. But now, she understood.

Sylvia had opened herself up to wonder.