Page 33 of A Sea of Fate and Starfire

Kolibri waited with the other horses under a canopy of ashwood where we’d left them. Her ears perked as we approached. Kye snatched her bridle from a nearby branch, lifting me into her saddle. Naiads followed, their backs to us as they kept their focus outward, watching for the enemy. Aitne brushed past Kye to lean in close, ignoring Kolibri’s nicker of agitation as she smoothed her fingers across my closed wound. “How’s it feel, my Queen?”

My brows pinched. “Just a bit tight.” Fatigue wore at me now, surfacing around the edges of my mind, prodding for a weak point in my faculties.

Aitne studied me, her mouth thin. “Are you all right to ride?”

“I’ll join her,” Selena said. The siren floated between two Juilean Naiads to Kolibri’s side.

I pulled away. Straightened. Forced myself to wake up. “No.”

Her brows lifted, eyes widening at my tone. Around her, the other Naiads reacted the same, surprise flitting through the gathered faces near me. A twinge of guilt, one I couldn’t force myself to drive away. Not under the weight of heat that coiled in the air around me when I looked at her.

Her voice snaked through my head, apology thick in her words. The Fates marked Nikolaos for dead.

Kye cleared his throat, hoisting himself onto Kolibri and drawing me in close. “Aren, Dimas, and Leal are across that canyon. They’ll be heading this way now, I’m sure.”

If they’re alive went unsaid. But we heard it in his tone.

For a moment, the world was quiet. I’d expected the fight to follow us. To hear the clatter of steel or the gasps of men choking on their last breaths. But the afternoon sun shimmered across the tiny crystals in the snow. Mountain trees stood still, the soft fog that spooled from our mouths the only movement in sight. Even the wind lay subdued, turning its ear to the sky to listen for sound.

It felt easy. Too easy. They’d outnumbered us, hundreds to one. Yet they’d fallen back from a few mere lightning strikes. One arm holding me upright, Kye’s narrowed eyes searched the far trees, his opposite hand hovering over his sheathed sword.

Someone inhaled sharply, and our heads lurched toward the noise.

To Olinne. Shock lined the whites of her eyes, and she stood arrested in mid-turn, as if she’d just noticed the person next to her.

Cebrinne.

16

Maren

“Hello,” Cebrinne said, and though her voice was calm and confident, the single word branded her almost shy.

Olinne gave a small shriek, though I couldn't decide whether excitement or fear hovered within the layers of the sound. Only a step away, Nori reached for Cebrinne’s arm, an equally astounded puff of air spilling from her lungs.

Something in my gut tensed. I suppose I should have known this moment would quickly unfold. Nori and Olinne had befriended Cebrinne when I was a baby. Had promised to look after me when they realized Cebrinne carried an unsettled debt. That she’d escaped to Leihani with no other options.

I’m not sure why it suddenly made my air constrict, my chest pull taut. Like I’d looked down to find rope around my wrists and ankles, binding me to the spot. I was trapped, forced to watch an event that I still didn’t quite understand but made me slightly ill anyway.

Cebrinne smiled at them, almost timidly, but it didn’t fit her face. Her eyes and cheeks had been carved for hard stares and defiant scowls, the lines on either side of her mouth undiscovered and unnatural. Her gaze whisked to mine, and when she realized I was watching, she swerved her eyes elsewhere.

Still at my hip, Selena now roamed from my side. The Naiads broke for her, cleaving a small path. I could only imagine Cebrinne had died in tapa and hau bark, but Theia had sent her back in swaths of black sea silk, a Juilean siren.

Nori shook her head. “How—" she began softly. But Cebrinne’s attention had shifted away, now fixed on the sable-haired twin closing the gap between them.

“You’re here.” Selena’s voice was breathless. She reached for the sides of Cebrinne’s face, cradling it within her hands.

At her touch, Cebrinne’s eyes closed. “I’m here.”

“You can speak.” Selena’s voice cracked. “Are you—are you still bound to him?”

“No.” Cebrinne’s quiet smile flickered. “I died when I broke my vow to serve him. But my dues are paid with that death. I’m free.”

Selena’s face crumpled, and I didn’t hear what she said next.

My throat swelled. My chest ached. I was weightless for a moment. Listless. Alone and adrift, stranded on a raft at sea, watching a distant ship pass me by. It rolled through the waves, abandoning me to the aimless water.

Perspiration clung to my brow, seasickness leaving me clammy and cold. Filling the cavity with weight and muddy, cloudy nausea. I couldn’t untangle it, even as my heart ached for them, and maybe that was the problem. Selena pulled Cebrinne’s head into her shoulder. Soft whimpers cut the deadened air between them and me, and I knew the window of space in which I examined them was discolored emotions I hadn’t yet had time to unsort.