Page 17 of The Unkindest Tide

The Luidaeg looked at our group, a frown growing on her lips. “Where’s your daughter?” she asked.

“She’s coming,” I said.

She eyed me suspiciously. “Are you sure?”

“I sent Danny to pick her up. She’s coming.”

“She knows she has to come alone?”

“She knows.”

The Luidaeg opened her mouth like she was going to say something. Then she caught herself, closed it, and shook her head.

I wanted to tell her not to cast aspersions on Gillian. I couldn’t. I didn’t know Gillian well enough to know whether she was the kind of person who kept her word. Maybe she was halfway to Canada by now, passport in her hand and bag over her shoulder, unwilling to take the step that would commit her to Faerie forever.

The Luidaeg, meanwhile, had found another target. “What are you doing here?” she asked Marcia, more curious than cruel. “Where we’re going . . . if something happens, you’ll be a long way from human medical care.”

“Don’t worry about me,” said Marcia. It was impossible to tell whether she was being brave and talking to the sea witch like it wasn’t a big deal, or whether she simply didn’t know what she was doing. I hoped for the former. If she didn’t know, someone would eventually tell her, and once that happened . . . .

There were very few things I could think of that would make being in the middle of the ocean even less fun. Trying to talk Marcia down from a panic attack while we were there was on the list.

Blithely, Marcia continued, “I’ve been in Faerie for so long that I wouldn’t know what to do with a human hospital, and I’m sure the Undersea has healers. They have such a warlike culture, there’s no way they could survive without someone to set their bones.”

“A lot of them don’t survive,” said Dean glumly, looking at the water. “A lot of people think of Saltmist as this provincial little nowhere, because the land Courts are so strong here that the Undersea has never really wanted to force the issue of coastal and surface territory. We—I mean, they—maintain a presence. There has to be some reminder that the Undersea isn’t to be trifled with. But in the deep waters, where land’s just a legend . . . a lot of people don’t survive.”

“The ocean is not and has never been a toy,” said the Luidaeg. Dean cast her a nervous glance. She ignored it. “Forget that at your peril.”

“What are we calling you?” I asked.

She looked at me levelly. “Whatever you want. The time for pretty illusions is over.”

Understanding washed over me. I swallowed my gasp. She wouldn’t have appreciated it. The Luidaeg’s gaze didn’t waver. Her eyes were deep blue, drowning blue, like the entire ocean had somehow flowed into them and been trapped there.

The Luidaeg hated the Selkies for what they represented to her and to her family, but she loved them at the same time, because the Selkies had continued, through the long march of years, to treat her like a person. She existed in their eyes, as she existed in so few others. She was their Cousin Annie, and being Cousin Annie had been her escape from the pressure of being the sea witch. And now she was giving that away.

The smell of crushed blackberry flowers broke me out of my introspection. I turned to see a portal open in the air, disgorging a tall, dark-haired man with mismatched eyes, and—

“Cassandra!” I rushed over and swept my honorary niece into an embrace before I could think better of it, lifting her off her feet. She laughed and slung her arms around my shoulders, hugging me back. “I didn’t think you were coming!”

“Yeah, well, Her Highness didn’t want her brother traveling alone.” Cassandra let go long enough to hook a thumb toward Nolan, who bore her uncouth pointing with a stoically tolerant expression.

The Luidaeg didn’t look nearly so calm. “I wasn’t aware Queen Windermere was intending to send a contingent,” she said frostily.

“Aunt Birdie, put me down,” murmured Cassandra. I did as I was told. She took a step toward the Luidaeg before sinking into a picture-perfect curtsy, head bowed, neck an elegant, vulnerable line. “I beg your forgiveness, Luidaeg. My liege intended no offense.”

“Sometimes I really miss the old forms,” muttered the Luidaeg. “You should have come to me with a raw salmon in your hands, its gills still heaving, and been apologizing before you were even close enough to look at me. You might as well stand up. You’ve already insulted me as much as you’re going to.”

Cassandra straightened. She wasn’t wearing a human disguise, but she didn’t need one as much as some of us; she could have passed for human in the right light, as long as no one looked closely enough to realize that her hair wasn’t dyed. It grew in a natural gradient, blonde at the crown of her head tapering into black at its tips. Her ears were dully pointed, topped with tufts of hair in the same gradient, like she was some sort of humanoid lynx.

I’ve known her since she was born. She’s Mitch and Stacy’s eldest daughter, and I’m not thrilled about the part where she’s somehow ended up as Arden’s seneschal.

“My sister Karen sends her regards,” said Cassandra. “She told me to say that she’s been practicing her dream-walking just like you told her to, and you should be nice to me because I’m her favorite sister.”

The Luidaeg actually looked amused at that. “Did she, now? Well, I guess I have to listen. It wouldn’t do to piss off the only oneiromancer we have on hand.” She turned to Nolan. “You, on the other hand, were distinctly not invited to this party. What are you doing here, Prince Windermere? Don’t you know what happens to nobles who sail too far from familiar shores?”

“I stand as diplomatic emissary for my sister, Queen Arden Windermere in the Mists, long may she rule in peace and in plenty,” said Nolan stiffly. I couldn’t blame him for that. He wasn’t accustomed to being interrogated by the literal sea witch.

He was a striking man, despite his somewhat old-fashioned clothing and his plummy, outdated accent. He looked and sounded like something from an Underhill production of The Great Gatsby, and while I wasn’t sure having him along with us was necessarily a good idea, it was nice to see him outside the knowe. He’d spent the better part of the twentieth century in an elf-shot coma, and he was still adjusting to the way the world had changed while he was asleep. This was, so far as I was aware, the first time Arden had allowed him out of her sight for longer than a quick trip to the store. Which meant . . .