Page 41 of The Unkindest Tide

I lowered my hands. “Did the furniture say something mean about your mother?” I asked.

“My mother is safe at home in Boston, and hasn’t spoken to me in over a century,” said Patrick. His voice was calm and measured, as it almost always was. There was blood coming from between the fingers of his left hand. He’d probably split the skin on several of his knuckles, assuming he hadn’t managed to do something even worse. He chuckled darkly, not opening his eyes. “She didn’t like me marrying a mermaid. Said it was ‘beneath me.’ I suppose that’s something she and Dianda’s family can agree on.”

“Dad,” said Dean desperately. “Please, let me see your hand.”

“Why? It’s only blood. As pure as hers, but that doesn’t matter, because I can’t breathe water, and she can’t be happy on the land.”

“It’s only blood, but if I have to stand here smelling it, I’m not going to be able to get anything done.” I started back toward the group. “Marcia? Did you pack a first aid kit?”

“The Count’s as clumsy as a newborn lamb, so yes, I packed a first aid kit. I don’t go anywhere without one.” Marcia stepped out from behind the tomatoes, looking relieved to have something to do. “I’ll be right back.”

“Great.” I walked toward Patrick, moving slow and careful. He couldn’t see me, but he could hear me, and I didn’t want to startle him. Under the circumstances, it seemed like a very, very bad idea. “Patrick, Marcia’s going to take a look at your hand. You want to sit down while she does it?”

“This was a trap.” He finally opened his eyes, turning to face me. “He would never have come here without first securing Saltmist. Do you understand?”

“Helmi—”

“Is one Cephali. One guard we know is completely loyal. I . . . I know our staff, I know most of them wouldn’t turn against us for no good reason, but this is the Undersea. You yield to the strongest hand in the room.” Patrick’s despair was written clear for anyone to see. “Torin must have had someone there, waiting for the day when we left without Peter. Someone signaled him. And then, once his forces took the knowe, all the people who were loyal to us would have changed allegiance to him and not thought for a second that they were doing anything wrong. This is how things are done in the depths. The peace is maintained because once it’s broken, everyone shifts sides.”

“Helmi wouldn’t,” I said firmly.

“No,” said Patrick. “She’s been with Dianda too long. She’s sworn to her in a dozen different ways, and she would never betray our family. Which is why I fully expect to hear that only two people from our household died in the fighting.”

I began to open my mouth to ask who he thought the second casualty would be. I caught myself, barely, before I could speak.

Peter. He was talking about Peter.

Quentin looked from Patrick to Dean, who was shivering, barely seeming to hold himself together. “I don’t understand,” he said, and finally looked to me, like he thought I’d have all the answers. And maybe he did. I’d been his knight for years, and he’d learned he could depend on me to know what to do, even if I thought “bleed” was the correct solution.

When none of us said anything, he repeated, louder, “I don’t understand. How can Torin just walk in here and arrest Duchess Lorden for treason? She didn’t do anything wrong. And you can’t really be saying he would . . . he wouldn’t break the Law to take Saltmist. No war has been declared. He doesn’t have the authority to break the Law.” Quentin sounded almost desperate.

I understood why. The Law is supposed to be absolute: that’s why we call it the Law, even though everyone knows it’s not the only thing a person can be punished for. Kidnapping, theft, treason—even if Faerie doesn’t have hard and fast laws forbidding them, doing those things is likely to make a lot of people angry. Nobles have the power to punish their own subjects for breaking the social code, and even outside of noble households, people police themselves fairly tightly. The one Law, the one inarguable rule of Faerie, is that purebloods don’t kill each other.

The Law doesn’t cover changelings; it’s always been perfectly acceptable for someone to kill me and then claim they did it because I’d looked at them funny, or because I’d been in their way, or whatever. Because Sylvester became my liege when I was remarkably young, as such things go, anyone who’d tried that would have found themselves facing a pissed-off Daoine Sidhe Duke demanding satisfaction . . . but they technically wouldn’t have broken the Law.

Peter’s parents were both fae. He might be a blend of Merrow and Daoine Sidhe, but that wasn’t enough to set him outside the Law. I looked to Patrick, hoping for an explanation.

I got one.

“The Undersea chooses to abide by the land’s ideas of what is and is not a war, when they have to interact; it’s easier, given how often they can avoid air-breathers, not to force a discussion of what exactly it means to go to war. But the Merrow, much like the Cait Sidhe, have been allowed to develop their own definitions of certain things. During a fight for succession, it’s totally acceptable to . . . to . . .” He stopped then, putting a hand over his eyes. Not fast enough to stop a tear from running down his cheek, visible and utterly damning.

“Oh,” I whispered. I bit my lip, watching Patrick. He wasn’t supposed to cry. It wasn’t right. “Okay. We have to . . . don’t jump straight to assuming the worst, okay? Helmi’s smart, she knows Saltmist, and she’s loyal. If she had any warning, she’ll have gotten Peter out of there.”

And if she hadn’t received warning, if Torin’s people had been quick and careful enough, she and Peter were both lost forever. I couldn’t dwell on that. If I did, I’d be useless to everyone, Peter included. He was just a kid. He didn’t deserve to be swept up in all this.

“Where will the trial be?” A dire thought occurred to me. “There is a trial, right? Torin isn’t going to haul her off and have her executed as part of this succession thing? Because if that’s the plan, we need to organize a jailbreak right now.” The Lordens could be exiles in the Mists, if it came to that. King Gilad had been a friend of theirs. His daughter would never refuse to offer them sanctuary.

Dianda would be miserable on land, but she’d be alive. We could get her a saltwater swimming pool or something. She could be safe. All the Lordens could be safe. Assuming it wasn’t already too late for the youngest of them.

No. Screw that. I wasn’t going to think that way. I turned and walked to the Luidaeg’s apartment, rapping lightly. There was no response. I knocked harder. There was still no response. I started knocking even harder, hammering on the door until the side of my hand ached. The others watched silently, clearly not understanding what I was trying to do—or if they did understand, not seeing a way to help.

That was fine. As usual, I was making this up as I went along.

“Yo, Luidaeg!” I yelled, over the sound of my own hammering. “I heal like it’s a contest, remember? I can break my hand on this damn door and keep right on going. So open up, before you get a headache to go with the rest of your problems.”

There was a long pause. I kept knocking. Maybe my first appeal hadn’t worked, but my second would, or my third, or my fifth—however many it took. We didn’t have a lot of time, but this was still where things needed to begin.

The door swung open without warning. I was already in the middle of my next knock, and for one horrible moment, I thought I was going to punch the Luidaeg square in the face. She was capable of forgiving me for a great many things, but even so, that would be pushing it.