Page 62 of The Unkindest Tide

“And if they were a Selkie, or a human?” I asked.

“A human, we’d drown.” Liz scowled at me before draining the last of the purple liquid from her glass. “Is that what you wanted? To be sure we were killers? I could have told you that in a much less roundabout manner.”

I wasn’t so sure of that. For all that being a Selkie meant she’d spent at least a portion of her life as a human, Liz had been a part of Faerie for much, much longer than she’d belonged, even in a sideways manner, to the mortal world; she thought more like a pureblood than I did. And purebloods are notorious about refusing to give a straight answer where death is concerned.

“What if it were a Selkie who killed one of your human kin?” I asked.

Liz bared her teeth in what might charitably have been called a smile. I knew better. I’d been sharing my bed with a King of Cats for long enough to know a threat when I saw one.

“One nice thing about being partially outside the law: no one interferes when we choose to take it into our own hands,” she said. “I’d skin them myself if that was what it came to.”

“Good,” I said. “I need to talk to you about Isla Chase.”

FIFTEEN

ELIZABETH LISTENED IMPASSIVELY as I explained how I’d stumbled over Isla’s body: the way she’d been tangled in a net, fixed to a pylon, in a way that seemed more accident than intent. How her hair had floated in the current, giving the illusion of motion.

How she’d drowned, and what that meant in terms of both the Luidaeg’s permission to rob each other and the Law.

When I was done, Liz tilted her head and said, “It’s not that I don’t believe you—I’m not quite stupid enough for that—but why were you in the water?”

Quentin and I exchanged a glance. Telling Liz exactly what was going on with the Lordens seemed both unwise and unkind. Their problems weren’t hers, and she had plenty of things already on her plate. Still . . .

“Duchess Dianda Lorden of Saltmist is currently indisposed, due to a challenge posed by her brother,” I said, as diplomatically as possible. “Her husband, the ducal consort, was concerned about their younger son, who had been left home with his caretaker when they came to witness the Convocation. I agreed to go get him. As that meant traveling to an Undersea Duchy, it was necessary to allow the Luidaeg to make a few small changes. They’re temporary.”

I reached up and swept my hair aside with the back of my hand, showing her the slits of my closed gills. Liz blinked, slowly. Then, to my surprise, she started laughing.

“Of course you let Annie transform you into something you’re not supposed to be; why in the world would you tell her ‘no, that’s all right, I’d rather be myself and rent some SCUBA gear,’ when she could just,” she made a swirling motion with her hands, “whizz-bang and you’re a mermaid? Oh, October, I wish I’d known you better when Connor was in love with you, so I’d have a better idea of how far you’ve fallen.”

I bristled. I couldn’t help it. It was blazingly obvious that she was trying to push my buttons, but that didn’t make it any harder for her to do. “Fallen or not, we brought Peter back to the Duchy of Ships to be with his parents, and I’m missing their reunion because I thought you might want justice for Isla.”

“Justice? For Isla Chase? That woman was mean as a moray and half as principled. She’d have slit my throat without a second thought if she believed it would get her another skin for her clan. She tried to do essentially that. Why would I want justice for her?”

“Because she drowned. Because someone stole her skin and threw her into the element that had been hers for her entire life, and they thought they’d get away with it, because she was human when she died. Humans deserve kindness, too. She was ours. She belonged to Faerie. She deserves answers.”

Liz still looked like she didn’t get it. I silently reminded myself that throttling her, while not a violation of the Law, would probably be considered impolitic at best, and really rude at worst. No matter how nice it would be in the moment, it wasn’t worth the long-term ramifications.

“If someone’s decided that having permission to steal skins means permission to go around killing your human kin, they need to be stopped,” I said, as clearly and patiently as I could. “This is not the sort of person you want to step into immortality with, and Isla deserves better, no matter how awful she was. No one should die cold and frightened and alone. Now will you help me?”

“How?” asked Liz. “And why? You’re here to put an end to us, and a Selkie without a skin is no concern of Faerie’s. Why in the world would you be willing to do this—why do you want to? You should be glad to know that there’s one more possible security flaw patched over and left to be forgotten.”

I took another deep breath. “Were you this terrible when you were living with the Luidaeg?” I asked. “Because if you were, I’m sort of amazed she didn’t turn you into something nasty and leave you for the seagulls.”

“She turned me into a bitter, broken-hearted drunk when she refused to tell me why she wanted me to turn away the birthright I’d been dreaming of for my entire life,” said Liz. “Is that crime enough, or should I go looking for something more direct that made me the way I am now? I gave her everything. I wanted to spend my life with her.”

“You gave her everything but the courtesy of leaving your back bare of her dead child’s skin,” said Tybalt mildly. “I have no living children: I’ve never been so fortunate. But if you appeared before me with my dead daughter’s pelt around your shoulders, I’d make you something other than a drunkard. I’d make you a corpse.”

“Okay, there’s going to be blood on the floor in a minute if we keep going down this road, and while that’s sadly tempting right now, it’s probably not the best thing for us,” I said. “Why do I care, Liz? Because when someone turned me into a fish and took me away from my family for a decade and a half, the Law said no crimes had been committed, and no one came to save me. The places where Faerie rubs up against the mortal world are unpoliced and unprotected, and Isla deserved better. You all deserve better. The fact that the Luidaeg is willing to let the Selkies steal each other’s skins for the chance to become Roane doesn’t mean she wants anyone slaughtering the defenseless.”

At least I hoped it didn’t. I didn’t think it could. The Luidaeg was one of Faerie’s oldest, weariest monsters, but she wasn’t cruel, not to children, not to the defenseless. The fact that she’d been able to love Liz before the other woman had draped herself in sealskin proved that. It was only the Selkies themselves who broke her heart, not their human kin.

Liz closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Finally, opening them, she said, “We should speak to Mathias. He isn’t my biggest fan—he’s always believed I owe my position to having been Annie’s lover, and maybe he’s right; maybe this was the best punishment she could think of for my many, many sins—but he knows I care for my clan, and he had reason to be well-inclined toward Isla. He’ll want to see her, and he’ll want to find the person who did this.”

“Excellent.” I hesitated, looking around the room, before I asked my next question. “Where’s Gillian?”

“I told you, she’s with the children,” said Liz. “They like her. She’s charmingly ignorant by their standards, and they get to feel clever when they teach her the things she doesn’t already know.” She looked at me levelly. “I’d strip that skin from her shoulders in a second to give to one of them, if she didn’t have Annie’s protection, and if she wouldn’t drop dead without it. Your girl doesn’t know how lucky she is.”

“Given the number of times Faerie has ruined her life, I’d say she knows exactly how lucky she is, and one day we’re all going to burn for it,” I said. “Take us to Mathias.”