Page 62 of The Dark Sea Calls

Now, all I saw was their betrayal.

I had come to terms with the Frosted Sands as much as possible, or I thought I had.

Learning that Cormac had pulled Liam from the debris and somehow gotten him back to Tarsainn without saying a single word might have broken me.

How many other Undine were in the Tarsainn dungeons, being slowly poisoned by iron?

“I can’t….” I stepped back, shaking my head, as I turned and fled from the dining hall.

I swam from the room as fast as I could. Ignoring the stares from every Fae that I came across. I couldn’t move fast enough as I burst out of the front doors of the palace, down the outstretched courtyard that led to the squirming wall of Reeds, like a mountain made of black snakes overlooking the city of light.

Liam wasalive.

I kept moving, ignoring the shouts behind me as someone called my name. My fists clenched tight enough that my long black nails drew blood, and I felt the hungry water drink it down. The lake felt my anger, and it wanted to act, but I couldn’t let it. I needed control. I needed a clear mind.

I needed to stay calm.

Which was easier said than done after I had found out that Cormac wanted to kill me so badly that he was willing to trade a valuable prisoner to have me in his possession again.

What would my uncle do when he received the missive? Even if the Siren Queen still intended to provide soldiers to Cruinn, her silvers were dust, and it would take a fortnight to reach the Twilight Lake from the Dark Sea. There was no way to tell my uncle that I was no longer at the Cradle.

Would Cormac kill Liam when he found out I wasn’t in Cruinn?

Liam and I hadn’t parted on the best terms, but we had been friends for years. Comrades in the stifling world of the gilded Fae. He had supported me, unthreatened by the tarred brush of my presence.

I couldn’t consolidate the imagery of Liam’s love confession and my view of the Reeds. How many weeks had passed since the frosted sands? Why couldn’t I just close my eyes and forget it? Why couldn’t I put my broken pieces together?

I had no intention of dying at Cormac’s hand, but I had no intention of ever sitting on the High Throne again.

Was I selfish for not wanting to die? For not wanting to bleed?

Someone called my name again. Rainn burst from the castle doors, looking around frantically until his eyes found mine, and he swam towards me. Panicked.

He crashed into me, pulling me into his arms and whispering my name.

Rainn didn’t offer platitudes or any attempt to understand. He held me. Allowing my head to rest against his chest as his arms wrapped around my body as if he was afraid I would turn to foam.

I didn’t know what to say.

How to explain.

I might have been a coward, but I had to help Liam. The Frosted Sands were all my fault. Cormac’s march on Cruinn was my fault.

My lip quivered, and I bit back tears, bundling every negative emotion into a ball and pushing it down into my body. I wasn’t sure how successful I was, but my eyes no longer stung.

“I wish I could turn it all off,” I told Rainn. “I hate feeling like this.”

“You can’t turn it all off. It doesn’t work that way,” Rainn’s words rumbled from where his head rested on my crown.

“I looked into the Siren Queen’s eyes, and there was nothing there. No anger. No fear. Just power,” I whispered. “When will I be like that? When will it stop hurting?”

“I hope you’re never like that,” Rainn replied. “But the answer to both is time. Immortality has a way of chipping away at emotions. Burying them behind a wall so thick that breaking through is almost impossible. My mother is the same.”

I knew the Selkie queen existed but didn’t know much else about her, only that she had birthed seven children, and Rainn was the youngest.

Rainn cleared his throat. “Is this Liam important to you?”

My brow furrowed as I tried to find the words to answer his question. “Liam is my stepbrother. We grew up together. Both outcasts in our own way. His mother, Elaine, had married my uncle, but it was well known that they were not Shíorghrá. Elaine had good breeding, but she was a widow. Liam was her only son, so it was known that she wasn’t barren. I always assumed my uncle would try to have an heir with Elaine, but they never had children together. Liam wanted to be a Troid Sídhe more than anything else.”

---