Page 28 of A Magic Deep & Drowning

His fur began to shed as he swam, his arms lengthening as water slid against scales and skin. He had not fulfilled his mother’s wish, and Clara had not broken the spell, and it most definitely had not been seven years, so why was he able to take his old form? But then, his mother had gotten what she wanted after all, and he supposed she had no reason to punish him further.

Except that she hadn’t gotten what she wanted, not quite. Pushing aside floating furniture and the bodies of partygoers, he caught sight of a glimmer of golden hair floating like a strand of seaweed. He dove, his heart pounding fast, under the murky water, until he was face-to-face with her motionless form. Her heavy skirts had pulled her down, and she bobbed gently, seaweed twined round her ankles.

Maurits had been young when the Great Flood happened, and most of what he knew about it had been learned fromplays and reenactments in his mother’s court. It had been a necessary evil, a hard stand to let the humans know that the Old Ones would not be trifled with. How short their memories were. His mother was to blame, yes, but if only the humans had kept to their end of the bargain then Clara would be warm and dry and sitting by a fire embroidering without so much as a scratch upon her person.

Gathering her in his arms, he touched her neck where he felt a featherlight pulse. Where could he take her that his mother would not find her? Beyond the lowlands obviously, but he needed the water, needed his mother’s nourishing water, damn her. There were caves, grottoes near the shore if he could just get to them. With every stroke, he felt his mother circling closer, pulling and grabbing at him. She would have taken Clara if not for his steel grip, and the water queen would not hurt her son.

You understand so little, my son. Bring her to me, and all can still be right.

He tried to block out her voice, but it was no use; his mother was everywhere. “Her parents are dead,” he ground out. “Everyone who was anyone to her is dead. What does it matter now if you take her or not? Her death punishes no one. It brings back none of our land or our kind.”

Bring her to me.

There was no time to argue any further; Clara had been without air for too long as it was. Taking her pale face between his palms, he brought his mouth to hers, giving her breath.

Clara was cold in a way she had never been before, hadn’t even thought possible. Her entire body was chilled through to the bone, and her chest ached as if someone had packed her in a barrel of ice.

There had been movement, as if she was being carried in someone’s arms, or perhaps rocked gently in a boat. Butnow she was still, the ground beneath her hard and cold. She scrambled up on her elbows. Stars winked in the black sky above her, a sharp breeze cutting through her. Cold air wrapped itself around her legs, and she looked down in horror to find that she was wearing only her smallclothes, and they were in a sorry state, soaked and torn. Someone had draped a damp blanket about her shoulders.

“I’m sorry,” a familiar voice said. She scrambled up straighter. The words sounded nearby, but she could not see him. What was Maurits doing here? “Your dress was too heavy,” he said. There was a blush in his voice.

Where was she? She was supposed to be celebrating her marriage, preparing for her wedding night. It was dark and wet and cold, and emerging from the shadows came the man she had thought she would never see again. Frantically, she began patting at the cold ground around her. “Pim... Where’s my dog?”

Silence followed, so thick that it threatened to suffocate her. “Clara.” Maurits moved toward her, hand outstretched, green eyes unbearably sad. He was shirtless, and wore some sort of strange breeches that shimmered in the thin moonlight. “Clara, there’s something I must tell you.”

Hugging her arms to her exposed chest, she shrank back. She didn’t want to hear him tell her that her parents were dead, that her husband was dead. She had been a bride but a few hours, and now she was a widow. The wind wailed around them, scattering leaves and sending the tall grass dancing. Was God punishing her? She had committed every transgression the priest warned against in the pulpit, and had thought herself exempt from retribution simply by virtue of her standing. Her heart was rotten, her soul tarnished.

At some point while she was lost in a fog of disbelief and self-pity, Maurits had closed the distance between them and had taken her hand in his own. Even with her being wet and cold, hisskin was shockingly frigid, though he did not seem to be shivering. She wrenched her face up to meet his gaze. “Whatever it is, I don’t want to hear it,” she managed in a cracked whisper. “Whoever you are, I don’t want to know. Helma was right—the whale was a bad omen. From the moment you came into my life, I have known only heartache and strife. I wish you would go back to wherever it is you came from.”

If there was any question in his mind about her feelings toward him, she put it to rest by withdrawing her hands and turning away. “Pim!” she called into the darkness. “Pim, please come back.”

How long could he bear to watch her call for her friend who would never return? She hated Maurits the man, hated him for lying to her, leaving her. But even if he could respect her wish and go, he would not. If his mother didn’t kill her, the exposure would. There was nowhere left for her to go, no home, no family. He was all she had now, whether she liked it or not.

“He’s not coming back,” Maurits called softly. “Please, come get warm near the fire.”

She barely paused long enough in her search to pierce him with a caustic glare. “He’ll come back. Pim would never leave me.” She paused. “He’s the only one that has never left me.”

“Clara.” Maurits used his most commanding voice, the voice of the prince that he was, who expected to be obeyed. “He isn’t coming back.”

“Pim would never leave me,” she repeated. “I know he wouldn’t.”

The crack in her voice nearly undid him. Did he tell her that her beloved companion had run off? Died in the flood? Her heart would be broken, but the only other option was the truth, and there was no telling how she would handle it. Worse, she might hate him even more than she already did once she found out he had deceived her. He was selfish, buthe could not bear to see her anger toward him deepen any further.

“Sit by the fire and get warm first. Then I’ll tell you.”

Her face said that she would as soon go back and throw herself into the water, but to his immense relief, she gave a jerky nod of her head. He draped another blanket over her shaking shoulders, and wished that he could join her near the licking flames, feel her warmth. But she didn’t want him near her, and he couldn’t go too close to the fire anyway, so he stood a few paces from her, useless and miserable.

“Tell me,” she said, her voice flat.

The tightness of her mouth, the dark resignation in her eyes told him that she wasn’t just asking about her dog.

There wasn’t time to ease Clara into the truth, or assuage her fears about what the future might hold; his mother wouldn’t leave the water, but she might send Thade, and it was only a matter of time before they were found.

Crouching, he resisted the urge to reach out and cup her cheek in his hand. “Clara, listen to me, love. I know you have little reason to trust me, but I must ask that you listen to what I have to say and not ask any questions until I am finished.”

She was staring into the depths of the fire, her gaze hollow. She wasn’t going to say anything. Maurits cleared his throat and raked his fingers through his hair. “There was a beached whale earlier this spring. You had come with Helma, for the spectacle of it I assume, like so many others. But you saw it for what it was, not as an omen or an opportunity for plunder, but as a tragedy. The quiet kind of tragedy that most people don’t even recognize. I could see it in your eyes. You were wearing a pale blue dress, and had let your hair down to feel the breeze in it.”

Her weary gaze lifted to him, her brows raised in the slightest surprise. “You... you were there? And you were watching me?”

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