Page 13 of The Water Witch (Fairwick Chronicles 2)

Lorelei snickered meanly. “Did you? Well, let’s give you a closer look. Hans!” She snapped her fingers and one of the wan boys lifted his head and tried to melt back into the crowd. But she turned and pinned him with her hard, glittering eyes. Hans skulked forward, head down and shoulders stooped. When he was a few feet away Lorelei caught him by a hank of his hair and pulled him forward.

“Take off your clothes for the nice lady, Hans.”

“Please,” I said, seeing the look of dread in Hans’s eyes. “I think I get your point…”

“Mypoint?” Lorelei laughed, baring a mouth full of tiny sharp teeth. “But do you get Hans’s?” She snapped her fingers and Hans’s clothes disappeared. He clutched his hands to his groin, but unfortunately the motion of his hands drew my eyes there and I saw what Lorelei meant by her cruel joke. His groin was as bare as a Ken doll’s. I looked away, but not before I glimpsed the pain in his eyes.

“All the males born in the last spawning were eunuchs,” Lorelei said.

“Eunuchs?” The juvenile undines echoed. “Does that mean…”

“It means no fun for you and no babies,” Lorelei hissed. “It means that if we can’t go back to the human world and stay for a season there won’t be another spawn. It means we’ll all fade away. Open the door for us, doorkeeper, or sign our death warrant.”

“But the door might close in a few days and then you would have to come back,” I said.

“Who will make me?” she said, baring her teeth.

She had a point. But suddenly I didn’t like the idea of lettingLorelei loose on my world. She was mean and her teeth were scary…

A gust of wind suddenly tore Liam from my side and Lorelei was at my throat, teeth bared. “Mean? Scary? You haven’t seen mean or scary yet, doorkeeper. Let me through or I’ll rip your throat out.” Her teeth grazed my throat and I smelled her rotting fish breath. I could also hear the juvenile undines’ fluttering thoughts.

She helped us, don’t hurt her.

Then I smelled the scent of raspberry and saw my new friend plucking at Lorelei’s arm. “Let go of Callie. She’s my friend.”

Lorelei swatted Raspberry away as if she were a gnat. I heard Raspberry’s cry of pain and felt her anguished surprise that one of her own kind would hurt her. But the years in Faerie had drained Lorelei of any kindness she might have once had. No way was I letting her loose on Fairwick.

“No,” I said. “I’m not taking you through the door.” I turned to face Raspberry and the other undines. “I will, however, try to keep the door open in the future for undines who promise not to hurt humans.”

Lorelei laughed and the wind roared around us. The honey light of Faerie was gone, replaced by dark scudding clouds. The undines were clustered together, clutching one another. Where had Liam gone?

“Not hurt humans?” Lorelei hissed in my ear, her spit spraying against my cheek just as a needle-sharp rain began lashing at my face. “How dare you dictate terms to our breeding! You have no idea whathurthumans have done us. Maybe I should just eat you.” Her rough tongue flicked against my face. “Maybe I’ll gain your doorkeeper’s power. These undines heard the spell you used to open the door. Only a very stupid doorkeeper allows her spell to be overheard.”

I was pretty sure she was bluffing, but just in case I drove my elbow into her ribs and uttered a spell I’d learned a few months ago. It was to ward off an attack from above and right now the storm Lorelei was raising was coming from above. I was halfway through it when Liam came up from behind me, grabbed me out of Lorelei’s grasp, and clamped his hand over my mouth.

“You can’t use spells in Faerie,” he yelled over the raging storm. “They do the opposite.”

“Shit,” I swore, looking up into a green funnel cloud. The tornado picked Lorelei up. She spread her arms and caught the wind in her dress. She snapped her teeth at me but she was too far away to reach me. Which wouldn’t do me any good if the storm killed me. “How can I stop it?”

“You can’t. The only thing to do is get you through the door. The storm will die out after you go. Quick, before Lorelei gets back down. It’s still her storm—she’ll use it to rip you to pieces.”

The undines were running for cover. The wind tore at their new flesh and ripped the skin from their bones. Then I looked at Liam. The wind was gnawing at him, scratching long red streaks down his face.

“I don’t know how to open the door from this side,” I shouted, “if I can’t use the opening spell.”

“You have only to need it to open,” he said pressing his lips to my ear so I could hear him over the roar of the storm.

I looked around and saw the destruction I’d caused. My first trip to Faerie and I’d pretty much wrecked the place. I closed my eyes and pictured the door as I saw it the first time—an archway in a moonlit, snow-covered grove, Liam by my side telling me he’d brought me there so we could remember how perfect our first week together had been.

The roar of the storm was suddenly muffled. I opened myeyes and Liam and I stood together in that moonlit grove. Above us the storm raged, but we were in a protected bubble. Like being inside a snow globe.

I took Liam’s hand and stepped toward the door. “Come with me,” I said, turning to him.

His eyes widened. “Do you love me, then?” he asked.

Did I? I looked into his eyes for the answer. I could practically feel my heart swelling. Surelythatwas love! But then a cold and barbed coil squeezed my heart and the words died in my throat. I could see the look of disappointment in Liam’s eyes and then, as if I’d broken the bubble we were in as well as his heart, the snow globe shattered into a million pieces. Lorelei rode the shattered glass, teeth bared, claws aimed at my throat.

“Go!” Liam screamed. He flung himself on Lorelei just before she struck me. I tried to grab on to Liam’s shirt but the impact had sent me sprawling backward. The storm picked me up and carried me through the door—along with something else that seemed to be flying beside me—and then I was sucked into the storm’s black maw and swallowed whole.

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