Forgotten Sea (5 page)

“I could stay with him,” she volunteered. “To watch him. Wake him up.”

The way she had on the car ride north.

Miriam shook her head. “It’s been a long day for all of us. You need your rest, too.”

“I don’t mind,” Lara said. “I’m not tired.”

It wasn’t strictly a lie. She was beyond tired, in that floaty state of awareness that was usually the product of training too hard or studying too long.

She saw the governors exchange glances. She understood their concern. She was only a novice Seeker. Her small authority ended the moment their car rolled through the gates. She’d already screwed up. It was better, wiser,
safer
to leave Justin in their more capable hands. Yet part of her rebelled at the thought of leaving him alone, unconscious and defenseless. 

Why he needed to be defended here at Rockhaven, in  the care of three nephilim masters, was something she wasn’t going to think about yet.

“I think you’ve done enough already,” Simon said.

Her throat constricted at the implied rebuke, choking off whatever protest she might have made.

Zayin stalked forward, pulling a leather cord from his pocket, a square black bead knotted in the middle. The fine hair rose on Lara’s arms as power hummed in the room.

A heth. Not a ward for protection, but a spell to bind and restrain.

Zayin slid the cord around Justin’s neck, tying it so that the black bead rested smooth and shining in the hollow of his throat.

Lara swallowed in comprehension. The heth would choke any demon that broke its limits, effectively extinguishing—killing—it.

Of course, it would kill an ordinary human, too.

“Is that really necessary?” she appealed to Simon.

After a pause, Miriam answered. “The patient shouldn’t exert himself. The best things for him now are quiet, dark, and limited physical activity.”

A binding spell would limit his activity all right.

Taking a second, shorter cord, Zayin slipped it under Justin’s ankle and then rolled back the cuff of his jeans.

Lara stiffened, staring at the black leather sheath strapped to Justin’s leg.

“Dive knife.” Zayin shot her a brief, hard look. “Still think he’s harmless?”

She didn’t say anything. They would not expect her to.

But Justin didn’t draw the knife, she remembered as Zayin unbuckled the sheath and laid it on the counter. In the bar, he’d bought a round for two sailors rather than pick a fight. He’d stuck up for her with Gideon. Saved her from the demon.

She didn’t know what he was, but she knew what he wasn’t. He wasn’t a threat. Not to her. At least, not in the way they all believed.

Lara looked down at Justin’s gaunt face, the angry lump, the line of black stitches, the purple bruise around one eye. After all he had done for her, he was being treated like the enemy. Tied like a prisoner. Like a dog. The unfairness of it made her knuckles turn white on the rail.

Simon regarded her with cool, blue, assessing eyes. “If you’re quite satisfied, I believe we’re done here.”

The others did not move.

Lara met his gaze, her heart banging in her chest.
She
was done here, he meant.

She was dismissed. Freed of responsibility, of blame, of consequences.

All she had to do was walk away.

“Good night, Lara,” Simon said gently.

She dropped her head, relieved and disappointed.

“Good night, Headmaster.”

The door closed behind her with a small , defeated click.

* * *

Justin dreamed he was floating, up and down, moving with the rhythm of the waves, tied to the remains of . . . a boat?

A mast, splintered and heavy. Thick wet rope constricted his chest and chafed his armpits. Cold ate his flesh, seeped into his bones. He could not feel himself, his swollen hands on the mast, his frozen legs in the water, anymore. Only cold and a throbbing in his head like fire.

He was not afraid of dying. The very concept of drowning was ludicrous, unacceptable, to his dream self. But his body would not respond the way he wanted—expected—it to. He had a memory (
or was it another
dream?
) of scything through the clear cold dark, his nostrils sealed, his eyes wide open, fluid and free, sleek and solid beneath the wave. In his element . . .

Voices drifted to him in the dark.

“Watch his head
.
”

“Get the door.”

“We need a light.”

He was lifted up and carried along, swiftly, smoothly. He heard gravel crunch and insects chirr, felt the air roll under him like the sea, bearing him up on its billows. The night embraced him, alive with the scents of tilled earth and worked stone, cut wood and cultivated flowers. Land smells. Human smell s. Confused, he stirred, opening his eyes.

A pattern of leaves overhead. The outline of a rooftop, silhouetted against a sky full of stars. He floated down a path like a river, dizzy and without apparent support, flanked by tall , moving figures. A silver globe like a tiny moon hovered almost within reach. He licked cracked lips, staring at the light dancing above his head.
Impossible.

A shadow swooped between him and the moon.

The rope tightened around him, dragging him back into the dream.

The pulse of the surge was his pulse, the rush of the ocean filled his empty heart, his aching head.
We flow as
the sea
flows.

He shuddered with loss and cold, clawing the mast, clinging to consciousness. The horizon moved up and down, gray and empty as far as the eye could see. As long as he hugged the spar, he could keep his head above water.

But after long . . .
Hours? Days?
. . . his concentration and his arms kept slipping. His head hurt. Every time a wave rolled the mast, he went under. Every time, he had to fight harder to get on top again.

They would search for him, he was sure. She would come for him. He was almost certain.

But when he tried to picture the nameless They, their faces wavered like reflections in a pool, scattered, lost.

“Mind the step.”

The air around him changed again, became dank and still as the refrigeration of a tomb. He smelled dust and mold and old, growing things.

All motion stopped.

“Are you sure . . .”
A woman’s voice. Not hers.

A rush of disappointment swallowed what came next.

When he focused again, a man was speaking.
“Old
storm
cellar . . .”

Their voices tumbled over each other, hard and meaningless as pebbles rattling at the water’s edge.

“No idea what he is . . . what he’s capable of.”

“
—
risk
—
”

“Can’t keep him down here like some kind of lab rat.”

“
—
expose our children
—
”

“More than a matter of academic interest . . . Matter
of
survival.”

His hips, his shoulders pressed something solid. A bed, hard and narrow as a ship’s bunk. A pillow, flat and musty.

The voices cut off. He heard a scrape, a thump, before the silvery light behind his eyelids faded away.

He lay on his back under the earth, alone in the dark, in the silence. His head throbbed.

For the first time, it occurred to him he might die after all.

* * *

She crouched alone in the filth, in the dark, her heart pounding so hard her body shook with it.

He was coming back.

She pressed her fingers to her mouth so she wouldn’t whimper, so he wouldn’t hear and find her.

He was coming back with a present for her, he said. The thought made her curl herself tighter in her corner. “
My
little
angel
,” he called her, which made her want to throw up. If only she’d be quiet, if only she’d be good, if only she were
nice
to him, he wouldn’t have to hurt her, he said.

She heard a scrape, a thump from the top of the stairs.

And woke gasping, her skin clammy with sweat.

Just a dream.

Lara lay dry-mouthed and wide-eyed, staring into the darkness, willing her stomach to settle and her heartbeat to return to normal. Throwing off the tangled covers, she staggered across the room and jerked open the window.

She drew a deep, slow breath. Held it, while the clean night air blew away the sticky remnants of her dream.

The quad was empty, the students in their beds. No one was up but Lara and the moon. Even the infirmary was dark.

Lara frowned. Miriam had said Justin needed rest. But whoever was with him ought to have a light. Did the sleep spell still hold? Or was he lying awake, alone in the dark?

From experience, she knew better than to go straight back to sleep after a nightmare. Maybe she would just go check on him. No one had told her she couldn’t visit the infirmary.

Because it never occurred to them that she would try, her conscience pointed out. She ignored her conscience and reached for her clothes.

Minutes later, she was creeping down the staircase of the sleeping dormitory. A tread creaked under her bare feet.

She froze, her heart revving about a mil ion miles a minute.

Which was ridiculous; she was a proctor now with her own apartment, and she had every right to leave her rooms if she wanted.

She stole through the silent common room, avoiding the clustered study tables, the couches crouched like beasts around the dark TV. Moonlight poured through the casements, forming silver tiles on the floor.

She fumbled with the deadbolt on the door. She had always been the good girl in her cohort. Her roommate Bria had been the one who nudged and pushed and led them into trouble, who snuck out at night and slipped in at dawn, flushed, laughing, and defiant. Lara was in agony for her friend every time Bria was called to the headmaster’s office. 

Bria had only grinned, shaking her wild mane of blond hair. Naturally curly. Naturally blond. It wasn’t always easy, having a best friend who looked the part, like a painting of an angel from the Italian Renaissance. “What’s Axton going to do, throw me out?” Bria’s smile invited Lara in on the joke.

“Come on, Lara, God Almighty cast us out of Heaven. You think I care if a bunch of teachers expel me from their stupid school?”

They’d been opposites in so many ways: Bria, outgoing, outspoken, and outrageous; Lara, careful, committed, and responsible. But as the only two girls in their cohort, they were inevitably paired. For eight years, they’d shared notes and secrets, skipped gym and meals together, whispered about everything and nothing across the space between their beds after lights out. Bria was Lara’s other self, her other side, secret and daring. Lara missed her more than she could ever admit, even to herself.

The school never expelled Bria. She’d been right about that. But the summer before their senior year, Bria ran away. Lara never saw her friend again.

Flyers.

The masters refused to acknowledge them. The students spoke of them in whispers. The ones who deserted the security of their own kind, the nephilim who left Rockhaven.

Lara shivered as she pulled the door shut behind her and turned her key in the lock.

She could never do that. She owed Simon everything: her home, her education, her identity.

Her life.

Wards made of glass rods chimed from the trees as she hurried along the edges of the upper quad. The night was alive with the rustle of leaves and insects, the flutter of breeze and bats. She ducked her head past the dining hall, lengthened her stride toward the infirmary.

She tested the handle. Locked. Of course.

It took only seconds to open the door with her proctor’s key.

The waiting room was empty and dark.

“Hello?”

No answer. No nurse behind the desk, no guard at the door.

She took a few steps forward, her blood pounding in her ears, her senses humming. They would not have left him alone.

She had a sudden, jarring image of Justin’s white face, the heth gleaming in the hollow of his throat, and doubt coiled like a worm at her heart. Would they?

“Miriam?” she called softly into the dark.

Silence.

She reached out with her mind, straining for the whisper of his presence, trying to pick out his scent, his heartbeat.

The effort made her tired brain throb.

Or was that an echo of his pain?

“Justin? Dr. Kioni?”

Nothing.

Her feet followed her thoughts down the deserted corridor.

She threw open doors as she passed, caution melting into anxiety.
“Justin.”

His room.

His room.

Empty.

She stood in the doorway, her gaze scraping the rumpled hospital bed. He was gone, the only signs he’d ever been there the wrinkled sheets and the black sheath on the table.

He was gone. A sudden chill chased over her skin.

Escaped.

She picked up the knife left lying on the table.

Zayin’s words mocked her.
“Still think he’s harmless?”

The sky was pewter and pale gold, the sun just breaking through the clouds to shimmer on the surface of the western sea.

Lucy Hunter sat alone in the inner bailey of Caer Subai, listening to the splash of the fountain and the restless murmur of the ocean outside the walls. After seven years, the work of rebuilding the selkie stronghold of Sanctuary was nearly complete. The towers rose tall and strong, wreathed in mists and magic. The scent of apple blossoms blew from the hills, mingling with the wild brine of the sea and the rich perfume of her garden. Roses rioted everywhere, cascading pinks and bold reds, bright yellows and starry whites gleaming like constellations against the thick, dark foliage.

Her hands clenched in her lap. Not everything on the island was barren.

“You are up early.” A deep voice disturbed her reverie.

She turned her head.

A man stood in the shadow of the castle wall , watching her with eyes the color of rain. Tall, broad, and handsome, his hair blue-black like a mussel shell . Conn ap Llyr, prince of the merfolk, lord of the sea. Even now, the sight of him had the power to steal her breath and stir her heart.

“Or couldn’t you sleep?” he asked.

She turned away, unwilling to burden him with her growing sense of failure. “I had a dream.”

His deerhound, Madagh, left his side to thrust a cold nose against her colder fingers. She stroked the dog’s gray, bearded muzzle. It was easy to take comfort from the dog.

“You could have woken me.” Conn’s voice was too measured for reproach.

She stiffened anyway. “I didn’t want to bother you.”

In recent months—since the Thing She Didn’t Think About had happened—he had withdrawn further and further into his duties, burying his own grief in the demands of ruler ship.

Once he would have taken her in his arms, this selkie male who did not touch except as a prelude to sex or a fight. Now he stood cool and immovable as a statue, separated by his natural reserve and her unspoken resentment.

“You are my consort.” His tone was patient, controlled. “My mate. What concerns you concerns me. Tel me.”

She gripped her hands together in her lap. “I dreamed I heard a child crying.”

Something moved in his eyes, like water surging under the ice. “Lucy . . .”

“Not a baby,” she said hastily. “A boy. A lost boy.”

The wind sighed through the garden, releasing the scent of the roses. The bush he had given her threw petals like drops of blood upon the grass.

 “You are upset,” Conn said carefully. “Such dreams are natural.”

“It’s not that,” she said impatiently. She couldn’t stand to think about
that
. She could not bear any more of his well meant reassurances. “This boy was
lost
, Conn. Like Iestyn.”

“Iestyn is not a boy any longer. He’s been gone for seven years. They all are gone.”

“I feel responsible.”

Conn’s face set in familiar, formidable lines. “It was my decision to send them away. My failure to keep them safe.”

“You sent them away because of me. Because I didn’t stay and protect Sanctuary.”

“You saved your brothers and their wives and children. You made the better choice for the future of our people.”

She was grasping desperately at straws. At hope. At control. “But suppose they’re still out there somewhere?  Iestyn and the others.”

“They would have found their way home by now.”

“Unless they can’t. Maybe my dream was a . . . a message. A sending.”

Conn was silent.

“Is it possible you are focusing on one loss to the exclusion of another?” he asked at last.

“You think I’m making things up,” she said bitterly.

“Lucy.” His voice was no less urgent for being gentle. “You are still the
targair inghean
.”

Her heart burned. Her throat ached. Locked in her grief, she did not, could not, answer.

He waited long moments while the fountain played and the wind mourned through the battlements.

And then he went away.

Lucy sat with her hands in her lap, staring sightlessly at the sparkling water. She was the
targair inghean
, the promised daughter of the children of the sea. Long ago, before she had loved him, before he loved her, Conn had stolen her from her human home so she would bear his children.

“I need you
,
”
he had told her then.
“Your children. 
Ours. Your blood and my seed to save my people.”

She put her head down among the roses and wept.