Siren's Song (10 page)

Unfortunately for her, I don't give a bleeding litch.

“You
knew
he was dying, and you still kept us.” My voice shakes in fury.

“Which is why I suggested in the throne room that you'd want to hurry.”

Is she jesting? “You're the one who detained us and
interrogated
him.” I point my blade at her. I don't care if she is Rasha's mum. “Now tell me how to fix him.”

Behind me I hear a clink of metal and my skin pricks as the guard pulls her own blade and holds it to my back. I stiffen.

The queen clears her throat and stares at me with a face that is neither stern nor overly caring. Merely . . . patient. “The Bron king can't be fixed here.” She glances to the window. “My members have worked to shore up what little life he has left, but you'll have to go quickly. Especially as even now the ships come. The horn has sounded.”

I don't ask what ships because we both already know. “You tortured him while knowing he was dying.”

She shrugs her lips. “He was dying anyway, through no fault of my own. You've no doubt seen from the injury on his neck, his internal wounds are from Draewulf. My interrogation may have sped up their progress, but it was his use of his ability that prevented them from mending in the first place.”

What the blast is she talking about? Is she unhinged?

She lets out a tinkling laugh. “Most likely. But I did what I needed to for my people. Now I will allow you to do what you need to for yours. You are free to leave.”

Just like that? Is she daft? “Lovely. How do I
save
him?”

“You know the answer.”

I let the blade flash again and the one at my back pricks harder. I clench my teeth. “If I knew, I'd not be standing here asking.”

“The Valley of Origin, of course. I suggest you take the fastest of your airships.”

The Valley in Faelen?

“I assume you mean the ships you confiscated.”

“The two that were not destroyed in your crash—which took down a bit of my Castle, I remind you—are ready and waiting for your departure.”

I bite my lip. “You're saying there's someone in the Valley who can help him? Where will I find this person?”

“Not a person. Well, not in our definition of one, anyway.” She stares at me meaningfully as if I'm to understand this.

I don't.

And I don't have time for her riddles. “Tell me what it is then—”

“It is not for me to say, only for you to find.” She turns her head to gaze out the window as if she's heard something.

I open my mouth, then shut it.
I'm done with this.

I turn to go, but her voice rises. “The internal bleeding set in around the torn organs and then, after my questioning of Eogan, the entry point on his neck. As I said, it may have even been able to heal given time for his ability to work. However . . .” Her eyes bore into my chest so profoundly that I follow her gaze down to my sliced, stained dress. “In gifting you his strength for healing on the airship, he became weakened past even what his power can fix.”

I narrow my eyes and peel back a piece of the material to see what she's staring at.

It's only then I'm struck by the realization that my chest hasn't ached in hours, since just before we crashed the airship. Not only that, but somehow the wounds that oozed the blood are gone. I pull more of the cloth away from my chest and poke gently where only last night my flesh was torn open. It's smooth. It's soft. My skin is whole.

She nods.

“How—?”

“You assume his gift is blocking others' abilities. Considering you love him, I find it curious you know so little of him.” She tilts her head and drifts her gaze over me.

Whatever words were in my mouth are sliding back into my throat. What is she talking about? “Is that what you told
him
?” My mind flashes to an hour ago in the room with Eogan, when he seemed so hesitant. “What did you say to him? What's his ability and what will help him?”

“What another asks of me is not for you to know. Nor is the answer given them. You should be less concerned with that and more with getting him to the Valley.” Her head snaps to the window again. “Even now Draewulf draws closer.”

I bat a hand toward the sky and light it up as if this is of little concern. “So come with us. Help me save Eogan, your people, and the Hidden Lands.”

Her eyes harden. “I've already said I will not leave my people. Draewulf will try to take me, yes. And if he succeeds, that is my destiny.”

“
If
he succeeds?” How can her Luminescent sight see so much and yet leave so much to fate? And how can she not know what he
will do—what he's
capable
of? “I believe we make our own destiny. We make our own choices.”

“Then you can choose to respect mine.”

“Even though it will cost your daughter's life as well?”

She tips her head as if to shrug, but not before I see the tightening of her throat. “If she is meant to survive, then she will.”

I give a harsh laugh as I pull away from the guard's knife that's now annoying me. “Are you insane? Of course she's meant to survive—we all are!”

“Then perhaps you should help her do so. But as I said, respect my decision.”

“Respect your choice to endanger the entire Hidden Lands because you'll only protect your own people—but not your own daughter? Forgive me, but I've seen your defenses. You can't protect your city!”

The same irritation I had toward Rasha bubbles up into my mind before I can stop it. Was it destiny that caused the murder of my Elemental race? Or simply the decision on Cashlin's and Tulla's parts to care only about themselves?

Her gaze snaps. “We have our reasons.”

“Yes, Rasha mentioned as much. Too bad she'd no idea how little care for her you have.”

“Careful,” the guard behind me growls.

“She does not always see eye to eye with those reasons,” the queen says. “But the safety of our people has always come first.”

I allow the words I spoke to Rasha not four days ago to emerge in my head—that my Elemental kind has spent the last hundred years being slaughtered while Cashlin has protected its own.

“Ah, but you did not know your people as I did. If so, you might feel differently. They were arrogant and too powerful for their own
good. Lucky for your kingdom at the time, none of the Elementals were as powerful as you, nor could they bear working together—plus, there were other kinds of Uathúils to control them. Had your people been more unified, they might've overcome the Uathúils hired to confine them in their internment camps before those same Uathúils began to be hunted themselves.”

I step toward her, my stomach churning and my hand clenching. The guard and her blade are right on my heels, but I don't care. “And that's your excuse for letting them die?”

“Oh, they put up a good fight and slaughtered their fair share of Faelenians. As I said, had they been more numerous and humble enough to combine forces, they would've succeeded. You should thank hulls they didn't.”

I open my mouth just as her voice softens. “Nym, it is arrogance that brought them down just as much as Draewulf's truce. I know you often believe your Elemental ability is a curse, but they
used
it as one. And, for that matter, you should understand I have often believed the same of my ability. That it is a curse. Imagine knowing how almost every decision of those you come in contact with will likely result. It's a burden.”

Her eyes moisten, and in that moment it's a kick of guilt to my chest. I've never thought of that. Either for her or for Rasha. Nearby, the lake water ripples, followed by the honk of a swan.

“Your kind made their own choice. Perhaps it was their destiny, or perhaps it was just foolhardy. However, just because I can see a possible ending doesn't mean I'm obligated to act upon it. Then or now.”

I don't want to talk about this anymore. “You admit you could've seen what would happen to the Elementals. Just as I suspect you can see what will happen to us. So tell me—what
will
happen to us now?”

“I know you and my daughter are quite close, and I'm aware of
the burden you carry for her and the Tullan people. While you may have hurried Draewulf to my door, it is neither your fault that he is on the move, nor that you could not defend all of them.”

Why is she telling me this? “Just answer the question.”

“I am. Because what I know is—this time, this path before the Hidden Lands is not mine to decide.” The queen drops her voice. “It is yours.”

“Mine?” I frown. “To decide what?”

“All of it,” she whispers. And suddenly her eyes are hardening. As if willing me to make the right choice. As if assuming I know what in hulls she's referring to.

“Just as even now you still feel the effects of the poisoned power that will always scratch at you. Because the choices we make have lasting consequences. You were lucky with that one. Because what you decide for the future of Faelen will be a choice of such magnitude, the consequences are beyond imagining.”

I glare at her. I have no idea what to do with this. “And what am I supposed to decide?”

Her lips twitch. “Come here, child.”

I narrow my gaze even more and flip a look at the guard to make sure I'm not going to get a knife in my gut. Then I step near her. As I do, the scent of frozen death invades my nostrils, invoking a fear I didn't know was there.
Good hulls.

She stares at my hand, as if curling her mind around my gimpy fingers, and it's all I can do not to yank away as her icy gaze cuts into me. She closes her eyes and waits. Until her breathing gets heavier and the only thing interrupting the silence is my heart beating and her breathing and the
honk honk honk
of those swans getting closer behind us.

“You have three choices in front of you.” Her voice sounds old and thin now, like brittle blades on paper. “The first is to run with
Eogan to the Valley of Origin and hope you arrive in time. If he's healed, you'll escape with him to hide in Drust.” Her eyes flare open and stare at me. How she knew this was on my mind scares me. I haven't even fully formed the thought of running and hiding with him yet, but now that she says it . . . “In which case you both will survive for a time.”

“And the Hidden Lands?” I swallow. “Will they survive if Draewulf can't find me?”

“There is a chance he won't find you for a while but could continue to wage his war, morphing humanity into his wraiths. At least until there is hardly a world left to take over. Or . . . your second option is to leave now with Eogan for the Valley, then prepare for war in Faelen. In which case, I should warn you that whether Eogan survives long enough to be healed or not, you'll still need to get to the Valley of Origin if you wish to have a chance at beating the beast. As the last Elemental, it is your responsibility to call forth the rest.”

“I'm sorry?”

“The other Uathúils. Faelen is
your
land, Nym. The Valley is your birthright.”

She sighs and murmurs something about what they're teaching in Faelen these days.

“Just like each of the Uathúil kings' blood is tied to sacred spaces in their lands, yours is tied to the Valley. And that is where you will call them because your true capabilities are not just in controlling the weather, they are in calling what once was into existence again.”

She suddenly twists her neck around to look at the sky. Then jerks her head back toward me. I see it. The moving lights in the distance that are too colorful and too fast. Draewulf's ships. The red in her eyes flares. “You need to leave.”

I plant my feet firmly beside her chair and lean in. “Not until I know what you're talking about.”

Her eyes snap and the guard behind me shifts. “Hope. And Uathúils. Both of which are the only chance at saving this world from Draewulf.”

“And these Uathúils—how am I supposed to call them?”

“I cannot say.”

I wave an arm in the air. “What in litches
can
you say?”

Her eyes flash red and harden.

I narrow mine. “In that case, what's the third option?”

She turns her head toward the lake and the swans that are getting closer.

I lift my knife and hear the slide of a footstep behind me. But the Luminescent guard must read my intentions because she doesn't cut me.

Queen Laiha's gaze swerves back to mine, however, and the spark there says if she could get up from her chair and slap me herself she would. Instead she tips her head toward the edge of the lake. “Touch it.”

“Pardon?” I frown and turn. The water is crystal clear and rippling gently on the white-sand shore.

“Touch the water with your boot, and then back up.”

I walk the four paces over and, scowling, tap my foot on the water.

There's an instant honking and commotion, and I barely have time to look up when the five snake-swans are charging toward me. I jump backward as they rush the shoreline, writhing their necks and pecking at the water as if I've thrown in food.

“Not food,” the queen whispers behind me. “A threat. Before I took them in, they'd been abused by man. Because of that, they now sense any disturbance of their territory to be a threat. And to a certain degree they are right. You could be a danger to them if you wanted to.”

The blind snake-swans are growing more and more agitated. Suddenly one lifts its head higher than the rest and throws itself on the sand. Flopping violently.
What the—?

My gut twists in horror as the other four descend on it and rip into its wings with their razor teeth until the poor thing's shredded and bleeding and dying. It gives one final, feeble honk and the others race away to the center of the glittering lake.