Page 120 of Curse the Fae

Juniper folds her hands in her lap. “Perhaps you might use that power to a beneficial end.”

Clarity returns to Elixir’s gaze. “You have a tactic in mind, then.”

“Like I said, we’re lacking valuable information about this Fable. Perhaps you might enlighten us.”

I translate her meaning. “Are you suggesting that he…?”

Elixir peers, incredulous. “You believe I know the second way.”

“We believe you havegreater accessto the second way,” Puck amends. “Your senses go deeper than ours.”

His brother scoffs. “Not with this. You are mistaken.”

“I don’t think so. You’ve got the capability.”

That rumble from a second ago magnifies, yet it doesn’t feel like the kelpies are approaching. It’s too soon for that spectacle. While the group debates, I rise and shuffle to the nearest wall tufted in foliage, then flatten my palm on the facade, which also begins to tremor.

“You’re even more attuned to the land than we are,” Cerulean insists. “Your senses exceed that of any Solitary. If you were to try—”

“The Horizon That Never Lies told you—not me or Puck—about the first way,” Elixir lashes out. “What makes you think I’m privy to the second?”

Puck grunts in frustration, “What makes you think you aren’t? And what the fuck is that fucking noise? The kelpies?”

I shake my head while Juniper answers, “That’s not the sound of a stampede.” She pauses, then suggests, “A wandering stream?”

“Another mountain peak rising from the earth?” I hear Lark guess with forced humor.

The earth shivers, then jostles. I yank my palm from the wall and swerve toward the group, who all rise to their feet. Elixir’s eyes lurch along the ground, feeling and listening, then soaring toward me, aware of what I suspect and agreeing with it.

He knows the sound of water, and he knows the difference between a rapid and something harsher, and I’ve learned those differences as well, because we’ve been roaming these tunnels for weeks, examining the shift in water levels, the drainage, and the overflows.

“It’s not wind or the earth,” Elixir says to me.

I whisper, “No. It’s not.”

“Cove.” His voice blurs, calmness layering over deadly urgency. “Get away from the wall. Now.”

That’s when I detect what he must hear—the river building, rolling, and rushing toward a barrier. That’s when the wall cracks open. And that’s when a tidal wave swallows me whole.

32

Once, long ago, I dove into a stream and tried to drown a young merman—a Fae with a viper’s tail. I remember the fall, the splash, and the quiet. And finally, I remember the swirl of liquid drawing me in, tugging on me as I tumbled through the depth. I remember the paradox of weightlessness versus suction.

Since then, I’ve experienced this onslaught numerous times while in Faerie. I’m no longer a stranger to violent fluxes. Except each time in memory, dating back to that first chaotic dive nine years ago, I had been prepared. I’d had time to fill myself with air, to store my breath.

This time, I have no warning.

It’s as if a giant pump has burst. Chunks of rock catapult from the wall and split into a gash, through which a great tsunami of water spews. The wave shoots forward like a predator, spreading and striking quickly. Stones crunch, and boulders roar, and the surge opens its mouth, then closes around me.

The impact flings me backward, hurling me into the void. Everything is slickness and silence and speed. It seals out the muffled bellows. Darkness envelops me as liquid drenches my lungs until I’m heaving.

I flail my limbs, wrestling against the liquid pressure. But it’s too strong, too violent, thrusting me across leagues.

For an instant, time suspends. In the span of seconds, I think how many times nature has been my ally and savior. Other times, it’s been my enemy. And yet other times, it’s been neither. It’s been a victim freeing itself from its cage, although it’s already been hurt, the damage already done. Here, now, someplace inside me says it’s the latter.

Hints flicker through my frazzled mind. The places where the river has drained, the areas where it has overflowed, and the territories where it has altered course. This isn’t random or the kelpies’ doing. With all those changes in levels and currents, and with its foundation weakening, eventually the water would end up someplace that couldn’t hold it, somewhere that would eventually break.

This is what happens when the Solitary wild gets closer to fading.

---