Page 107 of Tethered In Blood

I pushed into my room and slammed that door, too. My fingers curled tight around my journal until my knuckles turned white. The argument replayed in my mind—his words, my words, the way his nostrils flared in restrained rage. The way his eyes had burned into me.

Like I had been wrong. LikeIhad woundedhim.

My lips pressed together while I swallowed against the lump in my throat. I refused to cry over him again. I needed to focus, piece together what I knew and suspected, and stop ruminating over Oberon Sinclaire.

My palms pressed against the table, and I stared at the mess of ink and scattered thoughts before me. The connections were there, but something was still missing. The elf. The villagers. The sea. The trinkets. It circled back to the same damn thing, but I couldn’t put my finger on what tied everything together.

I picked up my charcoal, ran my eyes over the notes again, and traced my steps from the beginning.

The fishers spoke of those taken by the sea, the ones who vanished beneath the waves only to return… changed. They weren’t themselves when they came back. They only remembered enough to make their loved ones believe it was them. But it wasn’t.Theyweren’t. That detail clung to me, a sickness twisting in my stomach.Not themselves.That sounded unnatural.

Then there was that elf. The villagers looked at him as though he didn’t belong, as if they were waiting for him to make a mistake. And the way he spoke of the ocean wasn’t just passing knowledge. He knew more than he should. He was too smug, too certain. He had tested us, tested me. He wanted to see how much we knew.

Did the villagers suspect him? And if they did, why had they not done something about it? Unease crawled through my chest. What if it was because they couldn’t? What if whatever came back from the ocean wasn’t something they could fight?

The tension between the elves and humans was suffocating. The humans were wary, and the elves were resentful. The innkeeper’s reaction to Oberon and how she flinched at his presence wasn’t just hatred, it was fear.

Were they afraid because of what had happened here? Because of the ones taken? Or was it because they knew the truth?

My pulse pounded as the pieces shifted into place. The elves kept their distance, but the humans continued to fish. They continued to take their boats out to the sea and disappear. The elves weren’t just angry, they were hiding something.

Then there were the trinkets. They weren’t just for protection, nor were they just prayers. They weren’t only meant to keep something out; they trapped something. They weren’t simple warding charms but containment spells. The villagers weren’t just trying to protect themselves from whatever haunted the sea; they were trying to contain it. They had been dealing with something.

And the ones who were taken… they didn’t come back as themselves. I swallowed hard, my chest tightening.If the things taken from the sea were returned, could they still be the same? Or were they something else that wore their faces?

That elf felt off for a reason. The tension between the elves and humans had only worsened since this began. They were connected, but one piece was still missing. Something wasn’t complete. I needed to go to the pier. To the docks where the missing villagers were last seen, from which they had returned, and where the water whispered its secrets.

32

Oberon

MYJAWTIGHTENEDtight.The dull and simmering ache in it matched the one behind my ribs. I couldn’t stop replaying what I had said to her or stop picking apart the way her expression had changed. How abruptly that fire in her eyes had become hollow.

The sharp edge of our argument kept cutting deeper, over and over, a rusted blade I couldn’t pry loose. I shouldn’t have let my anger get the better of me. I shouldn’t have let my fear show. And that’s what it was. Fear. That she would be hurt again.

But,fuck, she had blushed at that bastard, let him get close enough to touch her again as if he weren’t a threat, and worse, she thought I saw her as damaged. As if she were just a burden that I had been saddled with, to be tolerated. She didn’t know I saw the way she fought, the way she bled, the way she survived.

“Would you sleep with him for that information, too?”

The bitter, foul venom in the words still lingered on my tongue. My fists clenched on instinct, and my blood pulsed hot beneath my skin. The second they had left my mouth, I knew I had crossed a line I couldn’t uncross. And then she was gone, storming out before I could chase the words and kill them myself.

Would she run?

No.

Not after Vaelwick. Not after…

A part of me still twisted with unease. Maybe it hadn’t been me she didn’t trust, but herself.

“Let’s go spar in the woods or something, Sinclaire. You’ve been smoldering for hours.” Garrick’s voice halted my spiral. I blinked, not registering him at first. My gaze drifted to the window, where the trees bent in the wind.

Sparring sounded good. Hitting something sounded better. The floorboards creaked beneath each step. They, too, were tired of carrying my guilt. The words I had flung at her circled in my mind like birds.Saints, I had watched the light die in her eyes before a pained rage replaced it.

Quinn was likely still furious. I hadn’t seen her since she stormed out, shoulders rigid and jaw trembling. But she hadn’t run yet. I doubted she would go anywhere before I had the chance to make it worse.

I cinched my weapon belt tight, the leather biting into my hips in penance, and stepped out into the brittle morning. Garrick waited, whistling an off-tune melody as we left the tavern behind us. His cheer grated against my nerves. Too bright. Too loud. Sunlight through shattered glass.

We crossed the main street, our boots striking the damp stone, as we passed shuttered stalls and broken carts. A lean cat watched us from beneath a crooked wheel, its eyes catching the light in twin embers. A few chickens pecked near the old bakery, feathers ruffling in the breeze that swept in from the shoreline. But even as they moved with caution, something in the air warned them not to linger.

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