Page 30 of The Wicked Lies of Habren Faire
“I’m helping Habren find her way to Llys-y-Ellyllon ,” Neirin says. “Which is where you need her to go, too.”
“What has the human told you?” Morgen goes rigid.
“He overhead our conversation, he knows about my sister.” I sigh. “You two are acquainted?”
Neirin finds Morgen’s eyes and she recoils. “Morgen is sworn to my court, though her absence from our rivers and lakes has been felt of late—I did figure out why, eventually.”
A look passes between Neirin and Morgen that I can’t read. Neirin’s eyes glitter, a tricky smirk on his lips that would make me mad with anger if it were turned on me.
Morgen’s nostrils flare and her tail flaps, sending an arc of water into the air. “Why are we standing here arguing? You need to find her, she’s far from water. She must be at the palace already, preparing to head north. Whatever you’ve been doing has lost us an entire day.”
I look between my two terrible allies, throat tight with terror. “We’re running out of time?”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you,” Morgen says flippantly. “Without sight, time here is stranger for humans.”
I think of how I slipped between day and night in the space of a few steps, and how sleep claimed me out of nowhere when I was hardly tired. Without sight I truly am running blind through the forest and, though I know I cannot help that, I still blame myself for the distance this failure has put between my sister and me.
I take a deep breath. “How much time have I lost?”
Morgen’s mouth is a grim line. “I don’t know.”
My fists clench at my side. Neirin lifts his eyes to mine and their corners crease as I scowl. Only he can give me sight and stop me from getting lost again. He knows as well as I do that he’s my only chance.
“You’ll get me there as soon as possible,” I tell him. “Summon the horse.”
“Of course, when we get back to the road—”
“To the road?Can’t you just… magic us there?”
“It’s not that far,” he snaps. “And whose fault is it that we left the road anyway?”
“Yours!You wouldn’t—still won’t—just give me sight, and without it I followed the hag’s trap and lost even more time,” I say quickly.
Neirin laughs. “You’re remarkable, you know that? I’ve never met such a pigheaded human. I can get us back to the road. We’ll reach it before dawn and be at the palace for sunrise. Once you’ve made the deal with the king, we head for Y Lle Tywyll.” He holds up a finger. “With one quick detour—”
“No more damned detours—”
“—to get you a weapon.” Neirin smiles coyly.
I bite the inside of my cheek, considering him. “I want a sword. And sight.”
“Sight, fine. Butyou”—he jabs a finger in my direction—“aren’t big enough to wield a sword.”
“Don’t point that at me.” I slap his finger away.
Morgen bangs a hand in the puddle that’s formed beneath her arm and we both jump apart. I hadn’t realized we’d stepped closer together, but our chests were near touching, my chin lifted to hold his eyes. Now we’ve put a valley between us.
“Stop bickering, catch up to your sister and…” She gives us a sweet smile. “Can you return Dwp to me?”
Both our heads snap around to the thing gasping and flapping on the grass. Neirin grimaces.
“Do Ihaveto touch that?”
“No need,” I tell him. “This one’s on me.”
Without another word I sidle up to Dwp, hitch up my skirt and boot the ugly little bastard into the river.
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