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I must make her see me as more than the stranger who stole her with a whirlpool and a command. I must make her believe there is a choice.
Only when she stands willingly beside me—if such a thing is possible—will I claim the boon the prophecy promises.
Only then will I hope for the old writs to be generous and grant me the tide-line—the zareth—that will anchor Castletide.
The power to save my homeland.
The ancient favor that any Lord would kill for.
It is a plan.
Half-formed, brittle at the edges.
Reckless, because every choice I make tightens a noose of consequence.
I know this.I feel it like pressure against my chest.
And yet every time I look at her—at the soft rise of her breast with each small, fragile breath, the way the light catches the curve of her mouth—the plan shifts.
What was once a ledger entry becomes a ledger that rewrites itself, line by line.
Duty blurs.
The arithmetic of power becomes personal.
The inevitability I counted on for strategy begins to feel, horribly and wonderfully, like fate.
I close my hand over the small, warm place at the hollow of her throat, more to keep myself steady than to possess her.
The keep is silent as a held breath.
Outside, somewhere along the ruined reefs, a current answers me more true than it has in months.
I take the sound as both promise and indictment.
And when I see her shift in sleep—watch intently as slumber turns to wakefulness—I brace myself.
Because whatever this is, there is no going back.
It all starts now.
Chapter 5
Phoebe
The Lordof Water’s Bedchamber—Casteltide
I come tumbling out of sleep gasping for air, like I’ve swallowed the ocean whole and am trying to cough it back out.
My chest feels tight, my throat raw from the dream-cry that hiccupped me awake.
For a beat I am still half in that impossible place—Aggie’s slick nose, the squeal of children, the fluorescent glare—before the room snaps into focus.
Silk.
Not the scratchy, hospital-ish stuff I expect, but silk that shifts under my palm like water.
The air smells of salt and something warm, like a hearth beside the sea.
