“Seriously? How could I not? Do you know how hard it is to find a good lawyer?” I bumped her shoulder. “You’re welcome. I know I’ve dragged you into a strange, dangerous world. I’m doing my best to protect you from it.”
“I came willingly. And I feel, I don’t know, energized maybe? Invigorated? This world might be strange and dangerous, but it’s also wondrous. Amazing, even.”
“When it’s not trying to kill us or capture us?”
She considered this. “Perhaps even when it is.”
“Even when it goes after your boyfriend?”
She sobered. “Yeah, that’s not cool. But, like I said, I chose this. You didn’t really have a choice in any of it.”
I kind of had, at least parts of it. She knew that, though, so I didn’t need to voice it. “It’s not too late to walk away, you know. I could send you and Leo to wherever you’d like in the world. You’d be set financially and you could just enjoy an easy life, away from this.” I didn’t look at her as I said this, though I knew what her answer would be. I still liked to remind her every so often that she had options.
“Where would the fun in that be?” Now I did look at her. She grinned, her eyes shining with excitement as she watched the water fae still propelling themselves from the water like a pod of sleek, colorful dolphins in front of us. “We’ll get Leo back. Maybe even show him this world and see what happens.” She lifted a shoulder. “Who knows?”
The engine throttled down and the boat slowed. I searched for the shoreline behind us and was surprised to see we were much further out than I realized. When I turned back, the water fae were making their way back toward us.
“Harris must have reached wherever he was going. His signal just slowed to a near stop.” Rand’s voice from behind made me jump.
Did that mean he’d reached wherever the children were being held?
He moved to lean on the rail next to me, opposite Sam. “Jeremy and Cappy are triangulating his position and trying to figure out what we’ll be walking into. The last feed from Jeremy’s spy shows distant lights we think might be coastline. The boat Harris was on disappeared abruptly and he or she can’t find it again, despite several fly-overs.”
“How would his boat just disappear?” Sam asked. She looked as worried as I felt.
“That’s what they’re trying to figure out. We still have the signal, though. Heads up, little mermaid ahead.”
I pulled my gaze away at Rand’s murmured warning. Both Olen and Arella were less than a stone’s throw away from the side of the boat. The rest of their group remained further out.
“Roxanne Devraux,” the king called out. “Where are our children?”
“We’re still working on that. Do you want to come aboard?” I asked. I was stalling, hoping Jeremy and Cappy would have an answer to his question by the time they were up here.
The two looked at one another, communicating without words. Finally, Arella swam over to the ladder off the back and pulled herself from the water. Rand kept his back to her, out of courtesy, but she emerged fully clothed. And dry. She used her ornate, but deadly-looking, trident like a staff.
“Welcome, Arella. Jeremy and the captain are trying to find the tracking signal now.” I motioned to the two visible in the cockpit, probably poring over maps and other things I couldn’t see from here. “Can I get you anything?”
“No,” she said shortly. “Where are our children? You said you had information that would lead us to them.” Her words were stilted, but understandable.
“We do. Jeremy is tracking a man that we believe knows where they are held.”
She bared very pointed, very sharp-looking teeth. “Why was this man not captured and tortured until he revealed all?”
I couldn’t say I was shocked by her vehemence, but it was still all I could do not to take a step back. Using as calm a voice as I was able to manage, I said, “Because we don’t do that. We weren’t completely sure of his involvement until just a short time ago. Now we know he’s involved, as is Margo Guillot, and . . . possibly an old witch and fae hunting group called the Paragons. We told Dorn all of this earlier. We’ll find the children. Tonight.” Inside, I prayed this was true.
She gave a curt shake of her head, the beaded ends of her braids clattering, her eyes hard. “We need to find them now.”
“We will.” I pushed more confidence than I felt into my voice.
“If they are not found soon, they will die.”
Rand, Sam, and I whirled at the king’s voice. He had boarded in complete silence. Arella didn’t look alarmed at his appearance, but she still sucked in a harsh breath at his words.
“Any sedative given them will wreak havoc on their underdeveloped systems, Madame Witch. Dorn said they were being kept in cages. If those cages are iron, it will weaken them, make them sick. And if their captors do not know they must allow their bodies access to water several times a day, this, too, will be deadly to them.” His words were delivered matter-of-factly, but I could see the pain in his eyes in the light cast from the cockpit and the softer deck lighting.
Swallowing hard, I nodded. “I understand this.” Well, not about the iron, but the rest I had figured from earlier. Quickly, I told him about everything else we’d found out so far. When I finished, his face became more grim, if that was even possible. Arella looked ready to go to war and the hand gripping her trident was white-knuckled. Trying not to sound desperate, I called
