Page 9 of Lore of the Tides

“Oh, I’m not vexed by a sea monster, mythical or otherwise. The only monsters that concern me are on this ship.”

Syrelle’s jaw began to twitch. “Scry, Lore.”

Lore was about to comply when her hand accidentally brushed the open grimoire, and her head was jerked backward, the sharp edge of a knife pressed to the delicate skin of her throat.

“Don’t even think about it, you little horror.”

Lore clenched her teeth, wanting to jerk away from vile Thadrik’s grip. Syrelle’s second-in-command reminded Lore of a boy she’d grown up with who loved to sprinkle precious salt onto slugs just to watch them bubble up, writhing in agony until their eventual death.

“If you so much as brush one of those pages with your foul fingers, it will be your blood that gives them color, not witch ink,” he said, his foul breath wafting over her, making her want to gag, though she didn’t dare even swallow with his knife poised so close to her artery.

Witch.

It’s what the guards and sailors had begun to call her. That orabomination.

Desecration.

Evil.

They knew she was a human with magic, something that, in their opinions, shouldn’t exist. It was just another fallacious reason for the fae to despise her, not for her deeds but forwhatshe was.

To them, she wasn’t just a lowly human, but a criminal. One who had committed the most heinous of crimes: discovered a way to pull herself above her “station” by pilfering magic, a resource that should only belong to, well, anyone else, they didn’t care who, as long as it wasn’t her kind that benefited from it.

The guard was everything bad about the Alytherians compiled into one hideous package. She couldn’t see his face, but she knew his thin lips would be pulled into a sneer at just the thought of being allowed the pleasure of killing her. The male itched to do more than that. He made it clear any time he escorted her from her rooms to Syrelle’s quarters, describing in horrible detail how much he would love to carve her up and feed her to the fishes.

He was sadistic.

And Syrelle had no qualms about him threatening Lore with violence.

“Stand down, Thadrik. She won’t touch the grimoire again.” Syrelle sounded bored.

At the word of his overlord, Thadrik lowered the blade and backed up a single step. He may be a creep, but he appeared to be loyal to Syrelle, despite Syrelle’s insistence that all the guards aboard theLavender Larkhad been appointed by the king.

Thadrik backing up one step was not enough. Lore wished he would back up another step. Or five. Hundred. He could just keep walking until he dropped off the ship, and then he would still not be far enough.

There was a time when Asher would have sent Thadrik out of Lore’s presence simply because the male made her anxious. Asher would make sure Lore never had to suffer Thadrik’s threats. But this wasn’t Asher. This was Syrelle. He neither noticed nor cared that Thadrik’s very presence made her skin crawl.

Syrelle had only one thing on his mind.

Auroradel.

Lore pressed her fingers to her throat and rubbed where the sensation of the blade lingered. Thadrik was practiced with his knives and hadn’t broken skin—because he hadn’t wanted to—but still she felt the presence of the knife as though he had. Lore gritted out between clenched teeth, “Maybe if you let me hold my grimoire, then my scrying would work.”

Syrelle’s expression remained impassive. Lore knew it must be a mask. He wore his apathy like armor.

“I’ve seen you do magic with the book concealed in your pack—farther away than it is now. You can do it.”

“I can’t! That was a matter of life or dea—”

“This is a matter of life or death!” Syrelle shouted, his apathetic mask cracking as he slammed his palm onto the desk. Lore flinched. “What do you think will happen to Duskmere if Coretha has her way and convinces the king to crown her as heir? FindingAuroradelfor me is the best chance your people have.”

Lore sucked her teeth. “Perfect. My people being in your hands makes me feelsomuch better.”

Lore was tired of resisting. It always came to this point, anyway. Syrelle gave commands. She defied his orders for most of the night, but she always relented. She couldn’t resist the pull of doing magic for long.

She picked the bowl up off the desk and gingerly rested it upon her lap. Whoever oversaw filling the wooden bowl had overfilled it today.

Lore cleared her thoughts of all that was wrong with this situation (everything) and concentrated on finding the one thing they both wanted:Auroradel.