Page 31

“ D o you know?” Riella asked, breaking the eerie silence around us. Her hand had been steadily squeezing mine since we started.

I gazed around me wearily, pulling shadows away from side streets I didn’t recognize. “Know what?”

“What actually caused Atlantis to fall? All Shen Shen ever tells me is that it was from greed.” Riella whispered.

“Stay back.” Pushing her behind me, I hissed at the bright green toad-horse creature, slightly larger than Riella, charging us from the darkness. Bulbous black eyes clouded by a thick film blinked once before swerving quickly into a new crevice of darkness.

My lip curled in distaste. “Kelpies.” I tugged Riella forward.

“We better get moving into the main palace. He will be back with some friends if we don’t hurry along.

” I refrained from telling her that Kira was quite capable of finding us through creatures of the water.

Most water fae could communicate with the beasts of the sea.

The faeling giggled nervously. “They are so funny looking don’t you think?”

I looked down at her anxious face. “They are.” I said, smiling faintly. “Their eyes are much too large for their body, like bubbles that need to be popped.”

I felt her small frame relax next to me as she smiled eagerly. “Exactly! I have always thought that too.”

I gave her hand a small squeeze and then nodded to an alcove beside the main palace doors. “There ahead. That side entrance will take us deep into the palace where the water portals should be. We will be less exposed taking that route.”

Pulling Riella along, we ducked into the shadowy alcove of the side entrance. The siren song of Atlantis was stronger here and if we were not careful we could easily become trapped within the golden maze of her palace walls.

Except my long stays as a child here were exactly what we needed to get through the perfectly preserved hallways. My eyes trailed over the ostentatious wealth, barely tarnished by the ghostly waters of the sea, with disgust. The water fae’s greedy nature was something I never truly understood.

“It’s a dead end!” Riella gasped.

I pressed my lips into a thin line at the statue that blocked our path. “It is not.”

Reaching up and controlling the trembling in my hand, I traced the face of my former lover, sweeping my hand up over her brow and trailing it down over the back of her ear. If I closed my eyes I could still feel the silky caress of her silver hair as I tucked it away from her face.

“I have never been in this area of the city before, who is she?” Riella whispered in the dark to me.

“Her name was Deirdre, the former queen of Faerie.” My fingers caught the latch behind her ear and I smiled.

“She was very beautiful.”

I turned my head and scanned the little faeling’s adoring wonder, the same worship that many fae had when they gazed upon the Queen.

“Sometimes beauty is a mask that hides many things, Riella. Always see with your instincts, sometimes your heart, but never—never with your eyes.” I pulled the latch and shifted back.

Riella gasped when the wall shook. The statue of the queen shifted and bubbles boiled up from beneath while she slowly lowered into the floor, revealing a passageway suddenly pulsating with blood crystals.

My hand gripped Riella’s shoulder and I lowered myself to her level, brushing back a floating lock of muted pink hair lit by the Sanguine power.

“Little one, this passageway is very dangerous but it is the quickest way for us to get to the whirlpools. No matter what, do not touch the red crystals.” My webbed hand brushed against her anxious face.

The existence of her still shocking. “Before, you asked me what caused the downfall of Atlantis—those red crystals are the reason. It is a power that only the blood fae understood how to use…it was a mistake for the water fae to think they could use it against them without a price. Blood power will always require a sacrifice. Remember that.”

Riella's eyes widened and her lip trembled. “But, mother has one of those.” Her eyes filled with red tears and she swallowed hard. “She was going to take me somewhere with it, I heard her talking to a fae through one of those crystals…mother called her the blood witch.”

I inhaled sharply, Deirdre wanted the girl. The water dragon knew this.

“Little one—” A shrilling screech cut off my next words and I tugged Riella harshly behind me, backing her slowly towards the open passageway.

“Riella, kelpies haven’t suddenly developed vocal chords in the past few hundred years have they?” I whispered softly over my shoulder.

Her muddy pink hair tickled my scales while she shook her head quickly back and forth. “No.” She squeaked.

I narrowed my eyes on the open corridor and backed us further into the red glowing tunnel. From the end of the hallway a dark hooded creature crept around the corner, then another and another.

A fight for another day , Emon's growling voice whispered like echoes in my mind and I shivered.

Grinding my teeth and cursing inwardly, I narrowed my eyes on their mindless hunting. They lacked direction as if they were waiting for orders.

Deirdre.

“Riella, when I say swim, I want you to swim as hard as you can and don’t stop for anything. This passageway will take you straight to the whirlpools.”

“What about you?” Her voice shook.

I reached back and squeezed her hand, tracking the creatures’ unhurried movement and whispered firmly. “I’ll be right behind you. Don’t look back.”

My chest splintered into a million pieces as the distance between us grew, her hand falling away from mine.

A slight tilt of a hood, then several more. A slow turn, the current froze. Fifty sightless gazes turned on me.

“Swim Riella! Swim now!” I hissed forcefully. Shoving her hard with my shadows while hundreds of others floated in the water awaiting my command.