Page 2 of The Dark Will Fall (Twilight Lake #5)

Maeve Cruinn

The crystal-clear water lapped my feet, encroaching on my path through the white, fluffy sand.

I wasn’t sure how long I had been walking; the beach had no beginning or end. The sharp sun hit my eyes, and I lifted a hand to shield my face.

I’d never encountered a beach like it. The sun beat down, warming the sand, allowing my feet to sink into the grains. The beaches of the Night Court were frozen, the sand a hard, icy sludge.

I couldn’t remember how I got there. To the unfamiliar beach. Much less what I had been doing before I’d started running.

No matter how far I raced, the beach never ended. I never reached the edge of the lagoon. The land cupped the shallow water, with a small break on the other side of the expanse, showing an endless sea that I couldn’t quite reach.

The water had been calm for as long as I could remember.

Until it wasn’t.

It started as a ripple. A stone dropped in still water, disturbing the surface. A splash. A hand breaking the surface.

Gasping, thrashing.

I stepped into the waves, standing on the edge of the water as I tried to identify the source of the disturbance. A fish, fae, or monster. I couldn’t be sure.

A flash of golden hair broke through the water.

I knew that hair.

Cormac!

I took to the water, my feet hitting the surface without sinking below.

I didn’t give it much thought as I sprinted across the crystalline surface, as Cormac thrust his hand out of the water, gasping before sinking under again.

I skidded to a stop, dropping to my knees where I had last seen the Mer-King, thrashing like a youngling taking their first swim. Cormac was a Mer—and though I would never tell him, at the risk of inflating his ego, he was a much better swimmer than I was.

The ocean remained still, calm. I slapped the surface of the water, but it did not move.

I leaned down, pressing my nose to the sea, endless blue but as clear as a window.

Cormac Illfinn hung limp in the water, his body sinking down, without his tail. His hair formed a halo in the water, obscuring his features.

I slapped the water’s surface again, with more urgency as panic clasped my throat like a tight fist. I wanted to cry, to scream, but I couldn’t. I didn’t have time.

Regardless of my complicated emotions toward Cormac Illfinn, I couldn’t just let him die.

Though my body refused to fall into the water, defying the laws of nature itself, I had to do something.

Cormac’s eyes burst open, and he began to thrash again. Waking up to endure the torture of drowning once again.

I took my chance as his hand broke the surface, clasping his damp, callused fingers with my own.

I fell backward, pulling with all of my might.

My bare feet slipped on the water's surface, unable to grip, but I kept pulling. Cormac’s head broke free, the whites of his eyes showing with panic.

I’d never seen him so flustered—I couldn’t imagine that drowning was particularly pleasant for a Mer.

I myself had endured the sensation once and had no desire to relive it.

My arms spasmed, my fingers giving way, but I did not stop until I had pulled the Mer from the water. He fell on the surface and rolled onto his back, gasping for air. He closed his eyes and appeared to be praying for a long while.

I didn’t dare interrupt him.

“Maeve?” His voice was weak when he finally spoke.

“Yes?”

“Are we dead?”

I sucked my lips between my teeth and squinted as I looked up at the burning sun in the sky.

“… I think so.”

Cormac reached for me, instinctively, and I moved closer. His arms outstretched, as if asking for an embrace. Before now, I would have kicked him in the ribs and called him a slug if he dared show any sort of vulnerability. Our relationship was one of enemies, not of confidants or even friends.

I knelt down and reached for his fingers.

Cormac smacked my hand away. Instead of embracing me, he wrapped his hands around my throat. His teeth bared in a snarl, as he screamed in my face. “You killed us both, you fecking lunatic!”