Page 23 of The Dark Will Fall (Twilight Lake #5)

Liam Cruinn

He knew of flames and fire—the element Landfae used to cook their food and heat their camps. The warm crackle of burning sticks and dung.

Fire could not survive underwater. It needed air, but could not extract it from the water as the Undine did.

Liam did not understand.

His mind refused to wrap around the heat and the screams of the Mer. The membrane-thin bubble his mother had conjured did nothing to stifle the sounds of their suffering, as their skin sloughed from bone.

Elaine Cruinn’s arms were outstretched as she floated above the city of Tarsainn. The stone stronghold was protected by a wall of magic that rivaled whatever his mother threw at it.

The surrounding homes were not so lucky.

The Mer had always been enemies of the Undine. When Liam had joined the Troid Sídhe in the barracks, their deaths had been joked about as sport. The Mer were a monster to be vanquished. They weren’t Sídhe , not like the Undine. They were half fish. Cursed. Unloved by the gods.

“What are you doing?” Liam fell off his steed in the rush toward his mother. Balor, she had called herself. Proclaiming to be a god. He grabbed her wrist and jerked back. His skin smarted, his palm coated in blisters filled with blood.

His mother had made a deal with dark magic. There was no other way to explain it. No God of the Tuatha Dé Danann would boil the Mer, even if they were cursed.

His mother laughed, showing no sign she had even noticed his bleeding hand. “This is just a warning, though I need their bodies for my Fomorians.”

Liam felt the lump in his throat grow bigger, making it hard to breathe, as if it were blocking his airways. He knew of Fomorians. The demons of the Domhain. Creatures of insatiable hunger.

“Stop!” He roared.

The bodies in the villages below did not turn to foam as they should have done. They floated, tossed by the currents and rolling as the boiling water bubbled to the surface.

“Rise, my army!” Elaine beamed.

The lakebed shattered, and a single crack opened with a resounding boom. Then a series of creaks and bangs, as the crack grew to a fissure.

The lake had many trenches and caves, but whatever lay beneath Tarsainn was different. The shadows leaked into the water like squid ink. The water took on the taste of rotten flesh.

Liam’s head swam, and his stomach roiled.

The lake was wrong. All wrong.

He had to stop it.

Liam flung himself back on his enchanted horse. He wished for a bubble-mare to rise to the surface as quickly as possible—thankful for the choice of steed.

Elaine was drunk on magic, her eyes like endless bore holes in her face. Her face was twisted with manic glee, and she did not notice her only son fleeing for the shore.