The young man turned his head, revealing the blue quartered circle inked into his neck. “The tet for luck.” He pushed up his right sleeve. “The taw for protection.” He rol ed back his left, where a simple circle adorned his inner wrist. “The ayin for sight.”
“Fat lot of good that did us,” Fremont muttered. “You thought they were demons.”
Max flushed. “I said they could be. There is a taint.”
“It’s this one,” Soldier said. “He’s not one of us.”
“He’s selkie,” Lara said. “One of the children of the sea.”
“Where’s his sealskin, then?” Fremont asked.
Irritation ignited in Iestyn, running along his veins like a match set to paper. They knew him. They knew what he was. But they were talking about him as if he were deaf or stupid. As if he wasn’t there.
“Lost,” he growled.
Soldier met his gaze. Held it. The flyer’s eyes were faded blue, like worn denim. “Convenient.”
“Not for him,” Lara snapped.
Her quick defense delighted him. Her hand stil rested on his shoulder, her little finger barely brushing the back of his neck above the col ar of his shirt, that smal touch of skin to skin soothing and inflaming him.
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“We’re trying to find his people,” she continued, “so they can help him.”
“Going to World’s End, are you?” Fremont asked.
Iestyn went very stil . His pulse pounded in his head like the sea. World’s End.
Lara’s fingers dug into his shoulder. “Where?”
“The island. That’s where you fish folk hang out, isn’t it?”
“How do you know?” Iestyn forced the words from his raw throat.
“Because we stay the hel away, that’s why. We’ve got enough trouble. We don’t need to borrow any more.”
Iestyn’s head felt stuffed with cotton, his thoughts hazy, his mouth dry. “What kind of trouble?”
Soldier’s eyes narrowed in suspicion. “I thought you were one of them.”
“I’ve been . . . away. Demon trouble?” he persisted.
“Maybe. What do you care? I thought your lot didn’t take sides.” Resentment simmered in Soldier’s voice.
Iestyn shrugged. “Things change.”
He’d changed. The balance of power was shifting, sliding.
Anything—everything—could have changed in seven years.
The thought seeped like ice through his veins, cooling the fire that seethed inside him.
“Can you help us?” Lara asked.
The three men exchanged glances.
“No,” Fremont said.
“Why not?” Iestyn demanded.
Soldier ignored him, speaking to Lara. “Wel , for starters, he’s stil crushing my ribs.”
Lara’s ful , soft lips flattened in irritation.
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“Iestyn, get off,” she ordered.
Reluctantly, he complied, offering a hand to the man on the ground.
Soldier brushed him aside, climbing unaided to his feet.
“I don’t need your help.”
“I don’t need your help.”
“Fine. I don’t need yours either.” Iestyn drew a ragged breath, holding on to his temper with an effort. “But she does.”
Lara’s brows snapped together.
“What kind of help are we talking about?” Fremont asked before she could speak.
Iestyn’s head throbbed.
“Your protection,” he said.
Max’s face split in a grin. “Absolutely.”
“Absolutely not,” Lara said. She rounded on Iestyn.
“What are you thinking? You need me to find your people.”
His people. Assuming he was even merfolk anymore.
Assuming they would take him back, take him in, without his pelt.
“Not anymore.” He hooked his thumbs in his front pockets and turned to Fremont. “Where is this World’s End?”
“About three hours north by road, another hour or so on the boat. You can take the ferry from Port Clyde.”
“Thanks.”
“I’m not leaving you,” Lara said.
She couldn’t depend on him. He must not depend on her.
He steeled his heart against the look in her eyes. “You belong with them.”
“I’m not a flyer,” she said flatly.
Another silence.
“Then they’l take you back,” he said. “To Rockhaven, if that’s what you want.”
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It’s not like he could offer her another option. Selkie or sailor, he didn’t have the kind of life he could share with a woman.
Fremont scratched under his bandanna. “Now, hold on.
We didn’t agree to anything yet.”
“You don’t want to go back there,” Soldier said.
“You don’t want to go back there,” Soldier said.
“There are other communities,” Max said unexpectedly.
“Other schools.”
Iestyn felt a quick clutch in the pit of his stomach. But it was the option he’d wanted for her, wasn’t it? Freedom and a future away from the stifling wal s of Rockhaven. He looked at Lara. “Is that true?”
She nodded slowly, her eyes dark with doubt. “I’ve heard of them. Amherst in England, Amarna in Egypt. But . . .”
“You’d be safe there,” he persisted. “Right? With other nephilim.”
“If they’l take her in,” Soldier said.
“If anybody wil take her,” Fremont said. “Travel’s risky.”
