The Unkindest Tide (October Daye #13) - Seanan McGuire Page 0,150

the Luidaeg approached the Selkies alone. She stopped a few feet away from them, the wind whipping her hair around her face, even though it barely ruffled the others. Her eyes were still green. Still so green.

“I promised on the day the Selkies were created that I would see the Roane swimming freely in the seas once more, and I keep my word,” she said.

Joan closed her eyes. Claude clutched his webbed hands into fists. Mathias and René shifted closer together, until there was barely any room between them. Only Liz remained exactly as she was, watching the Luidaeg with the mixture of longing and loathing that always stretched between them.

“But words are malleable,” continued the Luidaeg. “I was reminded of that today. I was reminded that sometimes, justice and mercy can exist in the same breath, in the same shining space.”

Joan opened her eyes.

“René Lefebvre, your sister has stopped her dancing. For that, I am truly sorry. I granted permission to the Selkies to steal from one another out of bitterness. I did not grant permission for a cruel Merrow to slay your sister. It was wrong and unfair.” The Luidaeg held the basket out toward him. “I can’t bring her back to you. But I can let you see what we’ve made of her loss.”

René bit his lip before letting go of Mathias’ hand and stepping unsteadily forward to remove the basket’s lid. He slid his hands into the oil, eyes widening with surprise before he pulled out a sealskin.

“It’s hers,” he said. “But it’s not hers at the same time.”

“The rules have changed,” said the Luidaeg.

René blanched. He didn’t hand the skin back. The Luidaeg didn’t reach for it.

“The tide is flowing out on the Selkies,” she said. “I made a promise, and I’m bound by Titania’s own grace to keep it, whether I want to or not. But I can bend the way it’s kept. Each of you will give me your skin. All the gathered Selkies. Every single one. I know you’re all here; I know none of you could avoid my summons.”

The Selkie clan leaders drew closer together, horrified and afraid. All, again, save for Liz, who didn’t move.

“My sister and I will split it along the seams of the spell that has kept it alive,” continued the Luidaeg. “It will happen today. We’ll make as many new skins as we can. After that, I’m banished for seven years.”

Hope was dawning on the faces of the clan leaders.

But the Luidaeg wasn’t done. “Your skin will be returned to you, as will the new skins we’ve made from the substance of it. They’ll be passed as you see fit, and all but one will be bound to their holders. The Roane return. Tonight, the Roane return. And the Selkies remain: one for each original skin. You’ll have time to settle your affairs. Some of you may still choose to set aside the sea. In seven years, when my exile is ended, we’ll come here one more time, and the final binding will be done.”

“I’m sorry,” said Joan. “I don’t understand. Are you saying we don’t have to be Roane?”

“No. I’m saying I understand it was unfair of me to give you all this time to learn how to be Selkies, and then to be angry when you had forgotten how to be Roane,” said the Luidaeg. “The tide is going out. I can’t catch it, any more than you can. I can’t keep it here. But I can grant you time to make this an easier transition. I can give you gentler waters.”

“When do we start?” asked René.

The Luidaeg smiled. “Right now.”

TWENTY-FOUR

SELKIES FILLED THE BEACH. Some were grown, as old as Liz, if visibly no older; like all fae, their clocks stopped upon reaching physical maturity, even if, for them, that stop was artificially induced. Not for very much longer. Soon, most of them would be as bound to the sea as the Luidaeg herself.

Others were children, wide-eyed and wondering and clutching their newly-split sealskins around their shoulders like they were a lifetime of birthday gifts rolled into a single narrow piece of fur. Some of the teenagers were crying, stroking their sealskins with shaking fingers, clinging to their parents. It was the end of an era. It was the beginning of a new one.

Not every skin had been divisible by five. Some could only split into two or three; a few rare ones had been divisible by as many as seven. In the end,