Through Stone and Sea - By Barb Hendee & J. C. Hendee Page 0,129
raising one open hand as he pulled Wynn’s pack from the water. He was soaked from head to toe, and his colorless eyes shifted rapidly as he watched everyone. As he passed through the gate, another Weardas snatched the pack away and herded him at sword point to the pool’s far side.
Then the wild- eyed man tore from the elf’s grip, lunging for the tunnel opening.
The duchess threw herself on top of him, screaming, “Freädherich, no!”
They both toppled and sank, but that name overrode Wynn’s fear for an instant. She recognized it.
The pair heaved up, splashing water everywhere.
Wynn sucked in a panicked breath as the captain flung the staff onto the pool’s far edge. And the bodyguard before her flattened his sword in warning against her chest.
The captain and the elf rushed toward the duchess as the third Weardas circled around, blocking off Chane. Like Wynn, Chane watched everything in complete confusion.
The closest teal-skinned being stepped to the half-open gate.
The wild-eyed man shrieked like a mourner, reaching out to it. Even with the duchess atop him, and the elf and captain trying to get a grip on him, his fingers kept clutching the air toward the visitor.
The visitor slowly stretched out its hand in turn. Long, narrow fingers, ending in claws, were webbed in the spaces between.
“Get away from him!” the duchess shrieked. She rolled off the madman, ducked around the tall elf, and slashed her saber. Its blade clattered across the gate’s bars.
But the being in the tunnel didn’t even lift its spear. It just slowly lowered its hand.
Duchess Reine threw her whole body against the gate. It slammed shut with a clang that reverberated through the chamber.
“You’re not taking him!” she hissed, backing away with saber held out. There was less rage than terror on her face.
All the being did was quietly grip one iron bar and gaze through the gate with its black-orb eyes.
The duchess whirled in the pool as the captain and the tall elf heaved the whimpering man onto the pool’s rear ledge. She looked as if she might break right there, collapse, and sink beneath the water.
“Highness?” whispered the bodyguard before Chane.
With a convulsive shudder, Reine straightened and turned her eyes on Wynn. In place of the whimpering man’s madness, some fear-driven rage filled her features. She surged through the pool straight at Wynn with the saber thrust out.
“What are you doing here?” she demanded.
Wynn might’ve come up with something if she weren’t so overwhelmed. Her gaze flicked erratically about. She knew of only one man named Freädherich, though she’d never seen him up close.
The younger prince of the reskynna, thought dead for years, was locked away in the Stonewalkers’ underworld.
Wynn couldn’t get out one word.
CHAPTER 17
Reine stood numbed by shock, barely aware that she shivered in the pool’s cold water. The chamber was half-illuminated by light leaking from the sitting chamber. On the side nearer the door leading out, a dark and dripping wolf stood upon the pool’s edge above the sage.
Reine couldn’t believe anyone, less that Wynn Hygeorht, had found their way in here.
Better that the sage and her companions had been drowned in the rising tide. It would have made things simpler. No one in the outside world must ever know Frey still lived.
Yes, it would’ve been easier on Reine if Wynn had simply died by her own fault. But the sage hadn’t come seeking Frey. That she’d found him was just the worst happenstance.
How had Wynn known where the texts were being kept? Was this why she’d schemed her way into speaking with Ore-Locks?
Reine lowered her saber slightly as she backed away.
“If you’ve nothing to tell me,” she growled at Wynn, “then you and yours will remain silent!”
Wynn nodded slowly.
These outsiders had already seen too much to ever leave this place. But the longer temptation remained in the tunnel, the worse Frey would suffer. Reine turned at the pool’s center.
Tristan and Chuillyon crouched upon the pool’s rear ledge, holding down Frey’s limp form.
“Release him,” she said.
Chuillyon quickly raised his head, glaring sternly at her—something very rare for the old one. The captain’s expression mimicked the elf’s, with a more frustrated anger.
“Highness—” he began.
“Do it!” Reine ordered.
With a grimace, Tristan took his hands away, as did Chuillyon. Frey’s haunted eyes roamed about the chamber.
“Frey,” Reine whispered gently, “come.”
His gaze lifted beyond her, fixing upon the gate, the tunnel, or whatever waited there.
“Frey!” she said more sharply, and held out her hand.
He scrambled over the ledge’s lip, slipping into the water with