The Unkindest Tide (October Daye #13) - Seanan McGuire Page 0,141

one day,” said Amphitrite. “Here, today, the reckoning belongs to Dianda Lorden, and to Isla Chase.”

“Please, don’t say her name,” said Torin.

“Why? Because you killed her? Poor boy. There’s a great deal more drowning in your future.” Amphitrite leaned back in her chair as she slowly, deliberately tilted her head to the side. Her hair was a black waterfall across her silvery shoulders; her eyes were unreadable.

“I remember,” she said, voice soft. “I remember the day my sister the sea witch brought her firstborn child to our father, so he could see the boy. I remember the way my father, Oberon himself, raised that child up and called him ‘grandson.’ I remember how he smiled to see the waters so blessed. I remember many things, Torin, descendant and disgrace, who would see his own sister bleed for the crime of falling in love with a man who I have never found to be anything other than perfectly appropriate. I remember how the storms raged when the Roane died, until it seemed as if the very oceans wept. I remember blood in the water, blood enough to float an armada, and I remember that the killings didn’t happen out of any altruistic urge to make Faerie a safer place. They happened because another of my sisters was cruel as a tsunami and shallow as a cove, and she couldn’t bear to see any apart from herself happy.”

She crossed her scaled tails at what should have been her ankles, eyes fixed on the now quailing Torin.

“If I were my sister, if I had transformations in my fingers and curses in my palms, I would cast you out,” she hissed. Her voice was barely more than a whisper, but still it carried to every corner of the room. “I would say the man you refuse to call brother is more Merrow than you could ever hope to be; that if you yearn to kneel at my eldest sister’s feet so badly, you should have that dubious honor. I’d strip my contributions from your blood and bones and give them to him, because I would much rather have him for a descendant. Let you go to bleed and break and beg a place upon the land.”

Torin paled, until it looked like he might lose consciousness from the lack of blood in his face. For the first time, I thought kneeling might have been the right move. He couldn’t fall down if he wasn’t on his feet.

“Sadly, and happily, I’m not my sister,” said Amphitrite. “I don’t have knots in my hands; I can’t tangle and tie you into something you’re not intended to be. But I can do these two things, Torin of Bluefish, and you had best heed them, or I’ll see you gone and gutted. I may not be able to cast you from my bloodline, more’s the pity. I can cast you from my sight. You shall find no favor from me. You can keep your demesne, for as long as you’re allowed, but I will not find in your favor if anyone does you harm, or if you bring complaints to lay at my feet. You are no descendant of mine.”

“Lady,” said Torin, in a strangled tone.

“And as to the other . . . you claimed the authority to arrest your sister, Duchess Dianda Lorden of Saltmist, on claims of treason, on the accusation that she had brought a king-breaker into these waters, where never such a thing should stand. But you lack that authority, because the Duchess Lorden committed no treason. The closest she has ever come is in her marriage to a Daoine Sidhe, which she did with the full blessing of Queen Palatyne and King Windermere, unifying land and sea. So here is the second part of your punishment. You have to watch what follows.”

Amphitrite turned to face Patrick, smiling like the star that leads lost sailors home from sea. “Come to me, Patrick Lorden, ducal consort of Saltmist, and have no fear.”

Patrick stepped forward. Amphitrite snapped her fingers. Another rush of impossible water flowed into the room, forming a column next to her dais before it shattered, revealing Dianda. She wore no chains; her dress was kelp and shining scale, and somehow managed to be beautiful, despite seeming like something that should have washed up with the low tide.

Dianda gasped, running hands over her hips and torso, like she was reassuring herself they were still there. Then she saw Patrick, and without waiting for leave from