The Unkindest Tide (October Daye #13) - Seanan McGuire Page 0,91
toward the distant promise of freedom. Which, weirdly, helped a lot.
When Simon transformed me into a fish, he’d gone all the way, leaving me without hands or arms or any way to communicate. Even here, silenced by the sea, I could gesture to get my point across. Quentin, at least, would recognize what it meant if I showed him my middle fingers. And that meant I wasn’t as cut off from the world as my increasingly panicked thoughts were trying to make me out to be.
The journey through the supply tunnel seemed to take longer this time than it had before, maybe because the urgency was even greater. Time was short—the Luidaeg’s spell would have to wear off eventually, and I doubted we had more than a few hours left—and more, there was a mess in the hall that would tell Torin’s guards something was wrong. We had to hurry. I hadn’t come this far to fetch Peter only to lose him before I got him back to his father.
I was the first to emerge from the hole in the side of the knowe. My flukes were still inside when someone grabbed me by my hair and whipped me around, slamming me into the coral wall. I began to push myself back into open water, ready to fight, only for my attacker to press the tip of a jagged blade against my throat. I froze.
Blood in the water means sharks, means setting off alarms, and even if it won’t kill me, having my throat slit isn’t my idea of a good time. I stared, wide-eyed and furious, at the Cephali hovering over me. It was the man from before, pale yellow with blue rings, and his expression was unreadable, impassive and calm. Had he been waiting for us to return all this time? I suspected he had.
Quentin came out after me, and froze when he saw the situation. I had no way to signal him, but he seemed to realize what he had to do, and whirled, clearly intending to block the others from coming out.
He was too slow. Helmi pushed through, followed by Peter and Kirsi. All three of them stopped for a moment, staring at the Cephali man whose blade was still pressed—uncomfortably tightly—against the skin of my throat. Then, with a wordless sound that carried through the water, formless and echoing, Helmi threw herself into his arms.
My attacker was good; he didn’t drop the knife. Instead, he transferred it to one of his tentacles while he caught Helmi, plucking her out of the current like she was a leaf blowing along on a stiff breeze. He gathered her into a complicated hug that involved at least six limbs on both their parts.
Then she slapped him.
He recoiled, looking startled and confused. She pulled back, pointing to me with one hand while three of her tentacles twined together in a complicated motion that couldn’t have been anything other than purposeful, an impression that was only reinforced when the man’s tentacles did something similar, if not precisely the same. Kirsi stayed where she was, holding Peter back while the two other Cephali argued.
The man pulled the knife from my throat. I reacted immediately, bringing my tail up and whacking him in the stomach as hard as I could. The reason Dianda depended on that move so much was immediately apparent, as the blow shoved him away with surprising force. He tumbled, not losing his grip on Helmi. I pulled my knife, ready to fight—
—and stopped as I realized he was laughing soundlessly. They both were, like this was the funniest thing they’d ever seen. I narrowed my eyes, glaring. They kept laughing.
Whatever. I’ve been mocked by better than a few octopus-people, and the longer I hung here having my feelings hurt, the less time we had to get back to the Duchy of Ships. I flicked my fins at him and spun in the water, taking advantage of the lack of gravity to return to Quentin and the others.
Kirsi shot me an amused look. I ignored her, motioning for Quentin and Peter to follow me. They did. Kirsi fell in behind them. Helmi and the stranger fell in behind her, and we swam as fast as we could back toward the gate that would see us safely out of these waters.
In Faerie, the king is the land. That’s not just a pretty phrase: it’s a reality of the way the magic that anchors us to the Summerlands works. A noble