Chapter 48
CHAPTER 48
I ’m slumped low in the boat and shaking with fever. Weakly, I plunge the oars into the water, nudging myself closer to the jagged rocks. The wind rakes at me, trying to drag me back toward Camelot, and waves slap against the sides, relentless.
It’s taken hours to get here. Ysolde’s magic only carried me halfway. The rest was slow, plodding. I threw up twice over the side of the boat. Not my finest moment, but I’m finally nearing the shore, and I paddle closer. At last, the boat scrapes against the rocky shore. I stumble into the shallow water, and the icy water bites through my leggings. I drag myself up the winding path toward the castle. I’m shivering and feverish, and an ache has settled in my bones. My skin hurts.
I reach the ruined castle doors and slump against the cold stone. I close my eyes for a moment, my teeth chattering.
A strong hand catches me, and I open my eyes to see Mordred peering down at me.
“Daughter.” I hear a note of panic in his voice. “What’s wrong?”
“Sick,” I rasp. “A Fey plague…the Pendragons. Not contagious, but I’m sick.”
He scoops me up and carries me inside to a high-backed chair at the banquet table. I slump over the arm like a discarded rag doll and hug myself tightly.
Candlelight glints off the ancient crystal glasses and porcelain plates.
“You shouldn’t have crossed the lake in your state,” he says.
“I didn’t have much choice.”
I take a sip from a glass of water—no idea how long it’s been there, but my throat is scorched. I’d drink poison if it were cold enough. “They found the moth you hid on me. That was all they needed to accuse me of treason. Thanks for that, Father.”
He folds his arms. “The Pendragons don’t need evidence. The moth only made it easier. They would have arrested you, anyway.”
I glare at him. “It would’ve been harder without proof, but it didn’t help that my mother recognized your portrait and told everyone about it.”
“Not ideal,” he mutters, “not ideal at all. You need sleep, don’t you? Give me a minute.”
He whirls and walks away, and I huddle in the chair. Wind howls through cracks in the walls, nipping at my skin.
My eyelids flutter closed, and I start to drift to sleep.
As I do, I hear Talan’s deep, sensual voice drifting through my thoughts.
I lie undone. My fingers graze her skin, pilgrims charting a sacred course across the water. She is warmth and shadow and the salt tinge on my lips. My desire stirs, then surges. Vast, ruinous. Deep as the sea…
I jolt awake, and Mordred is lifting me again, carrying me. I’m no longer sure if I was hearing Talan’s thoughts or merely dreamed them.
I rest my head against Mordred’s chest. He’s wearing a thick, dark fur that smells like a forest. “Where are we going?”
“I’ve arranged a bedroom for you upstairs. You need to rest.”
I’m half-conscious as he carries me up spiraling stairs and along dark stone corridors, torchlight flickering as we pass. He strides into a room with sharply peaked windows overlooking the lake and sets me down on a bed. Exhausted, I sit on top of the embroidered cloth and wool blankets, swaying a little. There’s no glass in the windows, only wind, but a fire roars in the hearth, and the room is blessedly warm.
“Rest,” he says.
He leaves, and I remove my boots and wet leggings and crawl beneath the covers.
I’m hot and cold at once. The shivering won’t stop, and neither will the thoughts.
Talan—his heartbreakingly perfect face, the raw, broken look in his eyes when he learned the truth.
Some of the people at Avalon Tower looked at me with the same sense of shock the moment they realized I’d been working with their greatest enemy.
I’ve been drowning in lies.
That’s what it means to be a spy: a wellspring of deception that never stops flowing. And when the first lie catches up with you, you spill another—a torrent of new lies to wash away the old ones.
My eyes drift shut, and I hear him again.
Vast, ruinous. Deep as the sea.
My eyes flutter open. Golden light is pooling across the floor like whiskey. I breathe in the scent of spring grass and cedar smoke and the light, delicate smell of wild cherry trees drifting on the breeze.
Mordred has left fresh clothes on my bed, and I have no idea where they came from. I’m guessing it involved magic. They’re beautiful, a gown of shimmering blue that glistens like the sea and a velvety cloak, dark as midnight.
When I sit up, I spot a cup of steaming tea on the table beside the bed. The scent curls around me, familiar, comforting. Tana’s tea. I’d know it anywhere.
I lift the cup and take a sip, the delicious heat soothing me. My throat is raw, but the fever’s broken. Already, my strength is returning.
Seems like I won’t die after all, but as for the rest of the Fey? I really need to do something about that.
The door opens with a low groan, and Mordred steps in. “Good,” he says, “you’re awake.”
“What time is it?”
“Midmorning.”
“Oh.”
“But you’ve slept a night, and a day, and another night.”
I take another sip. “I guess I needed it.”
“I found the tea in your pack in the boat. Thought you might want some. Also, I anchored your boat properly. Didn’t want it drifting back across the lake without you.”
“Thanks.” I eye him over the rim of the teacup. “Mordred, we need a plan. The Pendragons are going to kill all the Fey. I barely touched that virus, and it wrecked me.”
His gaze sharpens. “You need more sleep. You seemed half dead when you dragged yourself onto my island.”
The concern is strangely touching. After all those years spent wishing for someone to look after me, I never expected the parental care to come from him, an ancient Fey king known mostly for massacre and running his sword through helpless women.
“I’m not sure how much time we have,” I say. “And like you said, I’m forged from your blood and bones, the daughter of a king. You said I will crush my enemies. Remember?”
He nods slowly, the sun glinting in his golden eyes. “And what are you proposing?”
“I don’t know yet. I can’t go back to Camelot. I can’t go to Brocéliande.”
He takes a step closer, keenly interested. “And yet?”
“I won’t sit here rotting while Wrythe slaughters the Fey. We are their protectors. You their king, and me their Lady of the Lake.”
He scrubs a hand over his mouth. “Good. Good. Morgan would not sit idly by, either, but what if you did return to Brocéliande?”
My eyebrows rise. “I tricked the portal guards once, but next time, they’ll be ready. Talan surely told everyone I’m a spy. They’ll be looking for me now. They’ll murder me the second I step out of the portal.”
Mordred stares out the window at the lake, thinking deeply. He’s wearing a dark cape trimmed with lush, black fur that frames his head like a lion’s mane. “It might interest you to know there are no guards on the ley portal. No one’s there to kill you.”
I tilt my head, curiosity blooming. “There aren’t? I thought Talan would’ve made sure I couldn’t come back. Why wouldn’t he guard the portal?”
He shrugs. “I still have a moth in Brocéliande. I can’t tell you why it’s unguarded, only that it is.”
“Seriously?” I stare at him, and my heart flutters. “Maybe I can find what’s left of the resistance. Brados is still there, from The Shadowed Thicket.”
“Didn’t the resistance nearly kill you?”
“Yes, but now I’m sure that Wrythe gave them the wrong information. He wants me dead. If I can connect to the resistance, then maybe I can take a team of Fey through the portal and stop Wrythe before he gets a chance to unleash the plague.”
Mordred turns to me, his eyes gleaming. “And then…the banquet.”
He rises and saunters to the door.
My heart thunders in my chest. So, that’s it.
I’m going back to Talan’s kingdom after all.