CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Myra
The sun eventually faded from the sky as I sat in the windowsill and stared out at the neighborhood I called home.
Dusk settled in, casting it in shadows that stretched along the pavement while my joints ached and my stomach rumbled, but still I sat, fighting the demons of what had happened at the bar.
Laney, Sasha—even Curtis. I'd alienated all of them with one tiny admission, and really, in the pressing darkness of my room and the maddening silence it held, I couldn’t fault them for their reactions.
They viewed my attempt to flee the Playground as a betrayal—which, in truth, it was in a sense—and as much as I blamed Yael for outing my plan, even I knew that it had been my idea to leave before he turned up again.
Oh, I’d absolutely blamed him in the moment because it was easier to lash out at him than to sit with the painful consequences of my decisions.
Like it or not, the true cause of that shitshow—at its core—was me.
I leaned my head against the cool window pane and closed my eyes, hoping I could hide from the guilt I felt and the possibility that there might not be a way to make things right with The Riff Raff crew.
That truth eventually forced me from my perch with a frustrated exhale that flapped my lips.
If curling up in a ball of my own self-pity wasn’t going to help my mood, then I needed to do something else—something that had always worked for me in the past. I quickly threw on a jacket and ran downstairs as the last remnants of the sun disappeared behind the horizon.
The cool night air and the promise of the peace I might find only a couple of blocks away on the sliver of rocky shoreline between the piers drove my pace as I walked through the darkened streets.
I pulled my jacket tighter around me to block out the damp breeze rolling off the bay as it came into view.
The rhythmic lapping of the waves against the rocks began to calm my nerves even before I reached the shore.
It was such a stark contrast to the vibe of the Playground that it surprised me every time.
I crept carefully across the stony shore, getting as close to the waterline as I dared while still leaving a solid two or three feet of distance to avoid an unfortunate repeat near-drowning.
Inhaling the smell of brine deep into my lungs, I closed my eyes and tried to erase the images of my friends’ disappointed faces from my mind.
A high-pitched chittering in the distance grabbed my attention, and my heart leapt at the sound.
My eyes flew open to see three little heads on the horizon, peeking out of the water as they swam toward shore.
I waited impatiently as they grew closer, their excited noises announcing their arrival, and it was all I could do not to fling my body into the sea and swim toward them.
There was so much I missed about the ocean, but what hurt most were the creatures my curse had ripped away from me.
But that night, I was reunited with three of them.
Moments later, a trio of mischievous otters I’d known since they were babies barreled up the rocky shore toward me as I crouched down with open arms to greet them.
“It’s been so long,” I said as I tried to cradle the wriggly little buggers to my chest. “I’ve missed you three sooooo much.
” They pawed gently at my face and nuzzled my cheeks with their whiskered faces.
The albino one I’d long ago named Luna stood on my lap and stared dead into my eyes with her beady red ones.
Her look of disappointment was plain. “What?” I asked, leaning away from her judgment while the other two, Poppet and Teddy, flanked her to join in.
Angry squeaks and growls followed my question, and I listened intently as their years’ worth of hurt feelings surrounded me. “I’m sorry!”
Poppet, the youngest, grabbed my face and held it firmly as she rapid-fire chittered a slew of questions at me.
“Slow down! I’m out of practice at this.
” I swore she sighed, then repeated herself, making sure she over-enunciated her sounds.
When she was done, I stared at her with wide eyes.
“Okay, for starters—and I can’t believe I actually have to say this—I definitely am not, nor have I ever been dead.
I was cast out, not killed. But I can’t return to the water, or not yet, at least, but I’m working on it.
And I absolutely did not try to kill the queen.
That’s ridiculous for so many reasons, I can’t even begin to address them all. ”
Teddy crept forward and squeaked at me, a note of distress in her tone.
“Of course not,” I replied, gently scratching under her chin.
“There was never a plot to overthrow the queen—at least not in the way you mean. I was trying to help her!” The three shared another of their silent looks.
“Do you think I would ever do such a thing?” I did nothing to hide the hurt in my tone, and the trio shook their heads. “Where did you even hear this?”
Hesitation plagued them all until Luna bit out a single word in response.
Finnigan.
“Finn is the reason I’m up here—and why I nearly died,” I explained, trying to curtail my rising anger before I misplaced it on them.
They couldn’t have known that, and they certainly didn’t deserve the wrath I was reserving for him when we one day met again.
“He betrayed me.” Confusion tugged at their collective brows as they stared at me, unblinking.
I quickly explained my side of the story, which stirred them up into a swirling frenzy of angry noises and vengeance.
“Guys, you can’t,” I said, trying to capture them and hold them still so I knew they would understand how serious I was.
“Promise me you won’t do anything in retribution.
There’s no point. It won’t change anything.
” Poppet growled out a string of curses that forced a laugh from deep in my belly.
“He absolutely is a bastard,” I agreed with a smile, “but rallying the creatures of the sea to go after him won’t change that.
I need you to let it go… for me. Please.
” The trio looked positively offended but eventually calmed down enough to see reason.
That was partly why I adored them—they were feisty, just like me.
But I didn’t want that to get them killed.
I’d just gotten them back.
Instead, I made them tell me all about what they’d been up to for the past couple of years, and tried not to cry as they told me about their unending search for me, even in the face of the rumors about my demise.
They’d scoured the shores along the coast, hoping to one day find me.
And that night, by chance, they’d done just that.
The love I felt in that moment was too much for words, so I let the tears flow down my face while they patted them dry with their muzzles.
“I love you too,” I whispered, the words catching in my throat. “I love you too.”
Curled up in a pile in my lap, the girls settled down and just let me pet them absentmindedly as so many memories of the Deep assaulted me—some welcome, but most not.
Finn really had orchestrated an assassination attempt wrapped in the guise of banishment and carried out by the queen.
To what end, I couldn’t be sure, but power of some sort seemed likely and I could only imagine it was for a nefarious purpose.
My furry little companions hadn’t heard anything strange about his actions since I left, but Finn was cunning and smart.
Whatever he was up to, I doubted the queen—or anyone else, for that matter—would see it coming.
And by the time they did, I wondered if it would be too late.
My heart tightened at the thought. I really needed to return to save her, and her kingdom, from his deceit.
“Can you three do something for me?” I asked, breaking the amiable silence. They popped up instantly, staring at me with rapt attention. “Don’t say anything about finding me. If everyone thinks I’m dead, let them. It’ll be safer for all of us that way.”
Knowing the truth about my curse and Finn's involvement, they took no convincing at all.
“Thank you,” I said, pulling them into a hug, “for everything. I really needed this tonight.”
They squirmed and wriggled against me, peppering kisses on my face, until they abruptly stopped, their distress calls echoing through the night.
Their heads swiveled back and forth as they attempted to detect where a perceived threat was coming from, and I shot to my feet on the unsteady rocks to look for whatever danger might be lurking.
I squinted at the darkened streets behind us, searching for any movement, any sounds, any signs that something was amiss, but I found nothing.
“I think it’s a false alarm,” I told the girls, who were far from convinced.
They wove around my ankles and tugged at my pants as they tried to lead me away from the Playground and into the water lapping closer to my feet than was comfortable.
“No, you guys, I told you I can’t go back. I’ll be dead before I clear the pier—”
“You may be dead even sooner than that,” a sinister voice called from closer than it should have been.
I wheeled around so fast I nearly lost my footing.
Catching my balance, I looked up to see a figure appear out of nowhere and pull back the hood of his cloak.
Unfamiliar milky-white eyes stared back at me, emotionless and impossible to read, which could only mean one thing: druid.
Their power was endless if they were old and runed-up to the teeth, and judging by the swath of tattoos and talismans covering his massive body, he fit that description perfectly.