A Veil of Truth and Trickery by Analeigh Ford

Chapter Fifteen

Fae.They thought I was fae.

It was the one thing worse than being cursed.

For all Caldamir’s talk of me getting to choose my role as guest or prisoner, I sure felt like that decision had already been made for me.

The answers I’d been given weren’t what I’d been hoping for, but they were something. It was enough to leave me pacing across the floor, my hands digging into the roots of the same hair that’d betrayed me. The same damned hair that had led to me being kidnapped by the fae in some insane attempt to save the same dying magic that had terrorized my world for over a millennium.

The same magic these fae princes were now trying to claim ran in my very veins.

The room around me was closing in with every step, the very air growing suffocating as it did when I first arrived. This time it wasn’t the air, not in the strictest sense. But it still was Avarath. This place was smothering me, trying to squeeze the last bit of life from me with each moment I remained in it.

I couldn’t bring myself to eat the food they’d brought to me—rations taken from the human world while they waited to see if I was fae or if I died. This way, they said I wouldn’t at least be driven mad by hunger that couldn’t be quenched after tasting faerie food.

No, this way, I’d just be driven mad by everything else.

I could see no way back to Alderia. No way back to Sol. No road that didn’t end with my death here in the faerie realm. I should have known it was useless to imagine, even for a moment, anything otherwise. I’d known what I was giving up, agreeing to come here.

That knowledge did nothing to stop the crushing emptiness as the realization settled in a second time.

I fell back on the bed with a groan, only for Waylan to make an immediate tutting sound with his tongue from across the room. I sat up sharply, my face paling. I hadn’t seen him come in, hadn’t so much as heard a root rustle beneath his step.

“What’s with the disappointment? I thought you’d be glad to see a friend.”

“I … I …” I considered lying to him for a moment, but then reconsidered. There was sarcasm, sure, in the way he used the term ‘friend’… but then again, he was the closest thing I had here to one. Maybe it was because he was the only thing here that wasn’t fae, and from the sound of what he told me earlier, probably had every reason to despise them as much as I did. So, I told him the truth.

“I wish I could have just a minute to myself,” I admitted, pulling at the front of my bodice, already loosened as much as it could be and yet still felt like it was choking me. “I feel like I can’t breathe here.”

“You know, Armene would be very upset with me if you ran away. I’d rather not have to deal with that situation, if it’s all the same to you.”

I went to roll over onto my stomach, ready to bury my face into the pillow and hope the exhaustion of the last two days would swallow me whole and take me away from this place. But then I had a better idea.

I narrowed my eyes up at Waylan. “You didn’t exactly say no.”

“I didn’t think I could say ‘no.’ I have no say over what you do. I was told to guard the door, if I remember correctly, not you.” He fixed me with a look that hid something wonderfully evil within. “The fae aren’t the only ones who are … particular … with their words.”

“I won’t run away,” I promised, sitting up suddenly. “I just need to breathe. I just need to remember I’m not dead. Not yet.”

“You might as well be if you do run away,” Waylan said by way of warning, but he did nothing to stop me when I stood and crossed to the window. The vines rustled gently in the evening air, the sweet scent drifting in from outside enticing me further. As if I needed any further invitation.

I did consider, for a moment, what it would be like to run away. Where would I go? Back to the bridge where we made our crossing?

There’d be no way for me to get back to Alderia, even if I did.

So, without any other place really to go, I set my mind on the one place I thought I might, at least, be able to once again catch my breath.

“You’re my favorite, you know that?” I said, pausing with one foot swung over the sill. I glanced back once to the demon standing stoically guard at the door.

He bowed his head to me slightly. “As the creature here most likely to eat you if I was allowed, I take it as an honor.”

* * *

I finally understoodwhy they called this place the Pool of Indecision. I’d been warned of its effects, of the madness that would overtake me if I ventured into the dark, warm depths at its edge. More than a warning, I’d felt it.

I’d heard it.

Yet despite those warnings, I wanted to hear it again.

That was the second reason that drew me back to the pool. Almost as much as I longed for the clarity of lung my first plunge into it had given me, I wanted to hear the voice again.

Try as I might, I couldn’t get the whisper of the pool out of my head. It had only uttered my name, but I felt as if there was something else it meant to say. Something meant for me.

Now that I knew this pool was made by the same fae that the princes claimed had blood running through my veins, I couldn’t get it out of my head.

I half expected getting to the pool to be much more difficult, that the trees and roots would reach out to stop me, but something had changed in the court since the sun set on Midsommar’s day. It had grown all too quiet. All too stiff. It was as if, with the setting of the sun, all the court had fallen into a dream-filled sleep. I still felt the ground beneath me breathing, it was just a touch further away. It was the moment the eyelids started to flutter before waking, but they never quite opened. The moment before you know you’re about to let out a breath, a breath that never comes.

The tension only drove me forward.

It was surprisingly easy to pick my way over the bodies of the fae that had collapsed on their way back from the drunken feast. I guessed the pleasures of the great hall had finally gotten to them.

Once again, I was reminded of how little I knew of their kind. Caldamir, Armene, and Tethys might not look like the Woodland Fae … like Nyx in all his splendid, graceful glory … but they were still fae. They probably felt a tie to their world the way I felt a tie to mine.

And mine didn’t reek of magic. The magic might be leaking out of Avarath, but it was still here, seeping out of every knot and hollow.

Yellow sunlight had given way to silver moonlight streaming into the pool. The way the trees aligned over this place made it so that no matter what time of day or night, some sort of light shined down into it in full. At night, however, even the clear teal middle of the pool was eerie.

That was to mention nothing of the blackness. It had seemed to grow since the day, reaching out its shapeless form further into the water. It quivered there, alive, waiting for me.

That almost-spoken secret still lingered at the forefront of my mind as I unlaced the bodice of my gown and left it hanging at the water’s edge. I took several steps down, my feet feeling at the slippery surface as my skin grew accustomed to the freezing cold water staining the wood a dark brown.

It wasn’t until I stood on the very last step that I pulled the shift from my head to drape over the end of the railing. Insurance, should I need it quickly.

The moment the water touched my skin this time, it was like starlight itself had erupted across my body. It tingled so fiercely it almost burned, stinging at the insides of my eyes until salty tears gathered in their corners when I emerged, spluttering, in the very middle of the pool.

It was hard not to believe, in that moment, that a pool like this could keep me alive until the next festival—human or not—whatever the fae wanted to claim otherwise. More than that, it felt like it could keep me alive forever.

The water in the center was even more icy than it was in the daytime. My breath fogged in front of my face along the freezing surface, rolling in pale white tendrils toward the shadows refusing to be ignored.

That was the real reason I was there, after all—not only for the charmed water, but for the cursed.

Here, barely treading the freezing water, I was disappointed to hear not so much as a single syllable. Not that I could hear anything above my own chattering teeth, let alone a whisper.

“It only works when you’re underneath.”

My gasp nearly drowned me before I could turn to peer in the direction of the voice.

The gold of Tethys’ eyes shone from the shadows long before the rest of him followed. He sat perched on a low-hanging branch by the edge of the pool, one leg dangling dangerously close to the inky black at its edge.

“What are you doing here?”

“Interesting question for you to be asking.”

His eyes dropped down from mine to the crystal-clear water that did nothing to hide my nakedness beneath. I still instinctively dropped down a bit, as low as I could without swallowing more water than I already had.

Tethys’ gaze made its way over to the stairs, where my shift hung like a ghost over the wooden banister.

“Oh my,” he said, “I didn’t think I’d get to see quite so much of you so soon.”

His bluntness brought color to my cheeks as memories from earlier resurfaced in my mind. Tethys had been the most reluctant to leave Nyx’s Midsommar revelry. Well … aside from me.

I would never have admitted it, of course, but if it weren’t for Caldamir’s warning, I might have stayed. None of the persuasions of the other fae could have made me take my eyes off the Woodland prince.

Though for Tethys … I might’ve made an exception.

It wasn’t until my eyes had drifted from Tethys’ full lips to the defined lines of his upper chest, visible now above the loose neckline of the tunic tucked into his pants, that I realized what I was thinking.

What was I thinking? These were fae.

I’d be a fool to trust them with anything, let alone drool over them like some pathetic schoolgirl.

So, I averted my eyes, but not before Tethys saw.

Those eyes alit, glowing stronger than they were already, and before I could say anything he stood on the branch and stripped the rest of his clothes off in one fluid motion. It was impressive really, second only to the shape of his body in the brief moment I was able to see it before he dove into the pool at my side.

He didn’t come up immediately. He stayed underneath the rippling surface, swimming a half circle around me with wide, skillful strokes.

When he did finally emerge, there was something wrong with his eyes.

For one moment, a thin milky film obscured their color. Before my heartbeat could consider quickening, however, the film pulled back.

And he grinned.

“You’re even more beautiful than I imagined.”

Something inside me seized up as I realized what he meant, my arms trying to snake protectively across my chest before I realized I needed them to keep my head above water.

“You bastard,” I hissed, the slightest sound carrying across the surface as if it’d been shouted instead of whispered. “You can see underwater, can’t you?”

“A perk of my court.” Tethys let out a contented sigh and floated back up to tilt his head toward the stars. “My only regret is that it isn’t daytime. Then, I’d have been able to see you better.”

The rest of his body followed suit, the breadth of his torso breaching the surface to glitter in the moonlight. Only a thin film of water obscured his groin, not enough to hide the fact that even here, in the freezing water, his appendage remained impressive.

It was all I could do to keep from staring.

I was grateful for that same cold water, for any of the redness it might have dulled as it tried to spread to my cheeks again. I moved my strokes to carry me away from him, but Tethys just kept moving in his slow half circle, never drifting from me no matter how I tried to change my course.

“Be careful of the edges, unless you’re certain.”

I paused, pulling my eyes from him to glance over my shoulder. I hadn’t realized how close I was getting to the edge until now, but I should have felt the way the water had grown less cold. I’d subconsciously thought it was just my body finally growing used to the temperature.

It was, instead, because I’d swam right up to the edge of that inky darkness.

“Certain of what?”

The water made little waves as I hastened to swim away from the black fingers snaking out toward me. I heard, in that moment, a dull far-off sound. It was indistinct, able to be dismissed if not for the whispers I’d heard earlier.

It was, of course, the sound of my own name.

Delphine.

“Underwater,” Tethys said, from somewhere much closer than I expected. When I looked back from the dark water, I was met with the fae swimming close enough by my side to reach out and touch me. He moved through the water like a fish, every motion as natural and controlled as my own steps on land. I supposed it was to be expected from the prince of the Avarath Sea.

“If you want to hear what they have to say, you have to go under the water.” He pointed down to the clear stretch of water beneath us, the reflected stars darting in and out between our own shifting shadows. “But you have to be careful. Some of the fae think the water here is cursed, that whatever it tells you down there will—”

“Drive me mad?” I finished for him, looking away only long enough to catch another glimpse at the rippling, black water. “You told me earlier, remember?”

My teeth had started to chatter in the colder water again. It was somehow even more freezing the second time around. All my muscles felt strained and stiff, my breath catching somewhere before it reached the bottom of my lungs. It was a small miracle Tethys understood anything I’d said between my short gasps for air.

“Why would you help me?” I asked, when I turned back to him.

“I don’t know,” he said, each word punctuated by a smaller stroke carrying him ever closer to me. “Maybe it’s because I think everyone deserves to make that sort of decision for themselves. Or maybe it’s because I like you.”

“Why would you do that?” The question sounded stupid, but I was glad the cold made me blurt it out. I genuinely wanted to know, and not just because I kept finding myself having to remind myself to hate these fae.

He was close enough to touch me, and he did. He didn’t reach out and grab me like I might’ve imagined. He was gentle. Soft. Surprisingly so.

His hand reached out of the water to trace the outline of my hair along my left temple. “Little human, I don’t know.”

His hand dropped back down to the surface of the water, and for just one second, he let it run a small circle around the top of my shoulder before pulling it away. “But I intend to find out.”

I could feel the water changing course as it moved between our bodies.

We stayed like that, suspended as if flying for a long moment—hovering ever closer but never actually touching again. Tethys broke that moment with a smile, one so filled with mischief that it made me do the only thing I could think to escape before I was entirely and utterly lost in him.

I took his advice.

I turned away from Tethys and submerged, sinking below the freezing cold surface of the water. At first, I heard nothing but my own bubbles rising from my nose and corners of my mouth to burst up above.

Then I heard it, the same voice as before.

But it wasn’t a whisper. It wasn’t just my name.

“Delphine. We knew you’d be back.”