“You want me to believe you seek to be a glorified coach-and-four instead?”
“I will not drown you,” the kelpie says, ignoring my last question. “In fact, I promise not to. I vow to take you where you need to go and release you at your destination alive and unharmed.”
My mind whirls to process his words. Stating such a vow is as binding as a bargain. Should he so much as try to break his word, he’ll die, strangled by his own fae magic. Could he have left room for deception? Part of me recoils to even consider the creature’s offer, but this might be my one chance to reach Fairweather Palace before Torben is killed.
“Kelpies travel fast, don’t they?” I ask.
“Faster than any creature on land. Faster than any animal underwater.”
“And you’ll take me anywhere that I choose? Alive and unharmed?”
“I’ve said as much already, but if you must hear it again, here it is. I promise to deliver you where you need to go alive and unharmed. I vow that my mane will not strangle your hands, nor will I drown you or so much as deposit you inside any body of water.”
Warnings continue to blare through me, begging me to refuse, to run. But what other choice do I have? If I can save Torben, I must try.
“Fine.” The word bursts from my lips with a heavy quaver. “Take me to Fairweather Palace.”
The kelpie closes the remaining distance between us and lowers his head. My stomach turns as I approach the equine creature. I haven’t so much as pet a horse since my accident, much less ridden one. The closest I get to horses these days is from the safety of a closed coach. I swallow down the bile that rises in my throat, then grip his thick black mane in my hands and heave myself onto his back. I sway in my seat before I manage a somewhat comfortable position. Then I hold my breath, waiting for the kelpie to go back on his word, to somehow break the binding magic of his promise. Any moment, his hair could wrap around my hands and lock me in an iron grip…
But it doesn’t.
The kelpie’s mane remains limp in my palms. Next thing I know, he takes off, sprinting faster than any horse I’ve ever ridden. The dark forest flies by in a green-black blur. Night has now fully fallen, leaving the moon to cast sinister shadows along our path. I keep my head low, fearing the greedy hands of wayward branches, but the kelpie manages to avoid them. I’m surprised by his smooth gait, his graceful shifts and turns that belie his large form.
I lose sense of time, lose all concept of direction or miles traveled. But after a while, the forest begins to thin, revealing a modest clearing just ahead. As we draw near, I catch sight of moonlight dancing over the surface of a small pond housed at the very center of the clearing. To my horror, the kelpie slows to a canter as he takes us straight toward the body of water.
My heart climbs into my throat, drumming out the beat of my terror.
“You promised you wouldn’t drown me!” I shout, unwinding my hands from the creature’s mane.
“I won’t,” he says. “I keep my promises, for I have no intention of dying.”
Despite his words, he continues to head for the pond. I glance from the glistening water to the ground far below. A sickening vision floods my mind—of the last time I tumbled from an equine creature. The pain I felt as I struck the ground. The crunch of my ribs beneath massive hooves. The searing fire that surged through my shattered legs.
But I don’t have time for fear. Forcing the memories away, I release the kelpie’s mane. I half leap, half tumble from his back. My hip meets the ground first, then my shoulder. Fighting the pain that radiates through my bones, I scramble to my feet. The kelpie halts and rounds on me.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” he says, his tone unsettlingly calm.
“You shouldn’t have deceived me,” I say through my teeth. “How are you still alive? How can you survive a binding fae promise?” My eyes dart around the clearing, seeking a place to run, to hide. The pond is a mere few feet away, which still gives the kelpie a chance to drag me into its depths.
“I did not break my promise,” he says. He takes a step, and I flinch. Then I realize he isn’t stepping closer to me but toward the lake. “I brought you to where you needed to go, alive and unharmed, just like I promised. I was never going to deposit you inside the body of water, only at its shore.”
“This isn’t where I asked you to take me. I asked to go to Fairweather Palace.”
“Yes, but that is not where youneededto go.”
“And this is?”
“Yes.” The kelpie retreats closer to the pond again. His rear hooves sink into the dark waters, sending a ripple outward. A second ripple forms at the pond’s center, overwhelming the first as something begins to breach the surface.
I take another trembling step back. Then another.
A feminine figure rises from the pond and glides toward the shore. At first, she’s nothing more than a liquid shape, featureless and indistinguishable from the water she came from. Then the water sloughs off her, drip by drip, to reveal blue skin, pale lips, pointed ears, a nose. Finally, it drains from her upper face to unmask a pair of eyes.
Green eyes with too-large pupils.
Eyes that send me straight back to Danielle’s bedroom where I glimpsed a memory of them.
And before that…
