He inhaled deeply, leaning his head back against the wall too. His gaze shifted higher, above the pearls, to the happy, smiling faces of his parents.
“I don’t know,” he exhaled. “Pearls are delicate, beautiful things. They call them ‘drops of the ocean.’ The ancient stories of the deep are stored between their layers. Magic binds to them. This particular string was my father’s wedding present to my mother. I guess even in the frenzy of madness, I retained enough good sense to stop myself from ruining them. They are my one remaining treasure here now. And the only reminder of everything that has been lost.”
Once again I wished to hug him, or at least to reach out and take his hand. And once again, I just curled my fingers into a fist to fight that urge.
“They’re beautiful,” I said. “I’ve never seen pearls that perfect. I still can’t believe they’re real.”
He gave me an incredulous look. “Aren’t all pearls real? Why fake them? What for?”
“Oh, you’d be surprised if you ever go over to my world.”
“It’s a good thing I’ll never do then. Who needs a world with fake pearls? What other abominations does it harbor?” He lifteda hand before I had a chance to open my mouth in reply. “No need to list them, darling. Trust me, I don’t want to know.”
He shifted a foot on the floor and winced, stepping on an errant shard of glass that the servants had missed when cleaning.
“Oh no,” I gasped. “Are you okay?”
“Of course I am. What can possibly hurt me?” He kicked the shard off the ledge. It splashed into the water.
I noticed the red film of fresh crystalized blood on the glass floor.
“You’re not invincible, Kye.”
The fact disturbed me more than I ever thought it could. The metal blade of Leslo’s knife was thin enough to break when turned to glass. But a thick enough weapon, even if made of glass, could wound Kye greatly.
“A cut from a piece of glass won’t kill a fae,” Kye dismissed, rinsing his foot in the water.
When he stepped back on the glass with it, there was no more blood. The wound must’ve closed up already, beginning to heal.
“Okay, but what if a pane of glass sliced through your neck and severed your head?” I asked.
“You have quite an imagination, my dear,” Kye chuckled, shaking his head. “That would need to be a pretty thick pane, and it would have to come at a certain angle. It’s not easy to slice a person’s head off.”
“But it’s not impossible,” I argued. “And what then? Would you heal? Would you grow a new head?”
“No,” he admitted.
I felt no triumph at winning the argument, just worry. I didn’t want him harmed. I certainly didn’t want him dead.
We stood in silence for a few moments. I watched the water ripple in the middle of the hall. The dead darkness under its surface seemed especially threatening after last nightwhen a whole army of Abyss dwellers came to the surface. The creatures were so determined, so coordinated, following the same purpose. To get me?
Why? What did I have that they wanted?
“Kye,” I said quietly. “I think the monsters spoke to me when they attacked.”
It sounded ridiculous even to my own ears. But Kye didn’t laugh. He frowned.
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“Did you not hear them?”
“No. What did they say?”
“The first night, it was whispers that kept calling me. I thought they weren’t real, just an effect of white noise from the waves. Then, last night...” I rubbed my chest, wincing at the memory of the glowing blue appendage hovering over me, its unblinking black eyes staring. “It’s just one voice, actually. One whisper. It said it had been searching for me. What does it want, Kye?”
I turned to face him. He stepped closer to me, much closer than an arm’s reach.
“If it wants you, it sure as fuck is not going to get you,” he growled through clenched teeth.
