Page 34 of Ruling the Green

“Well, half the men I worked with couldn’t find their asses with both hands and a map, so I think your family secret is safe for the moment.”

“Anyway,” Jet said, shaking his head. “What is going on here?”

“I found your wife crawling into the bathroom.”

“Crawling?”

“She was too weak to sit up,” Nira explained. “But she was trying to get to something under the cabinet.”

“The flask,” Jet said. “Is it some sort of remedy?”

“Depends on how loosely you use that term.”

“Nira,” Vishen said, his voice holding a warning.

“It’s water.”

“There’s water in the bedroom.”

“Sure is. But not her water.”

“Her water—oh,” Jet said, his eyes going round. “You’re a water fae?”

I felt my stomach tighten, not sure how I felt about everyone knowing the truth. But what could I do now?

I nodded.

“Ocean?” Jet asked. I shook my head.

“Nymph?” Vishen asked.

“Naiad?”

“Bog fae?”

“She’s too fucking beautiful for a bog fae,” Jet said. He tossed the comment away, but my whole body seemed to react to the praise. My pulse skipped, my heart fluttered, and my belly swooped.

“She’s a Daughter of the Lake, you dimwits,” Nira said, rolling her eyes.

The men froze as their gazes slid back to me.

I couldn’t understand their reaction.

My life had been so isolated, so removed from the rest of the world. Sure, I encountered the occasional fae when I was in the woods around my lake. And some even came to visit the lake. I spoke to them or listened to their conversations while under the water. But as a whole, I was aware of the fact that while I was of the world, I wasn’t exactly in it. I wasn’t even aware of many other fae that existed, since unless they visited my lake, I had no way of learning about them.

I’d never seen another lake.

I didn’t know how many—or few—there were of me.

“He stole a fucking Daughter of the Lake?” Jet growled, seeming to be speaking to himself.

“Grimwood is slime,” Nira said. “Are you surprised he would take her?”

“She’ll die,” Vishen said. “She’ll die without access to her lake. And he installed her here as his own daughter. What was his end game?”

“He probably ran out of time trying to find someone who resembled Gemma,” Jet said, watching me in a way I couldn’t parse.

“Where is your lake?” Nira asked. “We could get her water from it, can’t we? That would fix this. At least temporarily.”