A Wilderness of Glass Read online

  His hands pressed into her back. He said nothing, only gave a slight warning shake of his head. Stay silent. Pretend you see nothing.

  Brida had expected a battalion of merfolk to join Edonin, but only she tread the waves. She, however, hadn’t come alone. A pair of colossal black shapes cut a swath through the waves, huge dorsal fins, twice the height of a tall man, catching the moon’s light on their tips before they dove beneath the surface.

  The ap had brought sea wolves with her. For what purpose, Brida couldn’t begin to guess, but their presence didn’t bode well for Ospodine, who was, so far, unaware of their presence.

  Ospodine, smug with his victory in luring the ap to him, executed a mocking bow. “Ap-Edonin. I thought I’d never see you again.”

  She stared at him, wearing that same look of anguish Brida had seen when she translated Ospodine’s name for her. “I’d hoped never to see you again.

  His face wiped clean of expression, except for a tightness around his mouth. “Is that any way to speak to your son?” he said in a hoarse voice.

  Brida’s mouth fell open and she stared at Ahtin, who showed no surprise at Ospodine’s latest disclosure. This violent, entitled man was the ap’s son?

  “I have no sons,” Edonin replied, voice cold. “You murdered them both long ago when you sacrificed your brother to a riven mage for the chance to walk on land. How much of his soul and blood did that monster steal before his sorcery turned you? And now you have regrets?” Her fluke slapped the water twice, fury in the stiff set of her shoulders.

  “You forced my hand!” Tiny bolts of lightning sparked off Ospodine’s fingers. “You knew what I wanted yet you refused me Pneuma’s Blessing.” He panted, visibly working to control his rage. “Gulsuca was a half-blood anyway,” he said with a sniff, as if that explanation justified his fratricide. He shoved Brida’s legs with the toe of his shoe. “No better than this bitch. Worse even because he tainted our herd.” He flung out his arm in a frustrated gesture. “How could you mate with a land walker?

  “Because I loved him. And I loved the child I bore him. A spirit of earth and sea in the best way.” The sorrow in her voice made Brida’s eyes well with tears. Her sorrow sharpened to anger, turning cold as before. “You didn’t just murder your brother, you desecrated him. Why would I ever welcome you back to these waters?”

  Brida might have pitied Ospodine for his mother’s rejection of him, if he hadn’t tried to drown her. As it was, his forlorn look didn’t move her, nor did it last. The haughty visage he showed to the world settled firmly on his features, utterly unrepentant for what he’d done. For what he was about to do.

  “Because if you don’t, history will repeat itself. You know this magic as well as I do, Mother. Used in the right spell, and the blood and soul of both elements can give one legs or fins. Gulsuca was convenient because he had both, but I don’t need a halfbreed whelp to work this magic, just land and water, and I have both here. He pointed to Brida and Ahtin. “Their deaths will fulfill that requirement.”

  Edonin glided closer to the rock, dangerously close to where Ospodine stood. “If you do this and return to the Gray, all of ocean-kind will hunt you. I’ll make sure of it.”

  Her threat, made in the gentlest voice, was no less terrifying for it. Brida believed her, and judging by Ospodine’s pale features, so did he.

  His jaw clenched, and his hands curled into fists. “Then I will swim the rivers and make of them my kingdoms.” He bared his teeth at Ahtin and Brida when Ahtin suddenly issued a series of whistles and screeching pulsed calls that made Brida wince. She gasped when Ospodine reached into his long overtunic and brought out a knife, an athame with a black blade. He crouched next to Ahtin, bound tight in the sorcerous net, and pressed the blade’s edge to the merman’s throat. Ahtin hissed at him.

  “Please don’t do this,” Brida begged him.

  He ignored her, attention fully on Edonin who met his eyes with an unwavering stare. “Give me Pneuma’s Blessing, Mother, so that I may become mer again.”

  Frozen in Ahtin’s arms, Brida stared at the blade, the edge pressed hard against Ahtin’s neck. A thin line of blood oozed over the steel where, to her horror, the metal soaked it up like a sponge, as if the athame drank from its victim. She almost added her voice to Ospodine’s demands. Whatever Pneuma’s Blessing was, she prayed Edonin would surrender it and save her grandson from the predation of her twisted son.

  Edonin lowered her head, the sigh she emitted an echo carried on the wind across the face of the waters. A black shadow coursed below them, crossing paths with another of equal darkness. The merwoman touched the hollow of her throat with her fingertips.

  Ghostly light pulsed beneath them, elongating into smoky skeins as she stretched her arm toward Ospodine. Gaze locked on the revenant magic, he stood to meet it as it snaked toward him. Brida sagged into Ahtin, hardly daring to believe they both managed to avoid having their throats slit, at least for now.

  “The Blessing of Pneuma,” Edonin said, and this time her voice enfolded them all. “All the magic of our herd spilled out before you, Seahorse. Passed from ap to ap and shared with all. Sea magic, long life, and we, the aps, the keepers of that birthright.” As she spoke, age lines blossomed across her face, carving deeper with each word. Her cheeks sagged, and her eyes grew hollow. Her breasts flattened and her arms lost their firmness.

  Ospodine changed as well as the misty tendril of ancient sea magic coiled around his hand to slide up his arm. His ears transformed, the once smooth helixes stretching to accommodate small spikes along their lengths. The hair of his eyebrows fell out, leaving behind bony ridges. He touched his changing face, trilling a victory tremolo in whistles he couldn’t sound earlier, uncaring that his longed-for metamorphosis back to merman came at the price of his mother’s life force.

  She watched him from sad eyes in a sunken face. “The Blessing must be freely given, Seahorse, or it isn’t a blessing.”

  Suddenly, the ghostly tether that connected him to Edonin solidified, becoming a thick rope tightening on Ospodine’s arm. Edonin gave a quick jerk of her head. The rope snapped taut, yanking Ospodine so hard forward, he pinwheeled off the ledge and into the water.

  Still trapped by the net, Ahtin managed to roll himself and Brida to a new position in time to see the spires of dorsal fins rise above the waves and speed toward Ospodine. He saw them as well and screeched his terror, an eerie combination that sounded both human and merman.

  The Blessing of Pneuma was gone, spiraling back to its customary place, giving back the grace of the sea to one of its matriarchs. Edonin no longer looked the crone, but she still looked aged, not by the parasitic draw of stolen magic but by the actions of her son.

  Ospodine flailed in the water, striking out for the ledge and the questionable safety of the rock flat. He made it, heaving himself onto its surface, murder in his gaze when it landed on Brida and Ahtin. He still clutched the athame and lurched toward them. He didn’t get far.

  Brida screamed when one of the monstrous fish, bigger than a fisherman’s boat, surged out of the water onto the rock flat, its momentum and weight propelling it forward at the speed of a ship sailing under full mast. Its maw opened, revealing rows of cone-shaped pointed teeth, before it snapped closed on the back of Ospodine’s tunic. Ospodine never had a chance to cry out. As fast as the creature appeared, it slid back in the water with its prey and dove. Its companion followed, dorsal spire shedding water as it rose, slicing clean as it sank, followed by the slap of a fluke the width of a barn door.

  The ensorcelled net surrounding Brida and Ahtin turned to dust and was swept into the sea to join its creator.

  Despite her shock at what she witnessed, and the events prior to it, she flung her arms around Ahtin’s neck and kissed him. He returned her affection with gusto, pulling away only when an inquiring whistle sounded next to them.

  Edonin swam to them, gripping the rock ledge with one hand, holding out Brida’s flute with the other. “This fel
l in the water.”

  Brida reached for it, then drew back, remembering Ospodine’s words. “I think it belongs more to the merfolk than to me.”

  Edonin’s effort to smile failed. She placed the flute on the ground. “You are mer in your way, and you’ve earned the right to keep it. Play it should you ever need us. Play to remember us.”

  Brida wiped at her eyes. “I’m sorry you lost your sons.” She was glad Ospodine was no longer a threat, but her heart ached for the ap’s grief at losing her children.

  Edonin emitted a trio of despondent clicks. “Ahtin would say Seahorse’s death was just. I say it was merciful. He was born empty and sought to fill that space. Maybe now he’s at peace, and I have avenged his brother’s death.”

  She exchanged a series of rapid fire whistles with Ahtin before turning back to Brida. “My son saved you. The debt is paid.” She raised a hand. “Farewell, Brida.”

  The ap swam away without looking back. Brida wondered if she’d ever return to the waters surrounding Madigan’s Teeth.

  A caress on her leg made her look down to find Ahtin next to her, balanced on his forearms. His tail arched his back, and the shallow cut from Ospodine’s sacrificial dagger no longer bled, though it left a red mark on the merman’s ivory skin. He nodded to where Endel now lay sprawled along the path. “Your friend?”

  Brida gasped and raced to where the guard lay, no longer frozen in place by a siren’s spell but sleeping the sleep of the innocent, completely unaware of what had just played out before him. Brida tucked his arms against his body and watched to make sure he breathed steadily. She’d have to invent a plausible story to explain why she was soaking wet, how her skirts ended up shredded, why Syr Ospodine was nowhere to be found, and why Endel was napping outside in the middle of the night. It shouldn’t be too hard if she put some effort into it. She thanked the gods it was Endel who accompanied her here and not the far more astute Lord Frantisek.

  She returned to find Ahtin floating in the water, waiting for her. Shrapnel from crushed mussel shells crunched beneath her feet, and she swept some aside to clear a spot for herself on the rock ledge level with the water. Seawater sluiced under and over her, cold enough to make her bones crack.

  Ahtin curved an arm on either side of her legs and rested his chin on her knee. “I feared you had spurned me, Brida.”

  She wove his slippery hair through her fingers in a long caress and bent to steal another kiss from him. “No,” she said when they parted. “I was sick. And then I was afraid. Ospodine knew about you. I prayed you and your family had already begun your journey south.”

  He nuzzled his cheek into her skirts, a frown drawing down the corners of his mouth. “We were leaving when Edonin heard your flute. She came back, and I followed. The rest continued south.”

  “And now she’s gone to join them.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you will too.” It was the way of the merfolk, and who was she to change it? Still, her soul ached at the idea of this inevitable parting.

  Ahtin captured her hand to kiss each of her fingers, her thumb, then her knuckles and the inside of her wrist. “I can stay.” He pressed her hand to his cheek. “I want to stay.”

  Brida sniffled and blinked back the tears threatening to spill down her face. “I want you to stay too, but sooner or later someone will discover you, and I don’t want that to happen.” She traced the elegant line of his nose down to the fine curvature of his lips. “Your ap needs you. All of your family needs each other. The children your women will bear are going to need all the protection they can get.” She stroked the high planes of his cheekbones. “I will miss this face.” Her thumb pressed his lower lip. “This mouth.” He covered her hand with his where it flattened against his chest. “This heart.”

  “I will return when the waters are warm again, beautiful Brida,” he promised. “Come to the shore then. I will be waiting.”

  He pressed her hand even harder to his chest before folding her fingers over her palm. “My heart,” he said softly. “Keep it safe.”

  No longer caring that tears streamed down her face and dripped off her chin, Brida repeated his gesture, pressing his hand to her chest just above the edge of her bodice before curling his webbed fingers closed. “My heart,” she whispered. “Take it with you.”

  They kissed a final time before Ahtin launched himself into the surf and dove out of sight. Brida watched the fading wake of his departure, peering into the darkness for a final glimpse of him until her eyes ached. The Gray held its secrets close and showed her nothing more.

  Epilogue

  Summer returned to Ancilar on the back of an unexpected gale that launched the Gray far onto the shoreline and snapped trees under its might. In the aftermath, the villagers crept out of their battered houses to survey the damage and thank the gods the sky was once more blue, the sea calm, and the temperatures warm.

  Brida joined the rest of the villagers as they gathered at the shoreline with their wagons, clearing away the debris strewn from one end of the beach to the other. Most would be taken back to the village for sorting and salvage. All the effort went toward clearing the area for the safety of the horse shrimpers who planned to start the trawling season in a few days.

  Norinn helped Brida throw pieces of driftwood into the dray. “Why is it all we ever do on this beach is work?” she said, encompassing the length of sand and dunes with a sweep of her hand. “Why not have a gathering? Build a fire. Bring food, play music, dance. Lord Frantisek is always borrowing you and the others to play at the castle. Why not play here for the neighbors?”

  Those who overheard her comment embraced the idea, and Brida was swiftly conscripted to play at the impromptu celebration that evening. She didn’t mind. Winter had been a lonely season, punctuated by bouts of melancholy that gave way to brief cheerfulness at the thought of summer’s return. Brida missed Ahtin, missed him even more when she played her flute. She worried as well. His world was far more dangerous than hers, at least in her opinion, though hers didn’t lack its share of evil men like Ospodine.

  No one seemed to care that he hadn’t returned from Madigan’s Teeth, though his lordship had asked her twice if she’d seen him there. That somber gaze, deep as the Gray itself, had settled on her for a long moment until he finally said “Sometimes the sea takes what it wants with no apology for the theft.”

  At the memory of the great fish snatching Ospodine off the rock ledge as if he were a seal, Brida couldn’t agree more.

  Once the sun set, all of Ancilar gathered around the bonfire stack they’d built. When two of the men set the kindling aflame with torches and fanned the flames to flare up the heap, everyone cheered. Children raced along the beach, chasing and being chased by pet dogs. The ale flowed, along with the gift of a cask of wine from his lordship on the bluff. No one worried about an obluda, especially after Zigana Imre dipped her hands in the shallow, then stood up with a smile and shake of her head. The Gray this night offered no threat to those who remained on the shore.

  Brida played alongside a large group of musicians with various instruments and skill levels spanning from beginner to expert. She’d brought her bone flute, her most treasured possession now, and played all the songs the villagers knew by heart. Her lips tingled with the urge to play the two-note siren song: Edonin’s name and so much more, but she resisted the temptation. That wasn’t merely a tune. It was a spell, and a powerful one at that, and had no business at this gathering.

  She did slyly incorporate the whistle that was Ahtin’s name into three of the songs. No one noticed, but Brida stared beyond the crowd of villagers and the bonfire with its blaze of light, to the dark sea.

  Was he out there? Had the merfolk returned? And if so, had Ahtin forgotten her? Brida prayed he hadn’t.

  As the evening wore on, the women gathered sleepy children and rode back to the village. Some of the men went as well. Those who stayed sat around the slowly dying fire, swapping stories and boasts, all growing exponenti
ally more outlandish in proportion to the ale imbibed.

  Brida returned with Norinn to help her put her large brood to bed. She declined an offer of tea, claiming exhaustion and an aching back from a long day of cleaning up the beach. She returned home, and just like more than a half year earlier, she sneaked out her back gate, taking a path that avoided the bonfire and its admirers.

  Ixada Cave no longer frightened her. She now welcomed its rumors of hauntings and doorways to dead places. It kept others away while Brida sat on the sand not far from the flooded entrance and serenaded the Gray with her flute playing. She did the same tonight, hoping against hope that she might hear an answering whistle.

  The crescent moon, though bright in a clear sky, offered little illumination, and night settled heavy on the Gray and its bordering shoreline. Brida played a few more tunes, stopping mid exhalation during one as a sound drifted above the surf’s rumble.

  She didn’t move, certain that if she did, the sound would disappear. The flash of a pale fluke striking the water made her heart leap. Streamers of seaweed hair glistened under anemic starlight, and a webbed hand rose in greeting.

  Brida stood, laughing and sobbing at the same time. She brought the flute to her mouth with shaking hands and blew into the mouthpiece, playing a song of salutation and pure joy as she waded into the shallows.

  The whistle came again, short and sharp, followed by a series of clicks that made her breath catch.

  “Brida. Beautiful Brida. Did you keep my heart safe?”

  ~END~

  About the Author

  Grace Draven is a Louisiana native living in Texas with her husband, kids and a big, doofus dog. She has loved storytelling since forever and is a fan of the fictional bad boy. She is the winner of the Romantic Times Reviewers Choice for Best Fantasy Romance of 2014 and 2016 and a USA Today Bestselling author.