One Salt Sea

by Seanan McGuire

“Some. Not much as makes any sense.” Danny’s sigh was like gravel rattling in a trash can. “See, the thing about rocks is they pay attention, but they do it slow. Once you upset them, it takes ’em a while to calm down. I’m still trying to get them to tell me their names an’ where they’re all from.”

  Knowing where the rocks were from would be a start. “What do you have so far?”

  “Gardens, rivers, sidewalks.” Danny gave me a sidelong look, taking a worrisome amount of attention off the road. “Some of the older ones—the calmer ones—remember you. One of ’em says it came from your yard. Says it used to live under a eucalyptus tree.”

  A lump formed in my throat. Sylvester only brought Raysel to visit the apartment I shared with Cliff once; it was too dangerous to take a noble child in the open often, and there was too much risk that Raysel would say something she shouldn’t. But Sylvester wanted to meet my daughter, who was too close to human to enter the knowe, and he wanted Raysel to start getting accustomed to the human world. We sat in the postage stamp yard behind the building for hours, drinking lemonade, talking, and watching Raysel chase pixies around the three stunted eucalyptus growing by the back fence.

  Before they left, she asked me if she and Gilly were going to be friends. Maeve help me, I told her they would. Six months later, Raysel was gone. Not long after that, so was I. Cliff moved out of that apartment while I was missing, and I’d never been back.

  “Yeah,” I said. “That sounds about right.”

  We pulled up in front of my apartment complex only a few minutes later. Danny stopped at the curb, saying apologetically, “I’d come in an’ be social, but I gotta get home and feed the kids. You gonna be okay?”

  “As okay as I can be,” I said, and got out of the cab.

  “I’ll call as soon as I know anything,” said Danny. Then he was gone, merging swiftly back into passing traffic.

  I hugged my waterlogged clothes to my chest as I walked up the sidewalk to the gate. Walther’s car was parked in one of the visitor’s spots, jammed in at an angle that made it clear how fast he’d been going when he arrived. I walked a little faster. If he was here during school hours, it was because he had something he needed to share.

  The wards on the door were open. That was a relief. Maybe it’s unkind of me to expect May to sit around playing secretary, but I don’t trust answering machines anymore, and people needed to be able to reach me. I undid the locks, calling, “I’m home,” as I stepped inside.

  “Oh, thank Oberon!” May came flying out of the kitchen, throwing her arms around my shoulders before she fully registered how wet I was. She squawked and pushed me away from her. “Toby, you’re soaked!”

  “Didn’t Quentin tell you where I was going?” Sudden fear lanced through me. Danny hadn’t mentioned driving Quentin home; I’d just assumed he must’ve, that Quentin would have sent him to wait for me. If he hadn’t—

  “Quentin’s asleep in my room,” said May. “He wasn’t making sense when he got here. He said you ran away with the mermaids. I put him to bed when the sun came up.”

  “That’s pretty much exactly what happened.” I shook my head. “I went to Saltmist with Dianda, to look for clues about what happened to the boys.”

  May’s pale eyes went wide. “Did you find anything?”

  “It was Rayseline. Any doubts I may have had . . . is Walther here? I saw his car.”

  “He’s in the kitchen. We were showing Raj how to use the cappuccino setting on the coffee maker.” Something clattered in the kitchen, illustrating her point.

  My relationship with the coffee maker is very dear to my heart. I grimaced, picturing my overenthusiastic Fetch taking it apart. “Okay. Tell him I’m going to go change into something dry, and then I’ll come in to review what we know. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “Back in a minute,” I said, and started for my room.

  Getting out of my wet clothes was the first order of business, to be followed by figuring out how to dry my leather jacket without destroying it. They were comfortably mundane problems, and the fact that they’d come about for distinctly nonmundane reasons was secondary at best.

  I peeled my leather jacket off as soon as my bedroom door was closed, hanging it from the doorknob to keep it from dripping—much—on the rest of the room. Everything else went into the hamper. I dried my hair with the discarded towel from last night—oak and ash, had that really only been last night?—and shrugged on my bathrobe. Walther and Raj could deal with me being in a state of mild undress. I wasn’t going to try putting on dry clothes until I had dry skin to go under them.

  I was emptying my jacket pockets when there was a knock at the door. “You all right in there?” called May.

  “Just soaked,” I called back. “Something up?”

  “Raj did something to the coffee machine. It’s making foam, and Walther won’t stop laughing. You should come take a look.”

  “Coming.” I checked the knot on my bathrobe, giving my rat’s-nest hair an irritated glance before grabbing my jacket. If anyone could get the salt off without ruining the leather, it was Walther.

  The coffee party was in full swing in the kitchen. May had managed to divert the promised flood of foam, probably through means I didn’t want to hear about. She and Raj swabbed the floor with dish towels while Walther sat at the kitchen table, holding a mug and grinning. Spike was perched on Walther’s shoulder.

  “Today we’re learning why it’s bad to use hearth magic to accelerate brewing,” May said, turning to wring her towel out over the sink.

  “It was educational,” said Walther.

  Raj beamed. “May said I couldn’t possibly mess up the new coffee maker.”

  “I’m proud of you. Once again, you’ve managed to exceed all expectations. Never hex my coffee maker again.” I held up my jacket. “Walther, any chance you can get the saltwater out of this?”

  Walther turned to face me, and blinked. “I can try,” he said, standing. Spike jumped down to the table. “Did you really visit the Undersea?”

  “Well, first I rode a pissed-off mermaid down Leavenworth,” I said, handing him the jacket. “After that, yeah, I went to visit the Undersea. It was a weird night, and it’s already shaping up to be a weird day.”

  “More and more, you convince me that taking a job in a nice, safe classroom was the smartest thing I ever did.”

  “Yeah, well, it probably was,” I replied. “Why aren’t you there now?”

  “I took the day off. The threat of war seemed slightly more important than keeping my freshman chemistry students from burning down the building.” Walther squinted at the leather. “What did you do?��

  “Again, I visited the Undersea.”

  “I don’t know why I bother asking.” He removed his glasses, tucking them into his coat pocket. He doesn’t need them—the only pureblood I’ve ever met who needed glasses was January O’Leary, and her eyes were actually damaged. Walther’s glasses are part of his whole Clark-Kent-isn’t-Superman routine, since no human disguise can hide the piercing Tylwyth Teg blue of his eyes. He doesn’t look at people as much as he looks through them. The glasses are intended to dampen the effect, since a little window dressing is better than having his students flee screaming on a regular basis.

  Raj brought me a cup of coffee, casting a sheepish look at the towels on the floor. “Sorry about the mess.”

  “It’s fine. Just clean it up, and all will be forgiven. Unless you broke the coffee maker.” I paused. “You didn’t break the coffee maker, did you?”

  Raj and May shook their heads in mute unison.

  I relaxed marginally. “In that case, we’re cool.”

  “Good,” said May. “Now, what did you find?”

  “Nothing good,” I said, and sipped my coffee before launching into an explanation of what I’d seen in Saltmist. Silence fell over the kitchen, broken only by the sound of Walther rummaging through the cabinets and filling the sink with water. Raj looked like he couldn
’t decide whether to be revolted by the idea of that much wet, or fascinated by the thought of a part of Faerie he’d never seen.

  When I was done, May sat heavily in the other chair and said, “Raysel killed someone.”

  “That, or she elf-shot a Selkie, stole the skin, and managed to hide the sleeping body somewhere.” I didn’t have to point out that something like that would be a lot of work—and Raysel was never a fan of work. “She couldn’t have made it past the wards without the skin.”

  Walther looked up. “If she elf-shot a Selkie and removed his or her skin, the Selkie is dead.”

  I blinked. “What?”

  “A Selkie without a skin is essentially human. Elf-shot is fatal to humans.” He shrugged. “If she used elf-shot, the Selkie is dead.”

  A cold knot was forming in my stomach. I’d been trying to tell myself that maybe—just maybe—Raysel had been smart, and left the Selkie alive. And there was no way that could have happened. She would have needed the Selkie to stay asleep indefinitely in order to be sure her plan wouldn’t be discovered; elf-shot would be the easiest, surest way to accomplish her goal. There was no way she would have used anything else.

  May’s expression was horrified as she turned to me. “Toby, Oberon’s Law—”

  “I know.” Murder is the only unforgivable crime in Faerie. Kidnapping, treason, and theft can be forgiven. Take a life, and your own life is forfeit. This wasn’t the first time Raysel had killed someone, but no one was going to take her to trial over Oleander. Dianda would take her to trial over this, and she would win, and Raysel would burn. “I don’t know how I’m going to tell her parents.”

  “Yeah.”

  Silence fell, lasting until Walther cleared his throat and asked, “Did you want to hear what I found out about the things you sent me?”

  “Please.” I sipped my coffee, trying to relax. I was in my bathrobe, I needed to rinse the salt out of my hair, the whole Kingdom was teetering on the brink of war, and I had to tell Sylvester his daughter might have broken Oberon’s Law—but for now, I had to focus. If we had a chance to stop things from getting worse, it began right here.

  “Well, for a start, your elf-shot is, and isn’t, normal. The recipe works like your basic elf-shot. Get hit, go to sleep for a hundred years.” Walther poured vinegar into the sink, stirring the water with his hand. “Sort of.”

  “I love ‘sort of,’ ”I said dryly. “It’s such a beautifully useless phrase. What else does this super-special elf-shot do?”

  “I’ve heard of this mixture but never seen it used, so I can’t be completely sure without sticking somebody with the arrow and watching them for a few decades. But I think it would eventually be fatal.” Walther picked up a dish sponge, dunking it in the sink before starting to wipe down my jacket. “There are some herbal compounds in the mix that aren’t used for elf-shot, but are used for slow-acting poison.”

  “Slow assassination,” I whispered. Most purebloods view elf-shot as more of an inconvenience than anything else. Get shot, fall down, and take a nice long nap. If you could make elf-shot that actually killed, it might be decades before anyone realized what you’d done. Plenty of time to get away.

  “Exactly,” said Walther. “Now, this mix takes a lot of mercury, and buying mercury is tricky. I’m hoping I can use that to find out who made the charm, but it’ll take time. And before you ask, no, I don’t think Raysel could have done it. She’s never studied alchemy. She would have poisoned herself trying to mix the tincture.”

  So Raysel wasn’t working alone. Swell. “Don’t take too much time,” I cautioned. “We don’t have it.”

  “I know.” Walther put down the sponge, giving my jacket a good shake before submerging it in the vinegar-and-water mixture filling the sink.

  “I thought you were supposed to keep leather dry,” said Raj dubiously.

  I gave him a sidelong look. “Why do you know how you’re supposed to take care of leather?”

  “Lots of knights wear leather armor.” He shrugged. “You do. I never see you without your jacket.”

  I decided not to argue. He was right, in a sideways sort of way. “Normally, you keep leather dry. In this case, I’m going to trust that Walther knows what he’s doing.”

  At the moment, what he was doing involved chanting to himself in Welsh. The air in the kitchen chilled, the smell of frozen yarrow wafting around us. Everyone quieted, looking toward Walther with varying degrees of interest.

  He chuckled, pulling my clean, dry jacket from the sink and giving it a final shake before lobbing it in my direction. I caught it easily, and blinked at him. “Hearth magic?”

  “It’s a form of alchemy,” he said, looking unconscionably pleased with himself. “I’ve learned a few tricks. Anyway, can I keep the arrow a little longer? I want to run some further tests, and see if I can get you a more precise origin.”

  “Please do,” I replied, slipping the jacket on over my bathrobe. The leather smelled like yarrow and salt and, very faintly, vinegar. “What did you learn about the other things we found? The needles, and whatever was in that vial?”

  “The needles are just needles. As for the contents of the vial—it’s a sleeping charm, with enough of a memory eraser worked in that if you drank it, you’d probably forget the last hour or so of your life. Not fatal, but not friendly.” He shook his head, expression turning almost admiring. “Whoever mixed it knew their stuff. This would put a person out for about a day.”

  “Oleander?” I asked—almost hopefully. Oleander was dead. At least if this were her work, we didn’t have to worry about Rayseline having any more of it.

  “I don’t think so. It’s herbal, not floral.”

  Damn. “Okay.”

  “I’m going to get an hour or so of sleep, and then get back to work. You should consider doing the same.” Walther flashed me a tired smile. “I’ll call when I know anything. Please, I know you’re not good at it, but can you try to be careful? Just until I can let you know what it is you’re up against?”

  “It’s a little late, but I can give it a try,” I said. I wasn’t willing to let myself hope yet—the odds were stacked too strongly against us for that—but maybe we were making headway. I had my jacket back. That was a start.

  My jacket . . . and the contents of its pockets. “Wait here a second,” I said, and turned to run for my room, not waiting for his response.

  Walther was standing there, looking confused, when I returned. “What is it?”

  “Here.” I held out the vial containing the needle from Dean’s room. “I found this in Saltmist. Can you check it out?”

  “I’ll add it to the list.” He plucked the vial from my hand. “I’ll let you know what I find.”

  “You do that,” I said. “Open roads, Walther.”

  “Open roads,” he echoed. “May, I appreciate your hospitality.”

  “Kind fires, Walther,” she said, and hugged him. “Now you get out of here, and take care of yourself, okay?”

  He smiled. “I’ll do my best. Good-bye, Raj.”

  “Good-bye,” Raj replied. Then Walther was out the door, leaving the rest of us in the kitchen, not sure what to say.

  As usual, May broke the silence. “Toby needs pants. Raj, go wake Quentin up.”

  “Why?” he asked blankly.

  She smiled. “It’s time for pancakes.”

  I laughed all the way to my room.

  EIGHTEEN

  I EMERGED FROM MY ROOM wearing dry jeans, a black cotton shirt, and a gray wool sweater. The smell of pancakes greeted me, awakening my appetite. Dianda’s bottles and the Luidaeg’s shell were in my pocket, and the pin was in the lining of my jacket. Maybe its magic was spent and maybe not; I couldn’t afford to throw it away if there was still a chance it might be useful.

  I was starting to feel like a fairy-tale James Bond, only my version of Q was as likely to kill me as she was to kill the bad guys.

  May met me at the kitchen door, shoving a plate of pancakes into m
y hand. “Eat,” she commanded. Raj and Quentin were already at the table, eating with a speed that almost disguised their total lack of table manners.

  “Yes, Mother,” I said. The pancakes were fixed the way I like them, with grape jelly and powdered sugar instead of syrup. My stomach roared, reminding me how long it had been since the last time I actually sat down to eat.

  I was halfway through my second serving—and most of the way through my second explanation of what happened in Saltmist, this time for Quentin’s benefit—when someone started hammering on the door. I dropped my plate onto the table and half-walked, half-ran to answer. No one would knock that way if it wasn’t an emergency. Wrenching the door open, I demanded, “What do you—”

  The rest of the sentence died on my tongue as I saw the haggard, almost haunted look on Tybalt’s face. For a moment, we both stood frozen. Then he grabbed my wrist, jerking me forward. “We have to go.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?” I demanded, trying to pull my arm away. He didn’t let go. “What are you doing here? Did the cats tell you something?”

  “For once in your life, be quiet and come on.”

  “Tybalt?” May walked up behind me, sounding bemused. “What’s going on?”

  Tybalt’s eyes stayed focused on me. “I’ve had Gabriel watching your daughter’s house. You didn’t ask for it, but it seemed like the best idea, given the circumstances. He just contacted me. Something’s happened. They’ve called the police.”

  I’d considered a lot of horrible scenarios for this war. None of them included my almost-human daughter. I went cold. “Gillian?”

  “She’s gone, October. She’s missing. Now please. Come.”

  “I . . .” I turned. “Call Sylvester. Tell him Gillian’s missing, and that he needs to put the knights on alert. Keep Quentin here with you.”

  “Yes,” she said numbly. She’s not Gillian’s mother. Some of her memories were probably telling her she was. Her fingers flashed in the air, accompanied by the scent of cotton candy and ashes, and the veil of a human disguise settled over me. “Go.”

  I nodded my thanks. I was going to need all the magic I could muster if I was going to make it through the day ahead. “Raj . . .” I began.