“That is the dream,” she replies sardonically, casting a lazy look around the enormous chamber. “Turn the water off, please. We are underground. Unless you want to drown or flush out all the Hidden Folk locked away downstairs.”
So, Murrey is not the only one chained up.
I force myself to settle, picturing things that can ground me, and the water dissipates before vanishing altogether.
“Very good, Ramya,” Portia remarks. “You do have a little control, it seems.”
The Druid has edged a little nearer to one of the doors, which I take for an exit. I lock that piece of information away. He looks deeply uncomfortable and is clearly formulating a plan of escape in his mind. Alona is behind me and when I throw a quick glance
at her, I can’t help but feel sorry for her, just for a fleeting moment.
She looks absolutely destroyed.
I shoot my gaze back to the front of the chamber. I take in Malachi. His eyes are deadened, and he doesn’t appear to blink. Warlocks, according to Opal’s books, are male witches who lean into darker magic. He certainly looks the part. He is fiddling with what looks like a coin and he seems distracted.
“Murrey needs blood, badly,” I mutter to Freddy. “He’s in the cell they took me from.”
I see his eyebrows raise as he processes my words. “I’ll see what I can do.”
“Freddy, get away from her, please,” Portia suddenly calls over.
Freddy does not move. The Fae glance between him and his mother. The warlock doesn’t react and the Druid edges even nearer the exit.
“You’ll be waiting a very long time for Opal to come,” I tell Portia. “Firstly, how would she know that your creepy secret layer is beneath Arthur’s Seat?”
“I would have thought that little fortune teller you met told you, and you told your family,” Portia says smoothly, and the words chill and disarm me. “Oh, yes, we found her. Hiding in plain sight, quite clever. She’s in one of these cells.”
I feel anger and indignation rise in me but, once again, I shackle it. “Still. There are other things keeping her from coming.”
Portia puffs out a sigh and rolls her eyes. “Go on then. What else?”
My eyes must be shining in the candlelight. I stare straight at the Siren. This Siren who has heaped so much misery on me and my family, and so much suppression on this incredible town. “She’s dead.”
Portia’s smile slips. “What?”
“She,” I spit, “is dead.”
She narrows her eyes at me. “You’re lying to buy
her time.”
I wish that was the truth. “No.”
She is utterly still and staring at me as if I have stolen air from her lungs. She looks briefly to Freddy and then back to me.
“What are you talking about?”
I point to the Druid, my blood heating with hatred. “Ask him.”
Alona gasps and Freddy steps closer to me. The Fae and the warlock turn to look at Alona’s maker, while Portia slowly rises to her feet. Every inch of her is quivering with rage, barely contained fury, and it’s enough to frighten me let alone the man on the other end of her attention.
“What is the little witch talking about?” Portia asks the Druid, her voice as calm as Blue’s loch but every bit as dangerous. “Would you care to explain to me why you’re thinking of running to that door?”
The Druid stumbles forward and I can hear Alona’s panicked breathing, behind me.
“Madam,” the Druid speaks with thinly veiled terror. “I…when I was trying to retrieve the Ripple…the other witch attacked me, the elder. She was powerful. And—and there was a dragon!”
“What,” Portia advances on him slowly, like a leopard to its prey, “happened?”
The large room is silent. The only sound is Portia’s heels on the ground as she continues her menacing approach. I’m confused by this reaction. There is something missing from my understanding of the situation. Portia is vibrating with rage, that’s obvious. That I can understand. Someone has gone rogue and deviated from her plan.
However, there’s something else. Her face seems to have a touch of fear in it. I stare at her profile, fascinated by this questionable reaction.
“I killed the witch,” the Druid finally admits, and I close my eyes to shut out the memory. “I hit her in the ribs. She fell. She’s gone.”
At first, there is no reaction at all from Portia. She is completely still and completely silent, her face a mask that I can no longer read. Then suddenly, she reaches out and grabs the Druid’s chin. He naturally flinches but her nails dig into his skin, causing him to freeze and whimper. It is a pathetic sight to witness. The Siren roughly jerks his face to the right.
“That cut,” she says softly. “That was her?”
He is almost hyperventilating as he nods. “Yes.”
I stare in astonishment as Portia reaches out with her other hand to touch the mark, almost a reverent caress.
Then she throws her head back and shrieks, a long and sustained note of anguish that is almost a whistle tone. The Fae react with yelps and Freddy dives to cover my ears. He shields me with his body, and we hit the floor, while Portia’s scream continues. When she stops, I look up. The Fae are clustered together in a corner, their teeth bared in a hiss. The warlock puts the end of one pinkie finger into his ear and clears out some gunk, shaking his head as if to dislodge echoes of the inhuman sound. Alona is crying quietly behind me.
“Fetch the Ripple,” Portia tells the warlock.
We all watch him saunter away to do so while Portia’s attention never wavers from the Druid.
