KARIS

The bank was dry and soft, and the water in the river itself was just high enough to flow over most of the smooth rocks in its bed. Stripping my bag and clothes off, I washed as quickly as I could in the shallow water, leaving my short shift on in case some creature appeared and I had to run back to Loftin.

He was so angry with me.

I only did what he asked. I armed myself and fought the Banshee; I just didn’t expect to do it in that way. While he might have blown the situation out of proportion in some ways, in one respect, he was right. I had no idea what power I held or how to wield and control it. That made it dangerous for anyone around me when it manifested.

I greedily drank from the river, feeling like land that had gone far too long without life-giving rain.

Dry. Wasted. Shriveled.

The water was cool and so clear, I could see every color variation in the pebbles beneath its surface. What I didn’t see was life within the water. There were no fish, no living things inside the life-giving flow.

Finean appeared in the water, shimmering in front of me. “Where are you?” he asked.

I shook my head. “I’m not sure.”

He sniffed the air. “Near the sea?”

“I think so.”

“I felt your power. Did you send a burst? Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. How did you feel that? And how do I know you?”

“You’ve always known me. I’m your oldest friend, Karis.”

Then why can’t I remember him? I searched his eyes. His brows knitted in concern.

“Are you sure you’re alright? That burst was more powerful than any I remember you making before.”

“I’m perfectly fine.” I tried to cover myself up, realizing how little I wore now that his eyes were raking over me.

“Karis? You okay?” Loftin cried out.

I looked at Finean. “I have to go.”

“Wait—” he yelled, but I tapped the water’s surface and he disappeared. I took another long drink and sat back, trying to comb my memories for a trace of Finean. Anything at all. I couldn’t find or remember anything.

My oldest friend?

Loftin hated him, and I wasn’t sure what to make of that.

I weighed Finean’s words and tucked them away carefully. If he was an ally, I might need him sooner rather than later. Now, I needed to hurry. We needed water, and like Loftin said, we needed to make tracks. I’d walked back to the bank to get my canteen when I noticed a strange humming sound coming from farther upstream, followed by the sweetest singing I’d ever heard.

Loftin had declared the stream would be safe, and he was so close, he had to hear her. He wasn’t far away. He was keeping watch while I washed. If he heard her and didn’t come running, she must not be dangerous.

The woman’s words were heart-rending and desperate—words of mourning, drowned in sadness.

I’d heard people sing at funeral pyres before, and this song was no different.

Stepping into the gurgling water, I followed the sound to find a beautiful fae woman crouched by the river’s edge. Her hair was dark, her dress simple and white. She knelt on the bank washing clothes, her singing interrupted by her sobs.

They shook me to my core. The taste of salt filled my mouth, as though I could taste her sadness and the tears that carried it from her body.

Step by step, I carefully made my way to her. “Are you alright?” I asked tentatively.

She raised her head and her lips wobbled uncontrollably. Tears of blood ran from her eyes, stilling my steps. Was she dangerous?

“They will die,” she vowed, a spider web of saliva stretching from her top to bottom lip.

With her washboard, she scrubbed what looked like a shirt. But as she leaned over to get water, her bloody tears soaked into the pristine fabric, rusty stains blossoming over it once again. She would never get the garment clean.

“Who will die?” I asked curiously.

“He’s dead. She’s dead. Nothing but shadow...” she sobbed.

“Who’s dead?”

She inspected the garment in her hand. “The ones who wear these clothes.”

I stepped closer. The shirt was white with a collar and buttons. It looked like the one I had Dusty buy for me, only larger. The same most males in Ironton wore. Iric had worn one into Faery.

“Whose shirt is that?”

She shook her head and with a sad smile admitted, “I don’t know his name.”

His. A male. A basket of similar clothes appeared beside her, overflowing onto the earth. She grabbed a dress and dunked the fabric into the water. More bloody tears. More scrubbing. More sobs. She sang in a language I didn’t know. I couldn’t understand her words, but their meaning soaked into my marrow, becoming part of me.

“Who does that dress belong to?”

It was exactly what I imagined the ones I used to wear in Ironton would look. Though I had never seen them, the fabric was familiar, and I imagined what it felt like wet beneath her fingers and dry over my skin. Tears spilled out of her eyes and splashed onto the fabric as she raised her head and hand. Her finger uncurled and she pointed directly at my chest. At my heart.

The confirmation was like a crushing blow.

Like an arrow to the chest that pierced the very essence of me, and as if to erase her prophecy, my heartbeat doubled in defiance.

“How do you know I’m going to die?” I demanded.

“I’ve seen it.” She cast her gaze to the garments again, wincing in pain as though the stains and blood dripping from her hurt so deeply, she could hardly move. She clutched her chest and let out a wail before composing herself again.

She removed the dress from the wash bucket. Bloodied water from the bucket reflected the darkening sky and then... there was movement in the watery image.

A woman with long hair and a beautiful gown stands with her back to me.

She places a crown on her head, slowly, deliberately.

Motioning for someone to come near, she waits. Someone kneels before her. A man. His muscles seize and his face contorts in a silent scream.

He struggles. His skin mottles and veins throb beneath the surface.

He collapses at her feet, his still-screaming face on her shoes.

She eases her slippers from beneath him and walks away without a backwards glance.

The Washer turned to me. “You saw a vision. In the water… you saw it happen.”

“Yes, but that woman - she wasn’t me. Who was it?”

She shook her head, letting out a sob.

“Please, who was that woman? What did she do to him?” I pleaded.

But the Washer shoved the dress back into her basin. Flustered, she scowled at me accusingly.

Her skin became crêpey, and she withered before me, her skin cracked and mottled. I waited for her to lash out, but she didn’t attack; she returned to her chore, which had become more difficult with her aged body. She cried and sang out, her voice rasped and weak with age. Her gnarled fingers tried futilely to rid my dress of the bloody tears that still dripped from her eyes.

“Let me help you,” I suggested, dropping to my knees and reaching out for the garment.

She smiled at me. “You could change it, you know. You could change the vision.”

“How?”

“Karis?” Loftin’s voice came from farther away.

I ignored him, but her attention was drawn away. “How can I change it?”

Then closer, “Karis!”

I couldn’t move and didn’t want to. I had more questions for the woman. How would I die? At the hands of the Unseelie? By a beast who tore both me and Loftin apart?

Loftin was in danger. If he stayed with me, he might die, too.

But if the shirt was Iric’s, did it mean we would find him? Could Loftin take him to the safety of Ironton while I hid away somewhere? There was no place that death couldn’t find his mark, but it didn’t mean I had to put others in danger when he came for me.

Loftin was suddenly in front of me, eyes wide, fingers curled around my upper arms. “Are you okay?”

I gazed at him and then back to the woman. She was gone. There was no basket. No wash board, no clothes or tears of blood. No mournful song.

His eyes drilled into mine, pleading. “Say something. You’re scaring me.”

“I’m fine,” I replied.

“What was it? What did you see?”

Looking away from him, I wasn’t sure I wanted him to know.

“Tell me, please,” he urged, softer. “Trust me when I say that the things you see in this place aren’t reality. It’s distorted, like peering through glass that has bubbles in it. I suppose you wouldn’t know what it’s like, but... you do know what blindness is like. You can hear, smell, taste, and feel, but without your vision, you don’t get the complete sense of it all.”

He was wrong. It had been complete in the darkness, because darkness was all I’d known. But how did you tell someone that? How could I explain that I would feel much safer right now if I didn’t have my vision? If I couldn’t see the dangers, maybe I could make it through. And since Iric didn’t have the sight, maybe that meant he’d been spared thus far and was still alive.

“Karis, please,” he begged.

“There was a woman—a fae woman. She was kneeling at the river’s edge, washing clothes.”

His eyes grew wide. “You saw the Washer.”

I swallowed. “I think so. Who is she?”

“She’s a prophet, and it is an immense honor to see her in your life. What did she tell you?”

An immense honor? She foretold my death and possibly Iric’s. I wanted nothing to do with her prophecies.

“She kept saying ‘they’ would die, and she was washing a man’s shirt and a woman’s dress. I don’t know who the clothing belonged to,” I lied.

“Describe the garments,” he prodded.

“A white men’s shirt, larger than the one I wear. And there was a plain white dress.”

He raked his teeth across his bottom lip and held it tight. “It wasn’t you,” he asserted. “Did she mention you by name?”

“No.” And that was technically the truth. She didn’t mention me by name; she pointed her knotted finger at me and then withered away into something barely more than a corpse.

“Good,” he breathed. He took a step away from me, staring upstream. “Good. Then there’s no need to worry.”

The look on his face told me he was worried all the same, but was trying to keep me from panicking. But panic wasn’t what I felt. I felt only bone-deep sadness. It was like she’d left a residue behind; palpable, thick, and filled with sorrow. And that residue had settled into the very core of me, weighing me down.

Loftin took a deep breath, tugging at his tunic. “If you could give me a second to wash and drink, we’ll get moving. We need to run across the sand before it gets too dark.”

“Sure, I’ll just wait where you were.”

“No!” he declared, reaching out to me. “Just stay. Stay here with me. It’ll be safer that way.”

I wasn’t sure whether he was afraid for my safety or his. The Washer clearly frightened him. He’d called her visit a great honor, but it felt more like a curse.

The images in the bloody water replayed through my mind.

It was obviously the dark queen. But who did she kill? I could tell it was a male, but I didn’t know him.

The sound of a loosening belt pulled me from my thoughts and replaced them with something more… carnal.

Loftin started to disrobe right in front of me. Oh my. I had no idea men looked like that. Did human men look like that too, or only the fae? He caught me staring and gave a small grin, so I turned my back to him. That move made him chuckle under his breath. My face burned like he’d scorched me with his fire magic.

Loftin was ridiculous, preening on purpose. Making his muscles flex with each movement, no matter how small. And he was smirking. At least I thought he was. I was only watching out of the corner of my eye.

Fae males, if they were all like Loftin, were insufferably in love with themselves. The silver lining? Any residual anger and worry from earlier was snuffed out the moment Loftin caught me studying him. I was thankful for the respite. Loftin’s conceitedness was helping to relieve the crushing feeling still weighing on my chest. The sadness that settled over me as if I was the one who wore the dress the Washer had been scrubbing was replaced with a different feeling, one foreign and warm.

I closed my eyes against the sound of splashing water that came from the river behind me. I’d gone to the river with Iric and the boys, but since I was blind, it was safe. This... this wasn’t safe at all.

* * *

LOFTIN

I made her nervous. For a minute, she even forgot what little she was wearing, but when she remembered, her face turned such a lovely shade of red, it nearly glowed. She stood and averted her eyes as she grabbed her clothes and quickly dressed.

I’d found her in nothing but a tiny, threadbare shift that left little to my imagination. It was all she’d been wearing under the ill-fitting shirt and pants that were too small for her frame.

“Would you stop staring at me?” she snapped.

“No.”

She was so uncommon, and just seeing her brought back memories of what should have been. I’d been betrothed to Lita, a fae noble with hair like fire and eyes that told me that beneath her regal appearance, her flames would consume me in more ways than one.

But like everything else, Lita was gone. Her light was snuffed out by Nemain’s darkness, when I wasn’t able to stop the evil queen from taking every good thing out of this world.

Karis saw the Washer, and now I needed to get her mind off what she’d seen. When I found her, she looked like she was going to drown herself, kneeling on the ground just beside the river. And something had shaken her. When I asked her what she saw, she refused to elaborate, which meant she either saw nothing important or something incredibly important—something she wasn’t willing to divulge.

Dressed and impatiently waiting for me to wash, Karis found a boulder at the riverside and eased onto it, almost losing her balance when she turned around.

“You can stare back, you know. I don’t mind.” I knew she wanted to look.

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

“Absolutely,” I teased. Her scent was driving me insane. It was sweet and feminine, like nectar. I swept water up, wetting my hair and trying to drown out the smell of her.

“Are you finished? I thought you wanted to move along quickly.”

“Sometimes it’s good to take your time at things. Do them properly,” I chided. I heard her teeth grind together.

I drew my leathers back on and called out for her. “Almost ready.”

She turned to find me tugging my tunic over my head. I heard her swallow, and then saw her try to hide the motion.

With a determined swagger, I made my way to her. She scooted back on the large rock, but I was faster and hovered over her, bracing my hands on either side. “I had no idea you enjoyed watching my body as much as I enjoyed watching yours.”

“How do you know I do?” she challenged.

Challenge accepted. I smirked and let her know exactly how…

“Well, there’s the way you just licked your lips, and the way your skin flushes when I’m nearby.” I inched closer to where I hovered over her body and brushed my lips against hers. “It’s in the way your heart races when I’m this close, the way your legs are parting ever so slightly, welcoming me in... and then, there’s your scent. Every fae female has a distinct scent, but a male can tell when she’s turned on, and right now, you’re on fire, Karis.”

“You seem very sure of yourself,” she breathed against my lips, her eyes at half-mast.

Brushing my thumb across her lips, she trained her eyes on mine and I knew what she wanted. She wanted something I couldn’t give her.

I wanted to close the distance between us, press my lips to hers, and consume her. It had been so long since a female had touched me, wanted me. And the way she’d been treated, I was sure this was as much as a male had ever touched her.

But I couldn’t let this go on any further. This was merely a distraction; a diversion to get her mind and mine off the Washer Woman.

I didn’t lie about what the ill omen meant. Did the old hag tell her she was about to die?

I stared at her pillowy lips as they parted beneath my fingertips.

If we stay on this path, these lips will never kiss again. I couldn’t let that happen.

“I’m sorry,” I pleaded, pulling away slowly. “I can’t.”

She stiffened and straightened her clothes as she stood up. “It’s fine,” she acquiesced, turning her head away from me.

Even if I took Karis back to her mother, and even if my father was restored, there was no way to ensure Nemain wouldn’t kill him and me before we could leave her court.

We can’t fight Nemain. We already tried, and look where it got us.

I had to tell her.

She was going to hate me, but I had to tell her the truth. After we got across the sand. The Cratans would eat us both if we didn’t hurry, and this would be a long and terrible conversation. I just hoped she didn’t send me away when I explained.

Karis refused to meet my eyes. My rejection hurt her, but not as bad as my betrayal would. She would have to endure pain in order to survive in this place.