Dread coiled in the pit of my stomach. “I—” I began, and stopped, catching myself before I could ask the question. If she wanted me to wait for Quentin and the others, I would wait. No matter how difficult it was, no matter how much I wanted to know now. I owed her that much, after everything she’d done for me and mine.
The Luidaeg shot me a quick, thankful look and returned to her nachos, working her way through them with the single-minded focus of a woman who didn’t know when she was going to eat again. I’m not sure the Firstborn—any of the Firstborn—actually need to eat; the rules for killing them are specific and complicated and don’t include “starvation.” But that doesn’t mean they can’t enjoy being comfortable, and there’s something about a full stomach that’s a comfort for almost everyone.
Tybalt shifted to stand closer to me. I bumped my shoulder against his, but didn’t lean. This felt like hero business, and while I might resent both the title and the responsibility, it deserved to be taken seriously.
Footsteps cautiously descended the stairs. Only two sets, which meant Raj was unnerved enough about the interruption in his gaming time to have gone into full silent Cait Sidhe mode. Like Tybalt, he only makes noise when he wants to. Tybalt and I looked toward the hall.
The Luidaeg kept eating nachos.
“Toby?” Quentin was the first to appear in the doorway. He spotted the Luidaeg and shifted his focus to her, offering a small wave and an even smaller grin. “Hi, Luidaeg.”
“Hi, yourself,” she said, pushing her plate aside. “Come give me a hug before shit gets serious. You haven’t been visiting enough recently.”
“Sorry,” he said, moving to do as he was told. “Between my lessons and Toby’s hero stuff and hanging out with Dean, there hasn’t been time for visiting old people.”
There was a sharp intake of breath. If I turned, I knew I’d see Dean Lorden, absolutely horrified by the flippant way his boyfriend was talking to the Luidaeg.
If I’m comfortable with her, Quentin adores her. She was never his childhood monster. For him, she’s always been a friend of the family, someone who helps as much as her admittedly restrictive geasa allow. That’s my fault. I’m the one who introduced them, however accidentally, and also the one who kept dragging him into her presence. But it’s been good for both of them, and I’m not sorry. There will always be a thin edge of fear in my dealings with the Luidaeg. Quentin doesn’t have that. With Quentin, she can almost be normal.
Dean, on the other hand, grew up in the Undersea, where the stories of the Luidaeg are less “scary sea witch” and more “unstoppable force of nature.” She’s the last of the oceanic Firstborn known to be alive and active, and she hasn’t been a part of the Undersea in centuries, not since Evening Winterrose arranged for the slaughter of the Roane. They were the Luidaeg’s descendant race. She still hasn’t recovered from their loss.
Like I said earlier, there’s a lot of history around here, and sometimes it doesn’t summarize very well.
The Luidaeg ruffled Quentin’s hair before letting him go. “This old person could cause a tsunami to take out this entire city if she feels neglected enough, so have some respect,” she said.
“The worst thing about that sentence is that it’s true,” I said dryly. The Luidaeg never lies. She can’t. She can talk around things, she can deflect, she can even try answering a question that hasn’t actually been asked, but she can’t lie. I took a quick look around, noting Dean in the doorway and Raj a few feet away, watching the Luidaeg with unblinking eyes. I turned back to her. “We’re all here. What do you want?”
“Are you sure?” She gestured to her nachos. “I could eat the rest of these. We could talk about things. The weather, maybe. I understand some people like to talk about the weather.”
“Luidaeg.” I pinched the bridge of my nose. “You didn’t come here to eat nachos. Please. What’s going on?”
“It’s time. That’s what’s going on.” She leaned back in her chair, closing her eyes and tilting her face toward the ceiling, like this would be easier if she didn’t have to look at us while she explained it. “I made a promise—an ultimatum, more like—and now I need to keep it.”
My stomach sank. I knew exactly what she was talking about, and yet I still wanted to hear her say it. Maybe if she said it, it would turn out to be something different. Maybe.
Probably not.
“What do you mean?” I asked, and was proud when my voice didn’t shake.
The Luidaeg waved a hand, like she was brushing away a scrap of cobweb. “We have to deal with the Selkies. Almost three years ago, I told Elizabeth Ryan she had a year to notify the clans, and after that, their bill would come due. I didn’t specify a date. I could have, I suppose, but if I had, I would have needed to stick to it or pay the price, and honestly, I didn’t feel like taking that sort of risk.”
“What bill?” asked Quentin. He glanced at me, confusion and curiosity in his face. “I wasn’t there when you went to see the Selkies, remember? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
My stomach sank even lower. “Luidaeg . . .”
“No. They need to know, because everyone in this room is going to be touched by this, whether or not they’re directly involved.” She sat up and opened her eyes, rising from her seat so she could turn and address all of us at the same time.
Her eyes had shifted colors while they were closed, going from deep blue to pure black, a darkness that filled them completely from side to side. She had no pupils, no irises, no sclera. Just drowning darkness, as deep and pitiless as the sea itself.
“I am Antigone of Albany, known as the Luidaeg, the sea witch, and by other names, as they’ve suited those who would speak of me,” she said. “I am the daughter of Maeve and the mother of the Roane, who kept the storms, who saw the future in the tangled tides. They were beautiful, my children, and they were innocent of the great, slow, terrible war fought between my siblings and I, for we had sworn, all of us, to keep it between ourselves. We hated, how we hated, but even in our hatred, we knew this was not their fight.”
She paused, tilting her face toward the ceiling as she took a deep breath. When she spoke again, her voice was softer, if no less formal.
“People wonder sometimes why my father, who was never fond of dictating our lives and ways, set down the Law. He thought, you see, even until the day he left us, that we’d eventually find our way to peace without intervention, as he’d done before us. He was an . . . idealistic man, my father, and I hope he still is, because that’s a rare gift. Even rare gifts can cause pain, when improperly used. Some of my brothers and sisters had children with teeth and claws, who were equipped to defend themselves. Others had children who could melt into the water or fade into the sky. And I had the Roane, and they were sweet, and kind, and even seeing the future couldn’t convince them to be anything else. My father made the Law to protect the Roane and others like them from the cruel hands of Titania’s brood, who would have slain all the children of Maeve purely to make their mother smile.”