water finds its way through the smallest spaces and the narrowest cracks. where the

bone meets sinew, where the skin is split. it is treacherous and loving. you can die as

easily of thirst as you can of drowning.

from angharad by emrys myrddin, 191 ad

the rain had already begun the next morning, just a light spray of it, enough to cloud the windows

of the guesthouse with condensation. outside, the green world had gotten greener: dripping with

rainwater, the leaves and the grass turned jewel-toned and the moss on the trees and rocks looked

richer. well-fed. the wood had turned almost black, damp and breathing. the pieces of sky that

showed through the tree canopy were densely gray.

effy walked up the path toward the house, wind tossing her hair every which way, the sea

churning and churning below. the rocks jutted through the slosh of foam like sharp teeth. she

squinted and peered down the side of the cliff, but the seabirds had all gone, their nests and eyries

abandoned.

once effy had read a book about the drowning that said animals had sensed it coming. the

penned sheep had bleated in desperation in the days before the storm, the yoked cattle straining

and straining against their binds. in the end, they had all perished, too. her skin chilled.

that was when she saw it, the flutter of something dark like a piece of fabric caught in the

wind. but as her eyes adjusted to the muddled light and she blinked rainwater off her lashes, it

took a more solid shape: damp black hair, scraggly as kelp, bone-white skin, and a jagged crown

of antlers. its face was blurred and featureless, as if it were a painting, not yet dry, that had been

run over and ruined with rain.

it spoke to her, but it was a language not meant for human ears, something unfathomably

ancient, or perhaps she simply could not make out the words over the thrashing rain and wind. it

extended its hand, long fingers uncurling, claws at their tips. effy stood there frozen in terror,

water pouring off them both.

and then she ran. the path to the house had already turned mostly to mud, sucking at her

boots, the air so fiercely cold she regretted her choice of a skirt and stockings instead of trousers.

she ran until she was short of breath, and then she stopped, panting, and looked over her shoulder.

there was nothing but the rocks and the rain, and her own sodden footprints in the mud. effy

curled her cold fingers into fists and squeezed her eyes shut.

she had taken her pink pills dutifully this morning. she had resolved not to believe in such

things anymore. what had gone wrong? had she lived in the unreal world so long it was

impossible to pull herself out of it? had she spent so long believing the stories, the lies, that her

mind now rejected the truth?

perhaps she was beyond saving. perhaps no pink pills or wheedling doctor could rescue her

from drowning.

effy stood there in the shadow of the enormous house, swallowing her tears. there was one

thing left, her last desperate resort. something she could still hang her hopes on. maybe when they

uncovered the truth about myrddin at last—unearthed the final, irrefutable clue—the fairy king

would die with him, with his legacy.

it was all she had to believe in, or else the rest of her life would be locked rooms and padded

walls and pill after pill after pill. she would sink to the seafloor like one of myrddin’s selkie wives

and never surface again.

so she tried to narrow her mind like the edge of a knife, focused on one singular thing—the

key, the key, the key. but her thoughts kept wandering to preston. specifically the memory of his

fingers cupping her hip. she had replayed the moment over and over again in bed the night before:

his hand sliding up her thigh, under her skirt. he had wanted her, too, she had felt it, the proof of

his wanting right there between her legs. and yet—

she shook her head, smoothed her hair back from her face, and forced herself to think of

anything else. anything but the fairy king she did not want yet could not escape, and the boy she

did want but could not have.

as she approached the house, effy heard a ringing sound. at first she thought it was the bells,

the fabled bells she’d been longing to hear, but it was something clearer, something above the

surface. metal against metal.

above her, hiraeth itself seemed to sway and groan, rocking perilously against the bruise-

colored clouds. effy picked her way around the house, her boots completely waterlogged now, in

search of the ringing sound.

to her surprise, she found ianto there, kneeling at the base of a large black tree. he had a

hammer in one hand and he was striking a small piece of metal repeatedly, driving the stake into

the root of the tree. his hair was loose and wild around his face, his brow drenched with rainwater

and sweat.

he didn’t see or hear effy until she cleared her throat and said, “ianto?”

he turned around, colorless eyes murky and depthless. “effy.”

“what are you doing?” she had to raise her voice to be heard over the wind.

“the trees have to be staked down,” he said. “or else the wind will tear them up by their roots

and hurl them right through the north wall of the house.”

effy looked around. there were hundreds of trees, branches whipping violently, their leaves

coming loose and curling up into the air. “do you need any help with that?”

ianto gave a mirthless laugh. “not from you, my dear. this isn’t women’s work.” but his

voice was light, and there was no cruel, glassy gleam in his eyes. there was a long metal chain on

the ground beside him, coiled like a snake ready to strike. “well. i suppose you could bring me my

jacket. it’s draped over one of the chairs in the dining room.”

“of course,” effy said. she was trembling already, overwhelmed by the opportunity she’d

been given. where ianto’s collar slung low, she could see just a glimpse of the leather cord.

she hurried up the stairs to the house and heaved the door open, breathing hard.

the foyer seemed darker than usual, one rusted candle stand in the corner giving off a bubble

of filmy light. effy splashed through the puddles on the floor, ignoring the water dripping from

above and the ceiling sagging like an old man’s jowls.

wetherell stood in the threshold to the dining room, looking even grimmer than usual.

“what will you be doing to weather the storm, ms. sayre?” he asked. his lips barely moved as

he spoke.

she did not want to tell him that she planned to leave; he might warn ianto. “what is there to

do?”

“board up the windows. tie down the trees.” wetherell’s eyes shifted under their heavy lids.

“if you were smart, you would leave now, while you still can.”

effy blinked in surprise. “you’re going to leave? you’re in charge of myrddin’s estate . . .”

“myrddin’s estate is more than just this house. it’s all the money in his northern bank account,

the royalty checks owed by his publisher, the letters that i gave mr. héloury. this house is nothing

but an ugly, rotting testament to the late myrddin’s cruelty, and the price ianto is still paying for

it.”

“cruelty? what do you mean?”

“this is no place to bring a wife, to raise a family, living always with the fear of destruction.

myrddin did it on purpose, building the house here and holding his wife and son within it. he

wanted them to be afraid—afraid to stay, and afraid to leave, in equal measure.”

suddenly effy remembered the one-sided conversation she’d overheard.

i didn’t have a choice, ianto had said, groaning as if he were in pain. this house has a hold on

me, you know that, you know about the mountain ash . . .

she remembered the look of envy in his eyes when she had left hiraeth with preston. she

remembered how desperate ianto had been to get back to the house after their meal at the pub,

desperate enough to leave her stranded on the side of the road.

if she was not supposed to believe in magic, how could she explain any of it? she had no

choice but to think ianto was mad, miserable, chained to this house and to his father’s legacy out

of guilt and grief and enduring terror. myrddin wanted ianto to be afraid, and so he was, even after

his father was gone.

perhaps the truth would free ianto, too. they just had to get to the basement.

effy drew in a breath and met wetherell’s eyes without contrition.

“i’m not afraid,” effy said, even as the wind made the window glass ripple like paper. “i’m not

leaving until i get what i need.”

when she went back out to bring ianto his jacket, it was already raining more furiously, the

droplets hard and fat, almost painful as they hit her skin. ianto scarcely looked up as she

reemerged; he was coiling the large chain around the trunk of the tree, looping it through the

stakes with a bitter, teeth-gritted concentration.

he shot her a brisk look and said, voice tight, “lay it on my shoulders, please.”

slowly effy approached, blood pulsing with adrenaline. if she failed now, it was unlikely she

would get another chance. with great care and deliberation, effy laid the jacket over him. one

shoulder, and then the other. and then, as he began to shrug into it, she slipped the cord from

around his neck with a gentle and innocuous tug.

sucking in a sharp breath, effy stumbled back, shoving the key quickly up the sleeve of her

coat. ianto didn’t even twitch.

he looked up for a moment, at the tree that he’d draped with chains and fastened to the

ground, like a sorceress tied at the stake. his eyes were half- closed. his expression was

unreadable.

“ianto,” effy said, against her better judgment. she knew she ought to just flee to the basement

now, knew that preston was waiting for her, that they couldn’t afford to waste any more time. but

her chest felt tight with an unexpected grief. this house has a hold on me, ianto had said out loud,

to no one.

despite his odd, shifting moods, despite his occasional cruelty, effy had finally realized they

had more in common than she’d thought. “are you sure you want to stay?”

he choked out something that effy thought was a laugh, but she couldn’t quite be sure. ianto

turned around at last, strands of black hair plastered down his face like the long claw marks of

some wild beast.

“‘but a sailor was i,’” he said, “‘and on my head no fleck of gray—so with all the boldness of

my youth, i said: the only enemy is the sea.’”

the sound of the rain blurred his recitation, striking out syllables. but effy knew the words by

heart. ianto, with his cloudy, turbid gaze, had no intention of leaving hiraeth.

effy could barely bring herself to nod at him. she staggered back up toward the house, heart

roaring in her ears. ianto had omitted the poem’s first line: everything ancient must decay.

preston was waiting for her outside the basement door, pacing nervously. one hand was curled

around the back of his neck. effy pulled the key from her sleeve and held it out, dangling it in the

air.

behind his glasses, preston’s eyes grew wide. “you really got it?”

“when will you finally stop underestimating me?”

he huffed out a laugh, but it was shaky with fear. “you don’t have to do this, effy. really. we

can come back later. we can hire a dredge crew to clear the water—”

“preston,” she said curtly, “we both know that we’re not coming back.”

wetherell had vanished from the threshold. effy hoped he’d packed his things and driven

down the road, away from this house, while he still had the chance. had he turned the car’s

mirrors right-side out again before he went?

she imagined the bartender at the pub in saltney nailing boards over her windows, all the

fishermen battening down their hatches. how many more houses would this storm take? how

many stories, how many lives, crumbling into the oblivious, uncaring sea? with trembling hands

she fitted the key into the lock and turned it.

the rotted door swung open without a sound.

behind it, the dark water rippled and seethed. it sang a wordless song of depths, of danger.

effy took one step down the stairs, then another, until she had reached the very last stair that was

not submerged.

preston stood in the threshold above her, his shoulders actually trembling.

“it’s all right,” she said, and she was surprised by how calm her voice sounded. “turn on the

flashlight.”

whispering something unintelligible, preston clicked it on. light grafted onto the damp stone

walls and illuminated the faded engraving above the water. the only enemy is the sea.

effy had liked swimming as a child, when her grandparents had brought her to the natatorium

at one of the hotels in draefen. they had gone on weekend mornings, while her mother slept until

noon, obliterated by last night’s bottle of gin. in her bright yellow bathing costume, effy had

splashed and played, and even made it a challenge for herself to see how long she could stand to

hold her head underwater. her grandfather had noticed her enthusiasm and paid for lessons, and

though they had tapered off by the end of secondary school, effy considered herself a stronger

swimmer than most.

she had practiced holding her breath last night, to see how long she could last before her lungs

started to burn and panic set in. thirty seconds, forty, sixty—but effy knew it would be different

once she was under. it always was. when there was only the bleary, distant light from preston’s

flashlight, when the cold sank into her bones. she knelt down on the slick, barnacle-ridden step

and began to slide her boots off.

“just give me one last chance to convince you,” preston said in an urgent, quavering voice.

“we can find some other way . . .”

effy set her boots down and stood there in her stocking feet, shivering at the feel of the wet

stone. she shrugged off her coat, tied back her hair with its velvet ribbon. she stared down into the

dark and impenetrable water.

almost impossibly, a sliver of her reflection rippled up from that black mirror. a pale crescent

of face, a puff of dark blond hair. the flash of high cheekbones and the feather of yellow lashes.

it made her feel both more and less afraid. she felt the way she had when she had seen the

ghost in the hall—fear not of the thing itself, but of the dark water closing in around it.

she turned around to face preston. she said, “don’t be afraid. i know that i can do this.”

he curled his fingers around her arm, anchoring her there for just one moment. he looked her

right in the eye, gaze steadier now, fierce with determination.

“remember what we talked about,” he said. “keep one hand on the left wall so you don’t get

lost. the first dive is exploratory. try to see how far the cavern goes, then come back for air and

we’ll reassess.”

under his collar, his throat was pulsing. effy wanted to touch it again, to touch him, but she

knew that if she did, she would never want to let go. very gently, she extricated herself from his

grasp.

“i know,” she said. “i’m ready.”

and then she turned back and began her descent. the water was cold and the initial shock of it

made her gasp, rolling up to her waist and then higher, until her arms were submerged. she was

buoyant now, having lost the sensation of the slippery ground under her feet.

she reached out, movements made sluggish by the turbid water, and found the left wall. it, too,

was slick with algae and she could feel the crevices where the brick had crumbled away, letting

the water in.

effy heard preston’s breathing quicken, but she was determined not to look back. her hair

drifted out around her head like pale flotsam. she took another deep inhale, and then ducked

under.

instantly the light dimmed; it turned the water a murky green in front of her, nearly opaque.

effy kicked, propelling herself forward. there was the dark shape of something in the distance, but

she couldn’t tell what, and already her throat was growing tight.

she let herself drift a little farther, carried by the inertia of her initial kicks, until her fingers

brushed against something hard and solid. the dark thing, whatever it was—she could reach it.

she wanted to keep going, to get her hands around it, to hold something, but she remembered

her promise to preston and turned back, kicking up toward the bleary light. she surfaced again,

gasping, and saw that preston had moved farther down the steps, now submerged up to his knees.

he grasped her wrist and hauled her up the steps, out of the water.

“effy,” he choked out. “are you all right?”

it took a few moments of labored breathing before effy could speak.

“i’m fine,” she managed at last. “i saw something—i touched it. i don’t know what it is, but i

need to get to it. i know that i can . . .”

her teeth were chattering, but she didn’t even feel the cold. adrenaline had cloaked her in a

haze of numbness, all her blood pulsing and hot. preston kept his grip tight on her wrist.

“are you sure?”

she nodded, and with every passing second, she felt more certain. the beam of the flashlight

flickered against the stone walls, against the water, dappling the black surface with gold.

effy slipped away from preston, and for a moment she saw herself through his eyes, drowning

in increments as she retreated back down the steps, vanishing like a selkie beneath the waves.

it was nothing like swimming at the natatorium, where the water was clear and chemically

blue. this was a dense and exquisite darkness. her body, too, was heavier now. she no longer had

the lightness of a child, all spindly limbs and easy faith. her arms and legs felt so burdensome

now.

effy pressed her left hand to the wall and kicked, the black shape materializing slowly, like

something moving under ice. she reached out and touched it again, trying to get a sense of its size.

rotted, ancient wood fell away under her hand.

there was a low noise, a thrumming sound that seemed to come from the water itself, and effy

remembered, suddenly, all the fairy tales that warned children away from the edges of oceans and

lakes. kelpies, selkies, fairy women wrapped in seaweed who took you to the water and strangled

you with their long hair. arethusa, the consort of the fairy king, who seduced men with her

beauty and then drowned them while singing to cover up the sounds of their desperate, doomed

thrashing.

a tense and terrible fear gripped her. she brushed her hand along the wood, quite sure now

that it was a shelf. she was as much a fool as the mariner in myrddin’s poem—if it really was

myrddin’s poem at all—who believed the only thing he had to fear was the might of the sea itself.

there were a thousand dark creatures in it. there were a thousand ways to drown.

effy had once read, in one of those ancient tomes on the sixth floor of the library, about a

method of torture practiced in the south, in the pre-drowning days. the victims were strapped

down and forced to drink and drink and drink, until their stomachs burst, until their bodies gave

out from the weight of it all. the water cure, it was called. for days after she could not stop

imagining all those swollen bodies. sometimes, she had read, the victim was forced to vomit up all

the water and then drink it down again.

effy’s lungs were starting to burn.

her fingers found the edge of something, something with a handle she could grasp. she tried to

pull but it was too heavy, and her chest felt close to bursting.

yet somehow she knew that if she broke for the surface now, she would never have the

courage to return. so she let her left hand leave the wall, and used both hands to grasp the heavy

metal thing and pull.

she tried to swim for the surface, but the thing in her hands—feeling it now, she knew it was a

box—weighed her down. panic loosed itself from her chest. she felt the cold, and the fear, the

awful fear that stilled her and pulled her down even farther. her vision grew black at its edges.

yet preston had been wrong about her, in a way. perhaps she realized it only now. even

though she was afraid of living, she didn’t want to die. effy was no architect, and she might never

be a storyteller, either, no heir to magic and myths and legends, but one thing she knew was

survival.

effy escaped the water and surfaced into a world of stubborn light.

her eyes were still filmy with blackness, so she couldn’t see preston. but she felt him as he

grabbed her around the middle and hauled her up the stairs, both of them gasping and coughing,

and effy spitting the fetid water out of her mouth.

they lay there for a moment, effy clutching the box to her chest and preston clutching her.

the water lapped tamely at their feet.

“i—i did it,” she stammered, voice hoarse. “i told you i could.”

“effy,” preston whispered, his breath warm against her ear. “look.”

for a moment she wasn’t sure what he meant; her brain still felt waterlogged, churning like

surf break. her numb fingers curled and uncurled around the edges of the rusted metal box that

now felt as if it was a part of her, a fifth limb.

a great daunting padlock jangled as she shifted. but printed at the top of the box, in steadfast

black letters, was one word. a name.

angharad.

the rain was falling in thick sheets as they stumbled down the path toward the guesthouse.

wetherell’s car was gone, frantic tire tracks gouged in the deep mud of the driveway. all around

them, as the wind howled, there were the terrible twisting, wrenching sounds of branches being

stripped from trees, of leaves being blown away in great swirling gusts.

effy would have been afraid, but she was too busy concentrating on not freezing to death.

layered under two coats—hers and preston’s—she staggered through the mud, holding tight

to preston’s arm. in his other arm, he held the metal box.

effy was trembling all over, her vision blurring in the half-light, the shadows oily and slick

between the trees. for a moment she thought she saw him again, wet black hair flashing, bone

crown shining, but when she blinked it was gone. she felt no fear. whatever was inside the box

was the truth, and it would vanquish the fairy king for good. it would evict him from her mind. it

would chain him in the world of myth and magic, where he belonged.

her own hair was stuck to her forehead and cheeks, freezing there like seaweed in slushy

water. her numb legs trembled under her, and she was afraid that her knees might give out.

somehow, without her speaking, preston knew to hold on tighter. he hauled her up to the

threshold of the guesthouse.

as he rammed open the stone-and-iron door, a deadly tangle of branches blew by them.

preston shut the door, muffling the horrible sound of the wind. he took out his lighter and went

around lighting the oil lamps and candles, while effy stood there, clothes dripping onto the floor.

everything felt very heavy, dreamlike.

she looked at the box, which preston had set down on top of the desk, reading that word, that

name, over and over again. angharad angharad angharad angharad angharad.

“i’m sorry,” preston said, jolting her from her reverie. “there’s not much wood in the

fireplace, and i don’t think i can get more, since it’s so wet outside . . .”

he trailed off, looking despairing. effy just blinked at him and said tonelessly, “it’s all right.”

“you should, um, take off your clothes.”

that, at last, made effy’s heartbeat quicken, cheeks flooding with heat. preston flushed, too,

and quickly added, “not like that—i just mean, you’re soaking wet.”

“i know,” she said. she slipped out of his coat, then hers, letting them puddle on the floor.

preston turned around, facing the wall, as she took off her wet top and wet skirt and wet

stockings. she dug through her trunk for the warmest sweater she could find and pulled it on. then

she walked over and got under the covers, pulling the green duvet up to her chin.

preston turned back around, face still pink. “that’s better.”

yet still she felt so cold. she felt like she might never be warm again, even under the covers,

even with the four solid walls around her. she wanted to feel safe, anchored. she wanted to live in

a world where there were no antlered creatures outside, where there was no need for iron on the

door.

was this the unreal world, or the real one? it all felt muddled now, like there was no longer a

rigid border between them. there was black water rising and she could barely keep her head above

the surface.

“the storm,” she managed. and then effy could not think of what to say. her mind was a

knotted sea net and foaming waves.

“it’ll be all right,” preston said. his glasses were speckled with rainwater. “we can still make

it down to saltney. you just need to get warm first.” he paused, lips quivering. “but you did it,

effy. you really did it.”

she made a choked sound that she hoped sounded enough like a laugh. “even if i lose a few

more fingers.”

preston just ducked his head, as if he wanted to scold her but couldn’t. preston, who had

delicately picked all the rocks from her wounded knees and washed away the blood, back when

they both still barely trusted each other. a surge of sudden, desperate affection swelled in her

chest.

“i should go back to the house,” he said. “we—”

“no,” effy cut in, heart pounding. “don’t.”

he frowned at her. “we still need to get the letters and the photographs.”

“please,” she said. “please don’t leave. i think i’ll die if you leave.”

she really meant it, right then and there, with the wind trying to tear through the door and no

way of knowing what was real and what wasn’t. he was the only thing that felt solid, stable, and

true. without him she would slip under and never resurface.

preston let out a soft breath. for a moment she thought he might leave anyway, and her heart

tumbled into the pit of her stomach.

but instead he moved toward her slowly, and sat down on the edge of the bed. his clothes

were wet, too. his shirt stuck to his skin, translucent with rainwater.

“all right,” he said. “i’ll stay.”

the heat of his body bled through the blankets. effy sat up and inched closer. she rested her

chin on his shoulder very carefully, as if she were setting a glass down on a table and didn’t want

it to make a discordant sound.

she felt him breathing slowly, shoulders rising and falling. he turned his head toward her.

he kissed her, or she kissed him—it mattered only as much as it mattered whether the house

was sinking or the sea was rising. once their lips touched, effy could think of nothing else.

preston took her face into his hands and, with exceptional gentleness, lowered her back down

onto the pillows.

they broke apart for a moment, preston half on top of her now, propping himself up on his

elbows. a bit of water trickled down from the back of his neck, past his collarbone. he said, “effy,

are you sure?”

she nodded. she wanted to say yes, but somehow the word got tangled up in her throat.

instead she said, in a small voice, “i’ve never been with anyone before. i’ve kissed boys—and

then there was master corbenic, but that was just . . .”

“this won’t be anything like that, effy. i promise. i’ll be kind to you.”

she believed him. it almost made her want to cry. carefully she began to work at the buttons

on his shirt, baring his throat and then his chest, his abdomen and navel. she had never seen

someone stripped down like this before and she was momentarily stunned by the vitality of him—

the signs of life in every clench of muscle, every shift that made his bones move under his skin.

effy couldn’t help but touch him all over, there and there and there, his rib cage and sternum

and, finally, the triangle of skin above his belt buckle.

preston shivered under her touch; she heard him swallow hard. his hands slid under her

sweater. “can i?”

“yes,” she said, finding the word at last.

he took her sweater by the hem and pulled it over her head. she was bare then, and he kissed

her again, softly dragging his mouth along her jawline, down her throat. effy gave a quiet gasp as

his fingers found her breast, but he only moved his hand over it and held it, as if to protect her

from the coldness of the air.

her own hands had stopped at his belt buckle, vexed by it, heart suddenly skipping beats. she

felt him again through his trousers, stiff and urgent. it thrilled her and scared her in equal measure.

she’d wanted him for so long, and now she knew—there was no doubt—that he wanted her back.

she managed at last to undo his belt and free him of his pants, and he lifted the covers and slid

into the bed beside her.

the only thing remaining between them was his glasses. she plucked them off his face and

laid them on the bedside table. he blinked at her, as though readjusting his eyes. effy saw the two

little nicks winging the bridge of his nose and ran her thumb over them, feeling where the small

bits of metal had made his skin give way.

one corner of his mouth curved. “what are you doing?”

“i’ve always wondered if these hurt.”

“not really,” he said. “most of the time i don’t even notice. i wish i could see you more

clearly right now. but even blurry you’re so beautiful.”

she felt her cheeks grow warm. there was no cold left in her now at all. “please be gentle.”

“oh. i will. i swear it.” he shifted, slowly parting her thighs.

there was a little bit of pain, but it was like a breath that was tightly held: it gave way to

seemingly infinite pleasure upon release.

she whimpered quietly into his shoulder, a sound that was half surprise, half surrender. the

yielding was easy when the assault was so tender. the land would never protest if the sea washed

over it with what could not be called anything else but affection.

they matched each other inhale for inhale, preston’s mouth close to her ear. when his

breathing sped up, effy could tell he was very close, but then he slowed again, strokes long and

deliberate.

“don’t,” she whispered petulantly against his throat. “don’t stop.”

“i just wanted to tell you,” he said, “when this is over, i’ll take care of you, too. if you want

me to.”

effy closed her eyes, and even the blackness there behind them was bright with false stars. “i

do.”

when it was over, effy lay beside preston, both of them concealed by the green covers. she lay on

her belly, he on his back, but they faced each other with their cheeks pressed against the pillows.

the four walls around them seemed impenetrable. effy scarcely heard the rain at all.

“i don’t want to go back out there,” she said, in a tiny muffled voice. “not ever.”

he didn’t ask if she meant back into the storm, or the house, or the world entirely. “that

seems, unfortunately, impossible.”

“why should i believe that? you can’t even see two feet in front of you.”

preston laughed. “i’ll put my glasses back on if that gives me more credibility.”

“no. i like knowing more than you for once.”

“you know plenty of things that i don’t.” he brushed back a damp strand of hair from her

forehead. “there’s an argantian saying about that, too, actually.”

“oh? what is it?”

“ret eo anavezout a-raok karout. ‘one must know before loving.’”

it was such a terribly preston thing to say that effy almost laughed herself. he loved nothing

more than the truth, and she had loved nothing more than her imagined world. somehow, in spite

of that, they had found each other.

“you argantians are a very poetic people after all,” she said. “as much as llyrian propaganda

would have us believe otherwise.”

“you told me i was smug.”

a smile tugged at her lips. “well, some stereotypes have a bit of truth to them.”

preston snorted. effy shifted closer to him. she ran one gentle finger along the crook of his

elbow, just to see how he tensed and shivered. a sign of life, like tiny green shoots that grew up

stubbornly out of the hard winter earth.

in her peripheral vision, she could see the locked box.

“you’re right about one thing, though,” she said at last. “we will have to leave eventually.”

preston must have heard the grief in her voice, the tremor of fear. he took her into his arms,

her naked back against his naked chest, her head tucked neatly under his chin. his heartbeat

sounded like the rhythm of a steady tide.

“the only reason anything matters is because it ends,” he says. “i wouldn’t hold you so tightly

now if i thought we could be here forever.”

“that makes me want to cry.” she wished he hadn’t said it.

“i know. it’s not the most original argument, and i’m hardly the first scholar to make it—that

the ephemerality of things is what gives them meaning. that things are only beautiful because they

don’t last. full moons, flowers in bloom, you. but if any of that is evidence, i think it must be

true.”

“some things are constant,” effy said. “they must be. i think that’s why so many poets write

about the sea.”

“maybe the idea of constancy is what’s actually terrifying. fear of the sea is fear of the eternal

—because how can you win against something so enduring. so vast and so deep. hm. you could

write a paper arguing that, at least in the context of myrddin’s works. well, it might have to be an

entire thesis.”

“oh, stop it. you’re being so relentlessly you.”

she felt his laugh against her back, making them both tremble. “sorry. i’ll be quiet now. i’m

so tired.”

“me too.” effy yawned. “but please go back to being you when i wake up. don’t go

anywhere.”

“you don’t have to worry about that.”

as inevitably as the sea rose up against the cliffs, sleep washed over them both.