One Salt Sea: An October Daye Novel

“Dad forbid I should interrupt your plans for a night of feeling sorry for yourself. Yes, Toby, it’s going take a while. I’ll be in the living room. Don’t make me wait.”


She didn’t slam the door when she left. Instead, she eased it gently closed, pulling until the knob clicked home. That, more than anything else, told me how concerned about me she actually was. Moving slowly, but with increasing curiosity, I got out of bed.

When I emerged five minutes later, still dragging a brush through my hair, it was to find the Luidaeg and my Fetch engaged in a hushed, rapid-fire conversation that stopped as soon as they saw me. May glanced away, a flash of guilt in her expression. The Luidaeg, meanwhile, looked me up and down, assessing my attire: black dress slacks, the dark green cashmere sweater from Shadowed Hills, and a pair of black flats. Finally, she nodded.

“That should be acceptable. Get your keys.”

“Glad you approve. May, we’ll be back later.”

“I’ll be here,” she said, mustering a small, not-quitesteady smile. I couldn’t quite make myself return it as I grabbed my jacket from the rack, checking to be sure my car keys were still in the front pocket, and followed the Luidaeg outside.

“Where are we going?” I asked again, once we were both seated in the car, me with my seat belt fastened, her without. I didn’t see any reason to argue. It wasn’t like she’d let us get pulled over. “I sort of need to know which direction to go.”

“Half Moon Bay,” she said, settling deeper in her seat. She made a complicated gesture with her hands, and there was a silk-swathed bundle that smelled of fur and seawater stretched across her knees. “I have something to return to Roan Rathad.”

I paled. “Luidaeg, is that . . .”

“One is Elaine’s, most recently worn by Margie Atwater. The other is Owain’s, most recently worn by Connor O’Dell.” She touched the silk covering the skins with an almost caressing hand. “We’re taking them home.”

There was nothing I could say to that. I started the car.

San Francisco to Half Moon Bay isn’t an inconsiderable drive. We’d been on the road for half an hour, neither of us saying anything, when the Luidaeg suddenly said, “We’re square, you know. There are no debts between us.”

“Swell.” And all it cost was Connor’s life, and maybe Gilly’s sanity. “I’ll try not to need a favor any time soon.”

“That would be an interesting change.” The Luidaeg glanced at me. “How are you doing?”

“Doing? I get up. I eat. I go back to bed. The bills are paid for at least another month before I need to do anything else.” More than a month, actually. Sylvester insisted on paying for everything until I felt like I could deal with working. Normally, I would have refused, but he was my liege, and his daughter was the reason I was in mourning. If he wanted to pay my rent, that was his call.

“I asked how, not what.”

“I really don’t know, Luidaeg. I really don’t.”

“It gets better.” She ran her fingers across the silk again, sighing. “It doesn’t go away, but it gets better. Believe me, if it didn’t, I would have followed my sisters to the night-haunts’ table years ago.”

“That shouldn’t help, but it does,” I admitted. I took a deep breath, and said, “Luidaeg, about the night-haunts . . .”

Her sidelong glance was troubled, her eyes skittering over me and away again in an instant. “Don’t,” she said, voice somewhere between gentle and cautioning. “They look like the people we lose, but they’re not. They’re only ever themselves.”

“That’s not what I want to ask.”

“Then what?”

“The night-haunts are connected to the Fetches somehow, aren’t they?” Her nod was all but imperceptible. I pressed on. “How?”