One Salt Sea: An October Daye Novel

A single door was open in the hall at the top of the stairs, letting a warm, inviting light spill out onto the floor. The Luidaeg stopped in the doorway, rapping her knuckles against the frame. “Hello, Lizzy,” she said. “Mind if we come in?”


“As if any could stop you?” asked the woman seated behind the room’s carved mahogany desk. She looked to be somewhere in her late thirties, with ash-blonde hair that couldn’t quite decide between gold and silver, and a Selkie’s characteristic sea-dark eyes. A snifter of what smelled like brandy was in her hand. The light came from the oil lamps set on the desk’s front corners, well away from the papers in front of her, or the books that lined the walls. “Come in, come in, and bring your friend along.”

“It’s still polite to ask,” said the Luidaeg, stepping inside. “Lizzy, this is October Daye. October, this is Elizabeth Ryan, current head of this clan.”

“And much grief it’s given me,” said Elizabeth bitterly. She took a sip of brandy. “You are welcome here, the both of you.”

“No, I’m not.” The Luidaeg dragged a chair to the front of the desk, gesturing for me to do the same. She put her bundle down in front of Elizabeth before she sat, and said, “That’s two skins returned. Be sure they’re passed quickly.”

Elizabeth’s gaze sharpened as she set her glass aside, reaching out to pull the bundle toward her. “Why?”

“Because time is almost up.” One corner of the Luidaeg’s mouth turned upward in something that bordered on a smile. “October was Connor’s lover, and she’s Amandine’s daughter. You have a year to notify the clans. Then? Your bill comes due.”

“You come to me in time of mourning to tell me this?”

“Yeah, Lizzy, I do, because this is when you’ll listen to me.” The Luidaeg leaned forward, the driftglass haze bleeding from her eyes, replaced by blackness. “I can make the choices for you, but you won’t like them. Tell the clans. One year.”

“And what do I tell the children for whom there are no skins? What do I tell the parents who have to choose between them? Annie—Luidaeg, please—”

“You tell them the truth.” The Luidaeg stood. “I’ve been kinder than I had to be. You know that. I didn’t have to give you warning.”

“I liked you better when I was young and foolish and thought you a cousin, sea witch,” said Elizabeth bitterly, reaching for her brandy. I wasn’t clear on what was happening, but I was pretty sure that brandy wasn’t her first of the night, and it wasn’t going to be her last.

“Yeah, well, I liked you better when you were young and foolish and called me Annie-my-sweet and danced with me on the beaches,” said the Luidaeg. She stood. “Growing up’s a bitch, isn’t it, Liz? You have a year. October, come on.”

I lingered for a moment after the Luidaeg left the room—just long enough to say, “Sorry about this.” And then I followed her.

We were halfway down the stairs when she said, voice pitched low, “Everything has a cost, October; remember that. It may be a long time before the bill comes due, but everything has a cost.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Come on.”

At the bottom of the stairs, the Luidaeg turned away from the light and music of the living room, opening the door that led to the porch behind the house. Moonlight glittered off the waves like a thousand broken mirrors, all of them too shattered to ever be repaired. She kept walking, and so I kept following, until we reached the wet, hard-packed sand at the water’s edge.

“I can lie to the Selkies because I’m their First, even though they aren’t my children,” she said, as matter-of-factly as if she were remarking on the weather. I made a small sound of surprise. She cast me a sharply amused look. “Did you think I’d lived a chaste life? I’m the mother of the Roane. I loved them so much it hurt. It still does, if I think about it too much.”