“Do you see her?” Dev easily kept up with me, but then I hadn’t gone all out.
Up ahead I saw what I needed to see. A man was standing at the edge of the big lake. “No, but there’s Marcus.”
It was odd to see Marcus looking anything less than perfect. He was always dressed to the nines and pressed and polished. But his clothes were decidedly wrinkled and his normally tamed hair was wild and I watched as he dove into the lake.
What the hell was he doing? Could he even swim? I’d never seen him swim before. I’d seen him lounge by a pool, but he’d never gotten in. He was a hot tub guy, but it wasn’t like he did any swimming in there.
“Where is Summer?” Dev asked, his breath even despite the fact that we were sprinting at this point.
I leapt over a fallen log, my whole being focused on getting to Marcus. “I don’t know, but I have to think she’s in that lake. Why else would he jump in? I don’t think he decided he needed to suddenly cool off.”
“Oh, goddess.” Quinn picked up the pace.
When the man wanted to move, he was like the wind. I wasn’t moving as fast as I could, but I was pretty close. “Why would she jump in a lake?”
I could see her telling Marcus to jump in a lake, but it was obvious he’d gone in after her. I hadn’t seen her, and Marcus was only concerned with Summer at this point. The rest of the world could hang. He was completely focused on the woman he’d been promised.
So Summer Donovan was in that lake, and Marcus was trying to save her.
We made it to the shore, stopping short of where Marcus had stood. I shrugged out of my jacket and was deeply grateful Marcus had healed my shoulder because I had no idea what was in that lake. The water was dark, and that screamed bacteria to me. It would have been a bad idea to jump in with an open wound even though I had accelerated healing powers.
Quinn pulled his shirt over his head and tossed it aside. “Kelsey, this isn’t the Earth plane. There are numerous water Fae, and many of them can be deadly.”
“I’m not afraid of fish.” I’d handled myself against some of the most dangerous creatures of the Earth plane, including a demonic elemental and an angel from the Heaven plane. I could handle some frilly fish.
“I knew you slept through my classes,” he accused. “I gave a two-day seminar on Fae water creatures and you can’t name one, can you?”
I’m not a textbook girl. I learn better when the lesson is hands on. Also, I’ve gotten really good at sleeping with my eyes open. Marcus called it meditation. He used a lot of big words for it, but I called it a nice nap. “Whatever it is, I’ll kill it.”
“Or it will kill you and your child.” Dev walked to the water’s edge and lifted a hand. Reeds sprang up from the water, reaching up to touch his palms.
His words made me stop in my tracks. I was used to throwing myself into the fight without a second thought. Fighting was kind of the point of me, and yet now I had to think. I wasn’t the only one at risk. I was used to fighting alongside people I loved, even vulnerable ones. But my brother chose to fight. My best friend chose to fight. My baby couldn’t choose anything. There was this tiny thing inside me that likely didn’t even have a heartbeat yet, but he’d managed to change my entire world and I was floored at the thought.
What good was I if I couldn’t fight? It was all I knew. I stared out at the surface of the water and it looked perfectly calm, as though nothing bad could ever happen here. But it could. There was a battle going on under the placid surface, and I had to think about whether or not I should join it.
“Damn it.” Quinn kicked off his loafers. “I’m going in. The waters here are deep and hide any number of creatures, including an each-uisge. You stay here on the surface and shoot anything that comes out of the water you don’t recognize.”
“What the hell is a yuck uska?” I should have paid more attention in class. I was sure that was some weird-ass Gaelic word that wouldn’t come close to being spelled the way it sounded.
Quinn stepped out on the water and for a moment seemed to be walking on top of it. That was when I realized he’d fashioned the reeds into a kind of platform. They’d woven themselves tightly right under the surface. “It’s a water horse. It’s typically quite malicious. I believe it has Summer. I need to figure out where it took her. I can’t simply swim around looking for her. The lake is large and deep.”
That was the moment Marcus broke the surface. He came up and took a deep breath, his fangs as long and thick as I’d ever seen them. And there was blood on his chin.
“Marcus,” I shouted.
He held up a hand. “Stay back, Kelsey. I’m going after Summer. Devinshea, there’s a trio of water sprites coming after me. My mental powers aren’t as effective on them underwater.”
As he said the words, female hands reached up from the surface, trying to haul him back under. The hands were pale, with long talon-like nails.
“Not a problem,” Quinn replied from his do-it-yourself-if-you’re-an-agricultural-deity pier. He lifted his hands up and the sprites were pulled under, snaking vines and masses of moss dragging them back below the surface. “My powers work fine here. They won’t trouble you again though I sense there are more of them. Many. This lake is filled with Gwragedd Annwn. Where is my daughter?”
I heard a long gasp as Summer’s head appeared. She broke the surface and dragged one long breath into her lungs. She was facing away from us, but I could feel her panic. Before I could call out to her, she was pulled under again.
“Marcus, it’s a yucky thing. You need to kill it. It’s like a horse or something,” I yelled. I didn’t have much time to give him the rundown on what he was up against.
Marcus dove under and in seconds the surface was smooth again.
Quinn knelt down and touched a section of reeds. “Find her. Lead him to her. Help my daughter.”
They peeled off and snaked away, doing the bidding of their master.
“You don’t do that at home.” I was feeling pretty useless, but I got my gun out anyway in case the yucky horse thing attacked on land, too. I was never swimming in lakes again. Oceans were iffy too because sharks are legit.
“The plants at home aren’t native to Faery. They’ve evolved differently. I can manipulate them, but I don’t have the connection I have here or on my home plane.” Quinn stared out at the water, his hands on his hips. “I’m going after her myself.”
“You’ll only make things harder for him. Marcus knows what he’s doing. He didn’t ask you to follow him. He cares about her. Let him handle this.” I knew what it was like when civilians shoved themselves into my battles. It could be chaotic, and every moment would count. Marcus wasn’t fighting in a place he was used to, and Quinn wouldn’t be either. Their senses would be dulled underwater.
Quinn looked like he was going to ignore me when Marcus’s head came up again and he dragged in a breath. He had wrapped one arm around Summer’s body and started to swim to the shore.
“She’s not breathing,” he said.
Now nothing I could say would stop Quinn. He didn’t dive in. He brought the platform to Marcus, who found himself lifted out of the water and brought to shore. I rushed to meet him. I might not have listened to long lectures about faery creatures, but I did know a lot about CPR.