He was finfolk. He had no use for human technology and little patience with human questions.
The little girl beside him chattered on, unaware of either predisposition. “Can‟t you drive?”
“I could,” he answered shortly.
“Then why don‟t you?”
“I like to walk.”
“Me, too.” She sounded out of breath.
It occurred to him her questions might be driven by more than curiosity. Her legs were very short.
He reduced the length of his stride. “Shall I carry you?”
She stuck out her chin. “I‟m okay.”
Dauntless, he thought, amused and admiring. Like her mother. “Give me your backpack, then.”
She wriggled out of the straps. “Where are we going?”
He kept his tone casual as he hitched the small pink bag over his shoulder. “Not far.” He hoped. Zachary did not have a car
either. “Why don‟t you take me where you went yesterday with your brother?”
He could not enter the water with the girl watching. But he could mark the place, assess the danger, return later to set
wards.
Her gaze slid from his. “It‟s kind of a secret.”
“You do not have to tell me,” Morgan said. “You can show me.”
She did not answer. But where the road dipped down to the beach, she turned off the paved way and onto a narrow track
through the tall grass. Beach roses and blackberry bushes pressed in on both sides. Thorny vines like trip wires crossed the
uneven ground. Her short legs were soon scratched with thin pink lines.
“Careful.” Morgan cleared a trailing cane from her path.
She flashed him a smile before flitting ahead.
He smelled the sea before he saw it, shining like mother of pearl in the sun. The path broke up in a welter of rocks. The
rocks tumbled down to a crescent of gray sand littered with pebbles and shells.
Secluded, with soft footing and a deep draft. A smart choice, a safe choice, for a finfolk youth learning to Change. A
perilous place for the human child left on shore.
Morgan frowned. “Do you come here alone?”
Emily shook her head. “I‟m not allowed.”
“And where do you wait when your brother goes in the water?”
Those big eyes widened before she hung her head.
At a loss, Morgan regarded her soft, dark curls. The child had not yet developed her mother‟s defenses or the human
facility with lying, but she was clearly keeping silent. To protect her brother?
He could understand that. He could even applaud her loyalty. He had his own secrets, his own loyalties. But he had
promised Elizabeth to keep her daughter safe.
“You must not go into the water.”
“I don‟t.” She scrunched her small face. “It‟s too cold for swimming anyway. Not like the beach at home.”
“Home?”
“North Carolina. Where we lived before.”
“It is the same.”
“No, it‟s not.” She skipped down the rocks.
He felt an unfamiliar qualm at the possibility she might slip and break her little neck. He took her arm to prevent it. Under
his palm, her skin was as smooth as the inside of a shell, her bones delicate and fragile as a bird‟s.
“The sea,” he explained. “It is always changing and always the same. You are always at home with the sea.”
She tipped up her face. “But I don‟t know anybody here.”
He stared at her, baffled. “You know your mother. And your brother Zachary.”
“They‟re family. I don‟t have any friends.” Her childish mouth trembled.
Morgan felt a flicker of panic. He had little experience with children. None at all with crying ones. “You know me,” he
offered desperately.
The alarming moisture retreated as she assessed him with her mother‟s clinical, critical eye. “You‟re old.”