Children of the Sea 03 - Sea Lord

thought you were dead.”
    Conn kissed her hair, her cheek, her mouth. She tasted her tears on his lips like the salt of the sea.
    “Almost,” he said. “Morgan saved me. He dragged me out of the sea by the chain around my neck, and he and Griff kept watch over my body until I could return to it.”
    “I love Griff,” she said in a choked voice.
    “You love me,” Conn said, a hint of arrogance in his tone.
    She didn’t mind. She loved his arrogance. He was the lord of the sea. The master of her heart.
    She smiled. “Yes. Always.”
    Emotion swirled in his gray eyes. “Do you forgive me?”
    She blinked. “What for?”
    “For not coming with you when you asked.”
    “You came to me when it mattered the most.” A splinter of pain pierced her happiness, a tiny icicle of doubt. “Can you forgive me?”
    He raised his dark eyebrows. “For what?”
    It had to be said. Had to be faced. “I left you.”
    “Yes.” A single word like a stone between them.
    She swallowed hard. “I destroyed Sanctuary.”
    “The demons destroyed Sanctuary.”
    “But I could have stopped them.”
    “You made the better choice. The only choice for either of us. Sanctuary is the past. You are my present and the future of our people.”
    She wanted so desperately to believe him. “But the prophecy . . .”
    “Is fulfilled.” His voice was strong with hope and purpose. “The balance of power is changed. The children of fire have suffered a defeat they cannot quickly forget or recover from. And my people, our people, have remembered the magic of the sea.”
    “But the castle . . . everyone on Sanctuary . . .”
    “Caer Subai can be rebuilt.”
    She eyed him doubtfully. “Just like that.”
    He looked down his long, elegant nose at her. “I did not say the effort would be easy. It will take cooperation. And time.”
    She nodded. She could help with the rebuilding, she thought. She was the targair inghean . But under her resolve, worry stirred. “How much time?”
    Conn raised his eyebrows. “You are impatient?”
    “No. Yes. Conn . . .” Her gaze searched his face. “Where will you live? You cannot stay in human form forever. Without Sanctuary, you will age. You could die. All of the children of the sea will age and die.”
    He shrugged. “Some may choose to live beneath the wave. Until Sanctuary is restored.”
    “But—”
    “Lucy. Each of us must use the gifts that we have, in the time that we have, in the place that we are. You taught me that. No more is required of us. And no less.”
    She touched his face. “I don’t want to lose you.”
    He turned his lips into her palm. “You told me you trusted me to come back to you. And so I have.”
    Her heart swelled. “And the others?” she asked anxiously. “Griff? Iestyn?”
    “Griff is well.” Conn slanted a look at her. “He sends his love.”

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    Conn still had not said he loved her. But that small worry was swallowed by a bigger one.
    “And Iestyn?” Lucy persisted.
    Conn hesitated. “I sent them away,” he said, grief roughening his voice. “Iestyn, Roth, and Kera. I sent them on a boat with Madadh, before the wave struck. We found pieces of the craft drifting in the sea.”
    Lucy’s heart contracted. She glanced down at the dog, its tongue lolling at their feet. “But Madadh survived.”
    Conn’s mouth curved. “Yes.”
    “So there’s a chance that Iestyn and the others survived, too.”
    Conn met her eyes gravely. “That is,” he said, “my second greatest wish.”
    Her gaze locked with his. Her breath caught in her chest.
    “What . . .” Her mouth was dry. “What is your first wish?” she whispered.
    Conn took her hands again, her cold, frozen hands, and folded them in his. He raised their clasped hands to his lips and kissed her fingers. “That you will come back with me to Sanctuary to rebuild,” he said. “To raise the castle and make the roses grow. To walk with me and rule with me. To bear our children. To be my love.”
    He dropped on his knees in the snow. Her hands trembled in his. “I did not know I could love,” Conn said in his deep voice. He looked up, and his eyes were the color of the sea at dawn, reflecting her joy as the dancing waves reflect the sun. “But I love you. Be with me now and forever. Fill my life with magic and my heart with love.”
    Lucy’s heart welled with emotion. Her eyes brimmed with happy tears.