Then I recognized it completely. We’d learned the poem in high school, along with “Bells” and “The Raven.” He recited into my ear, so I felt the poem as well as heard it, each breath a small hot gust—“For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams. And the stars never rise but I feel her bright eyes.” His forceful breath over and over with every consonant. “All the night-tide, I lie down by the side of my darling, my darling, my life and my bride, in her tomb by the sounding sea.”

Then his breath was the only thing I could hear.

I was frozen with fear, unable to move or even think.

“Cole?” I said finally—I hardly recognized my own voice, it was so quiet, muted with fear.

He pulled my hips against him, nuzzled his face into the back of my neck. “We belong together,” he said. “Lucas will come around, I promise you. He knows the nature of tides as well as you do. Then we can all be together.” I twisted to look over my shoulder at his face, which was defenseless and bare. I’d wanted to see vulnerability in him, sure it would make him more human, frail in some way. But it only made him desperate. It meant he would do anything. “You belong to me,” he said in a low, raw voice. “Sleep,” he said. “I’ll watch over you.”

He was soft, limp, quiet. But if I moved at all, his arms clamped over me, holding me in place. “Shh,” he said. “You’re safe.”

An hour later the light changed subtly, the grainy sky showing over the harbor out the strange window. The room was so quiet, the sky outside dark and still and lovely, it seemed unbelievable that my thoughts could speed with such intensity. I told myself to keep still—I told myself when the sun flooded the room all would be different. He would click into the Cole I knew from daylight, the careful, controlled Cole. I told myself Lucas would feel that something was wrong and come looking for me, but I knew he wouldn’t.

Then, just as dawn was about to break in earnest, he rose quietly from the bed, dressed, and left the room. When the latch of the door clicked into place, I sat up in bed. I looked around the dark, strange room.

My eyes were gritty, and my head ached. I felt cold, and I didn’t get out of bed for a long time. Where would I go? I thought about the kingdom by the sea. I thought about his name. I thought about his warm body and felt a terrible rushing sense of loss. Whoever I’d thought he was, that person was slipping away from me, swept right out to sea. Whoever he really was, he was strong, and lawless, and undeterrable.

Chapter 19

19