Marked with the sigil of a courtier from the Court of Rowan, it’s empty. Oak wipes some of the water off his face.
“Now what?” Hyacinthe asks.
“We find Wren and Bogdana. Can you guess where they might go? Surely you overheard something these past few days.” As the adrenaline of the fight ebbs away, Oak realizes there’s a raw line of pain down his back where he dimly recalls being stabbed. There may also be a shallow slash at his neck. It stings.
“And if we find them,” Hyacinthe hedges. “Then what?”
“We stop them,” Oak says, pushing away pain, pushing away the thought of what stopping them will really entail. “They can’t be too far. Bogdana needs to be close enough to control this storm.”
“I owe Wren a debt,” says Hyacinthe. “I swore myself to her.”
“She has Tiernan,” Oak reminds him.
The man looks away. “They’ll be on Insmoor.”
“Insmoor?” Oak echoes. The smallest isle, besides the one they’re standing on. The location of Mandrake Market and not much else.
“Bogdana turned the cottage back into a walnut before the hunt and tucked it away in her pocket. Told us we might have to meet her on Insmoor.”
So the rest of her falcons would be there with them. That makes things more complicated, but Oak won’t mind a chance to face Straun. And it isn’t like Wren could unmake Oak unless she wants to unmake her plans for ruling as well.
“I know how we can get to Insmoor,” the prince says.
Hyacinthe meets his gaze for a long moment, seeming to understand his scheme. “You cannot be serious.”
“Never more so,” Oak says, and plunges back out into the storm.
Oak’s teeth are chattering by the time he comes to the tent marked with Dain’s crest. Tatterfell and Jack are inside, huddled far from the flaps, which keep blowing apart, letting the cold rain inside.
“Jack, I’m afraid I need your help again,” Oak tells him.
“At your service, my prince,” Jack says, bowing his head. “I promised to be of use to you, and I shall.”
“After this, your debt to me will be more than paid. You will owe me nothing. Perhaps you will even be the one with a favor to call in.”
“I should enjoy that,” Jack says with a sly smile.
“I want you to take me under the waves to the shore. Do you have a way to keep me breathing while we go?”
Jack looks at him with wide eyes. “Alas, I am no help to you there. My kind do not much worry over the lives of our riders.”
Hyacinthe gives Oak an incredulous look. “No, you delight in their deaths and then devour them. Can you control yourself with the prince on your back?”
That wasn’t something Oak worried over before, but he doesn’t like the flash of delight that passes across Jack of the Lakes’ face at the mention of devouring.
“I can keep my teeth from the prince’s sweet flesh, but if you want to come along, there’s no telling what I might do to you,” Jack says.
“I’m coming,” Hyacinthe says. “They’ve got Tiernan.”
Oak hoped he would. He’s not sure he can do this alone. “No snacking on Hyacinthe.”
“Not even a small bite?” Jack asks petulantly. “You are making it hard to be merry, Your Highness.”
“Nonetheless,” Oak says.
“What fool thing is it that you intend to do in this storm?” Tatterfell asks, poking the prince in the gut. “And are you bleeding?”
“Maybe,” he says, touching a finger to his neck. It hurts, but his back hurts worse.
“Take off your shirt,” the little faerie commands, blinking up at him.
“There isn’t time,” he tells her. “But if you have some bindings, I’ll use them for my sword. I seem to have dropped the sheath somewhere.”
Tatterfell rolls her ink-drop eyes.
“I will swim as swiftly as I am able,” Jack says. “But it might not be swiftly enough.”
“You can surface partway there,” Oak suggests. “Let us catch a breath, then go on.”
Jack considers that for a long moment, as though it is not much in his nature. But after a moment, he nods. Hyacinthe frowns and keeps frowning.
Tatterfell binds up the sword and belts it to Oak’s waist with torn strips of his old clothes. She sews up the wound on his back as well, threatening to press her finger into the gouge if he moves.
“You’re ruthless,” he tells her.