29Lena tossed and turned in her bed. The heavy rain falling outside sounded as though there were hundreds of dancers swirling and stomping upon the roof of the inn. Blankets tangled around her legs, confining her like a fish in a sailor’s net.
She squeezed her eyes shut and a torrent of images wracked her brain. She saw Jace—frowning, glaring, turning on his heel and marching out of the inn. Then Soren—the curve of his lips as he smiled; his piercing eyes, the same green as a stormy sea.
Then, with startling clarity, the old merrow woman drifted into Lena’s mind. Soren’s mother, grabbing her hair, croaking the story of Mette, sucking the white meat from a crab with her sharp, rotting teeth.
The pink conch hummed to life and began to warm. Lena gasped and clutched it away from her throat
