Page 55 of Fierce Highland Magic

The shapes beneath the surface shifted.

They moved in a slow formation around our legs. They weren't touching us, or biting, or even breaking the water. They turned with us. Herded us.

Every time Rowan angled toward the far arch, the water thickened around his knees.

Every time I tried to step forward, a pale body brushed beneath the surface near my shin and the current—if it was a current—nudged me slightly back.

It wasn't enough to force retreat, just enough to make forward motion costly.

"This is not a crossing," I said.

Rowan's face had gone very still.

"It is technically a crossing."

"That wasn't the deal."

His eyes flicked toward me.

"You heard him."

"I heard him say clear passage."

"He said safe enough."

"He said that after the deal was done."

"Yes."

The water rose to my thighs.

Blue light rippled over Rowan's face. His mouth had flattened into a hard line, and the pale scar at his throat looked darker now. Like ash where flame had been.

"We can still get through," he said.

The conviction in his voice was too deliberate.

I looked at the far arch. Thirty feet away. I looked behind us. The entrance arch had also moved.

It was no longer three feet back. It stood perhaps fifteen feet away, its blue lamps smaller than they should have been.

"We're not moving forward," I said.

"We are moving."

"Not toward the exit."

"Then keep moving."

"Rowan."

He turned on me. The reaction was fast. "Do you think I cannot see that?" he asked.

The words struck the water between us.

For an instant, the charm was gone.

No smile. No warm evasion. No joke placed carefully over the thing beneath it. Only a man standing waist-deep in black water, watching an expense become useless in real time.