A Dark and Drowning Tide

A sharp-tongued folklorist must pair up with her academic rival to solve their mentor''s murder;in this lush and enthralling sapphic fantasy romance from the Lorelei Kaskel, a folklorist with a quick temper and an even quicker wit, is on an expedition with six eccentric nobles in search of a fabled spring. The magical spring promises untold power, which the king wants to harness to secure his reign of the embattled country of Brunnestaad. Lorelei is determined to use this opportunity to prove herself and make her wildest, most impossible dream come true: to become a naturalist, able to travel freely to lands she’s only ever read about. The expedition gets off to a harrowing start when its leader--Lorelei’s beloved mentor--is murdered in her quarters aboard their ship. The suspects are her five remaining expedition mates, each with their own motive. The only person Lorelei knows must be innocent is her longtime;academic rival, the insufferably gallant and maddeningly beautiful Sylvia von Wolff. Now in charge of the expedition, Lorelei must find the spring before the murderer strikes again--and a coup begins in earnest. But there are other dangers lurking in the dark: forests that rearrange themselves at night, rivers with slumbering dragons waiting beneath the water, and shapeshifting beasts out for blood. As Lorelei and Sylvia grudgingly work together to uncover the truth--and resist their growing feelings for one another--they discover that their professor had secrets of her own. Secrets that make Lorelei question whether justice is worth pursuing, or if this kingdom is worth saving at all.

Auteur
Allison Saft is the New York Times bestselling author of the eerie romantic young adult fantasies Down Comes the Night and A Far Wilder Magic. After receiving her MA in English literature from Tulane University, she moved from the Gulf Coast to the West Coast, where she spends her time hiking the redwoods and practicing aerial silks.

Résumé
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A sharp-tongued folklorist must pair up with her academic rival to solve their mentor’s murder in this lush and enthralling sapphic fantasy romance from the New York Times bestselling author of A Far Wilder Magic.

“Clever, emotional, and gorgeous—at its core, this is a story about the healing capacity of love.”—Ava Reid, author of Juniper & Thorn

Lorelei Kaskel, a folklorist with a quick temper and an even quicker wit, is on an expedition with six eccentric nobles in search of a fabled spring. The magical spring promises untold power, which the king wants to harness in order to secure his reign over the embattled country of Brunnestaad. Lorelei is determined to use this opportunity to prove herself and make her wildest, most impossible dream come true: to become a naturalist, able to travel freely to lands she’s only read about.

The expedition gets off to a harrowing start when its leader—Lorelei’s beloved mentor—is murdered in her quarters aboard their ship. The suspects are the five remaining expedition mates, each with their own motive. The only person Lorelei knows must be innocent is her longtime academic rival, the insufferably gallant and maddeningly beautiful Sylvia von Wolff. Now in charge of the expedition, Lorelei must find the spring before the murderer strikes again—and a coup begins in earnest.

But there are other dangers lurking in the dark: forests that rearrange themselves at night, rivers with slumbering dragons hiding beneath the water, and shapeshifting beasts out for blood.

As Lorelei and Sylvia grudgingly work together to uncover the truth—and resist their growing feelings for each other—they discover that their leader had secrets of her own. Secrets that make Lorelei question whether justice is worth pursuing, and if this kingdom is worth saving at all.

Échantillon de lecture
One

Sylvia was in the river again. Lorelei didn’t need to see her to be certain of it. Crowds, after all, were the smoke to Sylvia’s fire.

Lorelei stood with her shoulders hunched against the wind, trying and failing to contain her mounting disgust. In the span of an hour, the entire student population of Ruhigburg University had spilled onto the banks of the Vereist. They clamored and shoved and jostled one another as they fought for a better view of the water—­or, perhaps more accurately, the spectacle they’d been promised. Most of them, predictably, were nursing a bottle of wine.

As she approached the edge of the crowds, she saw silver glittering on throats and iron chains jangling on wrists. They wore their jackets inside out and strung horseshoes around their necks. A few—­Sylvia’s most avid devotees, no doubt—­had crowned themselves with rowan branches and braided clover into their hair. They clearly expected blood. Lorelei had never seen so many protective wards in her life.

Utterly ridiculous. If they truly wanted to guard themselves against fairy magic, they should have stayed well away from the river instead of gawping at it like nitwits. She supposed she shouldn’t be surprised. Good sense tended to flee wherever Sylvia von Wolff went.

Apparently, some poor fool had nearly drowned an hour ago—­lured into the abyssal depths of the river by an errant nixie’s song. It was almost impressive, considering a nixie hadn’t been spotted this close to the city in ten years. She’d overheard a girl regaling her friends with the gruesome details—­and then, nauseatingly starry-­eyed: “Did you hear Sylvia von Wolff has promised to tame the nixie?”

Lorelei had nearly combusted then and there.

Professor Ziegler had asked Lorelei and Sylvia to meet her fifteen minutes ago. Tonight, the king of Brunnestaad himself was hosting a send-­off ball in honor of the expedition, and the three of them were meant to make a grand entrance: the esteemed professor and her two star students. If they made Ziegler late . . . 

No, she could not even think of it.

Lorelei shoved into the crowd. “Move.”

The effect was instantaneous. One man dropped his opera glasses as he leapt out of her path. Another yelped when the hem of her black greatcoat brushed his leg. Another less fortunate soul stumbled forward as Lorelei’s shoulder clipped hers.

As she passed, someone behind her muttered, “Viper.”

If she had any time to spare, she might have risen to the bait. Every now and again, people needed to be reminded of exactly how she’d earned that name.

She elbowed her way to the front of the crowd and scanned the riverbank. Even beneath the pale light of dusk, the waters of the Vereist remained an eerie, lightless black. It cut straight through campus like an ink stain that wouldn’t lift. And there, shrouded in the branches of a weeping willow, was Sylvia.

From this angle, Lorelei couldn’t see her face, but she could see her hair. Even after five years of knowing her, it always shocked her—­the stark, deathlike white of it. She’d knotted the unruly waves at the nape of her neck with a ribbon of blood-­red silk, but a few stubborn strands had managed to escape. In Lorelei’s weaker moments, she imagined that grabbing hold of it would feel like plunging her hands into cold water.

She stalked toward Sylvia, and with as much acid as she could muster in two syllables, she said, “Von Wolff.”

Sylvia gasped, whirling around to face her. As soon as their gazes met, Sylvia’s face paled to the enchanting color of soured milk. Lorelei allowed herself one moment to delight in that glimpse of startled dread before Sylvia’s perfectly pleasant ma…