Chapter 3
Esmyra
Emissary.
Syrena’s words from the day prior echoed in Esmyra’s mind. It wasn’t what she’d expected. She wouldn’t be a ruler over Maerinys, but a representation of its queen, trusted to be proxy for her to the rest of the realm as they emerged once again.
It should’ve been an honor. It should’ve meant something, but all she heard was the unspoken truth beneath the title.
A leash. A noose wrapped around her throat, tying her to this kingdom when she wanted nothing more than to be free of it.
Free of everything. Of the kingdom, Kaelypso, and the grief threatening to tear her apart.
Esmyra sat atop the palace steps, basking in the sun for the first time in weeks, her jaw clenched. She tried to enjoy the warmth it brought to her skin, but she quickly realized that warmth was something she would likely never feel again.
And yet, the fire inside of her, the one that carried her through betrayal and heartache, burned too hot to ignore.
She let out a slow breath as she leaned back on her hands, pushing down the rage bubbling beneath her skin. Her talons clicked one by one against the stone steps.
Draevyn Rowe was still out there. Living.
The Phoenix. The man who had stood at her side and protected her. Who had whispered her name like a prayer and held her in the dark, promising to burn anyone alive who crossed her or looked at her with even a hint of lust.
The man who had left her.
Esmyra had been naive enough to think he would fight for her—to prove that he was more than the betrayal she’d seen with her own eyes. But instead, he’d abandoned her. Left through the caves and vanished without a word. No warning. No letter. Nothing.
The ache of it seared itself into her heart like a brand.
Draevyn had walked away while the man who raised her, the most feared pirate in the realm, perished in chains.
Esmyra had made her father the King of the Seas, and yet, Cyrus Blackwood died like a slave. And Draevyn’s father, the mortal cunt of a king, was the one who’d pierced his heart with a dagger’s blade.
The ocean surrounding the kingdom surged as if reacting to her wrath, waves crashing harder against the resurrected cliffs of Maerinys.
Esmyra didn’t flinch. She let it grow, let it fill every crevice of her being until there was nothing else.
Her father would’ve wanted revenge, and she would be the one to deliver it.
The Phoenix thought himself safe behind the walls of his castle, beyond the reach of what had risen from the deep. But she would find him. Esmyra would drag him beneath the surface and drown him in the weight of his own sins.
She didn’t need a throne, or a crown.
Esmyra only needed her vengeance.
And she would have it.
Below, the streets pulsed with movement as workers cleared debris, reforged homes, and began rebuilding what had been both lost to time and destroyed as they broke the surface.
It was strange, seeing the kingdom like this.
A place that had once only existed in whispers, in memories she didn’t own, was now real beneath her feet.
It was buried for so long that even its people had become ghosts of themselves, clinging to the ruins of a past stolen from them.
But now, they walked beneath the sun again, heads lifted, voices carrying through the misty air as they called to one another.
Most, if not all, had never seen the sunlight before or felt it on their skin.
Esmyra should’ve felt triumphant. This was what she and Syrena had fought for. What she had nearly died for as Kaelypso’s power threatened to consume her from the inside out. And yet, as she watched, she couldn’t shake the feeling that she was an outsider looking in.
This was never meant to be mine. And if it was, that life was abandoned long ago.
Esmyra had defied the gods themselves. And now that Maerinys was here, now that it was breathing and alive once more, she felt…
unmoored. She didn’t belong in these streets, not in the way the others did.
She didn’t grow up here and hadn’t suffered beneath the weight of the kingdom’s fall.
This place didn’t feel like home, and perhaps it never would.
There was still unfinished business waiting for her beyond the waves. Blood yet to be repaid.
Esmyra would stand beside her sister and play the role required, but she had her own purpose now. And when the time came, she would see it through.
I don’t see any ships on the horizon searching for you. Syrena’s words from earlier caused an odd stinging behind her eyes. Esmyra had at the very least expected to see her crew, but perhaps Syrena was right.
The crew of The Night Wraith were pirates, after all.
“Miss Esmyra?” The voice of Briar, her handmaiden, came from behind her. “Is there anything you need? You’ve been out here for hours and the sun is setting.”
Esmyra scanned the horizon as the sun cast it in hues of pink and gold. Her eyes narrowed toward the east as she asked, “Do you happen to know how far the cave’s isle is from here, Briar?”
The water rippled around Esmyra’s siren form as she glided through the sea, each flick of her tail slicing through the currents like a blade.
Everything about her new form was significantly more powerful.
Not just her magic, but her muscles and speed as well.
And, by all the wretched fucking gods, she couldn’t even find the joy in it.
Schools of fish scattered as she passed, their shimmering bodies vanishing into the blue void. The weight of the ocean pressed against her, bringing a familiar comfort, but the storm raging inside her made it impossible to embrace the peace she normally found from the underwater world.
Esmyra searched and searched above for the underside of The Night Wraith, but to no avail. Her throat tightened with every passing second as dread cloaked her.
They really left me. Just like Draevyn had.
It didn’t take her long to reach the cave’s isle. When she breached the surface, the jagged cliffs loomed in the distance. The island always seemed unwelcoming, but now, as she surfaced near the cove, it felt empty.
She pulled herself onto the rocks, the saltwater running in rivulets down her skin as she shifted, legs replacing her tail while she climbed onto solid ground. Her feet met the cool, slick stone, the wind whipping her hair as she took in the eerily silent shoreline.
There was no sign of her crew.
No voices carried on the wind, no laughter or grumbling from her men, and no flicker of a campfire burning against the dark sky. The pinnace that brought them to shore was gone, and her ship was still nowhere in sight.
The pit in her stomach deepened.
Esmyra clenched her fists, her talons biting into her palms. After everything, after all they had survived together, had they truly just abandoned her? How long had they waited before they left? And had Jak, Ren, and Riven survived the cave in?
Her heart pounded as she strode deeper inland, her sharp gaze scanning the rocky shore. She wouldn’t believe it, not yet. She knew her crew was loyal, but they had been down there for weeks. Perhaps they assumed she was dead.
Esmyra was nearing the cave’s entrance when she noticed the dark smears that marked the stone.
Her brows furrowed, eyes narrowing on the markings that trailed out from inside the cave. She walked to it and bent down, swiping her hand across the nearly black stain before inspecting the red tint that now marked her fingertips.
Blood.
These were footprints left by bloody boots. But whose?
Esmyra whirled in all directions, and she realized the footprints weren’t the only remnants left of a struggle—a broken blade, a torn scrap of fabric tangled in the dried seaweed, and…
A glint in the moonlight caught her eye a few feet away. She ran to it, searching the ground. Her breath caught when her fingers brushed against the cold bite of a small piece of metal.
Esmyra lifted the piece of jewelry to her face, and her jaw fell open. Lying in the center of her palm, was a blood-crusted bronze hoop.
The golden eyes of an owl flashed across her mind.
Jak.
With his earring left here, that meant they must’ve survived the cave in. Her stare fell back to the bloody footprints leading out from the cave’s mouth. She realized then it could only mean one thing.
Her crew hadn’t left.
They were ambushed.