Chapter 65
Esmyra
The sea rushed past Esmyra’s face, the salt stinging her lips as Levaia surged beneath the surface like a living current.
The serpent’s body cut through the deep with impossible speed, scales gleaming like sapphires and emeralds whenever shafts of moonlight pierced the water.
Esmyra clung to the ridged horns at the base of the beast’s skull.
The pulse of its power throbbed beneath her palms, each coil of its muscles vibrating through her bones.
Esmyra’s chest was tight. Not from fear—never again from fear—but from the weight of not knowing if Draevyn and their crew were safe.
Every second away from them scraped like a blade at her immortal heart, and though she trusted them to find their way, she couldn’t silence the thought that, even still, they could be running into a trap.
Ahead and above, the underbellies of countless ships blotted out the surface light. The fleets of Maerinys stretched endlessly in every direction, an armada gathered to crush her and everything she loved.
For a moment her breath caught, the scale of the kingdom’s fleet near impossible for one woman to take on alone. But it wasn’t dread that settled in her chest—it was fire. Wildfire.
Esmyra was no ordinary woman. She was a fucking god. And she intended to bring her enemies down as one.
“Now!” she screamed beneath the waves, bubbles rushing from her mouth and gills.
Levaia slowed, her enormous body rippling as it halted in the depths before violently surging upward.
The world erupted.
The sea exploded around them as they burst free, breaking through the surface in a spray of thunderous foam.
Levaia’s massive form arched high, casting shadows across the nearest ships as water cascaded off her shimmering scales.
Esmyra still hung onto her horns, hair plastered to her face as her armor gleamed.
For a moment, she felt as though she herself was born anew from the depths. The Goddess of the Depths riding atop her chosen beast.
“That’s exactly what we are,” Kaelypso agreed.
The serpent’s roar split the crimson sky, a sound so vast it seemed to rattle the stars themselves. Crewmen across the enemy ships staggered, some clutching their ears as others stumbled back in visible terror.
Good.
Esmyra couldn’t help her grin as her eyes cast an eerie, silver glow, her gaze burning toward the shoreline.
Her war had begun.
Endless masts rose from the sea like sharpened teeth, and as she stared down at them, a rush of memories clawed their way to the surface of her mind.
The searing pain when the shard was in her spine, her body convulsing and powerless. The nights she lay awake, terrified to move, trapped in a prison of agony.
The betrayal. Her only kin, the one person who should have protected her, had only ever sought to destroy her. Syrena had torn Esmyra apart piece-by-piece in more ways than one, stripping her of her dignity, her freedom, her souls. Both hers and Kae’s.
Her fists curled tighter around the serpent’s horns.
The lies. Syrena had carved her way between Esmyra and Draevyn, knowing all along their souls called to one another. And Esmyra nearly killed him for it, thinking he was the one who betrayed her all along.
Her eyes burned, not with tears, but with fury that felt older than the sea itself.
A goddess’s fury.
Her sister forced a bond on her through compulsion, thinking the chains had been unbreakable. Syrena thought she could bend Esmyra, break her, consume her.
But she thought wrong.
Esmyra had suffered heartache, agony beyond comprehension, and loss—but here she stood. Alive and stronger than ever imaginable. And Esmyra wouldn’t stop until her sister was nothing but seafoam at her feet.
Draevyn had believed in her without hesitation. He loved her for all that she was and would follow her to the ends of every world to prove it.
Never again would Syrena rip him away from her.
This was her vengeance.
Her knuckles whitened as she braced herself, feeling the serpent coil beneath her with barely contained power. Lightning erupted through the sky as her blood sang with power. She inhaled, the salt air burning in her lungs.
“And now, you’re all going to drown for her sins,” both Esmyra and Kaelypso said in tandem, the words echoing through the atmosphere.
The serpent answered with a roar that shook the Maerinys’s castle in the far distance. Its massive tail whipped across the sea, striking several ships broadside and splintering the wood as men were thrown into the waves, screaming.
Esmyra lifted her hands, calling out to the sea. The ocean obeyed her command, towering walls of water rising before crashing down on the enemy fleet. Her power engulfed multiple ships, before capsizing others, dragging soldiers into the abyss.
Spears flew upward at her beast, glinting in the blood-red glow of the moon. She snarled and the waves answered by curving around her and Levaia like a shield, the weapons bouncing uselessly off the watery wall.
The serpent dove, and she went with it, plunging beneath the surface. For a heartbeat there was only silence, the rush of bubbles streaming past her face before they burst upward again. Levaia impaled another ship with her horns, lifting it half from the water before smashing it apart.
Esmyra’s heart thundered.
There would be no mercy.
No hesitation.
No longer would she see this as a battle. It was annihilation commanded at her will.
A jagged pull tugged at the edges of her mind. Esmyra blinked, her brows furrowing at the sensation. It was subtle at first but then grew insistent.
“It’s Naerysa!” Kaelypso warned.
Fuck.
The bond flared, a cold, twisting claw trying to latch onto her consciousness and siphon her power. And that was when she realized her mental shield had dropped, focusing on the army before her instead.
Esmyra’s stomach clenched. She recognized it instantly, but now it felt magnified the higher the Blood Moon rose in the sky. Her vision blurred slightly, the roiling sea around them fading into the edges of her awareness as her sister’s throne room flashed.
“NO,” Kaelypso screamed.
Syrena’s wicked cackle echoed through her mind.
For a heartbeat, Esmyra’s strength wavered, her divine energy leaking out, threatening to leave her vulnerable mid-attack.
“Fuck. You.” Esmyra gritted her teeth, her talons digging into the serpent’s scales. She wrenched the bond tight with her mind, slamming the wall between them back down as her own power pushed back.
The sea responded, thrashing against the shore with renewed force.
Every moment of suffering, every betrayal, every battle had honed her into the weapon she was. She wouldn’t let Syrena touch her power, mind, or will ever again.
Esmyra snapped her focus, drawing her sister’s siphoning energy back into herself. The flowing, silver tattoos surged brightly as she reclaimed what was hers. And once she reached the end, a spark of Syrena’s essence flickered through her veins.
Her body jolted. It was unlike anything she had ever experienced.
Naerysa’s power was vast, radiant in a way that contrasted with her own. She could feel the currents of the surface coursing through her. It was hotter, brighter, more controlled than the depth’s chaotic pull she was used to.
Her vision blurred for a moment as the two forces mingled inside her. The violent tides surging beneath the reflective surface, and she could feel her power growing stronger, sharper, more alive.
But it also felt like it was sabotaging her from within; a thrill of power that bordered on pain, demanding control.
The moment the stolen brilliance settled in her veins, Esmyra screamed as her hands shot out, the air itself seeming to convulse around her. Torrents of raw, pulsing energy exploded from her fingertips, arcs of lightning lacing with crashing waves and storming winds.
Ships quaked under the force of her assault. Masts splintered, and sails caught fire from being struck by lightning as waves slammed over decks. The Maerinys soldiers screamed as tidal walls surged over them, twisting ships, tearing them from one another.
She could sense her sister’s presence, still clawing, still trying to reclaim what Esmyra had taken, but she shoved it down. Her eyes glowed a blinding silver, the air around her singing with the intensity of her power.
From beneath the waves, sirens surged like dark shadows, their sleek, sinuous forms cutting through the water. Their eyes glinted with malice as they breached the surface to strike.
Levaia twisted, massive jaws snapping at them viciously. The sirens were getting ripped apart mid-leap, their once haunting songs turning into screams as their bodies were tossed into the churning sea. And still more kept coming. They were relentless, trying to break through her defenses.
Chaos reigned. Ships collided, splintered, and burned. Bellowing screams of terror echoed over the waters, mingling with the roar of the serpent and the crackle of power.
And above it all, Esmyra became unstoppable—the fury of the sea.
Levaia tore through the water, her tail whipping with such force that entire clusters of sirens were catapulted into frothing spray.
More of their songs turned to shrieks as the serpent’s gaping jaws closed around them, crushing bone and shredding flesh before tossing the broken bodies into the blood-stained waves.
Esmyra crawled up her beast’s neck, heaving herself up with the horns. She stood tall on Levaia’s crown, her silver hair whipping wildly in the winds, eyes burning like the storm itself.
From her perch atop the sea-dragon’s head, Esmyra looked down at the shoreline. Soldiers who had charged so fearlessly only moments ago were faltering now, retreating as the sea itself betrayed them.
She felt their terror, and it tasted sweeter than the bloodlust consuming her. Her chest swelled with something dangerously close to exhilaration.
“There’s nowhere for them to go when the sea doesn’t forgive,” Kaelypso hissed.
A laugh nearly broke from Esmyra’s throat. It was dark, cruel, and even a little victorious.
And then she leapt.
Air rushed around her as she fell, but her descent was slow, deliberately instilling their fear. Her body was suspended in the air as lightning curled around her arms, flickering bright against the red sky.
Spears arced through the air as Esmyra floated downward in a perfect calm, her gaze locked on the castle in the distance. She didn’t even flinch as her magic answered for her, vaporizing the weapons before they neared her flesh.
As her bare feet touched the sea, her power thrummed with every breath. Ripples spread outward as she began to walk, each stride deliberate, commanding the flashes of light above. The ocean rose around her, waves cresting high only to bow down in submission and parting to clear her path.
And now, Esmyra Kaelypso Aeress Blackwood would be a harbinger of ruin.
Her lips curved into the faintest, merciless smile as her mind echoed with every betrayal, every shard of velsinyte, every whispered lie ever fed to her.
And with each step across the sea, vengeance itself drew closer to the shore.
Sand met her feet, and soldiers scrambled before her. Some tripped over their own boots, some clutched broken weapons, all their eyes wide as if staring at a nightmare made flesh. Others stumbled backward, screaming their prayers for forgiveness to the goddess they betrayed.
Esmyra raised her hand and writhing tendrils of water slithered over the sand and latched onto their lips.
Panic erupted. They clawed at their throats as the water forced its way in, flooding lungs and silencing screams before they could form. Their eyes bulged as their bodies convulsed.
The scene eerily mimicked a memory.
Esmyra recalled the shore bordering Lephyrin’s kingdom.
One that she had wrongfully condemned their innocent people to avenge her father when she should’ve only claimed the life of their king.
She had unleashed this same drowning on them all, but her wild wrath had been consuming her from the inside out.
Her rage had demanded blood, and she obeyed blindly. But now her mind couldn’t be clearer.
These soldiers weren’t innocent. They carried blades sharpened against her name.
Their own goddess’s name.
Their knees buckled in the sand, bodies collapsing as salt water gushed from their noses, mouths, and eyes.
She watched with a calm, chilling focus. Not a flicker of doubt touched her.
The beach became littered with the drowned, their bodies twitching as the tide crept up to claim them.
Her gaze shifted to the palace in the distance, while the serpent loomed and guarded her back. A small smile touched her lips, a chill running along her spine as revenge was already within her talon’s reach.
Esmyra inhaled deeply. “It takes a thief to know one, Sister. You stole my life, my crown, and even attempted my name, thinking it would go unpunished.”
Her grip on the spear was tightening so hard the shaft nearly snapped. “And now I’ve come to steal the breath from your fucking lungs.”