63. Maren
63
Maren
“ W ake up, creature,” Nori’s voice wavered in my ear.
I choked as frothy liquid gushed from my throat. Someone’s mouth pressed against mine, potent Naiad air filling my body.
They breathed again, their oxygen reaching to the lowest lobes of my lungs, so deep my belly swelled. My feet moved, pain shooting from my ankle, but a collective sigh ushered across the air, numerous voices exhaling at once. My eyes blinked my vision back into place, mottled at first, slowly sharpening into clarity.
A pair of irises hovered over mine, rich and warm like amber. The Naiad they belonged to sat back, offering me room to sit up. She was my age, golden hair like honey, straight but for a loose wave that claimed the ends of her long strands.
Beside her, Nori and Olinne leaned forward to help me sit up. My eyes fell onto Sidra, her skin ashen, open eyes silver and unseeing.
No one moved. The Naiads watched as if not even surprised. As if it’d been planned this way from the beginning of my life, their eyes solemn and soft.
From the center of my chest, a warmth spread throughout my limbs like glowing, soft sunshine, traveling from one vein to the next. I lifted my arms, searching for the source, and watched as blood trickled from the corner of my elbow towards my wrist.
As if summoned, the words of my blood oath appeared—then faded into my skin as if called away. I watched the red words disappear in awe.
It was Olinne who spoke first.
She pricked her thumb on the nearest spiked plant, then stood. Hands clasped, eyes closed, she bowed her head. “Your debt to another is fulfilled, your oath ended. You are free. Today I vow to you my blood and loyalty, Queen Maren of the Juile Sea.”
My promise to Thaan was complete, and I hadn't even needed the stone. My mouth opened as I stared at them, hardly believing it. Olinne smiled, pulling me onto shaking feet. The slice in my arm had already begun to stitch together, but my ankle wobbled, refusing to bear my weight. I hissed through my teeth as I tried to press it down flat and quickly lifted it away.
“Come to the nursery,” Nori said. “The medicinal water will help.” She threaded an arm under my shoulder, Olinne doing the same, and they helped me hobble to the chamber for the sick creatures of the sea. Sniffles and soft cries followed us through the passage. The amber-eyed Naiad followed as well, inspecting my ankle as they set me down on the edge of a pool.
“Broken,” she announced softly, her own eyes rimmed with red. “Low on your tibia, just above your ankle.”
Nori nodded soberly. Olinne turned away to wipe her eyes.
My throat tightened, watching them mourn their queen in silence. “I’m sorry,” I murmured.
“Do not be, my Queen,” Nori replied, a crack in her tight voice. “Sidra knew it was her time. She was ready.”
The warm water soothed the heat in my leg. I turned it gingerly, angling it so I could look.
“Keep it straight, my Queen,” the female shifted her gaze from my ankle to my own. “A broken bone does not repair fast for a Naiad, as brittle as they are when they need to lengthen into extended vertebrae. You’ll want to avoid swimming for a week while we heal you.”
“I can’t.” Unable to stem the guilt that flowed when I looked at their faces, I kept my gaze on my foot. “I have to go back tonight.”
Their eyes darted to me in unison.
“This is not advised, my Queen,” the healer Naiad said.
“Maren,” I corrected her gently.
She hesitated. “Queen Maren.”
I sighed. “I can’t stay for more than a day. My cordae is already at risk.”
They straightened at that, any argument falling from their tongues.
“My mother will be here in a moment,” the Naiad said. “She is the master healer of our colony. We will do what we can to aid your health. I am Aitne.”
“Tell me what herbs to find,” Olinne piped up, the grief shaken from her face, purpose rooting there instead.
“Rush grass for bone growth,” Aitne said, pursing her lips as she gazed at my leg. “You’ll have to climb onshore at Neris to find it. Kava will help her pain; Noni berries will stave off infection.”
“Would binding her ankle help?” Nori asked.
Aitne nodded. “Yes. There should be a heap of Byssus freshly woven into silk. I can harden it with plaster. A day spent in the pools here and it should improve immensely by tomorrow.”
Faces appeared in the passageway, led by a Naiad with warm eyes and hair like Aitne’s, though lines appeared around her mouth when she spoke, an echo of maturity among beings that seemingly didn’t grow old.
She brought wine in a blue glass, wading through the pool to stand next to Aitne and offer it to me. Naiads spilled in silently behind her, pacing the corners of the chamber, allowing room for all of them to follow, until I was certain every Naiad in the colony had squeezed inside.
“My Queen,” Aitne said. “This is my mother, Aoede.”
Aoede bowed her head, closing her eyes briefly, then held out the wine.
I lifted my chin, studying them all. “This wine holds the blood of Queen Sidra?”
“Yes, my Queen,” Aoede replied. The Naiads along the walls watched in silence with puffy eyes and tear-streaked cheeks, but Aoede’s face remained dry. “A single drop is all you need to transfer her power to you.”
A single drop was still enough to make my belly squirm. I swallowed, resistant to the idea of drinking Sidra’s blood. Aoede placed the glass into my fingers. “She already named you her heir, etched her tally in the stone, vowed it in her blood. The Queenship is yours, but her power is here.”
I spun the stem in my fingertips, watching the liquid slosh around. Almost clear, tinged with the faintest pink.
The Naiads waited.
“It is an honor to drink the blood of a Queen,” Aoede said.
I’m not sure that hearing it helped. But I exhaled a quick and thoughtless burst of air, clearing my mind and tilting the glass to my lips, emptying it fully over my tongue and swallowing it in a gulp.
Surprise flashed in Aoede’s eyes, and I wondered if I’d just offended her, though amusement drew Nori’s mouth into a soft curve. The wine tasted like silver. It landed in my belly, soothing me as soon as it touched my lips. But that single drop warmed my blood. I felt it slide into my veins, down to the tiny capillaries in my skin, simmering with vitality. Calling my Prizivac Vode heritage to answer to that of another, my body recognizing its ascension to Videre .
Nori slid her thumb across the spine of a nearby plant as Olinne had done, a hundred Naiads following her lead as Aoede reached to take the glass from me.
“Queen Maren of the Juile Sea,” Nori said, and though her eyes were swollen and her voice thick, she beamed at me with pride. “Today I vow to you my blood and loyalty.”
A hundred voices echoed.