27
Those who are willing to drown
T he winds finally began to settle as we sailed further from The Crown’s Justice. The ship was quiet, the crew shaken but trying to pretend they weren’t. I could feel the tension like a weight in the air, heavy and unspoken, until Ela broke the silence.
“What the hell was that?” she asked, her voice sharp, eyes narrowing at Alastair.
Alastair stood by the mast, his eyes distant, as if the memory of whatever he knew had reached him before her words. Of course, it would be him the one to have all the answers. The man who once wore the robes of a priest, who had seen more than any of us, and read from the old texts the rest of us barely believed in. Because we believed in the Romantic Order of things, in loving and caring Gods who gave us the land, not in evil men who created religions that prohibited, inhibited and forced people to believe in terrible Gods that didn’t listen and only punished. And he was once part of that .
He sighed, the sound heavy with knowledge none of us were ready to hear. “When I served as a priest for the Virelanth religion, I witnessed things…” he started, the edge in his voice already making my skin crawl, “…things that could chill a man’s soul. Offerings. Horrendous, violent offerings and prayers.”
He shifted, his hand tightening around the ropes. “The Virelanth religion is twisted, full of dark rituals meant to appease Death himself. What we just saw, that was Mornatos. Someone on that ship offered their soul for death’s power. And now, every time they beg for his favor, Mornatos answers.”
The silence was deafening. My heart pounded in my chest, each word sinking into me like stones into deep water.
“They have been trying to achieve this for years. And only now, what they have been doing for more than fifteen years, is beginning to become apparent.”
I glanced around at the others—their faces pale, eyes wide with the same realization.
Alastair’s gaze met the captain’s, both men sharing some grim understanding that unsettled me.
“This is much bigger than we thought,” Alastair continued, his voice low. “The Law of No Seas and this tireless pursuit against piracy were only a veil that covered up, in the form of justification, the evils that this religion has always venerated. Their only God is Mornatos. They managed to make it reign on land and little by little at sea too, but now? Now it is also beginning to reign among men. Death is controlling the men who dare to wield that power. ”
A heavy silence fell again. I could feel the weight of it pressing down on all of us, suffocating in the face of a truth we never expected. We were not just fighting men.
“This journey of revenge has become more than just that. We are playing with the Gods themselves. This is another clash of the titans and we're getting in the way of their puppets.”
The crew stared in shock, fear clear on their faces. They didn’t know what to do—what to believe. Their path had taken another route.
My voice didn’t waver when I said, “We have the Veil, we have the seas and the winds. We can make it to The Harbor.”
Alastair’s eyes narrowed as they turned to me. “This is much more than just that, Pink Arrow,” he said. “Tell us, what did the Veil show you down there?”
I hesitated, the memory of it rushing back like a tidal wave, but I took a deep breath and told them what I saw. I told them about the wedding of Thalassa and Ventus, the deal with Mornatos, about all of those legends being true. About the lost and now dead prince… my father. I told them everything.
When I finished, the silence stretched again, but this time it was filled with something different.
Ela broke it first, her voice soft but sharp. “So you’re a princess.”
Jonah, wide-eyed, nodded in agreement. “Dara was right… the prophecy is real.”
I frowned, the words striking me like a cold gust of wind. Prophecy? I turned to Calico, searching for answers, but his face gave away nothing. He wasn’t shocked by the news like the others. No, he was calm, almost resigned—like he had known all along.
Our eyes locked, and in that moment, something passed between us. It was like a secret, some unspoken bond that suddenly tethered us together in a way that I couldn’t understand.
A sudden flash of Thalassa and Ventus appeared in my mind.
Images of the sea being embraced by the wind, of the winds whispering stories to the waves. A wedding. The Veil. A sealed love.
His jaw tightened, and I could see it—a certain weight of a truth he carried, and that I think I was beginning to understand. My chest hardened with the knowledge, with the pull of something that had always been there between us, waiting. “There’s nothing bigger than us.” His words from earlier echoed gently in every corner of my mind. “You don’t understand, I’m begging you to step out of the water and ask your Goddess.”
I opened my mouth but before I could speak, Alastair’s voice cut through the tension.
“You said you felt the waters shift somehow,” he said, his voice now more ominous. “Maybe by unlocking the Veil, you opened gates that were long forgotten, gates that kept Death at bay. And now… Mornatos is stronger and it’s starting to manifest in his prophets.”
The words hit me like a punch, knocking the breath from my lungs. I had thought at first that the Veil was just a map, a way to ensure a safe return trip. And then I realized it was more than that, I saw it, Thalassa showed me that it was the key to saving the seas, to stopping Death. But now… now Alastair was saying I might had made things worse.
I swallowed hard, mind spinning. “I need a moment,” I murmured, barely hearing my own voice. The confusion was too much, the weight of everything too overwhelming.
Without waiting for anyone’s response, I excused myself and made my way to the bowsprit.
The wind whipped around me, salty and sharp, but I couldn’t clear my mind.
I gripped the wood, closing my eyes, and whispered to the waves once more.
It had to be done, Lady Love. To wear the heartbreak to free it.
“So it's true, I've given free rein to Death?”
Death has always been everywhere, Lady Love. Only sometimes we have been forced to lock it away, and perhaps, that is the reason we are now paying for our crimes, for not respecting the free course of life.
“It was never about The Vile Phantom, was it? I was always destined to find the Veil.”
You have to finish what your father started, Lady Love. He fought for free waters so your mother could live her dream, so that you could be born into free Kingdoms. He knew that the sovereigns, and those who call themselves prophets and presbyters, played with evil. He told me he could feel Death in every cold palace floor, he knew the Kingdoms weren’t a safe place anymore. Only the waters were. And he entered the depths without thinking twice, not knowing that once upon a time, Death also ruled the waters.
And he found himself betrayed not only by the one who was once his brother on land, but by me. By the Nine Seas. Because he realized this wasn’t a safe place either.
He was angry at the Gods. That is the reason he couldn't free the waters, Lady Love. Only those who serve the Gods with reverence and deep affection, with passion and delight, and with love and true belief, are heard by them. Only those who are willing to drown in the name of love are heard with sincerity, for they are the bravest souls.
My heart trembled with each gust of wind that carried the scent of brine, mingling with my whispers and the sound of waves slapping against the hull.
“So the legends are true.”
They were never legends. The Romantic Order only reflected the truth, Lady Love.
“You made a deal with Mornatos then.” Drops of water splashed up from the sea, cool and stinging against my skin, as the sea murmured her answer.
I'm sorry you now have to pay for that outrage, Lady Love. There won't be a day that I don't regret my actions, for now you have to carry that burden. My behavior was moved by the sadness of a broken heart. I only wished for Death.
“I’m sorry too. It pains me that you had to live centuries with a heart torn apart. ”
Don’t, Lady Love. I will be bound to that burden until the waters of the ocean are consumed and nothing of me remains.
“What do you mean?”
My heart dances with the winds, Lady Love. From the moment the breath, the blood, the light, the shadow, the flame, the earth, and the end, were formed. The winds and the seas were destined to touch, always reaching for one another, in every story whispered to the waves, forever drawn to each other in every chase of air brushing the surface of the water.
But should they ever surrender to their passion, they would tear the balance apart. Their embrace will unleash a tempest that none deserve to withstand, their union is a catastrophe waiting to happen—storms would rise, and the world would drown in their fury. To unite fully would summon chaos and Death, making their love a force the world cannot survive.
Hearing this painful confession only made my heart start beating with an ancient force that I couldn't understand. It was as if her loss was also now mine, and I suddenly needed air to survive this pain, as if my body was looking for that gust of wind that it needed to calm my heart down, and perhaps also to make myself understand.
The left side of my neck began to burn and I brought a hand to the small heart that resided there, while I whispered to the sea, “You reached for Mornatos because you couldn’t be with Ventus.”
I was desperate because I thought the balance of nature was not fair in its creation. And that fury inhibited my reason, making me wish for every human being who enjoyed that balance that I didn’t, to suffer what I suffered. I was moved by anger, Lady Love. And I was unfair to the innocent mortals who sailed the seas.
I was trembling, my neck and heart hurting without measure. “You married Ventus, but it was not a wedding, was it?” I could now see, I understood. “It was an act to seal your love forever, but not in the way you both wanted.”
A pact to never unite and thus not let Death break loose, ever.
Tears threatened to spill from the corners of my eyes. “You will never be able to be together?”
We may succumb for a night, maybe even a day or three, but what our selfish union unleashes is not just a couple of accidents. We are opening a door for Mornatos every time. Each time this desire overtakes us, innocents suffer and Death takes advantage to roam freely. We are Gods, Lady Love. We cannot succumb to this selfishness if what we are destined for is to protect and maintain a balance. Our love is doomed to Death.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
No, Lady Love. I am. For not accepting my destiny and break the balance. For now you have to undo my fatal mistakes.
“What can I do?”
There is a prophecy, Lady Love. Ask your captain.
And if I still thought my heart couldn't go any faster, that last sentence proved me wrong. “What do you mean?”
You opened gates that we once believed would remove Death from my waters by closing them, but that only made everything worse. Death grew in the places where he has always lived, filling the minds of the powerful with more ideas and hatred. The winds and I sealed that Veil with a prophecy and our silence, that is why I could never tell you until you unlocked the Veil and with it our secrets. There is a prophecy written in tomes, and Ventus and I spent years looking for those who could fulfill it, those who were willing to drown. And finally, we found them.
I couldn’t breathe. “Thalassa—”
Ask your captain, Lady Love.