29. The Survivor | Lyra
Lyra woke long before the light had shifted in her room. It was still dim, and the luminescence coming from the tentacles was barely visible in the shimmer of gold that slid from the window.
There was a slow, deliberate pounding behind her eyes that hinted at the nuisance the day would be.
The pounding grew louder. It wasn’t just her head.
It was someone knocking on her door.
“Come in,” she croaked, her voice raspy with disuse.
Nerida whirled through the door, her black hair like a flag behind her. She hadn’t pinned it up.
Lyra blinked as someone else swam in right after Nerida, attached to her sister’s wrist.
“Did it have to be this early?” Thalassa whined.
Her hair was only partially pulled back. It was as golden as the light. It reminded Lyra of the sun, of the warm rays she had lounged beneath on land.
“Lyra—” Nerida snapped and then spun in a circle before finding her sister still in bed. “Did we wake you?”
Lyra eased up onto her elbows and brushed auburn curls out of her eyes. “I’m not sure. I think I was awake already.”
Thalassa blew out a breath, and bubbles swirled. “Told you,” she muttered.
Nerida shot her a glare before setting her attention on Lyra and waving what looked like a bit of spelled parchment in the water between them.
“Do you know what this is?”
Lyra frowned and shook her head.
“This,” Nerida seethed. “Is a campaign to have you and Drystan dethroned.”
Nerida shoved the parchment at Lyra.
She scanned the scrawling script and read the list of offenses against herself and Drystan.
A snort erupted from Lyra. They weren’t all untrue.
Especially the first one, which listed her unlikelihood of following the rules and being a bad influence on younger mermaids.
“So?”
Nerida shared a look with Thalassa before she spoke. “It’s one thing to whisper in the shadows about the reluctance of new rulers, but to have it printed and distributed throughout the kingdom?” Her voice was shrill, reigniting the headache behind Lyra’s eyes. “He’s painted a target on your back.”
Lyra shrugged and bit back a yawn. “This isn’t our problem. Let Drystan and the council handle it.”
“They’re already meeting. Rigel was very distressed this morning,” Thalassa muttered, twirling a lock of golden hair around her finger.
“They’re not taking anything seriously,” Nerida ground out. “Between your bargain and the zealots in this kingdom …” She shook her head as if to rid her mind of that direction of those thoughts. “They’re not moving fast enough.”
Lyra sat up completely and let the parchment slip from her fingers. “What do you think we should be doing then?”
“You need to break the bargain now—at least on this side.”
Lyra slid her eyes from Nerida to Thalassa. The water in her room stilled.
“Oh, she already knows everything—all of us do.” Nerida waved her off.
“Except Vanora,” Thalassa grumbled.
“Wait—you all know?”
Nerida and Thalassa shared a look before bursting into laughter.
Lyra watched as her lips tugged down in a frown. How easily they laughed together.
It was strange.
When Thalassa wrapped a hand around Nerida’s arm to hold herself still while continuing to laugh, rage washed through Lyra’s blood.
“Yes, yes. Have a wonderful laugh at my expense.” Lyra swam from her bed to her vanity and began brushing back her hair.
“Baby sister,” Thalassa crooned and wrapped an arm around Lyra’s chest from behind. “It will be so wonderful bringing you back into the fold. For too long we have missed you.”
Lyra huffed a breath and leaned out of Thalassa’s grip. “I hardly know any of you.”
“Exactly,” Nerida said. “Which is why we want to remedy it.”
Thalassa grinned a smile so broad all of her teeth gleamed in the watery light, the brilliance identical to that of her pearl-colored tail. She was as beautiful as a fairytale princess.
Lyra rolled her eyes and slammed her brush down on the coral. “I’m in no mood for all the familial bonding rubbish. Let’s just break the tithe so I can get the fuck out of here.”
Thalassa’s smile vanished, and ire flickered in her soft brown eyes. She reminded Lyra so much of Maelys.
Maelys with hair spun of sunlight and a heart of pure gold.
“She doesn’t mean it,” Nerida said, placing a hand on Thalassa’s shoulder. “She’s just crabby because we woke her.” Nerida surveyed Lyra with a keen eye.
“Are you feeling well?”
Lyra faced the looking glass and rested her elbows on the tabletop, pressing her fingers into her eye sockets.
“No,” she grumbled. “I’m not sleeping well. And this fucking headache won’t go away.”
She felt the water stir around her before a hand pressed gently against the back of her neck.
“You’re not feverish,” Thalassa muttered. “Maybe lingering effects from her transition back to the sea? She was on land for quite some time.”
Lyra cracked open an eye as Nerida’s expression turned grave. There was a vacancy in her eyes as if she pushed whatever she felt deep beneath the surface, locking it away.
Lyra wished she could do the same.
She unfortunately felt everything so rawly, so profoundly, all the time.
“It’s the bargain,” Nerida replied gravely.
Thalassa clamped her sharp teeth down on her lower lip and sat on the edge of Lyra’s bed.
Her tail fanned out, casting little rainbows around the room by reflecting the light. It was a sharp sight to Lyra’s fatigued eyes, and she winced.
The sea smelled of salt and something old, but was unusual today, as if the tides had begun to change.
“The water smells different today,” she muttered.
Nerida snorted. “It’s nearing the summer equinox. Of course it’s changing.”
There was nothing special about their holidays anymore.
The only one mermaids were allowed to participate in was Tidal Tithe, which came several months after the summer equinox.
“Time never slows, just beats its constant drum,” Thalassa trilled. “We should proceed if we wish to stand a chance against its marching.”
Nerida snapped her fingers. “Up you get. Let’s show Thalassa how much you’ve improved.”
Lyra tilted her head back and let out a small exhale. “I’m too tired.”
“Just show her, and you can be done.” Nerida clicked her tongue.
There was a clinking of vials as Lyra shoved away from the vanity and turned to face her sisters. Nerida wasn’t wrong.
The magic had been easier to control and didn’t exhaust Lyra as much to use it now, but she hadn’t technically been using it. Just stroking the thread.
She hadn’t a flicker of an idea what to do to get her sisters off her back so she could return to her bed, so she did as instructed.
Lyra closed her eyes, gently reaching for the thread of gold around her heart, the same shade of gold as Thalassa’s loose, golden curls.
Just as Lyra’s fingers touched the thread of magic, her eyes blinked open, and she let go.
Nerida and Thalassa gasped, their eyes widening.
Lyra shivered, pulling her arms tightly around her chest before she sank to the edge of her bed.
“Lyra—” Thalassa began, reaching a hand out to steady her. “Are you alright?”
Nerida moved closer too. Her jaw clenched shut as she also reached for Lyra.
“You’re as white as bone,” Nerida whispered.
Lyra shook her head, her bottom lip trembling as she spoke. “I feel … nothing.”
Nerida’s swallow was audible. “It’s the bargain,” she hissed to Thalassa. “It’s getting worse. Fast.”
“We should tell Drystan,” Thalassa suggested.
“No,” Nerida spat. “There’s nothing he can do until he has the throne. It will only cause him to act irrationally.”
Lyra used what little energy she had left to frown as Thalassa and Nerida helped her lie down.
“Don’t talk about me as if I’m not here,” she mumbled.
Thalassa snickered, but Nerida shushed her.
“You’re going to be fine.”
Lyra felt the edges of her consciousness blurring as exhaustion tugged her under.
“We’ll see you tomorrow, baby sister,” Thalassa said.
It was the last thing Lyra heard before Drystan woke her the next day with frantic shaking.
“Get up,” he ordered. “Hurry. There’s been an attack.”
Lyra’s eyes felt as though they had been plastered with sand as she peeled them open to see his insufferable face.
It shocked her how unpleasant he appeared. His golden hair, usually expertly styled in an unmovable coif, was sticking up in strange places as if he had raked his hands through it multiple times.
The angle of his jaw was impossibly sharp. It amazed her that his teeth hadn’t been ground to dust by the way he kept clenching them.
“What did you say?” Her voice was raspy, still leaden with the effects of heavy sleep.
Drystan’s golden eyes flashed with ire. His tail flicks were clearly agitated as he forcefully displaced the water, and he rolled his neck with a sigh before answering her again.
“Our scouts on land were attacked. One managed to escape and is being brought to the council room.”
His words shocked her, but it was an effort for her to get her body to respond.
Sleep floated just out of reach, but close enough that should she wish it, it would ease her back to slumber.
Lyra rolled onto her side. “I fail to see how this involves me.”
Drystan ripped the kelp blanket off her and grabbed her by the arm.
“You are my betrothed.”
Lyra struggled weakly to free herself from his grip.
“What is the matter with you?” he asked, pulling her out of bed so that she was eye to eye with him.
“I’m tired,” she yawned.
Drystan raked his eyes over his face and frowned. “Why? You don’t ever leave your room.”
If Drystan found out she’d been doing magic in her room under Nerida’s tutelage, she wouldn’t be allowed any visitors at all or would be forced to constantly wear the collar.
Dread surged through her, dissolving any lingering exhaustion that the bargain had wrought.
“I’m not allowed to leave my room,” she ground out.
He studied her face a moment longer, and she made sure to hold her scowl as long as it took to sell her point.
“I didn’t realize your confinement would bring such ill effects,” he said at last, easing his grip on her.
Lyra slumped back into the shell and wrapped her tail around herself.