Chapter 4 #2
“I’m sorry too. She was also your sister.” Kaden let his arms hang slack at his sides. Saeryn mirrored him.
“We will have time to grieve properly—once the matter of her funeral and the throne have been settled, yes?” Saeryn began.
“Yes. I’ll help plan her funeral. And—” Kaden looked to the fins encircling his waist, bobbing up and down with the sea’s movement. “—I also wanted to talk to you about the throne. It sounds like it’s between you and me.”
The older merman nodded. “What are your thoughts? Would you feel prepared to hold such a high station?”
That would be an easy question. Saeryn knew as well as Kaden did that Kaden wouldn’t be fit to oversee the queendom. Saeryn answered his silence with a single nod.
“I’ve noticed the people’s approval of you is dangerously low.
You would have to spend so much time regaining their trust.” Saeryn’s tone was one of care and concern, and Kaden found himself agreeing with his uncle.
“That would be a lot of pressure on you, while you’re still learning your new important role, but I will stand by whatever decision you make and will help anyway I can. ”
He had a point and Kaden nodded. Perhaps Saeryn was the natural choice to succeed his sister. They grew up together, and Kaden knew from stories his aunt and mother told him and Cyrus, that his grandparents taught all three of their children the ins and outs of being a monarch.
“What would your plans for the queendom be if you did take the throne?” Kaden’s neck and shoulders tensed.
“Build this queendom up to the best she could be. I would promote peace among our people, and I would ensure my sister did not die in vain.”
“You would seek revenge for her death?”
“When the criminals who killed her are found, I would make sure they are punished accordingly.” Saeryn rolled his shoulders back and puffed out his chest, his jaw tightened.
If he were king, Kaden would do the same. “You can have the throne. I will speak to the council and decline.”
“Then it will be done, Nephew.” Saeryn bowed his head. “And I will allow you to keep the title and duties of prince.”
From what he knew of the council’s schedule, they would reconvene at high tide. In the flick of a tail, he felt the gentlest of caresses from the sea. The temperatures were dropping. High tide was approaching and he needed to make his way to the council chambers quickly or he’d miss them.
Kaden swam in the opposite direction of his quarters, past the common areas, and entered the room to the right of the throne.
Pulling open the polished, rock door revealed the three of members of the Mer Council—two mermaids and a merman, their tails wrapped around thin, coral pillars with stone slates in hand.
“Ah, Prince Kaden. Welcome, please.” Darya, a mermaid with a striped, black-and-silver tail held out her hand, and Kaden moved directly into her line of sight.
“What can we do for you?” A different mermaid spoke, this one with a golden tail, Allie. She lowered her slate, her tourmaline-hued gaze piercing into him.
Kaden swallowed hard. “I’m here to speak about the throne my mother left.”
“Very well. As Queen Serapha’s son, you would be the next successor after your brother, and before Saeryn.
It is tradition that we give ten tidal cycles from the death or abdication of the previous ruler for their immediate heirs to take rule uncontested.
The immediate heir must declare their refusal to allow the current ruler to keep their place.
” Allie went quiet, and the merman spoke next.
Kaden tightened his jaw. “I—I know all this.”
“Yes, but it is customary for us to remind you of the rules surrounding such a decision.” The merman, Alasdair, looked at Kaden with glowing eyes the color of zircon. His stare made Kaden uncomfortable, and inadvertently, his tailfins curled and tensed. “Today is the final tidesday to decide.”
The answer came easily. “I do not. I decline the throne and allow my uncle, Saeryn, to ascend it.”
Allie carved something into her slate. “By your word, you concede of your own choice? You have not been forced, threatened, or blackmailed? If this is of your free will, then the throne will go to Saeryn.”
“Yes, I concede.”
“Finally, because you are a prince by birthright, you will retain your title unless the king strips you of it, or you renounce.” Allie put her slate down.
Kaden bowed his head in a show of respect, and they bowed their heads in return. He took his leave. There was still much to be done, and he would reconvene with Saeryn, Adrielle, and, if he was able, Cyrus, to discuss his mother’s funeral arrangements.
But he had to see her and say goodbye, even if she was with the Goddess now. He hadn’t been here for her during her last moments and pain arose in the back of his throat.
The abyssal caretaker’s quarters were a swim on a downslope outside the palace on the seabed below. He stopped short when he reached the rock face and swam inside, his tailfins dragging behind and settling to a still, vertical position beneath him.
The caretaker bowed in greeting and the two examiners at her side followed suit.
His mother was the only mer in the quarters, floating upright against the side of the cavern in her open coffin.
She was lifeless, pale, statuesque as she lies in her final resting place, dotted with rare pink, orange, and red seaglass.
Worse still were the puncture wounds in her neck and chest. Such a sharp, black contrast from when he last saw her. Vibrant, strong-willed, authoritative, the queen and mother he’d always known.
At once, the finality hit him. She would never see or have dinner or functions with her family again. Never see Libbi and Hadrien grow up. Never issue another order from her throne or address her people. Now she was with his father in Sanyue’s embrace.
“May I have a moment with her?” Kaden asked, voice thick with emotion.
Without a word, the caretaker and examiners moved away from the Mer-Queen and out of the cavern, and Kaden swam up to his mother.
His gaze wandered to the roughshod ceiling to a small, rock protrusion above his mother’s head, and then to the gems adorning her coffin.
Anywhere but at her, and it felt as if a jagged piece of rock settled in his stomach.
His head swam like a small xiahuyu, swimming in circles, over and over again.
When the shock settled, he spoke. “Mother.” Two tidesyears of calling her that instead of her title and it still felt strange rolling off his tongue.
Where was he to begin? “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry I wasn’t here for you.
But I know you will find peace in the Goddess’ embrace, at Father’s side, and in your next life, whichever physical body your soul decides to settle next.
” His lips snapped shut, his mind struggling with what to say next.
What words were left to speak? He stayed with her in silence for several more heartbeats.
“Goodbye. I pray Sanyue keeps you and my father safe.”
He called for the three mer outside to return.
Kaden watched as the examiners returned to their duties studying her wounds. “What have you found?”
“We are suspecting landwalker weapons, but we need to be sure,” the male examiner said. “The size and shape of Her Late Majesty’s wounds do not match our lances or spears or tridents.”
Landwalker weapons. A human did this. His eyes burned with tears, swept away by watery fingers.
His mother was gone. Assassinated. What it meant for their already shaky truce remained to be seen, and it would not surprise him one bit if the mer’s trust in the humans had been shattered.
His certainly had.