Chapter 42
Forty-Two
Kaden
The darkness was stifling, even for him. It bore down on his back, enveloped him in it like an overprotective parent’s too-tight embrace. The trenches felt like they would never end and he kept paddling forward.
A vent hissed when he passed it and he jolted, the black plumes grazing his cheeks. It was the lashing of a haihuangfeng’s–or sea wasp, in human terms–tentacles, and Kaden clenched his jaw, his shoulders jerking upward.
Glints of ivory and light yellow caught his eye, and he balked at the sight below him. Scattered bones littered the floor, some in full view, others half-buried—ribs, skulls, spines, and a smattering of leg bones.
He imagined they had been dormant there for at least two tidesyears—from their last war.
Kaden slowed, hovering above them, and his emotions played tug-of-war.
Whether to feel sorry the humans had been dragged into a watery grave, particularly if some were innocent casualties.
Or hatred that they brought this on themselves for stealing their resources, and for the brutal torture and massacre they inflicted on his people, many of them civilians.
Another gulp of seawater and he quelled the rising anger. He wouldn’t become like his mother and leave a path of destruction in his wake.
When his mother and Zixin established their truce, sentries were set loose around the queendom to search for dead humans and mer to bury them.
Some bodies were never found, and now Kaden saw what became of them. He could let their oracles know to memorialize them, even if they were nothing but bones. If Saeryn allowed them to do so.
Farther into the trenches it grew desolate again.
An indecipherable whisper brushed his ear, and Kaden flinched, whipping his head in the direction of the sound.
Nothing, and he drew his shoulders up to his ears. Now he was hearing things.
Another unintelligible whisper came, and Kaden spun in the opposite direction. He swore he saw the flicker of a mer tail for a split second before it vanished into the blackness.
Ghosts. It shouldn’t surprise him a veritable graveyard was haunted.
Foreboding and anxiety built in his system, the biting cold suddenly more noticeable and pricking at his scalp.
This wasn’t his first time in the trenches, but it was his first time going so deep. Here, it was devoid of life, surrounded by blackness.
He left the graveyard behind, and a memory surfaced of being a child and playing with Cyrus in the shallower trenches closer to the palace. They had been two reckless merboys going where they shouldn’t and playing hide and seek.
It was all fun and games until he could no longer find Cyrus and found himself lost and terrified the rest of the tidesday.
His brother had found him early the next day, a notch less scared than Kaden was, and they returned home to a verbal beating from Serapha and Aqilus.
Their parents forbade them from leaving the palace for the next ten tidesdays.
About to let his fears persuade him into swimming upward and out of the trenches, the tip of a rocky dome came into view.
The villages were nearby and he pressed a fist to his mouth. The royals and nobles liked to keep themselves secluded and inaccessible, and they were used to traveling to and from the trenches. Kaden didn’t like it when he visited as a merboy and he didn’t like it now.
Kaden pushed forward, his focus so singular, tunnel-visioning to his destination, that he found himself too close to a hydrothermal vent when it erupted, shooting hot steam across the middle of his tail.
“Sharp-toothed, fin-biting son of a niu sha!” He flinched and drew his tail closer to himself, one hand flying over the burnt area.
With his other hand, he clutched at a protruding piece of rock nearby to keep himself in place.
Fortunately, the steam hadn’t burned through his scales, but it still stung to the touch.
The saltwater wasn’t helping any, but he forced himself to keep going.
He emerged from the trenches and Kaden slowed, plucking off a handful of sea moss from a nearby rock as he passed, nibbling on it after a quick clean.
The village’s entrance welcomed him; its borders crafted from layered rock and stone, and he moved through the archway.
He moved past the throngs of homes made of rock and metal plates and corals, and several mer who Kaden recognized from his youth stopped to greet him.
Who here would admit that Saeryn committed a crime, if he had? He couldn’t risk someone telling Saeryn what he was doing. The mer he questioned needed to have no reason to go to Saeryn. An old rival? Or someone who might have an old grudge against his uncle.
His gaze zeroed in on two mer nobles emerging from their home.
They were Saeryn’s former neighbors whose children were now grown, and who would join them for group activities when Kaden’s family visited.
“Prince Kaden! How wonderful to see you,” the mermaid started, her diamond eyes widening and long lashes swept upward by the sea’s caress. “What brings you here? How is Saeryn?”
It had to be them.
To his knowledge, the merman and Saeryn had a rivalry spanning over thirty tidesyears when Saeryn took the bigger home, the one the merman wanted, and then they fought over which surrounding space belonged to whom.
“Wonderful to see the two of you, as well,” Kaden replied. “I’ve been well, all things considered. I came to speak with you about my uncle.”
“Oh, Saeryn. Fascinating character,” The merman cast a glance toward Saeryn and Aiereka’s home. “What about?”
“I wanted to know more about my uncle.” Kaden inwardly cringed at the lie he was about to tell. “Since I was young, I always knew him as an upstanding merman and wished I was closer to him.” Would the mer couple take the bait?
The merman shook his head. “Clearly you don’t know him the way we did,” he muttered.
Kaden feigned surprise. “What do you mean?”
The mermaid tilted her head. “Come, we can go out to the gardens to chat.”
Kaden followed, making small talk with them on the way. Ten tail kicks later, Kaden floated upright with them, all three clinging to stone pillars with their tails, keeping them in place against the stronger currents in the area.
The garden was not made of grass, but of vibrant corals and the colorful yu and crustaceans living within them. Grass was scarce in this region, and the mer who lived there consumed yu and haizhe and traveled seamiles to find vegetation.
The merman lowered his voice. “You know about that controversy he created when he left his lifemate, right?”
“What?” Kaden’s tail jerked. “I thought she passed away.” Was this what Aiereka was about to tell him?
The mermaid shook her head. “No, he abandoned her when Princess Aiereka was still a child. She fled and none of us have heard from her since.”
“How? How was he not imprisoned?” Kaden struggled to wrap his head around what he heard. Abandonment of a lifemate resulted in life imprisonment for the offender.
“He claimed an abusive union.” The merman’s voice grew harsh, angry. “He was never punished, though we waited for it. Queen Serapha never knew and rumors were King Aqilus made sure of it.”
The words hit Kaden’s gut like a hard punch. What else didn’t he know about the secrets his father, or even his mother kept?
The mermaid nodded. “A terrible thing, indeed. And now he is King.” She blew out a stream of bubbles and motioned to the merman. “Sorry, we should be going. We have other matters that require our immediate attention.”
With a heavy heart, Kaden’s shoulders dropped and he bid them farewell.
“There’s no evidence he abandoned his lifemate,” Oryma told Kaden in the council’s chambers. “Hearsay from his neighbors doesn’t count.”
“Can you investigate it?” Kaden spoke through clenched teeth.
“I’m sorry, but this is low on our priorities right now. Also, his ex-lifemate is long gone. If she’s not dead, she’s likely living somewhere far away, and we cannot afford the merpower it would take to find her,” Alasdair added.
“Fine.” Kaden pressed his lips into a tight slash and left the chambers.
All that work had now sunk into the deepest trench.