Chapter Forty-Nine
Forty-Nine
Kaden
“Your Majesty. We should make our way to the coronation hall.”
The councilor’s words trailed in one ear and out the other. Would he ever get used to being called Your Majesty?
Kaden put his seaflute down, where he had finished talking to Angie before Oryma arrived.
Told her he was now king. In turn, she told him about finding his mother’s killer, that she was trying to get the young woman to turn herself in.
If only she could be at his coronation. There was nobody he would rather see.
“Your Majesty.” Her throaty voice came to him again, forcing his attention on her.
“Oh. Yes. The coronation hall.” He nibbled on his lower lip, following her as she swam out through the throne room’s doors.
They exited to the open sea and made a right turn into the opening adjacent to the throne room, and a flash of iridescence flickered in his peripheral vision.
He stopped and dragged his gaze upward. The opalescent shimmering of their barrier remained, but there were patches where the magic was fading.
Saeryn’s oracles must not be keeping the barrier up. Kaden looked at Oryma, whose fins swayed with the currents.
A prickly crustacean stared up at them from its spongy bed on the seafloor, waving golden claws in their direction and skittering backward. A golden king crab, as Angie would name them.
“I know I haven’t been crowned yet, but could you ensure the oracles are told to maintain the barrier?” Kaden swam away but took one more look behind him.
“I will bring it to the others,” Oryma said.
One more tail kick brought them to their destination.
The cavernous coronation hall was filled to the brim with nobles.
Adrielle waited in the far end with Libbi and Hadrien in her arms, and Cyrus on a flat rock bed with Raina and another healer at his side.
His elder brother sat upright, two hands clinging to the sides of the bed, and a thick seagrass-fiber blanket wrapped around his tail.
Beside them were Saeryn’s—now his—high advisor and messengers, and two Shangjiangs, Marron and Narea, awaited Kaden when he entered.
The long room was carved of gilded rock, with stone and coral pillars lining the sides for the mer to rest and await the new monarch’s entrance, creating a narrow hallway for him and his two Shangjiangs to swim through to the end.
A large statue of their Goddess, Sanyue, awaited his offering and request for Her blessing.
Her tail was wrapped beneath her, coiled like a cushioned seat, and her stony gaze pierced through him.
Lovingly carved bangles, necklaces, and thin chains adorned her forearms, wrists, and waist, and Her hands rested loose on the proximal part of her tail.
Across from Adrielle and Cyrus was Saeryn, flanked on either side by Aiereka and two sentinels.
Kaden drew his head back when he saw Saeryn’s serene face, and disquieted tingles flickered under his skin.
He averted his gaze from the former king.
Saeryn’s expression gave nothing away, and Kaden forced himself to keep moving, following close behind Narea and Marron.
After this, he would be king. He never imagined he would find himself on the throne, overseeing the queendom.
Eventually he would need a queen, if Cyrus did not recover in time.
The mer council would demand a Mer-Queen for him if he wished to stay on the throne after the war.
Then what about Angie?
The thought of not having her at his side sickened him, but he would deal with that when the time came.
Perhaps he could even change the law to allow Angie to rule at his side, if she agreed.
He would find a way to get the mer council to see his point of view.
For now, he had a monumental task ahead to regain his people’s trust and end this war.
Cyrus had told him that to be monarch, you must sacrifice for your people, and he held onto their trust by a flimsy strand of seaweed.
He maintained a tight grip on his wrist, and his scalp prickled. Time slowed. Or was the hallway much longer than he remembered? He should be more excited for this moment.
But the notion he was stealing his parents’ place nagged at him, though they must have been reunited in their reincarnated lives. Yet they were torn apart from each other and from their station much too soon.
“Provide your offering to Sanyue, and ask for Her blessing, as per tradition,” Shangjiang Narea began, and gestured with her head and hand toward the statue.
Kaden did. His offering to Sanyue was a prayer, and he bowed his head, pressing his palms together at chest level.
He prayed for Angie to be safe, and he would hold her in his arms soon. That he would unite the queendom and bring his mother’s killers to justice and broker peace between their races once more. And he would be the monarch his people and Angie needed him to be.
His gills flared as he closed the prayer. “Sanyue, I humbly ask for your blessing and protection as I become the reigning monarch.”
The hall went silent as Kaden awaited Her response, his chest tightening with anticipation.
Time stretched, and Sanyue didn’t respond. Did She not accept him?
He got his answer.
A faint whisper in the ancient mer language swept through the room and a comforting, warming glow coated him for a fraction of a second, and then vanished.
“She has given you Her blessing. Congratulations, King Kaden.” Shàngjiàngs Marron and Narea turned on either side of him and bowed deeply. “Please ascend.”
A large, smooth stone and seaglass pillar laced with gold and silver awaited him. After a moment’s hesitation, he ascended, wrapping his tail around the pillar and holding on with one hand. The mer in the room straightened, giving him another bow in tandem.
The Shangjiangs addressed the attendees, and both motioned to Kaden.
“In order of seniority, you will come and offer your words to our new king.” Marron ushered the attendees into a line.
With an uneasy heart and shaking hands, Kaden waited as first, Cyrus addressed him with Raina and the other healer, and Adrielle.
“You will be a great king.” Adrielle’s tone was soothing as she left with Cyrus, but Kaden wished he felt it with as much conviction as Adrielle spoke her words.
Saeryn approached next, with Aiereka behind him.
“Congratulations, nephew. You’ve succeeded in taking the throne from me, and I wish you nothing but good fortune, moving forward.
” His words were eerily measured and sent another swarm of invisible critters skittering down Kaden’s arms. “I hope you are ready for what is coming.” He pointed at him.
“The people will want me back on the throne. I look forward to watching the landwalker filth who killed my sister and pollute our home die the death they deserve.”
Kaden’s blood ran cold. “Enough. You’ve made your point, and I will hear no more of it. Next!” He craned his neck over Saeryn’s shoulder, ushering Aiereka to approach next.
The councilors followed. The palace staff were last, and Kaden’s tail, neck and shoulders had grown sore from clinging to the throne with more tension than he felt he should have.
All the mer, save for the Shangjiangs Narea and Marron, took their leave from the hall. They beckoned Kaden to follow for the last and final portion of the crowning ceremony: giving his edict that would be taken to the top of the palace and read out for the queendom to hear.
“My edict.” Kaden took the clay slate with a jagged piece of rock to carve on that Narea handed him.
He pressed the tip of the pen into the clay, writing the words in Renyuhua.
“I will stop this war for our sake, and for our sister queendom south of us. I vow to bring Queen Serapha’s killers to justice so we can have peace once more. ”
“An honorable edict, Your Majesty.” Marron took the clay slate from him, and Kaden followed them to the top of the palace. Once he exited the palace proper, the mer surrounding its perimeters made his stomach flip.
Or rather, the lack of mer. The crowds were thinner than they had ever been, from what he had expected.
Where had they gone? Had Saeryn displaced so many mer they were unable to attend the coronation?
Did they still harbor resentment or hatred toward him, and that was why they hadn’t shown today?
Or was there another, more sinister reason?
The questions wouldn’t stop piling in his mind.
They reached the top of the palace, swimming in from the outside, in between the statues of their three deities.
Something was wrong, even as the Shangjiangs spoke his words with broad chests and loud voices, rippling through the currents.
After this, they would be off to heat and harden the clay at the nearby thermal vents, and he could take a short rest before starting to undo the damage Saeryn had done.
No such luck.
“Your Majesty! Shangjiangs!” A harried voice came from behind them, and Kaden whipped his head around. A lone sentinel approached, her eyes frenzied.
“What’s wrong?” Kaden asked.
The sentinel sucked in a large swallow of seawater before continuing. “King Varin from Haiping has arrived to meet with you. Emergency meeting.”
Kaden didn’t know he was coming. So much for taking a short rest. But if Varin had come all the way here without prior word, something was amiss.
“Then let’s go.” Marron led them back to the palace. He swam over a longxia that had found their way inside, skittering along the floors, and picked them up.
The longxia waved their claws and antenna, and Marron released them into the open sea as soon as they had an opening.
Narea swam ahead of them to open the door to their war room, on the opposite side of the palace.
Inside the sparsely furnished room, three combat advisors awaited, positioned on their pillars in a rectangle shape. Across from Kaden was Varin, flanked by his high advisor and two sentinels.
Kaden gave each of them a nod of acknowledgement, and they returned it.
Several crudely drawn maps on hardened clay rested in their hands, of the Pacific Ocean’s queendoms: Haiping, Haibei, and Nanhai.
“King Varin brings further news from Haiping,” a combat advisor said.
“I’m all ears.” Kaden swam to the pillar beside the advisor.
“Your seat is at the head.” She pointed to the single stone chair at one end of the table.
Flustered, he moved to his designated pillar and swept his tail sideways to position and settled himself around it. There, he was in charge, but he felt so far from his advisors and his Shàngjiàngs.
“Forgive me for the sudden visit. I was on my way to your coronation, but it appears I missed it.” Varin’s viridian eyes looked haunted, shaded by dark shadows.
“Nanhai is lending their aid to us, and Cassia, thank the Goddess, is holding down the fort. Our queendom is on lockdown. We are constantly receiving reports of landwalker ships in our area, but they don’t appear to have located us yet.
” He rolled his lips between his teeth. “The death toll for the landwalkers and ours is up to nearly a hundred combined, but some landwalkers have offered their help and have assisted us in returning our abducted mer. The news had gotten out about our magic, and they were able to speak to our sentinels at the front lines. We believe it’s only a matter of time before they locate the queendom. ”
Kaden’s heart skipped a beat. Perhaps this was what Saeryn meant by his sardonic good luck wishes.
This worked out in Saeryn’s favor, now that humans were fighting back after Saeryn attacked the surface.
The realization hit him like he’d smashed into a rock wall.
A cunning manipulator until the bitter end.
About to say something else, Varin closed his lips as a panicked voice came through his pack.
“Varin? Varin!”
Cassia.
The room went silent, and Kaden stared at Varin’s seaflute.
Varin yanked the seaflute from his pack. “Cassia? What’s wrong?”
“The queendom is under siege. Landwalkers have found us.”
No. Kaden looked at his advisors and Marron and Narea, but all appeared deep in thought, or wore masks of worry.
“What?” Varin paled.
“Nanhai has arrived and we’re holding them back for now. Stay at Haibei. Don’t come back now.”
The seaflute went silent, and Varin floated, gaping, stroking one of his eyebrows. “I can’t leave her there to fight for herself. I need to go back.”
“She asked you to stay,” Kaden replied. “There’s a greater chance of you being hurt, or killed if you’re wandering through human attackers, even if you’re protected.”
“But I cannot–” A quake outside cut off Varin’s protests.
For a moment, all was quiet.
Still.
“These damned undersea quakes,” Marron grunted.
They got those every now and again, and Kaden rubbed his cheeks.
“I cannot leave her there. You must understand,” Varin said.
Another quake jolted the room. This wasn’t normal. In his twenty-five tidesyears, Kaden had never experienced two quakes in a row.
“A moment.” Narea glided to the rock door and pulled it open and swam outside. Outside, panicked cries filled his ears, and Kaden’s pulse raced with fear.
What was happening?
Narea returned, panic-stricken. “We’re under attack. Landwalkers and their vessels have been spotted. We are trying to hold them off before they break the barrier entirely. There are divers here. Hundreds. They’re sneaking through and infiltrating the palace halls.”
Kaden’s tail grew stiff and the color drained from his cheeks and neck. “Humans,” he repeated with a hoarse voice. “No. How many vessels?”
“I saw two,” Narea offered. “They’ve struck two of our villages, decimated them.
We have units addressing the vessels and divers, but they are camouflaged and have scattered.
The divers are infused with our magic. Marron, I need you with me to gather the rest of the sentinels.
King Kaden, King Varin, do not leave here. We will ensure you’re protected.”
Kaden took in their words, his chest tightening. He was speechless and needed more water, more oxygen to process what they were telling him.
“Let’s go. We cannot waste more time,” Marron said to Narea, his voice sharp. “We’ve lost our queen already. Nearly lost our crown prince. So many have died, been captured. We cannot lose you, too.”
Kaden snapped back to reality and gave a vehement nod, staying back with Varin as the Shangjiangs and combat advisors left the room, leaving them guarded by two sentinels, and trapped.