Chapter 55
Fifty-Five
Kaden
Kaden left the palace and moved through a grand school of yu, denizens of the now partly decimated coral trees at the courtyard’s center.
The little critters separated, giving him space to pass through.
A strong pump of his tail sent him upward, over the entrance and into the hollowed-out obelisks at the top.
Rebuilding of the palace had begun, but it would take some tidesweeks or tidesmonths before they would fully restore it, the barrier, and the destroyed courtyard and villages.
A smattering of bones lay beneath his tailfins, the corpses picked clean and other bones swept away with the currents. The humans and merfolk who could be recovered were set to be buried in the cemeteries.
The sight of the beautiful, shattered queendom tugged at his heartstrings. His next stop was to visit Cyrus.
On the way, he stopped to grab a bag full of food in the palace’s staff quarters and feed the yu at the sanctuaries.
Instinctively, he looked around for dujiaojings, but there were none.
He scattered them about and left the rest of the food on the ocean floor, watching the animals congregate on it and snap at each other for first dibs.
Two longxia ambled by, their hard carapaces brushing the tips of his dorsal fin as they passed him.
He left the sanctuaries to where a pod of mer awaited him. Kaden recognized them. They were one of the mer pods who were his staunchest of opposers and often led mobs to call for his dethroning.
For a moment, Kaden and the mer group floated still, and he clenched his fingers in anticipation of them spitting vitriol at him.
The head of the group, a mermaid with a pebble gray tail, bowed her head. “Thank you, Your Majesty. For saving the queendom.”
Kaden blinked. “Of–of course.”
The other five mer echoed their thanks before darting off.
Kaden wound through the palace halls and knocked on Cyrus and Adrielle’s bedchamber doors. No response, and he slid the seaglass door open.
The room was empty, empty hammock swaying with the currents. The tables and the chair Cyrus sat at bare.
Furrowing his brow, he left the chambers and stopped the first sentry he found patrolling the halls. “Do you know where my brother is?”
The sentry straightened to a vertical position and bowed. “Your Majesty.” She pointed in the opposite direction Kaden was going. “He and Princess Adrielle are in the infirmary.”
“The infirmary? When did that happen?”
“We moved Prince Cyrus after Shangjiang Narea and her sentinels ensured their safety during the attacks,” the sentry replied.
Kaden made a mental note to find the Shangjiang and thank her.
When Kaden arrived, Cyrus was sitting up in his rock bed in the infirmary, and Hadrien floated beside his father.
“So, you finally gathered yourself and sent those landwalkers back to where they came from?” Cyrus’ lips quirked into a partial smile, and his face fell. “I heard Uncle Varin perished while fighting alongside you.”
Kaden rolled his lips between his teeth and stared at his hands on the proximal part of his tail.
Fresh hurt, mingled with culpability bloomed in him again, of Varin’s passing and of sentencing Saeryn and Celia to their deaths.
“Yes. I can’t shake my guilt. He helped me with the wave, and when we returned to the palace, a group of divers ambushed us and speared him.
If only I had taken the throne earlier, or insisted he go back to Aunt Cassia, he might still live. ”
“I checked in on Aunt Cassia. She told me his funeral will be at the end of the tidesmonth, once they’ve recovered from their own attack,” Cyrus said.
“Thank you for speaking with her,” Kaden swam to float on his brother’s other side. “Did she say anything else?”
“Not much, only that she has ordered the building of memorials for the human deaths from her and Uncle Varin’s tsunami.”
Kaden gave a single nod. “Good news, then. But brother, why are you here, and not in your bedchamber? And where are Adrielle and Libbi?”
Cyrus gritted his teeth. “When the humans attacked and Shangjiang Narea came for us, Raina and her healers fled.” His hands balled into fists, and his tail tensed and straightened in front of him.
Kaden put a comforting hand on his shoulder.
“At the moment, Adrielle took Libbi to gather some food for us.” Cyrus patted Kaden’s hand and pulled Hadrien onto his lap.
A healer came by with a stone bowl with a grayish paste inside, interrupting them. “Your Majesty, Your Highness. We were able to determine why you have not been recovering at the pace expected of someone with your condition.”
“Why is that?” Kaden focused on the healer.
“Well, the medicines your private healers were administering were not medicine.”
“What do you mean?” Cyrus’ eyes rounded, and his hand shot out and grabbed Hadrien’s tail before his son could swim away, his attention fixed on a manyu gliding past, their long body undulating.
“The residual pastes and tonics we found in your bedchambers, and in the rooms where they worked, were made from poisonous flora, blue inkberry and spiny seanettle. They were preventing you from healing at your full capacity. It’s odd.
” The healer put his index finger on his sharp chin.
“You’ve shown some signs of healing, so we investigated further.
They mixed the inkberry and seanettle with healing herbs. ”
Kaden gritted his teeth, and Cyrus’ face was as white as bleached coral. “Who were they? My uncle told us they were his best healers.”
The healer shrugged. “I don’t know. They kept to themselves when they were, erm, ‘working’ with you, Your Highness, and they didn’t interact with the rest of us.”
“I’m going to have them found and arrested.” Kaden squeezed his eyes shut, and opened them again.
“They deserve no less,” Cyrus said with a groan.
“We will do our very best to have you healed up within the next few tidesmonths. And Your Majesty. Cyrus told us of your own condition, and we would like to offer you a poultice to ease the symptoms temporarily. Do you want it?”
“Yes, of course.” Of course, Raina hadn’t told him that, and he wasn’t sure if she truly didn’t know about a poultice, or if she purposely withheld the information from him.
The healer swam out of the room and returned with a cylindrical tube filled with a shimmering violet liquid inside.
Kaden popped the kombu covering off, swallowing it in one gulp.
He didn’t feel immediate effects, but he took the healer’s word that it would ward off any aches, pains and weakness he would experience while swimming at his usual speed.
He bid farewell to Cyrus, Hadrien and the healer, and left the infirmary to swim to the air chambers for a crisp seaweed snack, before he was due to hold his first court as king.
Cautious, he picked up his swim speed on the way back to his quarters. His chest didn’t ache, and his muscles didn’t scream for rest. His skin was still dull when he glanced at his arms, and his hair hadn’t grown back to its usual thickness.
He stopped short in front of his bedchambers, his dorsal, caudal, and pelvic fins adjusting for him to maintain his balance.
Aiereka, his cousin, and Shangjiang Narea awaited him at the doorway.
They were holding hands, and Aiereka had a large crossbody pack donned.
“Aiereka? Narea?” Kaden arched an eyebrow. “Am I missing something here? A-And Narea, thank you for your help in relocating my family during the attack.”
Narea bowed her head. “It was my pleasure, Your Majesty.”
Kaden thought back to when he caught Aiereka hastily talking to someone on her seaflute, putting it away once he approached her. “I had no idea you two were together. How long?”
“Nobody did,” Narea said. “And we’ve been together since before she and Saeryn came here.”
“We made sure to keep it secret. My father–may he rest with our ancestors–found out and didn’t approve. He demanded I cut her loose,” Aiereka said quietly. “It’s strange he’s not here anymore.”
“I’m sorry,” Kaden murmured.
“No, don’t be. You did what you had to.” Aiereka ran her thumb over Narea’s knuckles. “Though I miss his presence, I feel free. I quit the racing league, and I can be with who I love.”
“By the Goddess’ blessing,” Narea added.
“My father pushed me to serve in a royal court, marry a merman, be queen one day, and forced me to do and know everything,” Aiereka continued, speaking faster, as if releasing the words lifted a weight she had been carrying for far too long.
Kaden listened, and Narea’s attention was rapt on her, as well.
“I want to be the mer’s princess, do charitable work for communities in need. ”
“Then be free to do that, cousin,” Kaden said with an encouraging smile.
“I will. Calm seas, Your Majesty,” Aiereka said.
“We’ll be in touch!” Calora chimed in as the two mermaids left together, their hands still entwined.
Kaden watched after them until they disappeared around the hall’s bend, and he returned to his chambers.
He counted ten cycles of the sun, moon, and tides until he received word from his high sentry. The throne room doors peeled open, and he coiled his tail tighter around the coral pillar, pressing against its smooth, polished surface.
Rebuilding efforts had returned to the palace, and burial services were provided for the dead.
It would be a long time before the mer and humans could learn to trust one another, but he would relish this peace for as long as it would last.
“King Kaden.” The high sentry approached him in the throne room and bowed his head, one hand over his heart.
“I’ve received news from Haibei and Nanhai that mer and landwalker attacks have begun to cease on both sides.
They are adhering to the truce. There have been no conflicts since the past tidesweek.
” He paused, onyx eyes scanning his piece of kombu kelp.
“The landwalkers are meeting with Haibei’s sentinels to return the last of the mer they kept under their watch.
” He folded the piece of kelp in half, rolling his shoulders back and relaxing his sky-blue tail.
At the stained-glass window across from Kaden, a horn appeared, and he locked eyes with a single-horned dujiaojing, her mottled gray and white skin and stocky body visible behind her.
Prickles rippled across his skin. Was she back for more of the sanctuaries’ fish?
Was fish scarce toward the surface again?
“Thank you.” Kaden smiled warmly, never taking his eyes off the hovering female dujiaojing. She floated in place, staring back at him. “This calls for a celebration. And if you could do me a favor? Well, two.”
The sentry lifted his chin at attention.
“First, can you ensure these sentries are given ample time off for their duties, and they and their families are provided for?” He gave the sentry the names of the trainer and sentries who assisted him with unearthing information about Saeryn.
The sentry scrawled their names onto his piece of kombu kelp. “Certainly, Your Majesty. What’s the second favor?”
Kaden faced the dujiaojing, who hadn’t moved from her spot, swaying with the currents. “Could you assist me in ensuring the dujiaojing outside is fed? Otherwise, she’s going to invade the sanctuary again.”
His messenger made a strangled noise as he stared at the large mammal outside. “W-with what yu, Your Majesty? I would prefer not to go near her. I had an altercation with a dujiaojing when I was younger.” He showed Kaden a small scar on the inside of his wrist.
“If you could enlist help, then.” Kaden rolled his lips between his teeth. The dujiaojing glided away, out of sight. In the direction of the sanctuary.
Black fathoms.
The messenger gave a single nod. “If that is all?”
“And please let our chefs know to prepare a celebratory banquet come high moontide. And you are dismissed. Thank you again.” Kaden held out a hand, and the sentry turned and exited, the gilded doors, shutting behind him as soon as his tailfins disappeared from sight.