Chapter 34
Istumble back. “Impossible.”
The only creatures I’ve ever communicated with mentally are from the sea. Inhuman.
“Apparently not.” She glances at Caelus’s door. “But we can discuss it when we’re out of the castle. Any second now, they’ll come searching for the tails.”
I reach for the bag. “I’m not going anywhere with you.”
A smirk crosses her lips, and she steps closer, pulling the bag out of reach. You think I taste like spring rain? So good that even if you wanted to, you couldn’t pull—
“Get out of my head,” I snap, despite my power roiling at the silky words skimming my mind.
She leans closer and lowers her voice to a snarl. “If we don’t go soon, neither of us are getting out of the castle. Now walk.”
I grit my teeth. “Fine.”
We weave through the castle and down a flight of stairs. Arched columns sweep above our heads as we cross through the grand hall, the clock high on the wall creeping closer to midnight.
We come to an unmanned side door and I pause. “Wait.” I unclasp my cloak. “You need this more than I do. If they spot you, you’re dead.”
She tilts her head. “First you come to my bedside, concerned for my health. And now you’re worried I might die? I fear you’re getting soft on me.”
I narrow my eyes. “It would be terribly inconvenient for you to die.”
“Ah, of course. Terribly inconvenient.”
I slide one shoulder from the cloak, but she tugs it back into place.
The amusement disappears from her eyes. “If they catch me, I’ll be killed. But if they spot you”—she slides the button back through the clasp and pulls the hood over my head—“there are worse punishments than death.”
Like being stuck with Caelus.
Her fingers graze my cheek. “Yes, like being stuck with Caelus.”
My eyes widen. My mental barrier was locked tight, shut from any interference. “I—”
Shouts come from behind us, and footstep pound through the corridors. Guards.
Kressa throws open the door. “Looks like they realized the tails are missing.”
Night air blasts us, and wind whips at the edges of my cloak. Heavy storm clouds blot out the full moon, crackling with lightning. A blast of thunder shakes the ground.
A look passes between us. She presses her lips into a thin line and nods.
We take off across the street, twisting and weaving through alleyways.
Masts pierce the sky as the harbor comes into view. Waves crash against the aging stone barricade and crest over the maze of wooden docks jutting far into the water. I close my eyes and breathe in the mist, savoring the salt on my skin.
“How long have you been able to hear my thoughts?” Kressa asks.
I open my eyes to the tethered ships, bobbing in the waves. “That was the first time. How long have you?”
Her gaze lingers on the mountains in the distance. “When you came to the infirmary. They cut in and out, but I knew you were worried about me. And now, I can only hear certain things. Like when your emotions are heightened.”
My chest tightens, and the possibilities of her discovering my secrets swarm my head. I kick a rock off the boardwalk, and the waves swallow it whole. “How did this happen?”
“Maybe when our power exchanged?”
I consider. If it’s from my power, maybe I can control it. “Try to do it.”
She raises a brow. I thought you didn’t want me in your head.
Closing my eyes, I focus on the space in my mind. The mental bridge I share with the sea creatures is off to the side, but a new doorway gapes beside it, where her words filter in. I slam it shut and open my eyes.
“Try again.”
She stares at me for a long moment. “Did you hear it that time?”
“No.” The door in my mind is thin, and cracks splinter the wooden planks. It may not hold if my emotions heighten, but it’ll do for now. “What did you say?”
“It doesn’t matter.” Her mouth tilts into a cheeky grin. “Now you try.”
I crack open the door. Can you hear me?
Eyes shut tight, her lips rest comfortably together. Peaceful. I run a tooth over my bottom lip, where it was pulled between hers moments ago.
She opens her eyes, and I flick my gaze away.
Heat rises to my cheeks, and a faint emerald glow comes from my chest. I tug the edges of my cloak together. “Did you hear me?”
“No.”
“That seemed easy for you.” I’m accustomed to closing my mind off to creatures, but Kressa has no such practice.
“My brother loved to read my mind when we were children. I never got away with anything because he always told my parents. As soon as I learned how, I blocked him out.”
My lip quirks. “I like him.”
“I think he’d like you, too.” She glances sideways at me, pain etched into the lines on her face.
An ache spreads behind my sternum. “We’ll find him.”
We come around a bend to the northernmost tip of the docks. I reach across the pathway in my mind, bypassing the door that leads to Kressa.
Are you here?
Your Highness? a sweet voice whispers in response.
I smile. Where are you?
Pallid hands appear on the stone barricade. A selkie lifts her head from the water, black hair plastered to her face. Her sunken eyes study Kressa and she releases a low, menacing hiss.
The selkie bares her fangs. “Why are you here? I know what you did. We all do.”
Her blackening eyes swing to me, filled with betrayal.
I lower to my knees. She thought she was saving me during that trial, and wants to apologize. She helped me get your tails back.
She blinks and the pathway closes, shutting me out.
Kressa strides to the edge of the barricade, and the selkie watches her like a predator. Her nails lengthen into claws, and a low growl reverberates from her throat.
I stand and throw an arm out. “Kressa—”
“It’s okay,” she whispers, lowering my arm. “They need to hear it from me.”
The power in my chest shifts, and my heart warms.
She kneels close to the edge, pants soaking up water. The selkie doesn’t look away as Kressa unties the drawstrings on the sack and pulls it open. Scales shimmer in the moonlight like gemstones, and the selkie stiffens, the whites returning to her eyes.
Other heads appear along the barricade, their faces ashen—nearly lifeless.
Kressa pulls out the first tail, and a selkie gasps. She pulls herself along the barricade and whispers, “You found it.”
Kressa holds it out like a piece of fine silk and lowers her head. “I’m sorry for what I did to your friends.”
The selkie’s gaze darts over her shoulder and lands on me. It returns to Kressa, and the selkie nods. “You did what you thought you had to do.”
Kressa lowers the tail to the selkie, and she sinks into the water. She resurfaces with a smile, the color restored to her face, and flicks her tail, disappearing into the depths.
Pulling the tails out one by one, Kressa mutters an apology to each selkie before returning their tails. Tears threaten my eyes, but I smile. Watching her interact with them with such respect, such gentleness—loosens a knot in me.
To her, they aren’t vermin.
She glances over her shoulder. “How do you honor your dead?”
The final two tails rest in the bag, and I swallow at the sight of the charred scales. “We spend a night on the water, sleeping beneath the stars.”
She nods and turns back to the selkie. Carefully, Kressa spreads the tails on the surface of the water, the scales catching moonlight. She whispers something under her breath. The selkie’s eyes widen, and she nods.
Another selkie rises to the barricade. Princess?
Yes?
I have a message from your mother. One that I’ve been trying to share for a few years, waiting until we found you.
My stomach flips. I’ve sent countless messages to my mother via the sea, but never received a response. I can only assume the curse stopped the message from being delivered. Or disappointment outweighed her love.
I step forward. What is it?
She said she’s sorry, for everything, and she loves you more than you know. And that one day, you’ll understand why she did what she did. You’ll know why she had to promise your hand in marriage.
My knees weaken, legs threatening to collapse. I swallow, hard. And although her words ease my hurt, I’m not sure I’ll ever understand how a mother forces her daughter to marry.
And the war? I say. Did she say anything about that?
A shadow crosses her eyes. We were evacuated from the front. We—we’re losing a lot of soldiers. But last I heard, reinforcements are being readied.
Guilt pierces my heart, but I shove it aside. Reinforcements? From where?
She bites her lip. The Earth Court.
My gaze swings to Kressa, and I furrow my brows. The Earth Court was dismantled a decade ago, and as far as I’m aware, Terra hasn’t granted a new ruler with power. Powerless reinforcements will be useless against Caelus’s aerial armada and his wielders.
I turn back to the selkie. If you see my mother, tell her I’ll be at the warfront in a week.
Her eyes burst wide. How?
The trial you were subject to? I’m going to win and break this curse. Then I’ll join you with my crew.
She nods and tilts her head in Kressa’s direction. What do I say about her?
Her? I pinch my lips and shake my head. Nothing. She’s irrelevant.
The selkie narrows her eyes. But you’ve exchanged power. And she—
I close off the pathway. Kressa has nothing to do with my power or my court. “Don’t mention her to my mother.”
She slinks into the depths. The wind whipping through the city has subsided, casting a sense of calm through the air.
“Ready?” Kressa asks, folding the empty bag under her arm.
I nod and say a silent goodbye to the selkies.
We turn from the edge of the water, and a tail slaps the surface. “Thank you, Your Highness,” a selkie whispers.
My blood turns to ice, and my breathing halts. I don’t dare turn and acknowledge her—to respond to a title Kressa doesn’t know I have. Can’t know I have. But judging by the blank look on her face, she didn’t hear.
I relax my shoulders and tuck my hair into my hood.
We’re silent as we make our way back along the boardwalk. I open the door to her mind, and knock.
Hers opens for me.
You didn’t have to do that, I say.
Her gazes slides to me, the golden flecks in her eyes brilliant despite the dark night. I wanted to.
I pull my lower lip between my teeth. Thank you.
I close the pathway before she can say anything else—before she senses the way my power urges me to her, begs me to close the distance between us.
And how tempted I am to give in.