Chapter 14 #4
Helene’s arms stretched lazily before her in the gesture of dead saints as she summoned Yemi for an embrace. “Come, little fish,” she cooed in a dozen dark voices that bolstered Yemi’s instinct to flee. “You are no stranger here.”
The hands on Yemi’s shoulders hesitated before being lifted.
Judging by the expressions around the room, this had apparently been unexpected.
Yemi rose and made her way to the throne at a patient pace, one that spoke of her own royalty.
She was strong. She was poised. She was more than her rapid-fire heartbeat or the impulsive battering ram of her first impression.
The queen gestured toward an antechamber along the left side of the room.
Before Yemi could touch her, the queen turned away to head to the door now being opened for her.
Yemi did not immediately follow. She glanced back at the entrance, past the swarms of frowning onlookers to where Minevra remained watchful with her hands folded in front of her.
Yemi hoped she wasn’t the type to hold a grudge.
Once the queen passed the threshold, the doorman waited irritably for Yemi to do the same. She took a deep breath and reminded herself why she was here before going inside and letting the doorman shut the door behind her.
“You’re a rude creature, aren’t you?” Helene said in her hollow, booming voice.
The saintly facade was shed quickly, but that voice remained.
She took a position on the far end of the high-ceilinged, blue-walled room between ornate stone stacks that acted as the arms of a chair.
Her posture seemed to bow under the weight of her crown, her head dipped forward so far it seemed she was only being held upright by the will of her shoulders.
“My apologies. I meant no disrespect,” Yemi assured her.
“And yet.”
Yemi waited in tense silence for her to continue, but Helene stared flatly from hooded black eyes, either insisting or daring her to get on with it.
She swallowed the lump in her throat. “My mother, the Bear Queen Circe, is dead.”
“My sister’s daughter.”
“Yes.”
Helene’s spindly fingers thrummed thoughtfully against the stone. “We have not received her, the sea.”
Yemi frowned, confused for a moment. She’d always dismissed the Kept’s rituals as the busywork of idle elders. Apparently, the sea expected to collect its dead. She wondered now what it did with them.
“No, you wouldn’t have,” she explained. “She was poisoned. Turned to stone. Her body is still on the grounds at the palace.”
Helene stared, unblinking. “Then why are you here?”
Yemi wasn’t sure what she’d expected by way of a reaction, but it wasn’t a complete absence of one. “I—we… She wanted me to reconnect with the Mer side of our family.”
“ ‘Family,’ ” Helene repeated, as if that word, too, was foreign.
“Yes.”
“But why are you here?”
“I don’t understa—”
“If she wanted connection, she had her entire life to do it. You are here instead, after her death, trading your life to parade around in that costume the Mother Witch put you in, for what? To relay apologies for her failure? Tuh!” the queen scoffed, the corners of her mouth dropping suddenly as if she hadn’t meant to smile. “Why. Are. You. Here?”
Very well. Yemi sighed and set her jaw. She could be hard, too.
“My throne was usurped by a very anti-Mer contingent of our population, and I need your help to get it back.”
“No.”
“I’m sorry?” Yemi blinked.
“No.”
Yemi’s mouth fell open and she found herself having to close it repeatedly when words wouldn’t surface.
All of this effort, the pain of her transformation, half a world’s journey for a no?
She almost laughed as delirium set in. This would be the end of all things: her aspirations, her life ruling with Nova, what remained of her identity.
She would leave this chamber no more significant than the flecks of beings that gave the room light.
How easy it was to crush her entire existence, all on the wings of a no.
“ ‘Anti-Mer contingent,’ ” the queen said suddenly, biting the t’s in the words as if there was something delicious about them.
A smile twitched on her lips. “What is that? You mean my beloved sister, the Jewel of the Sea, the very heart of whimsy, failed so extravagantly to charm her way into the hearts of Men that even her granddaughter is shunned as an abomination?”
“Men are fickle in their allegiances,” Yemi replied, relieved at least that the conversation was still going.
All she needed was a reason, something she could counter.
Negotiate. “Arielle was a good queen. As was my mother. But you mean to tell me you’ve never heard of the Ixian wars?
My grandmother never returned, never spoke to you again after she left? Did you know I even existed?”
“Yes, we knew you existed. No being on the planet can be completely ignorant of Men’s tantrums. And no, Arielle never returned here.
She fled the responsibilities of her birthright.
Imagine being the custodian of your family’s legacy and leaving them and your people to suffer.
What reason would she have had to come back?
To flaunt her joy while we cleaned up her mess?
And here you offer us another mess. If nothing else convinces me you are hers, that reckless selfishness is unmistakable. ”
The familiar heat in Yemi’s chest began to grow the way it always did when the insults turned from her to her family. She tried not to glower. “Ixia’s new Harpy Queen is aligned with Ursla. She will become a problem for you, too, if we don’t unseat her.”
Helene drew herself up and breathed deeply, hands gripping tight the stacks of stone. Yemi thought the queen might strike her. “The sea will always remain!” she bellowed.
The swishing sound of someone entering behind Yemi startled her, and she turned to see Minevra with her permanent, polite smile nod her bow at the queen.
“Everything alright, Your Majesty?” she asked without so much as glancing at Yemi.
Helene sank back onto her pedestal. “It is,” she said calmly. “We’re done here. Whatever the customs in what was formerly your nation, Yemaya Blackgate, here our queens only entertain requests for war from kin, not strangers.”
Here she was, being denied again. “You are not my queen,” Yemi sneered.
“No. That girl on your throne is.” Helene smirked.
And now Yemi understood why she’d been stripped of her spear.
“You may stay in Abyssa as a tourist. But only because I cannot be seen exiling my own blood. It would be a defiance of the grace that separates us from the beasts who walk. You may consider it a gift.” Helene rose again, this time to signal Yemi’s dismissal.
“Take a day. Take two. But don’t take long enough that you convince yourself you are welcome here.
You are—as I have always been—on your own.
” She extended a long arm toward the door at the back of the room.
Seething over unimaginable defeat, Yemi turned to leave.
“Minevra, I leave her to your charge. If she slips your escort again, let the Hollow have her.”
The door closed behind them, and Minevra gave a satisfied sigh before smiling politely at Yemi and gesturing back up the hallway. Armed guards positioned themselves in front of every other tunnel behind her. “If you’ll follow me.”
“Where are we going now?” Yemi snapped.
“To your quarters.”
Yemi frowned, peering upward at the coral stalks to regain her bearings. She was certain Minevra intended to lead her back the way they’d come. “I thought it was this way. Where were you taking me before?”
“For questioning,” Minevra said plainly. “Her Majesty’s satisfied you are who you say you are, though, so there’s no longer any need for that.”
Yemi scoffed, relieved to have been right about something. “That right? You’re satisfied, too, then?”
“Thrilled.” She blinked. “But now that you’ve seen to your mission, you are welcome to rest before you’re on your way.”
Rest. Yemi chewed the side of her tongue in thought.
She’d been swimming for days and was now propelled by little more than aggravation and a mild headache.
But this journey couldn’t be for nothing.
She wouldn’t endure Ursla’s taunts on the trip back empty-handed.
What she had now was a little time to devise a plan, and she didn’t intend to waste it sleeping.
She would find a way to make this worth something more than a story.
She decided to try a more pleasant tone. “I can rest later. Her Majesty mentioned something about a tour?”
“I’ll be honest: I think she was being polite,” Minevra said.
“Well, it’s my first and only time in my grandmother’s homeland. I would like to see the whole of it properly.”
“I can do it.” A voice drifted from overhead, and Yemi looked up to see her persistent follower sinking toward them.
Up close, she was young, maybe Yemi’s age, with cheekbones high enough to rival Luzon’s and a perfect pillow of a mouth.
She already had a warmer disposition than anyone else Yemi’d met so far.
Minevra looked stunned for a moment, and then the furious chirping of unintelligible conversation pinged in Yemi’s ears as the two of them exchanged words not meant for her.
“This is my daughter, Lirik,” Minevra finally said. Yemi recognized the tone of a less-than-pleased parent.
Lirik tilted her head and gave a dimpled grin. “A tour seems appropriate, no? And I have nothing better to do.”
“That’s kind of you, thank you,” Yemi replied.
Minevra shifted her irritated gaze between the two of them. She appraised Yemi in silence, as if trying to suss out the risk of trouble her daughter might get wrapped up in. “You’re aware that you are something of a spectacle.”
“Quite.” Yemi smiled politely.
“And that traditionally, Her Majesty’s guests enjoy only her company, and the detail involved acts as a buffer between them and the masses.”
“We’ll be fine!” Lirik replied cheerily.