Chapter 19 Tula
TULA
The ocean stretched before Tula, endless and blue, the morning sun turning the waves into shifting diamonds. She sat on the cold stone bench, her hands clenched in her lap.
Hope and despair warred in her chest, making it hard to breathe. Wonder had promised to save her. Annani had promised to try. But both had made it pretty clear that extracting four people was nigh on impossible. The complexity was staggering. The risk was too great.
Areana removed the earpiece and put it in the hidden compartment in her purse. "Your sister will come through for you, Tula. And mine will come through for me."
"I hope so." Tula looked at the waves crashing on the rocks below—the same rocks that would supposedly claim her life when the time came to stage her death.
If it came to that.
Her hand drifted to her belly, where her child grew with each passing day. Four months now. Soon, she wouldn't be able to hide it.
Desperation was cold, she realized. The child inside her was warm. Desperation was death. The child was life.
"We can't just wait for them to figure out the impossible," Tula said, her voice breaking the silence that had fallen between them. "We already have a way out. The tunnel. Navuh's submarine cove."
Areana didn't look at her, her gaze fixed on the horizon where the sun climbed higher. "No."
"Why not?" Tula twisted on the bench to face her.
"It's perfect. We wait in the cove where the submarine is parked.
The clan sends divers to extract us from there.
No staged suicides, no complicated plans that might fail.
We just go, and our disappearance would remain a mystery.
In fact, I'm surprised that you didn't tell Annani about it. "
Areana's fingers tightened around the ribbon she'd pulled out and started embroidering. "It won't work."
The flat certainty in Areana's voice made something hot flare in Tula's chest. "You don't know that. You caught us before we could even try—"
"I saved you from making a catastrophic mistake, and you know that, so don't pretend like you don't." Areana finally turned to look at her, and there was something almost pitying in her expression.
"You wouldn't have been able to activate the submarine because you didn't have the code, but the truth is that you wouldn't have even gotten that far.
Did you forget about the surveillance cameras? "
"We didn't forget. We planned to cut the wire supplying the cameras with electricity. Tony and Elias saw it when they explored the cove during the power outage."
Areana laughed, but there was no humor in it. "That would trigger an immediate alarm. Tula, even I know that severing power to security cameras doesn't just make them stop recording. It sends an alert to the security team. Within minutes, guards would be swarming the tunnel to investigate."
Tula frowned. "Neither Tony nor Elias said anything about an alarm going off."
Areana laughed again. "Are they experts on surveillance equipment?"
They weren't, but neither was Areana. "You can't know that for sure."
"I do." Areana stood, walking over to the cliff's edge where the morning breeze caught her long, pale blond hair and sent it streaming behind her. "I asked, and I got answers."
"So, what are we supposed to do?" Tula pushed to her feet and walked over to stand next to Areana. "I can't accept that Tony and Elias and Tamira will be trapped here forever while I escape alone."
"I didn't suggest that." Areana's profile was stark against the blue sky.
"All I'm saying is that the cove plan won't work.
The clan will devise something better. They have the experts who take every little detail into account.
They would never assume that cutting an electrical wire would be enough to disable the surveillance cameras. "
When she said it like that, Tula felt stupid for not realizing that and not pointing it out to her friends.
She'd been so thrilled about the prospect of escape that she hadn't been thinking.
But then she didn't have any experience in such matters.
Tony had, though, and he'd thought that cutting the wire would do the trick.
Perhaps Areana was wrong? Or maybe she didn't want the clan to know about Navuh's submarine.
It was his escape vehicle of last resort, which was valuable information to his enemies.
Tula searched Areana's profile for any hint of deception. "Maybe you just don't want to use that route because it would reveal that Navuh has a submarine and a way to escape this island if the clan attacks and wins."
Areana's head snapped toward her, and Tula could see the flash of anger in her eyes. "You think I'm protecting Navuh's secrets?"
"Aren't you?" The words came out sharper than Tula intended, edged with all her fear and frustration. "You always protect him. Maybe you're not as committed to this rescue as you claim."
The goddess rarely showed anger, rarely let her composure crack, but now fury radiated from her in waves.
"Selfish," Areana said, her voice low and trembling. "You're being so selfish, Tula. Thinking only of yourself without considering what this will cost others."
"I'm trying to save my child, my partner, and my friends!" Tula shot back.
"What about me?" Areana turned to her fully now, the morning light catching the unshed tears glistening in her eyes. "Have you given a single thought to what helping you will cost me? What it will do to my relationship with my mate?"
Tula opened her mouth, then closed it. She had thought about it, but in the abstract, not really considering the full implications.
"Do you know what Navuh will do when he discovers your escape?
" Areana continued, her voice gaining strength.
"He won't just shrug and move on. He'll investigate.
He'll want to know how you got off the island, who helped you, and whether there are traitors in his midst. And when four people disappear at once?
He'll tear this place apart looking for answers. "
"But if we stage my suicide like Carol—"
"Your suicide might be believable," Areana interrupted.
"Pregnant, desperate, throwing herself off the cliff—yes, Navuh would accept that.
But four people? There is no scenario where four people vanish or die together without raising massive suspicion.
And every investigation will eventually point back to me. "
Tula felt her anger deflating, replaced by a cold knot of dread in her stomach. "He loves you. He wouldn't—"
"He might spare my life," Areana said softly.
"But only if he doesn't succumb to rage and kill me on the spot.
The truelove mate bond ensures he'll always love me and need me like he needs air to breathe.
But love and forgiveness aren't the same thing, Tula.
If he discovers I've betrayed him, helped you escape, lied to his face for weeks.
.." She turned back to the ocean. "He'll never trust me again.
He'll never look at me the same way. Every moment of happiness we've shared, every bit of intimacy and understanding we've built over five millennia—it will be poisoned by this betrayal. "
Tula's throat tightened. She'd never heard Areana speak this way.
"He might even lock me away," Areana continued, almost to herself now.
"Not in the harem—somewhere worse. Somewhere I'd never see sunlight or feel the wind.
Or he might keep me close but distant, loving me because the bond demands it while hating me for what I've done.
Can you imagine that, Tula? Being bound to someone for eternity who loves and resents you in equal measure? "
Tears were streaming down Tula's face now, hot and shamed. "I'm sorry. I didn't—I wasn't thinking—"
"No, you weren't." Areana's voice was gentler now but still edged with pain.
"You're scared and desperate, and I understand that.
But you're not the only one making sacrifices here.
I'm risking everything I have—my relationship with my mate, my safety, my happiness—to help you.
The least you can do is trust that I'm not trying to sabotage your escape. "
Tula sank back onto the stone bench, her legs suddenly unable to support her weight. The reality of the situation was a suffocating force. Areana was risking so much. Annani had promised to try but couldn't guarantee success.
She was going to have to leave Tony behind. Tamira. Elias. All of them.
"I'll have to go alone, won't I?" The words came out as barely a whisper. "That's the only way this works. One person staging a suicide. One person that the clan can extract."
Areana returned to the bench and sat beside her, close enough that their shoulders were touching.
"We don't know that yet. The clan might devise something creative, some way to extract all of you, but you need to be prepared for the possibility that you'll be the only one who escapes. At least initially."
"Initially?" Tula looked at her through blurry eyes. "What do you mean?"
"It means maybe Tamira can stage her own suicide in a few years. Once the turmoil from your disappearance has died down, once Navuh has stopped investigating. If we space the escapes out, make them seem unrelated, it might work."
Years. The word echoed in Tula's mind like a death sentence. Tamira would have to wait years for her chance at freedom, while Tula escaped with her child.
"I can't even tell them, can I?" Tula said. "Tony, Tamira, Elias—I can't tell them what we're planning because they can't know about your communication with Annani. They will think that I really jumped off the cliff and died."
Areana nodded. "That's how it must be."
"So, what am I supposed to do?" Bitterness crept into Tula's voice. "Pretend everything is fine? Keep talking about the possibility of our impossible four-person escape while secretly knowing I'm abandoning them?"
"You're not abandoning them. You're saving your child." Areana took her hand and squeezed it gently. "You wouldn't go without them otherwise. I wouldn't have risked it otherwise either."
Fresh tears spilled down Tula's cheeks. "It still feels like betrayal. I'm choosing my baby over them."
"Being a mother means making impossible choices.“ Areana’s voice echoed her own losses, her own sons taken from her arms. "It means putting your child first, even when it tears you apart. That's not selfishness—that's survival. That's love."
Tula thought of Tony, how he looked at her with such devotion, such hope for their future together. How would he react when she died? Would he mourn her? Or would he suspect the truth?
And Tamira—her friend, who'd offered to take Tula and Tony along on her own desperate escape attempt.
Who'd been planning it for weeks or even months with Elias, dreaming of freedom and finding her own child, who had been taken away from her over a century ago.
How could Tula look her in the eye, knowing she was about to leave her behind?
Areana was quiet for a long moment, her gaze distant. "You need to act distraught, hopeless, which shouldn't be difficult since that's how you feel. That will make your suicide believable."
"That part will be easy." Tula let out a bitter laugh. "I already feel that way. It's the guilt that I will have a hard time erasing from my expression."
"I know." Areana's arm came around her shoulders, pulling her close.
"The more believable your despair seems, the more convincing your suicide will appear.
And the more convincing it appears, the better chance we have of eventually extracting the others.
If Navuh accepts your death without question, if there's no investigation that might uncover my involvement, then maybe we can use the same method again.
For Tamira first, since she has the most obvious reason to be depressed.
Then perhaps Tony, grief-stricken over losing you. "
"And Elias?" Tula asked.
"Elias is more complicated." Areana's expression grew troubled.
"He's valuable to Navuh. You, Tamira, and Tony, you are disposable to him.
That's why Elias must be the last. Navuh would for sure investigate his so-called suicide.
But that would be years from now. Your child will be a teenager by then. "
Fates.
The thought made Tula want to scream, to rage against the unfairness of it all. But what good would that do? Screaming wouldn't change the cameras in the tunnel or the guards on the island. It wouldn't make extracting four people any less impossible.
"I understand now," Tula said quietly. "Why you stayed when Carol offered to take you. Why you refused to leave even though you had the chance."
"Do you?"
"You couldn't risk Navuh's wrath. Couldn't risk what he'd do to everyone here if he thought you'd chosen the clan over him. You stayed to protect us. If you'd left, he would have torn the harem apart looking for accomplices, for anyone who might have helped you. Many would have died."
"No." Areana's voice was barely audible over the sound of the waves. "I stayed because I love him. I stayed because leaving would have caused more harm than good. Because sometimes the cost of freedom is too high, not just for yourself but for everyone around you."
"And yet you are helping me."
"Because your escape, if done right, will do more good than harm."
"I'm sorry," Tula whispered. "For accusing you of protecting Navuh's interests and not thinking about what this might cost you."
"Apology accepted." Areana stood, brushing dust from her silk gown. "Use your guilt constructively instead. The better you perform your role, the safer everyone will be."
"Tony, Tamira, and Elias will be devastated."
"Better devastated than dead." Areana walked toward the narrow path that led back to the harem. "Come. We've been gone long enough that people might start wondering."
Tula followed, her mind spinning with everything they'd discussed, trying to process the reality of what lay ahead.
She would escape. Alone. Leaving behind the three people who'd become her allies, her friends, her fellow conspirators. They'd think her dead. Mourn her.
There was still a slim hope that the clan would come up with something brilliant that would make the impossible possible.
Tula clung to that hope as she walked beside Areana, even when the rational part of her mind whispered that counting on miracles was foolish.
But what else did she have?