26. Rowan
Rowan
“Everything is going to be okay,” Milo told me, and my heart seized in my chest.
“No!” I yelled, launching myself toward him, desperate to stop him from doing what he was about to do. I wasn’t fast enough, and he disappeared beneath the surface before I could reach him.
Hands pulled at my clothing as I pushed my way to the ledge, ready to jump in after him.
“Don’t be foolish, human. The goddess will protect him. I can’t say the same for you,” said Milo’s grandmother.
I didn’t have the faith in their goddess that they did. I couldn’t trust anyone or anything to keep him safe. The man I loved was in danger, and I’d get him out myself.
I yanked out of her grasp, only for more hands to grab at more clothing.
“Stop him,” Et’el barked, and then even more hands were grabbing at me.
I couldn’t pull free from them all, but panic had me thrashing in every direction as I attempted to anyway. “Milo!” I called for him. “Let go of me!”
A white head of hair broke the surface, but it wasn’t him. A terrified looking woman quickly scrambled up onto the little space that remained in the boat.
“The Aarlinuk!” she sobbed. “They’re here. One had me. He said he was going to eat me. I thought I was going to die, but Milo stopped him.”
My throat closed. Air evaded me entirely as I thrashed twice as hard. These Aarlinuk, orca people Milo had called them, were enough to terrify the selkies. They threatened to eat them for fuck’s sake. It told me all I needed to know. Milo was in very real danger.
“Please.” My voice escaped me, rough and broken. “Please, I need to help him.”
“Trust the goddess. She wouldn’t—” Et’el tried again. I didn’t care.
“I said let me go!” I screamed louder. I didn’t care about any goddess. Only the man under the surface who had taken my heart with him.
The popping of stitches didn’t bother me as my clothing started to tear from how hard I was pulling against the many hands restraining me.
“Get him away from the edge,” Et’el ordered.
Inch by agonizing inch, the hoard of selkies pulled me further away from the ledge, and I sobbed as I used all the strength I had to fight against them.
“Stop it, human!”
“No! Milo!” I gasped.
“You cannot help him!” she snarled, standing in front of me, blocking the path while her people refused to let me go. “The Aarlinuk are top of the food chain in the water, even more than you humans with your tools and inventions. If you jump into that water, you will be less than useless.”
“I don’t care. I can’t leave him alone!”
Et’el sighed. “You would really put your own life in danger just to help him?”
“Yes,” I answered without hesitation.
“Even if the odds of dying were far higher than succeeding?”
“Yes,” I answered again immediately. “I can’t live if it isn’t with him. If he dies, I die.”
Et’el gave me a scrutinizing look.
“Please,” I cried, tears streaming down my face, mingling with the cold sweat that had broken out all over my body. “Please, let me go. I don’t care if it’s dangerous. He shouldn’t face it alone. I need to help him.”
“Aanaa?” asked one of the selkies holding me down.
“I see your bond, Rowan. I understand your feelings,” she said, her voice softening.
“You are his mate, and that is deeper than life and death.” Hope blossomed in my chest and the tension eased as I prepared for them to release me so I could get to Milo.
“But I know my grandson,” she continued.
“And I know he would never want his mate in danger. I’m sorry. You cannot go to him.”
Hope was dashed, and pure anguish replaced it. “No!” I screamed, and my voice carried over the surface of the water, my chest colder than the ice it echoed off. “Milo!”
I couldn’t exist without him. Not for a single day.
Not a single hour. Not even a single minute.
He was everything to me. I didn’t care how much danger it would put me in if it gave him even a fraction of a better chance at surviving.
If all I could do with my life was ensure he could live his, it would be more purpose than I ever could have dreamed of.
But I couldn’t help him, they wouldn’t let me.
I didn’t give up. I pulled and fought. Each selkie I managed to push away from me had two more replace them, until my legs couldn’t withstand the force and weight and they buckled as I was pushed to the floor of the boat.
Dozens of white-haired strangers held me down and still I fought them, harder than I’d ever fought for anything ever before.
Milo was all that mattered. I needed to get to him.
I was so pathetically useless here. What good came from being his mate if he still had to face danger on his own?
Every second I was away from him was one that some unknown threat might take him away from me permanently, and I was powerless to do anything about it.
“Please, I’ll do anything. Please!” I begged, but Et’el’s mind was made up. I cried. Sobbed. Wailed. The sound of my grief poured from my lips, and I didn’t care to stop it. I didn’t care about anything but Milo.
What was happening beneath my boat? My mind blanked with fear as I considered it. He’d been gone for too long. What was he supposed to do against a group of predators? “Milo!” I roared.
“Rowan?” he answered, and bodies started rapidly shifting off me. “What in all the seas is going on here?”
Where was he? I needed to get to him. I scrambled to my feet as quickly as possible, my height over all the selkies letting me spot him at the edge of the boat, right where he’d disappeared from me.
I sobbed again as I lunged for him, and this time, no one dared to stop me.
Then his cold, wet body was in my arms, and I held him as if I could crush our forms together into one, so he’d never be able to go where I couldn’t follow him again.
“What happened?” he asked as his arms circled me to hold me back.
“I thought I’d lost you,” I whispered.
“I told you to trust me,” he responded, voice muffled by my chest.
“Never leave me again.”
“But—”
“Never.”
His arms tightened around me. “Alright, I won’t.”
For long minutes, all I could do was hold him.
My body was so large, and that had always bothered me, but right now I was so grateful for it, because I was large enough to be a shield for him against whatever would try to hurt him.
I wished I were even bigger, so I could cover him up completely and stop any bad thing from ever reaching him again.
“This is really nice, but I need to tell everyone the plan. Can we continue this later?” he asked, sounding content. Sounding safe.
I didn’t want to let him go at all, and I certainly wasn’t letting him drift out of arm’s reach, but I eased up on the bear hug enough to look down at him.
His nose and cheeks were pink from the cold, but his smile was as bright and warm as always as he beamed up at me.
For as long as I could remember, I’d been just like an unmoored boat at sea: lost, drifting aimlessly, thrashing around in an endless storm.
I’d been ready to sink. And then came Milo.
He was a beam of light, the beacon from a lighthouse, ready to guide me out of the storm and to a home I’d long given up hope of ever finding.
One he filled with warmth. He was my home.
“If you’re quite done, Rowan, we’d very much like to hear what your mate has discovered,” said Et’el from behind us. I’d completely forgotten we were surrounded, but I didn’t care. I’d claim him in front of anyone. Everyone.
Milo’s smile widened. “She called me your mate.”
“You are my mate,” I told him.
He squealed, bouncing up onto his toes so he could claim my lips, and I met him eagerly.
“Milo,” Et’el huffed, though when we turned to look at her, she had a smile on her lips as she watched us. “There’ll be time for that later.”
“And more,” he chuckled, offering me a wink before turning back to the group, all watching us with far less affection and amusement than their queen. And given the circumstances, I guess that made sense.
“They’re going to help us,” Milo declared proudly.
“Who is?” another voice asked.
“The Aarlinuk. They’re going to help us take down the poachers.”