2. 2 #2
I let out a slow breath, tension bleeding from my shoulders as her words settle deep. She’s right. She’s always been, even when I am too stubborn to admit it.
I glance down at her hand on the throne, steady, unshackling, and for a brief second, I remember the way we used to cling to each other in the wake of nightmares after my fathers death. In the hollow ache of grief.
“I know,” I say at last, my voice barely above a whisper. I allow my tail to unfurl, the weight in my chest sharpening into purpose. “But I cannot sit here waiting for answers. Not anymore.”
Nyx drifts beside me, her expression already narrowing into focus.
“I need to find her,” I continue. “This . . . Sarah Fischer. If she is tied to all of this; if even a thread of my father’s magic runs through her, I have to reach her before anyone else does, and demand her to relinquish it back to the kingdom, where it belongs.”
I don’t manage to swim halfway to the council doors before Nyx’s voice stops me in my tracks.
“No,” she whispers, but it lands like a dropped blade between us.
I turn to her, frowning. “No?”
She does not back down. “Orion, I know what Velmira said. I heard every word, but you cannot trust a land-dweller with this.”
There’s something in her voice, not just caution, but fear. And beneath it, memory.
“She may have your father’s magic, yes. But she is not one of us.
You cannot bring her here, to our world.
You do not know who she is. You do not know what she is capable of.
” Her jaw tightens. “You were not there when they tore my clan apart. When they hunted us beneath the sea like sport, destroyed our home, and polluted our waters as if we were nothing.” Her voice softens, but only barely.
“You are the king now. You cannot afford to gamble with our future. There has to be another way.”
I meet her eyes, the same eyes that occasionally shine bright with fire and laughter, now shadowed with the weight of what the surface stole from her. I glide closer to her, lowering my voice, not in anger, but in understanding.
“Nyx, I know what they did. I have not forgotten. I never will.” Her gaze flickers, but she holds it.
Always unflinching. “I do not trust land-dwellers either,” I admit.
“I do not like that this is happening. That a stranger, someone who has never swam the depths of our waters, has stolen something so powerful, something his. But whether we want it or not, if she holds even a sliver of his magic, then she will be brought here to answer for her crimes.”
She looks away, jaw tight.
“I can feel it,” I murmur. “Not just in the prophecy, but in me. There’s a pull. Like a current I’m not supposed to fight. Like his magic is calling to me.” I pause, grabbing the back of my neck. “And I have never felt anything like it before.”
Nyx’s eyes meet mine again, searching for answers in my words.
“I need to know what this all means,” I admit. “For the kingdom. For my father. And maybe for something else I cannot name yet.”
She stares at me for a long moment, the silence between us thick with memory and unspoken fears. Then, finally, she exhales deeply. “You always were stubborn,” she mutters, though there is no real anger in it.
A small smile tugs at the corner of my mouth. “You would know.”
She shakes her head and finally looks away, gaze fixed on the chamber doors. “If you are going to do this, then I am coming with you. I do not care what Velmira’s vision shows, if there’s danger ahead, I will not let you face it alone.”
I place a hand gently on her shoulder. “No,” I say firmly. “I need you here.”
She opens her mouth to protest, but the look I give her offers enough—she knows too well that she cannot argue.
“If this prophecy is real, if the tides are turning like I think they are, the kingdom will need steady hands. Eyes that see what I cannot while I am gone. I trust no one more than you to hold the line.”
She hesitates, torn between duty and instinct. “You would leave me behind?”
“I would leave you in command,” I declare. “Not because I do not want you with me, but because I need to know home is safe.”
She pauses for a brief moment before nodding slowly. “Then I will guard it like I guard you,” she says, as her hand closes into a fist over her heart.
My private chambers breathe with the ocean.
The open archways carved from coral frame the endless dark around the palace, currents brushing against the smooth stone floor with a slow, deliberate pull.
Bioluminescent flora spirals up the support pillars, spilling a soft, green-blue glow into the surrounding gloom.
It is quiet here, deceptively so, but the water is never still, not in a place this deep.
I coil near the largest arch, scales brushing the currents, and look out into the vast expanse of Virellan below.
Towers shaped like shells and spires of carved reef stretch in silent grandeur, rising into the dim, distant shimmer of the surface, hundreds of fathoms above.
Here, in the depths, the palace feels both eternal and isolated, suspended in the shadowed pulse of the ocean.
I close my eyes, letting my hydro-senses reach into the surrounding currents. The kingdom trembles with uncertainty, whispers of prophecy and fear threading through the water. My subjects feel it. So do I.