21. Chapter 21
Chapter twenty-one
TAVRIC
I barely had time to register the pain of Ethel’s knife slicing through my arm before I stumbled into Lyri and fell back into nothing but air.
Even worse, Lyri was falling with me.
I’d had her. She’d been safe in my arms for only a precious few moments, but then…
What had I done?
I’d killed us both. And in those few moments of free fall, all I could do was try to get a hold of Lyri while I lamented my own stupidity. She deserved better.
The impact came, but instead of pain and nothingness, I found myself submerged in water. The tower room was gone, replaced instead by the ocean that held us in its embrace. Luckily, I had the wherewithal to keep hold of Lyri, and I kicked hard toward the sunlight shining through the water.
Our heads broke the surface and Lyri coughed and gasped.
My head whipped around, searching for danger, but there was nothing but swells rocking us back and forth, so I brought my attention to sweet Lyri.
I cradled her cheek in my palm, frantically searching every inch of her face to reassure myself that she was alive.
“You’re all right. You’re all right,” I babbled, and then bound her up in both of my arms. My legs churned beneath the surface to keep us afloat as I clung to her.
“I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry I couldn’t get to you sooner.
I came through the portal with you, but he had the knife, and you had no strength. ”
Her breathing was still panicked and wheezing as she held on to me with shaking arms. “We’re back,” she muttered amidst rasping coughs.
“Just breathe slowly,” I told her, trying to pull my mind from the torment just enough that I could help her. “We’re safe now.” I leaned back so I could look at her, keeping my arm firmly anchored around her waist. “Are you hurt?”
“Harlan is dead,” she choked out, the horror in her voice matching the horror in her eyes.
“I know, love. I’m so sorry…for everything. Now, please, are you hurt?” I didn’t think she knew just how vital that question was to my well-being.
“No, I don’t think so.” She was starting to calm, her breathing becoming less harried and her eyes less frantic. Then she started to wilt.
“You’re still fatigued,” I said as her body sagged against mine. “You healed my father, Lyri,” I said with wonder and thanks.
“Did I?” she asked as she rested her head against my temple. “Is he well?”
“Yes, love. He’s going to live because of you.”
“Good, good…but are we?”
“Are we what?”
“Are we going to live? We’re in the middle of the ocean, Tav.”
A shot of terror pulsed through me. She had a point. But I pushed my worry aside. “We just have to find the boat. It should be close by.” Though how far it had drifted was anyone’s guess. I strained to look around, and pain lashed across my abdomen. Air hissed past my teeth as I winced.
Lyri pulled back, suddenly alert. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s nothing,” I lied.
She looked down and pushed back so she could see my torso beneath the waves. My shirt was shredded. “You’re bleeding!”
I was, yes. Ethel’s knife had not only cut my arm, but had sliced across my ribs. “It’s not deep. I’ll live,” I gritted out, exerting myself to keep us both afloat as the pain set in. It was a good thing I’d spent so much of my life in the ocean and treading water was as easy as standing.
“Hold still,” she said, reaching for it.
“No!” I said, catching her hand before she could touch the wound. “If you sing, it will open the portal. We have to get away from it first.”
“But you’re bleeding!” I could see her spiraling into a pit of fear.
I cupped her cheek and made her look at me.
“I won’t risk us going back to that tower. Hold on to the back of my shirt. I’ll swim us away and then…I’ll let you heal me.” I hated saying those words. I hated the thought of using her in that way, especially when she was still not recovered from saving my father.
“Fine,” she conceded, no doubt realizing that a little cut was not worth a potential trip back through the portal.
She maneuvered around to my back, and I marveled at the trust she put in me. She looped her hands under my shoulders so that she wouldn’t choke me, and I had to hope she had enough strength to hold on.
My mind flashed through everything that had just happened. We’d fallen from Lyri’s tower. The portal had brought us back here. Harlan had betrayed me in every way imaginable and was now dead. Lyri’s aunt was a more terrible human being than even I had imagined and was utterly unworthy of Lyri.
To be fair, I was unworthy as well, but at least I knew how incredible she was—and it had nothing to do with her magic.
I swam hard, pulling us through the water. With every movement, I gritted my teeth and choked down a groan, breathing through the pain.
“That’s far enough,” she insisted, and I felt her grip slip.
I stopped and turned so that I could hold her up. “I’ll be fine. I don’t want you to waste your strength.”
“You won’t be fine, and neither will I!” She grabbed hold of my chin and forced me to look at her.
“I can’t swim, Tav, and that means I need you.
I need you to be strong enough to get us to the boat and sail us to shore, and that means you need me to heal you.
So stop being stubborn and let me work!” The way her eyes sparked with fiery frustration made me love her just a little bit more.
“You’ll be even weaker,” I pointed out, terrified that she might lose consciousness again.
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Of course it matters.” I craned my neck around to look for the boat. “Where is it? AGH!” A searing pain ripped through my torso as she shoved a hand over my wound and sang.
Just let me heal you.
Please, I have to know you are well.
The sensation of her healing power rushing through me took my breath away. It was like nothing I’d ever experienced—a sweet agony as my flesh knit itself back together, and then the euphoria of relief when the pain was gone.
She stopped singing, and I breathed in wonder.
“Wow,” I sighed. “That was extraordinary.” I put a hand to my ribs and found that there was no searing pain, no pinching, not even an ache.
Even more extraordinary, my arm had been healed as well.
I brought Lyri into the circle of my arms and hugged her, then pulled back and looked in her eyes, grateful that she did not look any weaker or more tired than she had before.
“Thank you, sweetheart.” I placed a gentle kiss on her mouth.
When I pulled back, she was crying. “Thank you for coming for me.”
“I always will.”
She nodded. “But I don’t want to do anything like that again. Ever.”
“Never.” It was all I could say because the fear was still too fresh. I’d been so close to losing her. Then I looked around again, still not seeing the boat, and realized I still might lose her. There was no boat, no ship, no help in sight.
But there might be help out of sight, I realized. How did one summon a mermaid? I did the only thing that came to mind. I put my face into the water and yelled, “Help!”
“What are you doing?” Lyri asked as I lifted my head from the water.
“A mermaid helped me earlier. Perhaps one of them will help again.” I could hear my own lack of confidence.
Her eyes were huge. “A mermaid?”
“Yes. She helped me to find you and the portal.”
“She… But… I thought you had to have magic to go through the portal. An actual mermaid really helped you to—”
A head appeared above the water and I jerked away, startled, pulling Lyri with me.
“Peace, Prince,” the young lady said with calm surety as sunlight glinted off her blonde hair. “We’re here to help.”
“You’re a mermaid.” Lyri stated the obvious, awed as we both gaped at the mermaid, mesmerized by the glow of her pale pink tail that beat back and forth close to my own legs. I doubted I would ever get used to magic, no matter its form.
The mermaid smiled. “Of course. My name is Neeah, and I’m glad to see you well, miss,” she said to Lyri.
“Me?” Lyri blinked in confusion.
“Yes, you.” The mermaid glided closer to Lyri and put a hand out to support her, making it easier for me to stay afloat. “When you first came through the portal, we would have helped you, but you were fortunate enough to be dropped practically on top of a ship.” Her eyes sparkled as she said it.
“I don’t understand,” Lyri breathed.
Saskia appeared beside Neeah, startling Lyri again. “We all came from Branfrie,” Saskia told her.
“All?” Lyri gaped.
“Yes, all. There are many of us who were made for these waters.”
I looked at Lyri. “You didn’t tell me there were mermaids in Branfrie,” I said.
“There aren’t,” Lyri responded.
Saskia smiled. “She’s right. There aren’t. We’re made here.”
What was she talking about? “Made here?”
Saskia nodded. “When we are dropped in these waters, we cannot survive as humans.”
I nodded. Of course they couldn’t.
“But if you surrender to the ocean,” Neeah continued, “your magic will save you. The portal doesn’t want us to die. It put us here so that we could thrive in our own world.”
“So if I hadn’t been found…I would have turned into a mermaid?” Lyri asked.
“That’s right.”
My head was spinning, and Lyri looked even more off-balance than I did with the onslaught of information.
“We try to give everyone a choice though,” Saskia assured us.
“What kind of choice?” Lyri asked.
“If ever we find someone like you—someone like us—we tell them this: If you want to stay with us, all you have to do is breathe in the water and your magic will do the rest. I’ll pull you under, and we’ll be your family.
But if you don’t want to stay with us, I’ll take you to land.
” She tilted her head at me. “But I’m guessing you don’t need the choice. ”
Lyri smiled, allowing Neeah to support one arm while the other was wound tightly around my shoulders.
Despite her fatigue, she was trying awkwardly to help us stay afloat by kicking her legs.
I wasn’t sure if it was helping or hindering, but I loved that she was trying.
I needed to teach her to swim, and soon.