“What’s in there?” I ask, curious.
Bran produces a key. “The royal garden.” Then he grins and leans close. “Very exclusive.”
“In that case, I’m honored to have been invited.”
He swings the door open and extends his hand inward, allowing me to enter a place few people have visited.
Immediately, I suck in a startled breath. “I’ve never seen one, not outside of paintings.”
“They prefer cooler weather,” Bran says, admiring the Eldentimber tree in the center of the garden. Its leaves are gold, and they shine in the dancing light of the walkway’s urns. “But our gardeners are very talented.”
It’s a massive tree, ancient. I itch to paint it, to catch its likeness on canvas, but now is not the time.
Slowly, I realize we’re quite alone, which I’m afraid was Bran’s intention.
“Bran…” I begin, trying to pull away.
“Elodie,” he says in a teasing tone, though there’s a catch in his voice.
“Why prolong the inevitable?” I ask, searching his face. “We will never work.”
To my astonishment, Bran does the unthinkable—still holding my hand, he sinks to one knee, kneeling in front of me. My heart stutters, and my mind goes blissfully blank with shock and heartbreaking longing.
Bran meets my eyes, his face sincere but not solemn. “The morning you washed up on our shore, you turned my life upside down. Before you, every day was the same—every day lacked hope. Before me was a future I didn’t want, a future I didn’t believe I was strong enough for.”
I blink several times, knowing deep in my heart I have no choice but to turn him down.
“But now, for the first time, the thought of ruling doesn’t fill me with anxiety. Instead of a prison, I see a home. A place where we can build a family, ruling together, taking care of our people and seeing them grow.”
I begin to shake my head, but the king of all Triblue smiles, undeterred by my initial reaction. Quieting my protests, he produces a ring from his pocket. It’s beautiful, gold set with a perfect pearl, sparkling with diamonds and aquamarines. It’s a ring suited for the Queen of Triblue. “Elodie…will you marry me?”
My heart breaks, shatters into a million pieces.
“Bran…” I whisper. “Your people will never accept a mermaid queen.”
Undaunted, he cocks his head, studying me. “I’m afraid they’ll have no choice. I don’t want another girl—I refuse to choose anyone other than you. Yours is the only name I will give at the gala.”
“But Bran…”
He stands, seeing my struggle, and pulls me close. “I love you, Elodie. Only you, always you, for as long as we both shall live.”
“That might not be long.”
“All the more reason to cherish every day we are given.” He sets his forehead against mine. “I can’t do this without you.”
“You can.”
“I don’t want to do this without you.”
Softly, I say, “If I were a human girl, if circumstances were different, I would answer without hesitation.”
“But?” Bran’s voice is heavy with anticipated rejection.
I can’t do it. I can’t turn him down—even though I know it’s the right thing to do.
“Let me think about it,” I whisper.
He tilts his head back, meeting my eyes, and presses the ring into my hand. “Promise me you’ll truly consider it?”
I clutch the band in my palm and loop my arms around his neck, brushing the short ends of his hair with the very tips of my fingers. “I promise.”
“Swear.” His breath caresses my skin, and he teases my lips with his.
“I swear—I will consider your proposal.”
Finally, our lips meet. It’s a sweet kiss, tinged with frustration and want. I put my heart into it, trying to show Bran it’s not for lack of love that I must walk away.
He’s just tugging me closer when someone clears his throat from the entrance of the deserted garden. We break apart, startled, and find Dristan standing by the gate. He wears the strangest look, one full of confusion, disbelief, and maybe even fear. I slowly step away from Bran.
“What is it?” Bran demands.
“There are half a dozen men on our shore—they appeared from the depths of the sea and walked right onto the beach. They’ve demanded we release Elodie.” The younger prince’s eyes turn on me. “I can only assume he means Elle, but I wasn’t aware we were holding her captive.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Elodie
By the time we reach the shore, my stomach is in knots. The new arrivals have gathered an impressive crowd despite the late hour—one that only parts once Bran’s knights ride ahead of us.
Bran begged me to stay behind, safe in the castle, but I will not hide. No one questions my presence by Bran’s side, though I get a great deal of wary looks from the king’s men. Whispers are surely spreading about my connection to the newcomers that materialized from the sea.
Taller than the growing cluster of people atop my mare, I spot the men standing on the shore. Aristos is at the head, tall and strong, and just seeing him freezes the anger, turns it to ice in my core. Lyden stands beside him, expressionless. Croissin is nowhere to be seen.
Aristos’s eyes lock with mine, and his stance softens. I ride Firefly onto the beach before I realize there’s no way I can dismount while clinging to my dignity. Instead of humiliating myself, I sit atop my mare.
“You’re alive,” Aristos says, holding his hand out to me. “I worried when the link broke…”
But I don’t reach for him. “You lied to me—told me you charmed the bands with an illusion only.”
Pity shadows his face, making me want to slap him. “Elodie—no. Croissin deceived us both. He exchanged my rings for a previously charmed pair. He was testing my loyalty.” He holds my gaze. “So he could challenge me.”
In proof, Aristos produces a pair of matching silver bands from a pouch at his side. They shimmer with a true illusion spell, something I immediately recognize as Aristos’s work.
Confused, I accept the rings for inspection. I was so sure…
“I would never hurt you, Elodie,” the merman swears softly. “Never.”
“Where’s Croissin?” I ask as I turn the rings over and over in my hand.
Aristos looks at the ground, his handsome face lined with anguish. He takes a moment before he meets my eyes once again. There’s pain etched on his face—true sorrow. “When he found me on the beach, he was livid. He knew I deceived him with the rings. Even though you knocked me out, he realized I helped you escape. He banished me, sent me away from Isle Milayle.” He steps forward, his eyes earnest. “But I couldn’t let him hurt you, even if you can’t be killed. I went back. For you, I challenged him.”
I glance at Croissin’s men—his five knights, but their expressions don’t so much as flicker in the dim firelight of the beach.
Aristos steps closer to Firefly and takes my hand like he did when we were children. “I’m sorry, Ellie. He’s gone.”
I stare at him for several seconds, waiting for his words to make sense. “You killed him?”
The merman clenches his eyes shut, and then he gives me a stiff nod.
I sit, stunned, remembering the young man I used to look up to when I was a girl, the one who dared me to swim past the reef, the one I thought myself in love with. For several moments, I allow myself to mourn that boy in my memories.
“And now it’s finally safe for you to return home,” Aristos says, bringing me back to the beach. “That’s why we’re here. To free you from your human captors.” He shoots Bran a venomous look.
Still mounted as well, the king stays behind me, watching the exchange with a shielded expression.
“I am here by choice,” I tell Aristos.
His face softens, and he drops his voice. “You are safe now—I swear it. Come down from that horse and get behind me.”
“Aristos, I’m n
ot a prisoner.”
He steps closer, mindlessly capturing Firefly’s bridle. “I see the young king watching us with fire in his eyes. No doubt he’s made you believe he’s in love with you, but do not doubt that he wants you for your power. He will steal it from you as surely as Croissin did.”
“Bran’s not like that.”
Anger flashes across his face, bright and horrible. He clasps my arm, his fingers almost painful on my skin, and hisses, “They’re all like that.”
Bran breaks from his knights, kicking up sand as he rides to my side, and draws his blade. Pointing it directly at Aristos’s chest, he growls, “Unhand her.”
Slowly, realizing he’s hurting me, Aristos does as he’s told, and then he turns to Bran, his face twisted with contempt. “Is this how you welcome all your visitors, King of Triblue?”
“Only those who dare touch my future queen.” His words are loud, more a decree than an answer, and surprised exclamations ring out from the crowd.
Aristos looks at Bran, startled, and then his face becomes ugly, so different from the friend I remember from my youth. “And what do you think your people will say when they learn your dear queen is a mermaid?” He turns to the crowd as several people gasp. “Did you hear me, people of Triblue? Do you want a mermaid—a siren’s cousin—on your throne? A woman who is responsible for the storms and attacks that killed your loved ones?”
“Aristos!” I cry.
He whips back to me. “These people who you think care about you are snakes. You need to learn how quickly they will turn on you.”
And he’s right. The crowd is pressing forward, kept back only by the king’s guard and knights. Some are yelling now; it’s a riot in the making.
“You’ve twisted the truth, merman,” a rumbling voice bellows from behind the mass of writhing people.
The crowd parts in surprise, and there stands the ebony dragon, looking bored. People run from him, shrieking, acting as if he’s going to make a meal out of them if they linger.
Aristos’s eyes go wide, and he gulps.
“It was the girl’s magic that did the damage—that is true,” the dragon says. “But it was you who wielded it, wasn’t it?”
True fear cloaks Aristos. “It was my brother.”
The dragon sticks his snout in the air, sniffing like a dog. “I can smell her magic on you, clothing you like a stolen cloak.”
“Aristos,” I murmur, looking back at him, horrified—but not surprised. “Why? Why cause the storms and the needless destruction?”
The merman’s eyes move to me, and then he jerks his chin toward the crowd. “Because they deserve it. They live in their kingdoms like gods, doing whatever they please, to whomever they please. Too long we have hidden ourselves away when we are the ones who hold the power.”
“So this was your way of teaching them a lesson?” I demand. “Toying with them, destroying innocent lives to show them what we are capable of?”
His eyes turn to Bran, though his words are directed at me. “It is time they see we are not a people to be trifled with.”
“We are guilty of nothing but ignorance of your existence,” Bran says, narrowing his eyes at the merman. “If you are in hiding, it is your own doing.”
“I want peace for my people,” Aristos snarls. “I want them to live without fear that humans will hunt them like unicorns, mad with lust for our magic.” He steps toward Bran, practically shaking with anger. “I want the woman I loved—a woman one of your subjects stripped of magic and murdered—to live again. I want the man who hurt her to pay. But you can’t give me what I want, can you, Fledgling King of Triblue?”
“Cassia,” I murmur, nauseous at the thought.
Aristos whips his attention back to me, and his face contorts with horrible pain. “They killed her, Ellie! Do you not understand? He might as well have stabbed a knife in her heart!”
“Which is exactly what you were doing to Elodie!” Bran roars, taking the onlookers and me by surprise.
“She’s powerful, her magic untouchable,” Aristos says, his eyes wild. “The gimly saw it—she will rule for forty years. By my side.”
“Elodie, ride to Dristan,” Bran says.
The king’s voice is unusually cold, and my gaze goes between the two men. Tension grows on the darkened beach, becoming almost palpable.
“Bran—”
Aristos cuts me off. “Elodie will return with me, or I personally swear I will wipe out your entire kingdom and every living soul in it.”
“Aristos!” I cry, glancing at the multitude of angry humans. “What are you thinking?”
Judging from his arrival, it’s obvious he and his men have linked themselves to more women of my kind, but even with several, he is not capable of that sort of destruction.
He turns to me, suddenly calm. “I no longer require your magic for strength, Elodie.”
I can feel it in my bones before it manifests itself—an eerie chill that makes the hair on my arms and neck stand on end. And I’m not the only one who senses it.
The people of Saltwreath suddenly go quiet, spooked as a low, but shrill, cry drifts on the wind.
Firefly spooks, tossing her head and pawing the sand.
“What have you done?” I hiss at Aristos, appalled.
There’s only one way to access the dark magic—with life.
“He killed his brother,” Bran says, using Firefly to herd me toward his knights.
“Relinquish her, King of Triblue,” Aristos says coolly, a strange deadness cloaking his eyes. “Elodie is mine.”
“I am not yours,” I hiss, holding onto my poor, terrified horse’s reins.
Aristos pins me with his cold gaze. “You were to be my brother’s, and now you belong to me. We will reign together for decades, just as the gimly predicted. I don’t need your power—I will never again have a reason to steal it. You are safe with me. Always.”
And he believes it too. How long has he been dabbling with the dark and forbidden? Doesn’t he know what will become of him?
As hard as it is, I try to remember that he was once a man I trusted. “Please, don’t do this, Aristos. I too ache for Cassia’s loss, but you cannot reconcile a wicked act with more evil.”
Ignoring me, Aristos raises his hands, letting orbs of black swirl in his palms as he turns to Bran. “I’m not an unfair man. I’ll make a deal with you. Who will you protect? Your people? Or the girl? Because you can only choose one. Give me Elodie, and I will leave you in peace. But if you keep her from me, I will level Saltwreath.”
Bran and his men are already drawing their swords, others are pushing people back, yelling at women and children to run for shelter. Many scream at Bran, demanding he hand me over.
I can feel Aristos’s dark magic thick in the air, pressing against my skin like cold, wet hands of death.
“My men will fight,” Bran tells the mad merman. “And no matter your magic, you will lose. There are only six of you.”
Aristos laughs. “But will your men fight?” He turns to Bran’s knights and extends a hand toward me. “Will you risk your lives for the mermaid? Or will you urge your king to send her back to the sea, where she belongs, and avoid unnecessary deaths?”
Instead of standing with their king, Bran’s elite shift, uncomfortable. Slowly, one by one, they turn their eyes to Stuart. The king’s cousin stands near the front, watching with crossed arms.
“Sheath your swords if you’d like me to take the girl,” Aristos urges. “Save your people and your kingdom.”
“Send her back where she belongs,” Stuart says to Bran in a tone that sounds like a royal decree. “We don’t want her.”
One by one, Bran’s men sheath their blades, unable to look at their king.
Bran turns on them, livid. “What kind of men are you that you would sacrifice a woman to this darkness to save your own hides? We don’t protect our kingdom by bowing to evil when it presents itself—we fight it!”
Stuart steps forward, his eyes fla
shing. “She’s not one of us. How dare you ask your men to sacrifice their lives for a sea witch?”
Aristos laughs, delighted, and turns to me. “How quickly they turn.”
“I propose a marriage tournament!” a crystal clear female voice cries out from the back of the shifting crowd. All eyes turn to find the princess of Lauramore pushing her way through the writhing mass of terrified onlookers.
Pippa shoots an irritated look over her shoulder when she finally steps free.
“A marriage tournament?” Aristos says, incredulous.
The princess straightens to her full height and looks at the merman as if he’s quite simple. “It’s where men fight in events for a woman’s hand—”
“I know what a tournament is,” Aristos snarls, making Pippa smirk.
“Then why do you object?” she demands. “Do you not believe you could win?”
“You propose my men fight against Triblue’s? With Elodie going to the king of the winning team? No, I do not lack confidence in my skills. I lack confidence that the Fledgling King has anyone left to fight at his side.”
“I’ll fight,” Dristan calls from atop his white horse. He meets his brother’s eyes and gives him a single nod.
“As will I,” Galinor yells from the middle of the crowd.
“Oh, why not,” Irving says like we’re choosing teams for a game of cards. He grins at Bran, striding forward. “It’s taken him this long to find someone to love him—it would be a shame for him to lose her this quickly.”
“I’ll fight as well,” Archer calls from Galinor’s side.
Bran’s knights fidget, perhaps embarrassed for their lack of allegiance, likely realizing that since Pippa has saved Triblue from the inevitable war, their heads won’t be attached to their bodies for much longer.
“That’s only five to our six,” Aristos taunts. “Can you not find one more man loyal to your cause?”
“I’ll fight with King Bran.” Lionel, the dragon rider, materializes from the crowd, leaving people murmuring in his wake.
Elodie of the Sea Page 20