‘OK, then I have to wear it.’ Cursing softly under her breath, Meri put it on. It was a little loose for her finger, just right to drop off. That would be a good start, wouldn't it, losing the first thing she had been given?
Rayne saw her problem. ‘Hmm, we’ll have to get that adjusted. I was guessing your size. You are smaller than I thought.’
Meri stretched out her hand. The ring looked very out of place on her usually bare fingers.
‘You’ll get used to it. Think of it like a wedding ring. You’re now pledged to Atlantis.’
Meri twisted the stone so it faced outwards. ‘Are we really Atlanteans, like in the legend?’
Rayne smiled. ‘A good question with a complicated answer. The myth of Atlantis grew many accretions over the years, like barnacles on the original foundations. It is similar to the stories that grew up around King Arthur, who, if he ever existed, was not the Medieval king that storytellers made him into for their own times, but a leader in post-Roman Britain.’
‘And if you scrape back the barnacles?’
‘Yes, there was an ancient civilization on an island, and yes, you are related to those people.’
‘Cool,’ Meri murmured. The ring really was beautiful. You can do this, Meri, face these people and don’t lose the one thing you’ve been given to look after.
The car stopped under a portico and a footman in blue livery rushed to open her door.
‘You’re sure you’re ready to go in?’ asked Rayne.
Meri shook out her skirt and straightened her shoulders. ‘Yes.’
‘Then follow me.’
They climbed a short flight of steps, passed through a hall, and through an archway that gave onto an interior balcony overlooking a courtyard. A crowd of finely dressed people mingled on the tiled floor below, serving staff weaving between them with trays of drinks and canapés. Violin music came from somewhere, haunting and beautiful. Meri felt a twinge of panic, akin to stage-fright. In a second, they were all going to turn and look at her.
‘Wait here a moment,’ said Rayne softly. She signalled another footman at floor level who tapped the shoulder of a young man dressed all in black. He put his drink down and walked briskly up the steps leading to the balcony. The interval gave Meri time to take him in. This had to be Rio Cruz, the regent, the one she had usurped. He certainly looked the part. His suit was expensive with just a few accents at pocket and lapel to show it was designer; his shirt was black silk, no tie; his shoes polished to mirror-shine. With his dark hair brushing his shoulders, he looked like a tall column of obsidian and showed no sign of cracking as he gave her a shallow bow.
‘Miss Marlowe. Enchanted to meet you. I’ve heard so much about you.’ He retained his Spanish accent when speaking English which she had to admit was very attractive.
‘Mr Cruz?’
He nodded. ‘Shall we?’ He offered her his hand.
‘Er…?’ She wondered if she was unwittingly committing herself to something by taking it.
‘Put your hand in mine. I’m about to introduce you to the assembly.’
‘Oh. Thanks.’
‘It is my duty.’ He turned her so that they both stood at the stone rail of the balcony. A bell rang and all voices ceased. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I announce the arrival of Miss Meredith Marlowe, claimant for the throne of Atlantis.’
A scattering of applause rippled through the crowd and Meri tried to smile.
Rio held her hand tightly, pressing the diamond ring into her finger so that it hurt. ‘Her claim will be tested tomorrow, but tonight, I hope you will all make her very welcome. Thank you.’ Speech over, Rio gestured to the waiters to continue serving and the hidden orchestra to start playing again. He dropped her hand.
‘Short and to the point. Now what do we do?’ Meri asked, loosening the ring from where it had pressed into her flesh. He was handsome, she supposed, with the burnt sugar brown eyes framed with thick black lashes that many girls sighed over. She could see how Derwent would assume she would fall for Rio, but then, he had also thought she’d like the pink gown. She just hoped Rio wasn’t expecting her to swoon at his feet too.
‘We pretend to exchange pleasantries and give the appearance of getting on well. That will please the council.’ Rio took two glasses from the waiter who approached. He handed her one. ‘Salud!’
‘Cheers.’ She took a sip and winced. Champagne—very dry. Frankly, at this point of the day, she’d prefer a cup of tea and some slippers. ‘So, um, how much warning did you get that I was on my way?’
‘Not much.’ He tossed back his drink and grabbed another.
‘It’s put you in an awkward position. I’m sorry.’
‘Your claim has still to be verified.’
An alarm bell rang in her head. ‘Yes, I suppose it has.’
‘You don’t have any training to be our leader, do you? Not like me.’
‘I’ve no idea what it all entails but I’ll try to learn.’
‘And while you’re blundering about learning, I’m still next-in-line, regent if you are absent.’ He grimaced and flicked at her gown. ‘What Disney princess did you borrow that monstrosity from?’
Ouch. So he wasn’t even going to pretend to play nice. If he thought he was going to send her running from the room with junior school insults, then he could think again. ‘And when’s the bank job exactly?’
‘What job?’
‘The heist. You’re dressed like one of the crew from the recent Ocean’s Eleven remake. What’s your role? Will you crampon your way up the outside of the building, Rio the Human Spider, or do you just get to drive the getaway vehicle?’
‘Got a mouth on you, haven’t you?’
‘What were you expecting, that I’d wither under your disapproval?’
‘You shouldn’t be here.’
‘I am. So deal with it.’
He drained his glass. ‘Puta de Peligroso,’ he muttered, flashing her a fake smile.
‘Hijo de perra—and yes, I do speak Spanish, enough to know what you said. My teacher made sure we were prepared for rude people.’ She handed him her full glass and set off down the steps. There had to be someone here who wouldn’t savage her within seconds of meeting. Rio had revealed something interesting, though, that her relationship with Kel was widely known. Peligroso, was the Spanish word for Perilous. He’d called her their whore—ironic when she was mortally afraid of going too far when she touched Kel. And her reply: that he was the son of a bitch, in the literal sense of a big female dog with teeth and claws. It was a lesson she needed to learn.
Meri, you’re entering a jungle. These folk are predators and scavengers, not allies, even though they are wearing silk and satin. She tipped her chin up with determined pride. She had no choice but to attempt to be the biggest beast among them.
Midnight passed before Meri got a chance to go to bed. Rayne fetched her from a circle of young people, who had all been too sycophantic for Meri’s liking. The prime minister handed her over to Leah. With a few words about the next day’s arrangements, she left for her own residence. Meri had already worked out her prime minister didn’t enjoy social evenings like this one, which worked in her favour as far as Meri was concerned. She was already tired of the fake friendship on offer.
‘Enjoyed your evening, miss?’ Leah guided her through the palace with confident steps. Despite being designed on an older vision of architecture, it was so very shiny and clean, like the headquarters of a multinational corporation rather than a home. Meri realized, of course, that had been the state of the original buildings of the ancients when turned over from the builders to the first occupants. She only thought of ruins as weathered and dusty because that was how archeology found them centuries later.
‘It was…interesting. Where are we going?’ asked Meri. She hopped out of her sandals and walked bare-footed.
‘To the apartment the regent allocated you as claimant.’
‘Ah, the dungeons then?’
Leah was surprised in
to a smile. ‘You didn’t like Señor Cruz?’
‘Oh, we got on like a house on fire.’ One that burned right down to the ground with no survivors.
‘The rooms are the set normally given to VIPs. If your claim is verified tomorrow as we all expect then you’ll move into the royal apartment.’
‘And let me guess who is occupying that at the moment? Señor Cruz?’
Leah nodded.
‘Great. Another reason for him to hate me.’
Meri found nothing to complain about in her suite for that night. Her bedroom was decorated to the height of elegance with pale blue and cream furniture and a bed curtained with white net. Owls were woven into the mesh. Was this a nod to Athena, the Greek goddess, as the owl had been her symbol? Had she been part of the old Atlantean culture too? The coldness of the marble tiled floor was relieved by carpets woven to an abstract design which included many bands of peril in their scheme. The wavy lines reminded Meri of ripples on the surface of a calm sea. She wondered who had made them. The bathroom was huge, bigger than the whole of Theo’s flat in Wimbledon. She could’ve moved a family of five in there and not felt cramped. Her sitting room was set out as if it had been arranged for a photoshoot. The white leather sofa gave reluctantly under her when she tested it, the glass-topped coffee table displayed books of landscapes and seascapes that she knew she would enjoy looking at later. Someone had even thought to include an easel, canvas and paints by the window, all brand new and not a speck of mess. If she did open any of the tubes, she’d soon change that. Intelligence on her likes, dislikes and hobbies had clearly gone into more detail than just her relationship with Kel.
‘Do you have everything you need, Miss Marlowe?’ asked Leah after she had unzipped the back of the pink gown.
Not while she didn’t have Kel. ‘I’m fine. Oh, Leah, before you go, I don’t suppose you know how they test my claim, do you?’
Leah shook her head. ‘No, miss, but I wouldn’t worry about that. It can’t be too bad. Try to get a good night’s sleep.’
Meri ran her fingers over the silk pyjamas that had appeared on her bed. Where were all these clothes coming from? ‘Do you know when there was last a full-blood Tean here in the palace?’
‘Twenty years ago—some years before the Flood.’
‘They were building it even then, before this area became an island?’
‘You’ll have to ask Dr Caspian. I think the Tean royals were based here to keep an eye on the archeological exploration out to sea. When the Jerez region became an island they took it as a sign that it should become a separate state, and made it their new HQ.’
‘And Aragon and Castile have let them get away with that?’
‘They’re too busy fighting each other to worry about us. Goodnight, miss.’
Leah closed the door. Meri changed into the pale blue pyjamas and walked to the double doors of her bedroom. They led out to a balcony shared with her sitting room. It was chilly, but nowhere near as cold as London and the Atlantic. Opening a door, she breathed the air, taking in the scent of the nearby sea, the pine forests that surrounded the palace and the bitter tang of a bonfire somewhere. The palace was beautiful, there was no question about that, but it felt dangerous here, like walking on a glacier not certain of where the crevasses lay. She needed to know more or she doubted she’d outwit Rio and the others who opposed her presence here. They’d had years to prepare. She had to build her own power base or she would never be able to bring Kel home.
First item on the agenda tomorrow: request a phone and a computer. Kel had been gone for more than three days, Theo for much longer. If she didn’t get an answer to where they were, and whether they were all right, she would cut short her time here by her own choice. No duty to the Crown was more important than them.
6
While Valerie distracted the guard with her string of vulgar jokes, Theo discreetly tested the gate just to be sure. Damn: still locked. The walled garden in which they were allowed to exercise was really just a very beautiful prison yard: an acre of box hedge beds in geometric patterns, gravel walks and planting deep in its winter dormant phase. Pretending he hadn’t just been exploring their latest escape plan, Theo made his way back to Saddiq. His friend was sitting by the fountain in the middle of the knot garden. Water turned off so it wouldn’t freeze in the subzero temperature, the empty basin made a miserable centrepiece, the dolphin statue on a crash course with concrete. He tried not to make it a metaphor for their current predicament.
‘How are you doing?’ he asked quietly.
Saddiq stood with arms folded. A dandy in his normal dress, he looked odd wearing the clothes they’d been issued as unwilling guests of the householder. The only piece of him still in keeping with his usual attire was his diamond-studded eyepatch. That hid the scar of his missing eye, lost in a terrorist bomb when he was a child. He didn’t like to talk about that, though he was proud of his piratical appearance, enhanced by the long black hair brushing his shoulders. Standing with one foot on the basin edge, he reminded Theo of one of the smaller birds of prey come to rest, a kestrel perhaps.
‘I’m just planning another season in my “who to sue?” mini-series.’ Saddiq flashed one of his grins. Theo loved his friends. He couldn’t ask to be stranded with a better pair.
Theo rubbed the back of his neck, tension tight across his shoulders. ‘Yeah, me too. Sometimes fantasy keeps you warm when reality is a cold, cold bath.’
‘Trouble is, T-Mate, that I’m getting the impression these guys are a law unto themselves. It’s like their top guy—his flippin’ majesty Osun Waters—trumps all rules and regulations of our country. They act like the mafia. It makes me so furious!’
‘But they do live here—they have broken the law by keeping us against our will for a month. We must be able to get justice somehow.’
‘But it’s going to be our word against theirs, isn’t it? And who is going to be more impressive? In the blue corner, we have Osun Waters, reclusive but super-rich international businessman, backed by numerous associates swearing he's been nowhere near us. And in the red in more ways than one, Theo Woolf, impoverished arts fundraiser, and his equally insignificant colleagues with some bizarre story of kidnap.’
‘I’d take you over them any day,’ said Theo loyally. He worried, though, that Osun might decide they were simply too much bother. He didn’t know for sure that the people holding them wouldn’t balk at murder if it made their lives easier.
At that moment, Valerie gave a whoop of dirty laughter as she concluded what was in all likelihood a very blue joke. They had taken her colourful African print clothes but they hadn’t managed to dampen her character even when she was dressed in the dullest of dull jeans and a sweatshirt. She’d made the guard crack a smile too, a feat that Theo would’ve thought impossible. ‘Any judge would see that Valerie is so damn straight-forward, she makes a Roman road look twisty. They would believe her.’
Saddiq kicked at a loose stone on the fountain plinth. ‘We’d be ruined before we even got to court. You know none of us probably have any jobs waiting for us when his royal-pain-in-the-arse finally lets us go?’
‘Yeah, it’s not escaped my notice.’
‘And I still don’t get what they’ve got against Meri. The kid’s only eighteen.’
‘It’s a vendetta—doesn’t have to be rational to be real.’
‘Then I’m pleased she got away. I hope she stays away.’ Hearing the crunch of feet on gravel, they turned around. ‘Don’t look now, T-Mate, but we’re honoured with a visit from villain Numero Uno.’
Ade Waters was entering the garden with his sidekick, Lee Irving. They’d been classmates with Meri—that was before the whole ‘let’s-kill-an-innocent’ phase in their pathetic lives.
‘I wonder what this means,’ murmured Theo. ‘I hope it doesn’t mean they’ve found my girl.’
‘He would be smiling if that were the case. Should we lick his boots like everyone else or kick him up the arse?’
‘I vote the latter—if only we could get away with it.’ The one good thing about this prison was being with his friends. Saddiq and Valerie kept him steady with their irreverent sense of humour.
‘Something tells me two petunias like us will be looking for our teeth if we had a go. Let’s set Valerie on them. Hey, Val, we’ve got incoming.’ Saddiq waved at their friend.
Valerie broke off from her joke swapping session with the guard and strode over, reaching them just before Ade and Lee. ‘Well, if it isn’t Dumb and Dumber,’ she said in her deep voice that always reminded Theo somehow of home cooking and motherly hugs.
‘Miss Johnson, Mr Woolf, Mr Haaf.’ Ade stopped out of kicking range.
Saddiq rolled his eyes at Theo. ‘Damn: there goes another dream.’
‘Adetokunbo Waters, what can we do for you today? Seen the error of your ways and come to let us out?’ asked Theo, purposely using the young man’s full name to irritate him.
Ade folded his arms. ‘I’ve come to ask for your help.’
Valerie choked. ‘Did…did I just hear the boy right? That’s the best joke I’ve heard this year and I tell you, I’ve exchanged some pretty good ones with old Slate-for-a-face over there.’ She waved at the guard she had been cultivating on the grounds they’d need someone to turn a blind-eye when they made a break for freedom.
‘Can we take this conversation inside?’ asked Ade.
Theo shrugged. ‘This is your party, not ours. And by the way, have you got the memo that we really should’ve been allowed home from New Year four weeks ago?’
‘I know you love us all but, man, enough’s enough,’ said Saddiq, a satirical glint in his eye. ‘We’re really not that into you.’
Lee stirred, taking a step nearer Saddiq.
‘Try it, Big Boy, and you’ll see what I’m made of,’ jeered Saddiq, clenching his fists. Lee was tall and lean, but he was as mean as a rattlesnake. Theo knew his friend would lose miserably if he let his temper get the better of him.
‘Power down those rockets, Saddiq.’ Theo patted him on the shoulder. ‘The little boss wants to talk, so we’ll talk.’ No one else would call the six foot plus, broad-shouldered Ade ‘little’ but Theo could tell from the tightening of the jaw it annoyed him. That was good enough for Theo.
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