by Dee J. Stone
It is all right, my love, Damarian’s voice says in my head. He squeezes my hand. Do you trust me?
Of course I do. But I don’t trust that sea serpent. And the truth is, Damarian is kind of freaking me out right now. He has a look on his face, almost like he’s possessed by some force.
Cassila doesn’t move. She just floats there, waiting. For what, I don’t know, and I’m not sure I want to find out.
“Your kin is dead,” Damarian says. His voice…it’s never sounded like this before. It’s so strong I swear it can snap a slab of stone in half. And it echoes throughout the ocean so loudly I know it would make my ears bleed if I weren’t his mate. It causes goose bumps to form all over my body, and that’s odd because I’m in the middle of the ocean and am not supposed to get goose bumps.
“Surrender, Cassila of the sea serpents,” he continues. “You have lost.”
She laughs that sinister laugh and bares her fangs. “A sea serpent never gives up.”
“We are not fighting you,” Damarian says. “You will yield to us. You will break the connection you have with Cassie.”
I gape at him. Is he serious? If it was so easy to negotiate with a sea serpent, we wouldn’t be in this situation to begin with.
Cassila swims closer, lowering her slender neck toward us until it’s only an inch or two from Damarian’s nose. “And what makes you think I’ll yield?” Her voice holds so much venom it makes my blood churn. “All I need to do is sweep my claw, and the two of you will be beheaded.”
Damarian doesn’t blink or flinch, just holds his ground. “No, you will not.”
She laughs again.
“Because from this point forward, you are weak.” He stretches his arms outward, and Cassila’s eyes fill with shock. I have no idea what’s going on until I feel my body growing. Larger and larger until it’s us looming over her.
“You do not understand the love I have for Cassie Price,” Damarian bellows, his voice causing tremors to pass through the ocean. “You do not understand the heartache I feel at the possibility of losing my mate. You are nothing but a filthy beast that derives enjoyment by torturing others.”
Cassila hisses and tries to slash her claw, but Damarian flicks his arm and her claw freezes above her head. She hisses again as she tries to move it, but it’s like it’s being held by invisible manacles.
“Our love knows no bounds or limitations,” Damarian continues, moving over Cassila, who shrinks back. “I shall have a future with Cassie Price. We will share many moons together. You cannot stop it. You cannot change what is sealed in our future. She and I will be together for all eternity!” He yells his last sentence, and more tremors pass through the water. A hint of fear flashes across Cassila’s face, but she shakes it off and tries to pounce on us. But with each move she makes, Damarian stops her. It’s like she’s a tiny ant fighting against a human. And it looks like Damarian wants nothing more to do than squash her with his tail.
“We have experienced so much together!” Damarian continues. “The bond we share is like no other. It is deep, made of intense, eternal love. It cannot be broken easily. Not by you and not by any creature in the sea!”
For a second, it looks like Cassila shrinks away, as though Damarian’s proclamation of his love for me is actually hurting her. But then she releases a thunderous roar, and her claws shoot outward, breaking through the invisible shackles. She then thrusts out her claws, and the next thing I know, Damarian and I are thrown backward.
When my back hits a wall of rock, it feels like my spine has snapped. I try to cry out, but I’m in so much pain I can hardly open my mouth. A bright light nearly blinds me, and then I feel myself being launched toward the surface.
***
I wake up to the beautiful feeling of the sun kissing my skin. I moan softly, but I don’t open my eyes because I don’t want this to end. When I turn my head slightly to the side, something grainy touches my lips. Sand. Another moan leaves my body. I’m on the beach, and it feels so good.
Laughter in the distance. At first it sounds like a million miles away, but as the sleep completely leaves my body, I recognize it as Damarian’s. My eyes snap open and a large smile captures my mouth. I scramble to my feet and am about run to him, to let him sweep me in his arms and spin us around and tumble to the ground as we kiss each other’s faces off. But every single one of my organs slides out of me and lands in a puddle by my feet. Damarian’s arms are wrapped around another girl.
Knowing my eyes have to be screwing with me, I march closer until I’m only a few feet away. My vision turns blurry and my chest slices open when I see the way his golden head dips toward her lips. Her beautiful, sleek, long, dark brown hair flows behind her like a silk cape. It flaps around them like it’s cocooning them in a nest of love.
They giggle as they whisper romantic things in each other’s ears. Their lips touch like every kiss is sacred. Every caress is its own world and brings with it what looks like the most mind-shattering sensations.
I fall to my knees as tears burst out of my eyes. “Damarian.”
They stop nuzzling and twist their bodies toward my direction. Even though my vision is blurry, I can see the expression on Damarian’s face. Nothing but pure disgust. Pure revulsion. Pure hatred.
And now I get a good look at the girl’s face. Queen Flora.
He presses his lips to her temple, his eyes holding nothing but love for her. My chest feels like a block of wood. I clutch it as I try to breathe. I can’t.
“Damarian,” I choke out.
“What is it you want?” he practically spits, venom rolling off his tongue.
I manage to regulate my breathing somewhat. At least enough for me to get to my feet and move a little closer to them. “What are you doing?”
He puts his hands on her waist and gives her a passionate kiss. “What do you want, human?” he asks again in that same tone.
My hand is still clutching my heart. “Why are you doing this? You’re hurting me.”
Fury flashes across his face. He gently deposits Flora on the side and stomps over until he’s only a few inches away from me. “I am the one hurting you? What of the pain you have caused my family and me? The pain you have caused little Zarya? It is due to you that she will be disadvantaged for the remainder of her moons!”
It feels like he took the sharpest knife in the world and rammed it in my heart, over and over, twisting and turning. A fresh wave of tears pours down my cheeks. “That…that wasn’t my fault,” I say, my voice trembling.
“How do you stand before me and claim it is not due to you?”
“Damarian, please.”
“The day I arrived on land is the day I shall regret for all eternity,” he says, his voice cold. He lays a gentle, sweet hand on Flora’s cheek. “It was her wish to tear us apart, my love. But she cannot keep us from each other. Our love knows no bounds. It is for eternity.”
“Stop!” I yell. “Stop saying those things to her! You don’t feel that way about Flora. You feel that way about me!”
“What nonsense does she speak, my love?” Flora asks Damarian.
“You ran away from the ocean,” I tell him. “You ran away from her. Because you don’t love her. You never have. You love me!”
He storms toward me until his nose almost touches mine. “It was your wish that I do not take the crown!” he shouts. “That is all I yearned for all my life—to have the throne. To return the crown to where it rightfully belongs. But then you seduced me—”
“Seduced you?”
“—and have left my beautiful mate alone! But you shall no longer tear us apart, human. Do you understand?”
“Damarian, what are you talking about?” I beg, desperately looking between him and Flora. I want to grab him by the shoulders and shake him until he stops saying these awful things. “You’re mated to me. Me.”
Flora laughs. Her voice is so musical, so beautiful. “Mated to a human?” She laughs again. “They indeed have the brain capacity o
f an infantfish.”
Damarian chuckles, too.
“Damarian, please,” I whisper.
“Why do you not return to your love, Kyler of the Emerald Clan?”
“What?”
Flora laughs again. “Is he not still banished by my father?”
Damarian grins. “Indeed.”
“This isn’t like you,” I say. “What’s happened to you?”
His face flashes with fury again. “How dare you claim to know me?”
“We were together. We slept together. We mated.”
Flora looks like she wants to wrap her hands around my neck and squeeze until my head shoots off. Damarian releases a disgusted noise. “A grave error. One I shall regret for the rest of my life.” The back of his index finger strokes Flora’s cheek. “My first mating should have been with you.”
I shut my eyes and slam my hands over my ears because I can’t bear to see or hear any of this. “Stop,” I mutter. “Stop it!”
“What means must I execute to rid you once and for all?” Damarian grumbles. “My mate and I have journeyed here for she wished to explore land. We do not wish to be bothered!” An evil look fills his eyes. “Another shark attack perhaps? Is it your wish for me to slay more humans?”
My hands slowly slide down my face. “K-Kayla? It was…it was you?”
He smiles proudly.
“But it was a tiger shark. Tiger sharks don’t serve your clan.”
Flora juts out her chin. “Just as a human to utter such absurd words. All serve the king, you silly human.”
I dab at the tears seeping out of my eyes, but they’re never-ending. “Why would you kill an innocent little girl?”
Damarian shrugs. “The shark was hungry. I allowed it to feast.”
I fling myself at him and bang my fists on his chest. “You bastard! You don’t mean any of that!”
“Release him at once!” Flora yanks on my arm, but I shove her away.
Damarian tries to pull me off him, but my fists are strong and fast. He loses his balance and we crash to the ground. Tears shoot out of my eyes and splash all over him. “You killed an innocent little girl!”
“You injured Zarya!”
“It was an accident! You know it was! You told me you don’t blame me for it.”
“I said no such thing!”
“Release him, human!”
“What’s wrong with you?” I cry. “Why are you with Flora? You promised yourself to me forever. You love me.”
“I can never have any love for such a vile creature.”
That’s all it takes for me to lose it. I yell and slam my fists into his chest and curse him out and throw sand on him. I’ve lost my mind. Damarian grabs me by the waist and shoves me down on my back, knocking the air out of me. His eyes are raging mad. And yellow.
Yellow.
I stare into his eyes, his eyes that are always a beautiful shade of dark blue, like the deep ocean. But they are not that color right now. It looks like those eyes belong to…
A sea serpent.
“What is your wish to do to her, my love?” Flora asks.
Damarian’s chest heaves as he tries to regulate his breathing. “I do not know.”
I frantically examine my soundings. We’re at the beach, the one I’ve been going to since I was a kid. It all looks real and familiar, the same sand, the same waves, the same rocks in the distance. But none of it is real.
“Damarian.” I grab his arms. “Damarian, this isn’t real!”
He yanks himself out of my clutch. “Unhand me.”
“No.” I crawl onto his lap, pushing aside his hands that are trying to stop me. I take hold of his face and force him to look into my eyes. “This is all an illusion. Cassila is playing mind tricks on us. We need to snap out of it.”
“I told you to unhand me!”
“She’s trying to tear us apart by turning us against each other. It’s the only weapon she has. She knows how much we love each other and how strong our bond is. She knows she’s no match for that. So she’s trying to tear us apart.” I grab his shoulders again. “We can’t let her do that. Damarian, you need to believe me!”
His eyes are still yellow. And his face holds the same repulsion.
“None of what you think is true,” I say. “You were promised to Flora since you were a kid—a fry. But you didn’t love her. You tried so hard to please your father, but you wanted to experience love.”
“Do not listen to her!” Flora yells.
“You washed up on shore because you were running away. I saved you. I brought you to my house and woke you up. We were both so scared and confused, and then you turned into a merman and my whole life turned upside down. Both of our lives have. Ever since that day, it’s been one big rollercoaster ride. But that’s what makes our bond so strong. Because despite everything we’ve been through, our love for each other has only strengthened. You love me, Damarian, and I love you. For all eternity. And no one is going to take that away from us.”
He blinks at me, his entire body frozen. After he blinks another two times, his eyes return to their deep blue color. He slowly rests his hand on my cheek. “Cassie,” he breathes. “My beautiful Cassie.”
A bright light shines in my eyes, and I once again feel like I’m being launched in the air.
Chapter Twenty-One
We’re back in the ocean in my mind, facing Cassila once again. We are still much larger than her, maybe even more than before. She hisses.
“Nice try,” I say.
Another hiss.
“You wished to destroy us,” Damarian says. “You wished to take my Cassie from me. But you will never destroy us. You will never take my Cassie from me.”
“A monster like you could never understand what love means,” I say. “You can try to play with our minds, but you can’t mess with our love. No weapon on this world can fight it.”
She swoops forward and tries to slash our faces, but Damarian and I, once again getting bathed in that dark silver glow, hold out our hands, forcing her to remain in her place. She tries to fight us, but we have her in a tight lock. I realize now that no amount of physical harm can hurt her. It’s all about the mind, the emotion. That’s the key to cutting her from me.
Damarian must understand this, too, because he says, “Our hearts, bodies, and souls will always beat as one. Even when we are no longer together in this world. The bond shared between us is one you cannot touch or see. It is one you can only feel. But it is more profound than any other object in the world.” His eyes narrow at Cassila. “And try as you might, you can never destroy it.”
My eyes must be playing tricks on me, because it looks like Cassila is shrinking.
“A creature like you could never understand what love means,” he continues. “And that is the reason you and your kind must be eradicated from the sea and from land. The world cannot sustain beasts as yourselves. Be gone, you filthy creature!”
No, my eyes are not playing tricks on me. The sea serpent in front of me is shrinking. I don’t think she’s even five feet tall anymore.
“Be gone!” Damarian says. “For as the love between Cassie and I grows even stronger, you grow weaker.”
Our hands grip each other’s as tightly as possible. “Because our love for each other knows no bounds,” we say together. “Nothing in the world can destroy it.”
She shrinks smaller and smaller, falling toward the ocean floor. Because we’re so big, I can’t see if there’s anything left of her. When I squint, I make out a black object buried in the sand. “Damarian, what’s that?”
The glow starts to disappear from around us. He loosens his hold on my hand, and we swim to the object. I feel my eyes pop open. It’s a black egg with a tint of blue, green, and gray. “An egg,” I say.
“She is not completely gone,” Damarian says. “But the connection between the two of you has been severed. She will no longer be a threat.”
I stare at him. “How do you know?”
H
e blinks and gets a faraway look in his eyes. “I am not certain. I just…know.”
My hand closes around his wrist. “What we just did…that was beyond the physical. Beyond this world. Because we’re supposed to be together. Forever.”
Damarian envelops me in his arms. “For all eternity.”
***
When I open my eyes, two pairs of eyes stare down at me, all the color of deep blue. I blink a few times to get my vision into focus and realize the two people are Syren and Kyle. I’m no longer in my mind, but back in the ocean.
“Cassie,” Kyle says, his voice filled with relief. “We didn’t know what to do. You and Damarian just fainted.”
My gaze moves down my body. I’m lying on the surface of a flat rock. Damarian lies beside me, his eyes shut tight. Syren’s eyebrows are creased with concern.
“Damarian.” I try to sit up, but every part of me feels heavy. Kyle helps me to a sitting position. I blink a few times again to clear my head. Why is Damarian still unconscious? Is it because we drew on his energy? I remember how he bathed us in that dark silver glow. That must have taken up a lot.
I grab hold of his shoulders. “Damarian! Please wake up.”
Fiske, who I now notice is by his side next to Shoney, nudges his head into Damarian. But he doesn’t budge.
“No,” I nearly cry. “This can’t be.” Not after everything we’ve been through. I peer closer at his gills, only to find them not moving.
“Don’t you dare die on me!” I shout. An electric pulse shoots out of my hands and enters his body. He jerks a few times and then his gills start to expand and contract. “Cassie,” he rasps.
“Damarian!” I throw myself on him and hug him tight. “Don’t you dare scare me like that ever again.”
Both Syren and Kyle help Damarian sit up, though it’s hard because I refuse to let go of him. Damarian presses sweet kisses to my temple, murmuring over and over how much he loves me.
“I am very glad the two of you are well,” Syren says. “But may I ask what has occurred?”
I look past him to the sea serpent floating a few feet away. Jace. He’s still guarded by the jellyfish and Guards. He looks close to death.