Water Games (Watergirl Book 4)

by Juliann Whicker

  Sean cut in. “To be honest, my wife hasn’t had time to seriously pursue her music for some time now. She’s been occupied with matters of state. While I’m rebuilding Terramore, I’ll rely on her for so many things that I couldn’t mention them all. She’s involved in charities and the constant need to establish representation for the underrepresented…” He turned to face me. “Her work will never be finished, however public it is.”

  There were a few more questions, but soon we were in an elevator, holding hands, me leaning on his chest while he held me around the waist.

  “There will be pizza in my room when we get back. You didn’t want to go out, did you?”

  I inhaled deeply, the scent of Sean and salt almost too much. “As the cleaver queen? No. I want to see Otto.”

  He stepped away to frown at me. “You can’t sing to him.”

  I nodded even though something in my stomach tightened. I wanted to sing so badly. “I won’t.”

  He hit a different button and with that we were going down instead of up. We came out in a broad hall filled with water held out of the elevator by a skin. We stepped through and swam down the hall, still holding hands. We weren’t going fast, just steady, and every time my leg brushed his, I’d glance over at him and notice the strength of his shoulders, the way his body cut through the water, as perfect as ever.

  “Are we going to sleep in your bed or on the couch tonight?” I asked the water making my voice blobby.

  He didn’t look at me. “You could sleep in your own bed.”

  I frowned and focused on swimming. Could I? “It’s bigger. You’d probably fit okay.”

  He turned to glance at me, a slight smile on his perfectly soft, pouty lips. “Since you’ll be leaving from my apartment tomorrow, you might as well spend the night here. The couch is uncomfortable.”

  “The bed then.”

  He looked straight ahead like he didn’t care one way or another. He did care. He wouldn’t have made a private elevator from my room to his apartment if he didn’t. I bit my bottom lip.

  “Sean, you didn’t have to do the elevator thing.”

  “I didn’t do it.”

  “You didn’t?”

  “No. I’m not really into elevators.”

  “You didn’t pay to put it in?”

  “No. My father did. It was his idea. Makes playing multiple roles simpler.”

  “Oh. Are you guys okay?”

  “You mean because he’s not currently threatening to kill you? Of course. We’re great.”

  I grabbed his arm. He turned and stared at me. We floated in the hall while I stared into his ridiculously beautiful eyes above those sculpted cheekbones. He was too beautiful. I shook my head and kept swimming.

  He didn’t say anything until we were at the end of the hall and on one side of the squishy glass, Otto on the other. Piper was with him, wearing an oxygen mask. Her voice came in sweet and clear and Otto answered her in a trill that gave me shivers. He was so beautiful.

  I turned to beam at Sean. “He’s okay. I know you sent me videos, but this is better.”

  There was a crash on the glass and I jumped, spinning around to see Otto sliding tentacles over the surface, his enormous swirling black orbs searching for me.

  “I take it he can hear you.” Sean frowned at me. “You’ll have to go in and calm him down. No singing.”

  He headed right, through a round opening that closed behind us. He signed me to take off my red dress. I stared at him and he gestured to the black assault suits that hung in a row. They were all woman’s suits. Were we in the woman’s changing room? Must be. I reached back for my zipper, but couldn’t get it before Sean was there, his hands pushing mine away, sliding over the back of my neck for a second before pulling down the zipper, slow, steady. He stopped and backed away.

  “I’ll let you figure out your own zippers. You don’t need a Soremni male to take care of you and your dress.”

  He left me there to finish dressing. I was still fastening up the wrists of my suit when he came back, dressed in his own black, bumpy suit. He looked so strong and practical. Like he could milk a brogge or fight a war.

  He swam ahead of me through aisles of the changing room until we got to a tunnel that went down and then came out into a brightly lit white tank.

  I followed Sean but had barely glanced around the enormous tank when Otto was there, sliding around me in happy circles. He crooned to me while I laughed and spun around, trying to keep up with him. He was enormous.

  “You’re all grown up! Are you happy here?”

  He trilled and touched my cheeks with his six blobby fingers. I caught his fingers in mine and beamed at him.

  “Do you eat a lot?”

  He trilled again and then dragged me across the hundred yard tank to show me his feeding area. It was nice. Lots of different kinds of fish floating in tanks. He let one out and it tried to swim away. He caught it and sucked on it before pausing to turn and hold it out for me. Aw, offering to share a wriggling fish.

  “No thanks, Otto. You eat it. Really. You need to get strong.”

  He finished sucking the juice out then dragged me away to show me his garden, an area full of waving kelp and brilliantly colored coral. He burrowed in the sand then shot up, sending bits all over. I laughed again and he came back to me, twining around me like a puppy jellyfish.

  We sank down into the sand in a happy pile. He started going through my hair, his goopy fingers tangling it while I lay cushioned against his squooshy body. I wasn’t supposed to sing, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t talk. So I did.

  I told him all about my time in Terramore, about the brogge and the kelp mardu, about Soremni Botox and afrateau.

  When I finished, he started singing, a song that made me close my eyes and think of the mardu waving beneath the glow of the nets.

  So I didn’t end up sleeping in Sean’s bed. Nope, I fell asleep with Otto instead.

  I woke up to blaring horns in Otto’s little garden. He was staring at me, just staring. Slightly creepy.

  “Did I fall asleep? I’m sorry. Your song was beautiful.” I ran my hand over the bell of his head, my fingers sliding along the squishy pale skin of him. There was a silver scar where he’d caught shrapnel for me.

  “Thank you,” I said, petting him gently. “You saved me.”

  He stared at me for a long time before bumping my forehead with his and untangling from around me. He went towards the feeding area while I floated into the main area. Sean was waiting by the exit. Should I go without saying goodbye to Otto? I’d be back.

  I went to Sean. He grabbed my hand and pulled me out of the tank, sealing the door behind him. He kept pulling me along until we got to the elevator. Once we were inside the dry area, he let go of my hand and crossed his arms over his massive chest.

  “Good morning to you too,” I said kind of lamely.

  “You have an hour until our Soremni marriage custom. Spyguy’s waiting to do your makeup.”

  I blinked at him. “I slept there all night? Why didn’t you wake me up?”

  “You think I should disturb an adolescent Cluverai who has his long-lost mother in his tentacles? We’re just lucky that he didn’t decide to breed with you.”

  “Excuse me? Otto wouldn’t ever… Why would you say something like that?” Was that an actual risk?

  He raised his eyebrows. “It was a joke. Cluverai don’t breed. Didn’t you see the way they reproduce?”

  “Oh. Yeah, I guess. Don’t joke about breeding.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe because I hear your dad’s voice asking me if I want to breed with you. I don’t want to think about trying to raise some baby and deciding if I want to sew her gills shut so she can have a normal life or let her grow up with the ocean trying to eat her and then—”

  He stepped close to me and put a finger to my lips. His eyes were so clear, so blue. “No one is sewing anyone’s gills shut. It’s a miracle that you survived cut
off from water like that. I agree that we are going to wait to breed until we’re married for real.”

  I touched his chin with my forefinger. “And I’m not obsessed.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “What if you’re obsessed with me? It could happen. I had more marriage proposals today.”

  I blinked at him turned away while my chest ached. Why would that bother me? It wasn’t fair that random females who didn’t know him could propose to him when I couldn’t. “I had no idea that Soremni's could perform marriage rituals with more than one person at a time. I’ll have to really up my game with these ring things.”

  “Those rings will not see you coming. Are you all right?”

  I wrinkled my nose. “I’m fine, just a little bit frustrated. What am I wearing for this Soremni custom?”

  He frowned at me. “Are you sick of the decal? You still have it on from last night.”

  I rubbed my cheek. “I should get tattoos. Do you, um, mind waiting until we’re married for real?”

  “And for you to not be obsessed? It has advantages.”

  I turned to face the doors. They opened and I walked down the hall towards his room. “Sean, what if the obsession never goes away?”

  He grabbed my hand and squeezed it. “Then you’ll always need me. I make the obsession disappear, don’t I?”

  I nodded and turned, crashing against his chest. “I wish I could make you leave me and find someone who didn’t let Oliver kiss her in his room.”

  “He kissed you?”

  I looked up at that ice-angry tone. “I was in his room. It was pretty serious before Spyguy knocked him out with a sculpture. I should have told you sooner.”

  He pursed his lips. “He said that you said no.”

  “I did. Lots of times.”

  “Lots of times? He just ignored you?”

  I shrugged. “He’s obsessed with me. He didn’t like me saying no. He likes to be the one to pull away. He’s such an arrogant, beautiful jerk.”

  “Did you call him beautiful?”

  I sighed and pulled away from him. “Don’t worry, he’s not as egotistical as you. Or as beautiful. All the Soremni females say so. What were we talking about? Elevators. You shouldn’t have put it in. I don’t want you to spend millions on my internship. I’m trying to be independent and stuff.”

  “Why?”

  “Because after I tried to follow you to Maine I realized that I need to remember who I am without you, you know, in case something happens.”

  “Like I die?”

  I scowled at him. “You can’t die. You’re perfect. Perfect things aren’t real and alive so they can’t die.”

  “That makes so much sense. You mean if you never stop being obsessed and I dump you and marry Leslie or Bernice.”

  “You can’t marry Bernice. She stabbed me.”

  “But it’s fine if I marry Leslie?”

  I shrugged while my stomach tangled. “She’s kind of cool.”

  He grabbed me and pulled me against his massive chest. “It’s a good thing you’re so cute or I’d have to kill you for being so idiotic.” He grabbed my hand and placed my pointer finger on his throat. “Loyalty.” He moved my hand to another mark. “Devotion.” Slid down to another swirl. “Constancy. Do you know how expensive tattoo removal is? I’ve already blown all my cash on elevators and provinces. You’re stuck with me.”

  I gripped his hands tighter and tighter. “What if I can’t live without you?”

  He raised my hands and kissed each one before lowering them. “Then you should probably live with me.”

  Chapter 21

  The Soremni ritual was kind of cool. There was this enormous wall in the center of Cierdeep’s old sector where the crumbling original palace was now a public garden. The wall around the garden was covered in metal links.

  Takeo and I went before the ways were crowded, taking currents most of the way. We held hands and when we got there, there were a dozen or so other couples with links.

  “Now what?” I asked Sean.

  He glanced at me and smiled a golden Soremni smile before he signed, Now we find my father’s family and add our links. We swam around the garden, trying to find the links with the symbol of Sean’s dad’s family. After a half hour combing the wall, I was between a crumbling palace wall and the still high wall around it, Sean a few feet away. What was the purpose of walls in a water city where you could just swim over it?

  I fingered a set of loops and saw a symbol I’d seen before on Oliver. Oliver. I stumbled back and fell over into the rubble of the old building in slow motion. Oliver. My skin ached and my whole body trembled. Oliver. He was here. This was his city. Why wasn’t I with him?

  “Gen?” Sean took my hands and pulled me up into his arms, bubbles swirling around him. He brushed my hair back and leaned his forehead against mine. We were supposed to be Soremni. Soremni didn’t kiss lips. He bent his head and kissed the side of my neck, soft, slow while his hands massaged my back, pulling me against him until his warmth spread through me, warmth and sanity as my brain came back. I should have spent the night with Sean instead of Otto. Sean was better for my obsession.

  “Better?” he asked, bubbles spilling out along with the words once my heart rate had stabilized and I could look at him without longing for green eyes. I hated myself for that. It wasn’t me, just the obsession, but it felt like me.

  “How is the cure coming?”

  He turned away from me, but kept my hand in his. “Nothing yet. I would mention it if there was any notable progress.”

  “Would you? I don’t think you’ll say anything until you have a syringe full of cure you’re about to shove in my vein.”

  He glanced at me as we swam beneath an algae covered archway. “That does sound like me. Do you want to talk about birth control?”

  I stopped moving, but he kept pulling me through the water like he didn’t notice. “Why?” No. Absolutely not.

  “You’re an endangered species. Eventually you’ll want to think about it. You know that I like to be over prepared where you’re concerned. We aren’t doing anything that would jeopardize your ability to reproduce. That takes out the most definite methods of birth control. Once we begin breeding there will always be a chance of conception. If you conceive, you will carry to term if at all possible.”

  I blinked at him. “So you’re really pro-life?”

  “You’re an endangered species.”

  “Would you stop saying that? I’m a me. I have the right to choose whether or not I want to continue me or not.”

  He turned and faced me. He brushed my hair back and studied my face kind of analytically without any tenderness or softness. “You don’t want to talk about this. It’s traditional to discuss the kind of family you want to have while you do the link ceremony.”

  I looked around at the few other couples I saw, talking closely and giggling beneath the water. Did they look slightly embarrassed? I smiled at my beautiful gladiator. “It’s fine. Um, I want kids like you.”

  “Then you should probably marry me for real some day. I keep getting marriage proposals.”

  I poked his chest, his beautiful chest. “You keep telling me about it. So, um, how many kids do you want?”

  “Three boys and three girls.”

  I stared at him. “Really? That’s six. Six kids? Are you crazy?”

  He smiled slightly and brushed my cheek with his thumb. “It would be fine. We’ll live with your dad, of course, in your tiny house, naturally. One kid can sleep in the shower, two in the tub, three on the couch, and we’ll have plenty of room for Haverre and Trainchain on the floor.”

  “Good thinking. And to think for a second I thought that was a lot of kids. We should have twelve. I have six dresser drawers.”

  He kissed my hand absently as we moved around a fallen wall. He seemed to know where he was going. “If I have children, which I always thought I wouldn’t, I thought I may as well have a lot to make the bother worth the effort.”


  “That makes no sense.”

  He turned to glance at me. “Soremni males tend to be preoccupied with breeding. I’ve been channeling my Soremni male. I have not considered the possibility minimally. Anul and Petra make it look not half bad.”

  “Really? You’re serious about wanting to have lots of kids?”

  “Your children would be an adventure.”

  “Am I not enough of an adventure for you? Where are we going? You seem to know these gardens a lot better all of a sudden.”

  “You’re going to be late to your interview if we’re here much longer. You think that I wouldn’t know where my father’s family line is? My father took me here the first time I came to Cierdeep. I remember thinking, ‘I am never putting a link in this chain. I’m not Soremni and never will be.’ And here we are.”

  We were at a corner behind a thick hedge of something purple-green and slightly luminous.

  I watched him search the wall, pulling out strands blackened with age and covered in ancient growth until he found the last link.

  “Is that your father?”

  “Grandfather.”

  “Why aren’t your lines the same as Oliver’s?”

  “My father and the king are only half-brothers. You must have noticed the different coloring. Our two families have interbred for centuries, but always the two lines are separate. There are complicated distinctions that I don’t have time to bore you with. Do you have your link? You have to put them on all by yourself, weak female that you are.”

  I rolled my eyes and opened the link. It actually was a little bit difficult, but finally I slipped it onto his grandfather’s and then Sean put his beneath mine pressing them all closed very firmly before he gripped my hand and stared into my eyes.

  “I swear to you, Genevieve Fielding, that you will never have to clip your tentacles alone again.”

  I almost reached up to touch my hair, but he held my hand tight.

  “Spyguy clips them.”

  “I know, but if he was off spying or blowing stuff up, I’d do it for you.”

  “Okay?”

  “We’re swearing stuff to each other. It’s really emotional.”