I giggled as I flipped my tail and took off through the firmament.
I'd never seen Titus smile so wide. He was always so stoic. But somehow, he'd gotten the wyrms back.
"Titus!" I shouted.
"Hail!" Titus replied. "I suppose you're probably my queen, now?"
I nodded. "I am."
"I assumed they'd make you queen," Titus said, grinning ear-to-ear. "It's an honor, Your Highness."
I snorted. "La Sirene is fine. I'm no higher or lower than anyone. I thought you were killed. The zombie legionnaires..."
"Very well, Your High... La Sirene. As far as the zombies go, they aren't particularly attentive. And Marinette was distracted with other matters at hand. I shouted and screamed a little, got them riled up and tearing each other apart, and slipped away."
"And the wyrms? They were taken into the voidbringer... I thought..."
Titus chuckled. "I hope you are pleased with my acquisition."
I smiled wide. "Nammu!"
Hello, La Sirene!
"How did you all get out of the void?" I asked.
"It was your son," Titus said. "I was alone. I didn't know I'd be able to come back. But then a golden gate opened next to me, and out of it came the wyrm..."
"Merlin must've sent them from the void before he died..."
"My condolences, La Sirene."
"Thanks," I said. "Kind of strange. I mean, I'm on my way to go visit him now. His baby self."
"Yeah, that's weird," Titus confirmed.
I laughed. "Yeah, you're right. I can't believe he..."
I swam to Nammu and put my hand on her side. "Nammu, how did he get you here now... when we stopped the voidbringer and sealed the cave... that was weeks ago."
Through the fabrics of both space and time, La Sirene...
"He sent you to the future," I said, smiling wide.
Indeed, La Sirene.
"So, Titus. We are down a Wymrider. How'd you like to join us?" I asked.
"I'd be honored, La Sirene," Titus replied.
"Take the other three back into the city," I said. "Tahlia, make sure Agwe knows what happened."
"Of course," Tahlia said. "We'll take good care of them until you return."
"Nammu," I said. "Mind if I hitch a ride to shore?"
Certainly. Would you prefer to travel by sea or air?
NAMMU CRASHED THROUGH the surface. As we met air, she shifted into a dragon's form. Her wings almost knocked me off her back as they sprouted, suddenly, from each side.
I released my mermaid form and felt my legs take their place.
Trying to put on a skirt while riding a dragon is a challenge. It takes balance. But Nammu flew amazingly smoothly. And in dragon form, her body had more girth. Not that she was slender as a wyrm, but her body was more elongated that way. I had a bit more space to try and twist my body around until I got my skirt in place.
I held onto Nammu tightly, my hands tucked under her scales.
Having her with me... no wonder Merlin knew I'd be fine making it back to see him. He knew I could handle it because he knew I'd have Nammu. So long as she was here, so long as I was on her back, I was at peace. I couldn't stay on her back, of course. But she'd be nearby. If I got too uneasy, I could always return to her. And once I was at the shire—what Elijah called the home we'd started to establish in the Ozarks in his attempt at paying homage to the Lord of the Rings—I could draw on Awen. Druid magic flowed through that place like water does in pipes in most homes.
Nammu landed gracefully in front of the shire.
I patted her on the side and dismounted her.
I stood in front of the shire door and took a deep breath.
My heart was thumping hard in my chest.
I knocked on the door.
It was a heavy door. The whole place, in fact, was hewn from a single piece of wood. It had been grown through Druid magic, made by his parents, who were magical beings of their own right.
This place had been my home. I still remembered trying to decorate Merlin's room. So pregnant. So full of anticipation. So excited for life...
So much had changed.
The door swung open, creaking loudly.
"Joni?"
"Hello, Elijah," I said. Tears filled my eyes. I'd be embarrassed, but his eyes were as watery as mine. "Can I see our boy?"
"Of course," Elijah said. "Hey, Ems!"
"Emilie?" I asked. Emilie had been Elijah's best friend. Last I knew, though, she'd went off to music school in New York.
"Hi, Joni," Emilie said, she was holding Merlin in her arms.
"Oh my God!" I exclaimed. "Can I hold him?"
Emilie smiled kindly and laid him in my arms.
I kissed him on his forehead. He'd grown so much. "Merlin, you've gotten so big!"
"If you're lucky," Emilie said, "you might get to see his first steps. He just started pulling himself up on our legs."
"Oh my gosh! Can we try?" I asked.
"Um, Joni?" Elijah asked, clearing his throat. "Did you park a dragon outside?"
I chuckled. "Yeah. Long story. She's a friend."
Elijah pressed his lips together. "I'll take your word for it."
Elijah and Emilie held Merlin on his feet. I knelt a couple feet in front of him.
He giggled and took a step. Then another, before collapsing in my arms.
"My baby!" I cried as I held him tightly.
"You're not staying, are you?" Elijah asked.
"I can't," I said. "I wish I could..."
"I understand," Elijah said. "But you're always welcome here. You can stay as long as you like."
Emilie took Elijah's hand and interlaced her fingers with his.
"So you two... you're together now?" I asked.
"We've been through a lot together since you left, Joni," Elijah said. "I'm sorry if this seems fast."
I nodded. "It's okay. I'm married."
"What?" Elijah asked, coughing in his hand. "How the hell did that happen?"
I sighed. "Since I left, I've been through a lot, too."
"Why do you have to leave?" Emilie asked. "I mean, you could bring your husband here. We could be a big, awkward family."
I chuckled. "He's a merman, Emilie."
"Well, in that case... we could get a pool?"
I chuckled. "I don't think he'd go for that. Agwe and I are the king and queen of an underwater merkingdom."
Elijah raised an eyebrow. "Queen Joni?"
I smiled. "They call me La Sirene."
I kissed baby Merlin on the cheek. He cooed. This wasn't my home anymore. But when I held Merlin, I was home.
I couldn't stay here. I couldn't bring Merlin with me. But at least I knew, now, I could be in his life.
"I love you, baby."
Merlin giggled and spat up on my shoulder. Emilie came quickly to the rescue with a rag.
I laughed. "Thank you, Emilie. You've got this mother thing down."
Emilie smiled kindly. "Thank you for saying that. It means a lot. That you'd call me mother."
I nodded. "Don't get me wrong. I'll always be his mom. But I'm glad he has you, too."
End of Book 1
To be continued in…
Wyrmrider Vengeance
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Book 2 - Wyrmrider Vengeance
"I NEED YOU on patrol, Titus."
"Yes, your Highness," the muscle-bound merman who happened to be the captain of the merlegions said. "But I must ask, what are we to do if we encounter something? These legionnaires still don't have a clue how to fight."
I nodded. The merlegion used to be a formidable force. Under King Conand, my predecessor, they were a well-trained unit with years of combat training and experience.
But that was before they were zombified—every last one of them.
Except for Titus.
Not much we could do for them other than put them out of their misery—with the aid of the wyrms, of course.
Now we had t
he challenge of raising up a new merlegion. And Titus, while he was my predecessor's right-hand man, was the only one left in all of Fomoria with actual credentials to lead a legion, not to mention train them up.
The new merlegion mainly consisted of young mermen and mermaids. Used to be just mermen. But hello... there was a new queen in town, and I'd be damned before I told a mermaid she couldn't do something.
Not like we had a lot of mermaid volunteers. While I made it clear that the new legion wouldn't discriminate based on gender, centuries of patriarchal rule were hard to shake.
A mermaid legionnaire. There were already a few misogynistic jokes about them circulating around the kingdom. I knew of it. It pissed me off. But it wasn't something I could reverse overnight.
And I didn't have time to screw with their bullshit.
"Use the patrols as training exercises," I told Titus. "If anything comes along too difficult to handle, give me the signal, and I'll join you with the Wyrmriders."
"Yes, your Highness," Titus said as he turned to leave.
I couldn't help but gawk at his body as he turned to leave. He wasn't at all the sort of man I found attractive or anything like that. But he was so muscle-bound you couldn't help but look.
I half-wondered how he'd built so many muscles. Typically resistance training doesn't work the same way underwater. At least, I assumed it didn't. You know, on account of buoyancy and whatnot.
I trusted Titus. Perhaps I was naïve to do so. He'd supported the former King almost to a fault, pretty much until the ninth hour when it became clear the king himself was possessed by another Loa. And that Marinette, the Loa who'd claimed the king's body, tried to turn him into a zombie along with the rest of the merlegion.
Yes, Titus was absolutely loyal. But even absolute loyalty had its limits.
Joining a zombie merlegion...
If that was his limit, and since he'd pledged fidelity to me and my new regime, I figured he could be trusted.
So long as I didn't threaten to turn him into a brain-eating corpse, we'd be good.
Besides, when I'd thought we lost the wyrms, he was the one who led them home, back to Fomoria. He deserved a chance to keep his job.
I watched the enchanted map I'd inherited from my predecessor. Fomoria had beacons scattered across the gulf. They interacted with some kind of bioluminescent ooze on my map that revealed any traces of energy—magical or electrical—when spread across it.
It was a great way to keep an eye on potential threats.
So why did I need Titus on patrol?
Because the bokors were still out there. They knew what we could do, the energies we could detect. And if they still had their sights on us, I figured they'd have a plan. Some way of coming after us that wouldn't trigger the beacons.
Every Fomorian carries a magical signature. I could see Titus and his rag-tag group of legionnaires in training as they left the city and circled the perimeter. They left snail-like ooze trails behind them as they moved, creating something of a spiral on my map.
Typically, they'd make a round relatively close to the firmament—the magical shell that protected Fomoria—and then they'd swim out a mile or so and make a much larger pass.
After the second pass, if they still hadn't seen anything, they could either take another mile-long swim and make a third pass or come home. I didn't require the third pass every time. I mean, each round was significantly longer than the last based on the formula for circumference.
C=2πr
Learned that shit in High School.
And if "r," which stood for "radius," was larger, it meant the "C" or "circumference" would be bigger, too.
Joni Campbell. Mermaid queen.
What the...?
No one called me by my real name, of course. Well, almost no one. To Agwe and Tahlia, I was still Joni. To everyone else—La Sirene, Queen of the Sea, Queen of Fomoria!
Let the trumpets sound!
Of course, trumpets aren't a thing in Fomoria. Wind instruments, in general, don't tend to work under water. Hell, most of the merfolk around here probably didn't even know what a trumpet sounded like. But I'd only been a mermaid a few months—which made the fact I was the mermaid queen totally surreal.
Seemed like yesterday I was graduating high school. Yeah, human high school. And now I was ruling an underwater merkingdom.
My guidance counselor screwed the pooch on that one.
Culinary arts...
She thought I'd be a great cook. Well, this bitch became a queen. Suck a lemon dry and pinch yourself in the morning.
Not sure what that means. But my gran used to say it. So why not? Probably some kind of southern remedy, I supposed. For what? Who knows. A remedy for making sense, more than likely. Seemed to work. Every time I said it.
As strange as it was to be a queen, though. Child's play compared to being the wife of a demigod.
I didn't love Agwe. Sure, he was hot. Great abs and a killer tan—particularly for a guy who didn't get much sun on account of spending most of his time in the deepest parts of the Gulf of Mexico.
And he was kind enough, so far as deities go.
But I knew enough from history to know royals rarely marry for love.
An alliance.
To acquire some kind of power.
Whatever.
We did it to save Fomoria and, with it, the rest of the world. The voidbringer might have devoured it all otherwise.
Not that I didn't want to love him. But you can't just tell your heart to start beating for someone else. Especially not when the wounds from a lost love were still so fresh. Not only my love for my son, Merlin. But for his daddy, too...
But I couldn't be with them. No matter how much I wanted to. And he was with someone else now, anyway. And there was the whole thing about Erzulie “the Loa of love.” Alliteration is annoying sometimes. Wait, that was one too. Dang it.
Agwe was one of Erzulie’s many husbands, in addition to being mine. No, he didn't love her. He didn't give a wyrm's tail about her. Again, it was about power. Alliances. Otherworldly politics I didn't understand. He assured me it meant nothing. But let's face it. He was a polygamist. All the Loa were.
Not my jam. Not at all. Call me traditional. But I prefer to keep my husbands to myself. Husband, I mean. Singular, not plural. Seriously, trying to babysit one man is hard enough. Why would anyone want more than that? Reverse harem? No, thank you. And I certainly wasn't going to be a part of Agwe's harem, either.
CONTINUE READING Wyrmrider Vengeance
Copyright © 2020 by Theophilus Monroe.
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
For information : www.theophilusmonroe.com
Cover art by Deranged Doctors Design
BEING POSSESSED BY a familiar isn’t all bad. I mean, it comes with some pretty impressive abilities. Don’t get me wrong, Isabelle can be a major pain in my ass at times. But she’s also hyper-aware of our surroundings.
Annabelle! Watch out! Isabelle screamed, her voice echoing from within my mind. A split second later a figure stepped out in front of my Camaro. I slammed the brakes, cranking the wheel hard to the right. Spraying gravel struck the underside of my car. A thud against the passenger side quarter panel suggested that I’d failed in my attempt to miss the moron who’d stepped in front of the car.
“Are you okay?” I tilted my head. It was my graduation party, but Ashley was the one who had too much to drink. Just a few minutes earlier she was singing, loudly, to the tune of “Sweet Child O’ Mine.”
I’m pa
rtial to the oldies. But now, she was unresponsive. I grabbed my phone and paused my playlist, silencing Axl Rose mid-shriek, before punching the lump of flesh that vaguely resembled my sister in the shoulder.
“Huh?” was Ashely’s only response before rolling back over in her seat. She wasn’t going to be of much help in this situation.
She was fine, relatively speaking.
It took a second for my mind to recognize what had happened. I’d hit someone! Shit…
I reached for the door handle, praying that I hadn’t killed anyone.
Wait, Isabelle urged. There’s something unusual here…
“You mean, of the supernatural sort?” I asked. Ever since my family had been attacked by a few supernatural baddies when I was nine, my sister and I had become a sort of two-girl paranormal investigation team. We were damn good at it, too. And we’d seen our share of insidious creatures. Whatever this was, particularly with Isabelle’s powers at my disposal, I was sure I could handle it.
Yeah, Isabelle said. But I don’t recognize its aura… this is something new.
New wasn’t a word typically used to describe anything supernatural. Most of the things we encountered were ancient, predating human history. “What do you mean by new?”
It’s not like anything I’ve ever encountered… at least not recently.
“Is it human?”
Sort of…
Sort of human was my jam. Most of what we encountered—vampires, zombies, demon-possessed Ouija boarders, ghosts—they were all sort of human. At least they’d started that way.
“If it’s human at all, I can’t leave it on the side of the road,” I said. “We have to help.”
Just be careful, Isabelle said. With your adrenaline pumping this hard, I don’t think I’d be able to take over if things get nasty.
Isabelle was the source of my power. Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t helpless when I was in charge. I could access most of her abilities. They were just turned down a bit. And I could only access her magica in limited quantities. I was more than capable in most circumstances, but it was nothing compared to the kick-assery we were capable of when Isabelle held the reins. Letting her take over came with a cost, though. It was hard to maintain. A little emotion, something startling, and I’d be back in charge, only with a raging headache that would leave me useless, like a pile of mush, for the next several hours.
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