by Tobie Easton
“But—”
“Look,” she snaps, her patience apparently run dry. “I know you want to save your little boyfriend, but this is the part where you give up.”
She wrings her hands, glancing at the door like she’s ready to bolt.
Concern furrows Caspian’s brow. “Are you okay? Did anything else happen at the academy?”
“I’m fine,” she says, but I’m barely listening. I’m still registering something else Melusine said.
Wait … an idea dives into my brain and splashes on impact. It’s the kind of risky, crazy idea that’s born only in the too-late, too-early hours after midnight.
“You said we can’t trick an object as powerful as the dagger. But we did before!” My hands flail as I gesture wildly. “When we broke the curse on our immortality! Casp, your grandmother explained it broke because Clay and I were both willing to accept death so the one we loved might live, just like the Little Mermaid did. But the seaquake that triggered the end of the curse didn’t actually start until Clay’s blood poured out into the ocean.” I remember the colorless, blindingly bright light that burst out in all directions as the curse broke—it burst out of the cloud of Clay’s blood in the water. I look at Melusine. “So, the curse broke because when you went to stab me, and Clay took the blade instead, he bled enough that the dagger believed he was dead.”
“But, Lia, he would have died,” Caspian says, shifting uncomfortably.
“Right, he almost did. But he didn’t. He didn’t because you gave him your grandmother’s blood replenishing potions.”
Caspian’s eyes widen. “Lia … no.”
“What?” Melusine asks, but I ignore her.
This is it. This will work.
“Think about it,” I say to Casp. “I know it sounds dangerous—”
“Because it’s dangerous,” he says.
“It wouldn’t have to be. If you were already there waiting with the blood replenishing potions when I used the dagger to slice into my legs, then as soon as Clay got his tail, you could heal me.”
“That’s your plan?” Melusine asks. “What if he,”—she jerks her head toward Caspian, who’s still shaking his—“gets distracted by … a sneezing fit from all the dust in the human world and you bleed out before he’s finished?”
I roll my eyes. “Because that’s likely.”
“It’s one example out of a million things that could go wrong at the pivotal moment and kill you. Not that I care.” She crosses her arms and mumbles something under her breath that sounds like, “Gambling with your own life when so many have lost theirs.”
“Clay has suffered so much because of Merkind. Because of me. If I can do this for him safely, I will.” When I finish, Melusine doesn’t look at me. Whatever. She’s not involved in this decision. I turn away from her, squaring my shoulders in Caspian’s direction. “We’d be really careful. We could do it in that abandoned mansion where Clay and I meet up. No one ever comes there, and we’d lock all the doors so there’d be no interruptions. No surprises. I took anatomy in school—I know where to cut so I’m nowhere near major arteries. We could do it in the bathroom, clean everything first so it’s really sanitary.”
The words pour out of my mouth in an endless stream as I try to counter every one of his objections before he can make them. “You can watch me the whole time, every step. You’ll be right there with the potions already uncorked, lined up in the sequence you need them, and ready to go.” I paint an orderly picture I know will appeal to Caspian. “As long as we’re super careful and plan everything out ahead of time, it won’t be dangerous.” I’m buzzing with giddiness, sleep-deprivation, and the surety that this is the way forward, the way to make Clay Mer. “What do you say, Casp? Are you in?”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Melusine
“I can’t believe you said yes to her.”
“I made her sleep on it. And when she came back to me this morning—”
“She batted her eyelashes at you, and you said yes.”
“It wasn’t like that.” Caspian swims farther into my room, then turns back toward me. “She can’t stand the thought of Clay dying one day, and she knows this will probably be the only chance she ever gets to prevent it, so she’s going to try this with or without me. If I’m there, I can make it as methodical and safe as possible.”
“If you’re there and something goes wrong, you could implicate yourself in her murder.”
“And if I don’t go and something happens to her, I could never forgive myself.”
Jealousy flares in my chest and throat. The look in his eyes as he talks about her, the sadness on his face as he thinks about losing her … the two of them share a connection I can’t touch. A connection I’ll never be able to touch.
When Caspian showed up at my door this morning, I thought maybe I’d, maybe I’d tell him what Jinju said about my mom. About how my dad …
I stayed up most of the night thinking about it. I want to believe my dad couldn’t do it, that he could never, ever … but. And he’s due here today. The guards are transporting him to the palace. I’m sure it’ll take a few days for him to be questioned, but then he’ll expect to see me, and how can I face him if he … No, he couldn’t have. Could he? I need to tell someone. I need to tell Caspian. I need to spend the next few hours diving deep into this and going over every possibility.
But all he came here to talk about is Lia.
It’s always about Lia. Because Lia gets everything. She broke the curse without trying and got to be savior of the Mer world even after she sirened Clay. She has the crown … and the family to go with it. Sisters and a childhood in safety and a frortik dog. Parents who don’t leave. She gets everything. She even got the dagger against every conceivable odd, and now she’ll almost definitely be able to use it to turn her human boyfriend into a Merman. Because everything works out for her, every time.
“Please understand that I have to be there for her. She’s my best friend.”
And she gets Caspian.
“I’d like you to support my decision,” he says.
Anger at the unfairness of it all wells inside me, pooling just under the surface. “Why?”
He swims forward and takes my hands in his like he did in the shoe storeroom. Was that really only two days ago? “Because I care about your opinion.” He glances down at my hands, then up into my eyes. “I care about you. There’s …” he takes a deep breath, “something between us.”
Those words—I want to drink those words. To soak in them. “I feel it, too,” I murmur, my hands holding his now as much as his are holding mine. I move in close, floating up so our foreheads are almost touching. My mouth is a hairsbreadth away from his when I whisper, “Stay.”
“But she needs me,” he says. I reel back.
I need you! I want to shout. To stop myself, I shout something else instead. “Why do you care so much? Why do you care enough to risk yourself for her—again? The last time you went rushing in to help Lia, you got yourself kidnapped and nearly killed.” A memory of him struggling in pain against ropes of Ondine’s magic bubbles up and makes my throat constrict.
And after all that, Lia still rejected him. She still chose Clay. So why does he keep choosing her?
“Don’t do it again,” I say. “Please.”
“Melusine, I …” He moves to pull his hands away, but I hold them tight.
“I’m right here. Stay here.” So I can tell you what I heard yesterday. So we can make sense of it together. So we can make sense of everything.
Caspian’s ocean blue gaze wavers with indecision as it moves up from the floor and fixes on my face. Our eyes meet, and hope swells inside me.
“I can’t,” he whispers.
He drops my hands.
“No, you can’t.”
He drifts backward in the water and says slowly, “Lia will always be my friend. You have to understand that. She needs my help, so I’m going to he
lp her.”
“Of course you will. Because you will always choose her.”
“That’s not what this—”
“That’s absolutely what this is! You’re kidding yourself if you think you only see Lia as a friend.” We both are. It doesn’t matter that he feels something between us—that I feel something between us, something I’ve never felt with anyone—not when he’ll never let himself get over her. I convinced myself that he actually … but, no. So what if I was just starting to want it, really want it? Just starting to think maybe—I shake my head. I’ve been so hopeful and weak it’s disgusting.
Not anymore. A familiar sneer leeches onto my face before I can stop it. “So go crawl after her, begging for any scraps of affection you can get, like the fool I knew you were. I’ll be here laughing at you.”
His eyes and mouth gape open as hurt sluices across his handsome, honest face. No, more than hurt. Heartbreak?
“I thought you’d changed.” He stares at me.
“Apparently not.” I choke back tears that I know would fall hot and angry if I let them, but I don’t. “Now go. I can’t stand to look at you anymore.” He stands there, frozen. “Go!” I shout again. “Leave.”
And he does.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Lia
I don’t remember ever being happier than I am now. The only thing better will be Clay winding his tail around mine as he kisses me, deep and lasting, once I’ve given him his immortality. We’ll be together forever and no one will be able to pull us apart.
In fact, once I reach him tonight, we’ll never have to be apart again.
The thought exhilarates me, making me swim faster and faster. So fast, even my guards, who are in top physical condition, have to push themselves to keep up. They may be workoutaholics, but I’m in love.
I can’t believe I’m finally swimming toward Malibu again. This morning passed at a snail’s pace, and I felt like I would never get out of the palace.
This morning, after running a quick but essential errand to the Magic Department, I told my parents I really needed to check something online for my college applications and that I didn’t want to be at the palace knowing Mr. Havelock was there. Which, hey, is actually true. Would you want to be under the same roof as the man who nearly strangled you to death? They agreed to let me go to our house in Malibu provided I was guarded. But they wouldn’t let me leave until Mr. Havelock arrived safely at the palace. It took FOREVER. But as soon as they got word he’d made it onto palace grounds and was securely locked up in a cell awaiting questioning, they gave me permission to head out.
After so long spent cooped up inside, I’ve never felt so relieved to spread my fins. And for the first time since Mr. Havelock escaped and we found that letter saying he might be coming after me, I finally feel safe again.
When the blue, phosphorescent glow of the Border comes into view, I do three backflips in a row. I’m almost home! Almost to Malibu. Almost to Clay.
I flick my gold tail as hard as I can, propelling myself over the Border and into the familiar waters I swam in all my life. I spent so many years yearning to get beyond them, and now I’m so excited to be back, I could cry. Funny isn’t it?
I smile so much, my cheeks hurt. I can’t seem to stop. We approach the shore near my neighborhood before it’s dark enough to risk surfacing without being seen by my human neighbors, so we wait just underwater. I peek up behind some rocks and catch the first glimpse of my house, far up on the hill, its wall of windows lit up (thanks to an automatic timer), bright and warm and welcoming. It calls to me, almost as strongly as the call of the ocean.
Once darkness falls, I relish the sensation of sand between my toes as we cross the beach and climb the weather-beaten wooden steps to my backyard. Soon, we’re walking past the swimming pool and outdoor fire pit—and then I’m home again.
Now all I have to do is wait until I can sneak out and get to Clay. I stayed in the palace all those weeks without complaining because I never would have risked sneaking away from my guards with Mr. Havelock on the loose, but now that he’s in custody, it can’t do any harm.
Fortunately, I spent a good chunk of my time under guard in this house after the Tribunal stripped Clay of his memories and forbade me from seeing him. I know all the spots where the guards position themselves, how they organize their shifts, where they patrol—and where they don’t. Plus, it isn’t as hard to evade them when they know their presence is more of a formality at this point. Soon, while they think I’m still in my upstairs bedroom using my computer, I’m out of the house and on my way to the abandoned mansion.
And into Clay’s arms.
He knows to meet me there. I spent most of the day talking to him in my bedroom mirror at the palace while waiting for the authorities to arrive with Mr. Havelock. Clay and I went over the entire plan in detail. At first, he was dead set against doing any spell that involved me bleeding, but luckily, Caspian and Melusine weren’t there to make the spell sound more dangerous than it is. Once I explained to Clay that we’d have the same blood replenishing potions ready that saved his life, he finally agreed. If anyone has first-hand experience with how well those potions work, it’s Clay. And, okay, I maaaay not have mentioned exactly how deep I’ll need to cut or how much blood the spell will need to work, but that’s only because I don’t need Clay to get all overprotective when it’s my choice and I’ve already made it. We’ll do everything in a clean, controlled, safe environment, so the risk will be minimal. Yeah. So there’s no need for him to worry for nothing.
Besides, the elation on his face when I told him we finally had a way to make him Mer was worth any pain I’ll experience at the tip of that dagger. I swallow and push that thought—and the accompanying fear that roils in my stomach—away. Nope. Nope, nope, nope. I’m not thinking about the pain. I’m picturing Clay’s face in the mirror instead.
In a few minutes, I’ll get to see that face in person. At last! I’m sick of mirrors and mind-melds. I want biceps and lips and legs. I want laughter that rumbles through a chest pressed against mine and warmth that envelops me as I lie under it.
A pleasant tingle runs down my neck and I walk faster, my flip-flops slapping against the sidewalk of the wide residential streets, the evening breeze cool as it stirs my still-damp hair.
It isn’t long before I’m taking the spare key from its hiding place beneath a stone frog and slipping in the front door.
The lock has barely clicked behind me when footsteps run along the floor and Clay enfolds me against his chest. The world instantly narrows. Going up on tip-toe, I press my face to his neck and inhale. Cinnamon and leather and him.
This. This is what I missed. The physical, visceral, all-encompassing sensation of nearness. Of having him hold me. Of having him so close and wanting him even closer.
Right when I think I’ll drown in him, my face pillowed on the softness of his T-shirt for eternity, Clay takes a step back and holds me by my shoulders, running his gaze up and down my body like he’s forgotten what I look like. My skin heats.
I drink in the sight of him, too. Did he always look like this? Was he always so much taller than I am? Were his teeth always so straight and shiny? His jaw always so square and perfect? Was he always this downright sexy? Tides! So handsome he stole away all my breath? Did he always look at me with so much love it seemed to radiate from him? Yes.
Yes.
Our eyes meet, and then our lips do. They crash together like wind meeting waves, stirring up everything below. With my mouth pressed to his, I show Clay exactly how much I missed him, how much it means to touch him, to taste him, to tangle our tongues and limbs together until we’re gasping.
We both get lost in that kiss, but when we pull our mouths apart and can see each other’s faces once again, we get lost in that, too. In every freckle and eyelash and quirk of the lips—all close enough to touch again.
We’re smiling, mirroring pure happiness back at one anoth
er.
And then we’re laughing. At nothing. Just bubbling up with uncontrollable joy. Laughing and smiling and pressing our palms to each other’s cheeks and staring at each other’s faces and grabbing each other close and staring again and laughing again. I thought I knew how much it hurt to be away from him for so long, but I didn’t really know until this moment, when all the pain of it lifted at once. I just might brush away the tiniest of pearls, and as it rolls away somewhere under a couch, Clay’s hazel eyes are shining, too.
Once we’ve communicated all the most important things through looks alone, I ask, “Did you have any trouble getting here?”
“Nope, none. The guards in the pool cleaners’ truck disappeared from my street the day you told me Mr. Havelock was captured. I’ve been coming here since then. Just to read or,” he shrugs. “It reminds me of being with you.”
It irks me that while my guards stayed with me, some committee somewhere in the palace revoked Clay’s as soon as they could justify it. Then again, unlike me and Melusine, Clay was never specified as a potential target. Whatever. I refuse to waste another second on a negative thought. All I care about now is that we’re both safe and here, in the same room for the first time in what feels like forever. With a plan I know in my bones will give us forever for real.
“I have something to show you.” Without another word, I unzip my backpack, unwind an old beach towel from around the dagger, and hand the weapon to Clay.
Remembering how I felt when I held the dagger by the hilt, I ask, “Does it make you wanna,” I make an exaggerated serial-killer face and mime stabbing.
He shakes his head. “I guess it doesn’t make me feel that way ’cause I’m not Mer.” He tilts his head with a conspiratorial smirk and we both hear what he doesn’t say. Not Mer yet.
“Then you’d better hang on to it,” I say as we walk toward the den. Our den.
“How long until—” I cover his mouth with mine before he can finish, unable to wait a second longer between kisses, but I know him well enough to know that he was asking how long until Caspian gets here with the healing potions.