“What?” Elandria said in surprise, but she was immediately greeted with a bottle of tequila being shoved between her lips.
“Chug, chug, chug!” Visola chanted.
Elandria involuntarily gulped down some of the liquid, before turning to the side, sputtering and coughing. “Visola!” she complained, but she was laughing too.
“I just tequila-raped you,” Visola said with a wink. She turned to Aazuria and pointed at the champagne bottle. “If you don’t drink up, I’m going to Listerine-rape you, Zuri.”
“Fine,” Aazuria said as she brought the bottle to her mouth. “I suppose I could use some artificial relaxation.”
“A toast!” Visola said as she lifted a bottle of spiced rum. “The old king is dead! (Again.) Long live the (badass) new king!”
“Long live the king!” echoed several of the people in the room as they lifted their beverages.
“I hope you guys all live pretty long too,” Trevain said as he grinned and sipped his scotch.
“May I speak now?” Vachlan asked his wife.
“Be my guest,” she told him.
“Great. So the first order of business is King Kyrosed. What was his agenda in coming here? He couldn’t have acted alone. Who brought him back to life?”
“It wasn’t me,” Sionna said with a hiccup. She turned to Dylan and gave him a suspicious look. “Did you do it? Were you a baaad boy?”
“Um, no,” he answered, clearing his throat and shifting a few inches away from her. He straightened the lapels of his blazer and looked around the room. “I cannot perform Sionna’s procedure to reanimate the dead, and even if I could—I would not have used it on that man.”
Trevain sighed. “Look, guys. I’m sorry I killed him. I know you wanted him alive for questioning, but I couldn’t…”
“That’s fine,” Visola said as she waved her hand in dismissal. “We captured his servant. I’ll drill it out of him later. Next order of business?” She had retrieved a few instruments from one of her gift bags, and had begun using a hammer to drive nails through a wooden stake.
“What exactly is she doing?” Brynne asked. “Do I even want to know?”
“That servant,” Visola explained. “How could he listen to what Kyrosed did to us and still be loyal to him? He’s one sick dirtbag. I’m going to do to him exactly what I would have done to King Kyrosed if the old man had lived.” She continued to drive nails through the wood, biting her lip as she added spikes to her wooden stake. “This is going to be my personal therapy. I can’t bottle this stuff up—right Dylan?”
“I suppose it wouldn’t be healthy,” the doctor agreed, as he tried to ignore a very drunk Sionna who could not seem to keep her hands off him.
“You intend to use that instrument on the servant?” Elandria asked softly as she studied Visola’s face. “Is that truly your intention?”
Visola seemed surprised. “Nope. You got me. I lied. I intend to desecrate Kyrosed’s dead body. And then pray that someone brings him back to life again so he can feel the pain of his perforated colon.”
“Dammit, Visola!” Vachlan cursed. “I was going to do that.”
“Great minds, lollipop,” she said with a wink. “We could always do it together.”
“It’s a date,” he told her, lifting his vodka.
“I believe that I know who brought him back,” Elandria told them, glancing at Aazuria. “I don’t have any proof, but I think it was Mother Melusina.”
“Well, we need proof,” Visola said thoughtfully. “I’ll get some in the morning. I don’t feel like working tonight. Too sleepy for torture, so just preparing the materials. Hey, Varia! Nice ink, kid. Come here and let me check out that tattoo.”
Varia smiled and complied, showing off the triple moon proudly.
“Awesome!” Visola said, nodding in approval. “It looks like Glais’ artwork. Did he draw this?”
“Uh,” Varia said, looking to her friend nervously.
“Cool, cool,” Visola commented. “Very stylish.”
“Glais gave you that tattoo?” Trevain asked in surprise.
Varia was saved from responding by Visola’s yammering.
“Did you know that I’m also inked?” Visola asked. “I’d show you, but it’s in an inappropriate place. Maybe later when everyone else isn’t looking.”
“Really? What’s your tattoo of?” Varia asked curiously.
“It’s a word,” Visola explained, chewing on her lip and glancing at Vachlan. “Anyway, getting a patriotic tattoo is just nerdy, Varia. You should have asked me first. If you want to be a rebel and cause trouble, you have to get a tattoo of something that will really freak your mother out. Like a penis.”
“Visola!” Aazuria said in disbelief. “This is the advice you’re giving to my daughter? Who admires and idolizes you?”
“A really nice, circumcised one,” Visola said thoughtfully. “In case you get stuck with an uncircumcised penis forever. Just saying.”
Everyone turned to stare at Vachlan, whose cheeks were darkening.
Sionna grinned. “Oh my god, Vachlan, are you blushing?”
“Circumcision is genital mutilation for men. I would not allow myself or my son to be subjected to the fashions of superficial women. Like his perverted, degenerate, wanton mother.”
“What did you just call me?” Visola snapped. “I am not superficial!”
“Vachlan is blushing!” Sionna said in a singsong voice. “He’s sooo cute when he’s blushing. Viso, why do you always get to keep all the cute boys? Why are you so much prettier than I am? Is it because you’re a slut, they find you more attractive?”
“It’s because you’re a lesbian,” Visola explained.
“Girls are so booring,” Sionna said with a sigh. “Don’t complain about uncircumcised or circumcised, you spoiled whore. As least Vachlan has a penis. I bet it’s a nice one, too.” Sionna snapped her fingers together. “Oh! Penises. That gives me great idea.” She began quickly walking across the room, but Trevain stopped her, grasping her shoulders firmly.
“Aunt Sio, what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to find a penis,” she told her great-nephew triumphantly, “and attach it to Princess Yamako while she’s sleeping. It’ll be a fun surprise.”
Dylan spit out his drink and Vachlan began to choke on his violently. Trevain stared at his aunt in disbelief.
“Can she really do that?” Varia asked curiously.
“You have no idea what this woman is capable of,” Dylan Rosenberg said seriously. “A sex change operation would be child’s play to her.”
“My sister can do anything she puts her mind to,” Visola said proudly.
Dylan had moved to Sionna’s side and was opening her eyelids to check the size of her pupils. “Good heavens! What did you put in her drink, Visola? This isn’t just alcohol.”
“I don’t know,” Visola said with a carefree shrug, “but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t cocaine. Isn’t she adorable like this? Leave her alone. It’s funny.”
Trevain looked to his daughter nervously. “I don’t think we’re all in the right condition to have our serious adult conversation right now. Maybe we should all go to bed and continue this in the morning. Glais, why don’t you escort Varia to her room?”
“No, thanks,” Varia said sweetly. “I’m learning things.”
“These are not the kinds of things you need to learn.”
“I agree with Trevain,” Aazuria said quietly. “It’s past 2 AM, and that means Viso will soon begin uttering a minimum of five bad ideas per minute.”
“Begin?” Dylan roared as he examined Sionna’s vitals and tried to restrain her from leaving the room. “That witch drugged Sionna! Why would you give your sister drugs?” He glared at Visola furiously. “Are you insane?”
“Yes,” Visola answered at once, frowning. “Haven’t you been taking notes on me all evening? And for the record—literally, you can record this in your little notebook—Sionna was sad. She was really
devastated about what happened to Yama, and I’ve never seen her like that. You don’t know us very well, Dylan, because you were too much of a pansy to get on a fucking boat and come to see her after we moved away. But if you had tried—if you had been a man, and fought for my sister instead of letting her go, you would know that in this family, we take care of each other. We don’t let each other be miserable.”
“My relationship with Sionna is none of your business!” Dylan retorted. “You could have harmed her with those drugs! How could you give her something without knowing what it was? You are an ignorant fool!” he accused. “You act tough to hide your illiterate blunderings, but you are nothing more than a monkey. You are not one tenth of the woman she is!”
Visola dove at the man, intending to rip him to shreds, but Vachlan clamped his arms around her.
“Calm down, love,” Vachlan said quietly as he held her in a secure body-lock. “He means well. Breathe, Visola.”
She took several ragged breaths and tried to still her boiling blood. “I would never harm my sister!” she shouted. “When my daughter died she gave me these drugs and told me that they would help to take the edge off. I don’t know what they are, but I know she wouldn’t hurt me. She has drugged me dozens of times. She gave me fertility drugs without my knowledge and thanks to her, I had to lead my troops into a war while eight months pregnant! With a medical condition that was giving me seizures! But she knew me, and she knew I could handle it. You don’t know our lives, Dylan Rosenberg. So don’t come around here and act like you’re suddenly family when you abandoned her for even longer than Vachlan abandoned me!” Using her flexibility and acrobatics to pivot in his grip, Visola slammed her elbow into Vachlan’s nose.
Vachlan doubled back, blinking as a trickle of blood began to drip over his lips. He removed his handkerchief from his pocket and dotted it away. “Do you feel better now, darling?”
“No!” she barked, grabbing the front of his shirt and slamming her knee into his ribcage. The cracking of bones was heard, and Vachlan grunted as he struggled to remain upright.
He winced and exhaled a short, steadying puff. “Feel better now, dear?”
“No,” Visola said in a small voice, her face contorting with pain. “He hurt my little girl, Vachlan.” With a tiny gasp, she fell forward against his chest, burying herself into his collarbones.
The raven-haired man seemed to predict this, as he did with most of Visola’s unpredictable motions. He slipped his hands around her body comfortingly. Her shoulders shivered with a single, violent sob.
“And you!” she hissed, pulling away suddenly and planting her knuckles into Vachlan’s jaw. “Getting them presents! Finding the fish! Buying her a narwhal! The best daddy in the whole world! How dare you? Acting like the fucking father of the year! How dare you do this to me!” Visola found that tears were pouring down her face, and she wiped them away hastily. She moved away and retrieved her bottle of rum. She took several giant gulps, her throat engorging as though she were chugging water after a long run. She then wound her arm back and flung the bottle at Vachlan’s head.
He would have caught the missile, but he felt that Visola needed to hear the satisfying sound of the smash. Quickly checking the mental map which kept his surroundings memorized at all times, he acknowledged that the path was clear of innocent bystanders, and moved his head just a few inches to the side. The bottle went sailing past him, brushing a few stray strands of his hair, before crashing against the frozen wall.
“Where were you two hundred years ago?!” Visola shouted. “Where were you when she needed you?”
Vachlan could not respond, so he remained silent and still, waiting for the storm to pass. He made eye contact with Dylan. The therapist seemed to be spellbound by Visola’s rage.
“Zuri,” Visola said, stumbling over to her friend. She collapsed on the ground in front of the chair where Aazuria was sitting, and bowed her head in shame. She placed her hands on Aazuria’s knees. “I’m so sorry I let him do that to you. I’m so sorry I just stood there and watched. I know that all the alcohol and drugs in Romanova won’t erase what he did to you, and all of my stupid jokes won’t help to cover it up or help us forget. Forgive me. Forgive me for failing you.”
Glais and Varia looked at each other, not quite understanding what Visola was talking about. However, they could both make educated guesses, and none of their speculations were pleasant.
“I’m fine, Viso,” Aazuria said, slipping off the sofa and sitting beside Visola on the ground so she could look the woman in the eyes. She pressed a hand against Visola’s cheek. “You mustn’t worry about me so much. I’m not a little girl anymore—you don’t have to follow me around, protecting me from the big bad world. Here...” Aazuria took her friend’s wrist and began trying to remove the golden bracelet.
“No!” Visola said sharply, pulling her hand away. “No, that’s mine. Maybe my official job to protect you is over, but I am honor-bound to serve you as your warrior and friend. I failed… I have failed you just like I failed Alcie.”
Sliding her arm around Visola’s back, Aazuria slowly helped the woman stand. She turned to the other people in the room with a forlorn expression. “We’ll talk in the morning. Let’s meet back here at eight o’clock. I’m going to take her to bed.”
“What’s wrong with my sister?” Sionna asked Dylan in her drug-induced haze as she watched Aazuria guide the woman out of the library.
“The short answer is ‘everything,’” Dylan responded. “She’s… a piece of work.”
“Yes,” said Vachlan in a low voice. “That’s my belligerent, bellicose woman. Her skin is made of iron and fire, but her heart is made of gold and gossamer. She’ll never be able to reconcile the fragility of her soul with the violence of her flesh; but I wouldn’t have her any other way. She’s perfect to me.”
Dylan cleared his throat to begin his apology. “Vachlan, I’m sorry for attacking her like that. I just got upset. The situation with Dr. Ramaris is a tender spot for me, and I didn’t know…”
“It’s fine, my friend.”
“I’ll look after Sionna and make sure she’s properly hydrated,” Dylan promised Vachlan.
“No, sir. You will not,” Vachlan told him, moving over to pry his sister-in-law from Dylan’s hands.
“Don’t,” Sionna protested, clinging to Dylan’s side. She batted away Vachlan’s hands. “I like him. Leave me alone.”
“Sorry, Sio,” Vachlan said as he wrestled her away from Dylan. “There is no way in hell I’m leaving you with this man in your current state. Nothing personal, Dr. Rosenberg, but I simply don’t trust anyone from my homeland.”
“We’re not all bad,” Dylan said.
Vachlan smiled. “I am. Just look at what I did to my wife.”
Sionna put two fingers on Vachlan’s lips. “Lies. Shush. You’re a cutie pie.”
Vachlan chuckled. “Yep, she really is out of her mind if she’s forgetting how much she despises me.”
“Pretend I’m Viso,” Sionna said as she played with Vachlan’s tiny ponytail. She pulled off the elastic band and messed up his hair. “Don’t I look like her? For five minutes, love me like you love Viso.”
“I’m going to tell you that you said that in the morning, and you’ll never unintentionally do drugs again,” Vachlan said. He picked Sionna up and tossed her over his shoulder, before turning to the others in the room. “Goodnight, my friends. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“I’m out of here too,” Brynne said with a yawn. “Later, Captain Murphy.”
Trevain sighed as he looked at the few remaining people in the room. “Glais, Varia—I’m sorry that this meeting was a mess. I hoped it would be more productive, but we’ve all had a rough night.”
“It was actually really entertaining,” Varia said with a smile.
“Thanks for inviting us, King Trevain,” Glais said happily. “Hope we can come to more meetings! Also, I really like this vermouth drink.” He hiccupped slightly.
“It’s pretty tasty once you get used to it.”
“Get to bed, kids,” Trevain said with a smile. When they left the room, he turned to Dr. Rosenberg. “I must apologize for the behavior of my grandparents…”
“Nonsense. They are wonderful people, and I understand the reasons for their actions.” Dylan turned to Elandria, who was sitting alone on the couch, wrapped in blankets. “Queen Elandria, I was wondering how you’re feeling? It must have been a terrifying experience, having that bomb on your body.”
The quiet woman regarded the man carefully. “I understand that you’re a therapist, Dr. Rosenberg,” Elandria said. “My sister and I didn’t have much time to catch up, but she told me that you’ve been helping her. She spoke very highly of you.”
“It’s an honor to be working with Queen Aazuria,” Dylan said, “but right now I’m interested in you. Is there anything I can do to help? Would you like a listening ear?”
Elandria’s face fell. “Perhaps. I would love to speak to you about many things, but not tonight. I fear I’ll snap in half like a twig, as Visola did, if I try to address what just happened. In a way, she was quite thoughtful to force feed me tequila.”
“I suppose you’re right,” Dylan conceded. “There is a great wisdom in tequila that simple psychology cannot ever hope to recreate.”
Elandria smiled. “I look forward to being properly introduced to you another time, Dr. Rosenberg. I do not believe I made the right type of first impression wearing duct tape and C-4.”
“You handled yourself spectacularly under the circumstances, ma’am. I’ll be off to bed, then. Have a good night.” The doctor turned to Trevain and bowed slightly. “Good night, sir.”
“Good night, Doctor.”
When Dr. Rosenberg left the room, Elandria felt the atmosphere change. The one person she had avoided speaking with all night was suddenly alone in the room with her. She pulled the blankets around her more closely, and turned to gaze out the window.
“Elan—”
Tides of Tranquility Page 25