The Mermaid's Mate

by Kristin Miller

  “Slater, damn it, get back here!” Getting his feet beneath him, Timber ran along the narrow footpath that was no wider than the breadth of his shoulders. Through the haze of rainfall and the blanket of night, Timber spotted Marian up ahead. Slater was close behind her, and closing in. “Slater, this is between us!” Timber yelled again. “Get your ass back here and let’s finish this!”

  He didn’t know what else to say. He forced his legs to churn over faster, willing his feet, and Marian’s, to stay on the slippery trail.

  She screamed, her shrill voice catching on a gust of wind. She fell to her knees. Timber’s world collapsed around him, the air stilling to an impossible halt. He ran hard, praying he’d reach them before Slater lost control.

  Slater snatched Marian by her long mane of blond hair and dragged her to the ground. Her hands were clawing at his, her neck arched back at an uncomfortable angle as he yanked her back against him. Then, mere steps before Timber reached them, Slater bit into Marian’s neck. His head thrashed back and forth. Marian screamed, a shrill protest that penetrated the night before blending into a groan of thunder.

  As Timber sprinted to their position, he realized Marian wasn’t screaming at all. Her mouth was closed. Her eyes were rolled back, her head limp. With horror gripping him cold, Timber realized his throat was strained. It was his howl that went unheard in the storm’s shrieking fury.

  The screams were his own.

  With unbridled fury flaring through his body, Timber raised his arms over his head, clasped his hands together, and brought them down over Slater’s head. The swing was like a battle-ax, powerful and true to its mark. Slater’s legs gave out. His clutch on Marian’s hair dropped and his teeth dislodged from her neck. Slater toppled to the side, his neck flopping onto his shoulders before he tumbled over the side of the cliff onto the rocky banks of the river.

  Chapter Six

  When Marian came to, she was lying against something warm. Something that she yearned to nuzzle against, though she couldn’t understand the longing. Her legs were covered with something soft that brushed against her skin. Her knees were tucked beneath her. Her feet were dangling over something hard...

  “Little bit farther,” Timber said.

  His voice was so close to her ear. So close. She could almost taste the words coming out of his mouth. But she couldn’t muster the strength to open her eyes.

  “You’re going to be fine,” he said, his voice somehow soothing away her worry. “I promise I won’t let anything happen to you again.”

  Marian got the feeling she was bumping along an uneven road. She was swaying, walking, though her legs weren’t moving. And then the unmistakable thump-thump of a heartbeat that wasn’t her own beat against her.

  She was in Timber’s arms.

  He was carrying her.

  Awareness seeped through Marian’s stupor. Timber’s arm was roped around her back, his hand flattened protectively on her waist. His other arm was beneath her legs, cradling her softly. Her head was against his chest, her arms draped around his neck. He was warm. Bare chested. His skin was slick with rain, and it only amplified his natural masculine scent. She breathed him in and tightened her hold around his neck. They could travel all of Feralon this way, Marian realized, and she’d be the happiest mermaid on the isle.

  “Are you awake?” he asked, pressing her more closely against him. As if they could get any closer. “Say something if you’re awake. I need to hear your voice.”

  She couldn’t speak. Her thoughts were too at war with her feelings.

  She shouldn’t be getting used to how Timber’s arms felt embracing her this way—although the path his hands traveled might as well have been emblazoned on her skin—because whatever the rogue pack was doing on the southern edge of the isle, it wasn’t good. And Timber was undeniably tied up in it. Once she reported their acts to her Emperor, Timber would take the fall with his pack. She couldn’t be caught up in it, too, no matter how she wanted to be caught up in him.

  For now, Marian took comfort in the fact that they were safe. She was safe. Timber was going to make sure of it. As her eyes pinched closed, and the soft rhythm of his heartbeat lulled Marian to sleep, she dreamed of being whisked away by a knight in shining armor—one who would protect her, no matter the cost.

  * * *

  “What do you think, Sapphric?” As Timber kneeled beside the bed where Marian lay, he kept his eye on the Were healer across the room who was stirring a foul-smelling concoction. “How fast will the wound heal?”

  The teeth marks on Marian’s neck had changed from disgusting shades of black and red to a pinkish hue that made Timber believe the skin was healing quickly. But he was no doctor.

  “The wound is already healed, thanks to the Feralon River water you put on it, and there won’t be infection at the site. I’m not sure we can prevent a scar, though.” The old man turned from the back wall of the den, a crude bowl cupped in his crippled hands. “We wouldn’t want this mermaid going back to her colony with a bite mark permanently etched into her skin, so I’ll do everything I can but—”

  “That’s the last thing I want,” Timber said, holding Marian’s hand. She was so delicate. So fragile. She could be permanently scarred thanks to his inability to protect her. How could he have let this happen? His heart lurched when he thought about the horrors that could have happened. He cared for Marian, more deeply than he originally thought, and couldn’t deny it any longer. It was too bad Marian had to get hurt for him to realize the truth. “What is that stuff?” he asked.

  Turning her head to the side and raising her right arm over her head, Sapphric dribbled some of the green liquid onto Marian’s neck, then smeared it around with his fingers. It absorbed instantly, leaving Marian’s skin a glowing shade of honey-tan. “It’s a combination of mud from the riverbed, Feralon Hot Spring water, salt, lavender, mint leaves and a few drops of water from the bay in Merfolk territory.”

  Before Timber could speak, Sapphric looked up from his work and said, “Did your father ever teach you that the waters in Merfolk territory have magical properties?”

  “Not my father.” Timber brushed a blond lock of hair out of Marian’s face. She moaned as if she was coming to, but her eyes remained closed. “But I’ve heard that somewhere before.”

  “Yes, yes. Judging from the work I’ve done on some of your pack mates, the liquid seems to strengthen both physical and mental weaknesses.” Sapphric continued to dabble the liquid on Marian’s wound, rubbing it in until it disappeared into her skin. “Where did you rescue this mermaid?”

  Timber scrubbed his hands over his head. “On the southern edge of the isle. She was bitten by a member of Ryder’s pack.”

  He was probably saying too much, but Sapphric was a holy man as much as he was a healer. Things spoken to him were kept in strict confidence, which was part of the reason Ryder visited him. It was the sole reason Timber brought Marian here. Sapphric was a peaceful Were and wouldn’t harm a hair on Marian’s head.

  “She must’ve gotten too close to Ryder’s stash of chips,” Sapphric said simply.

  “Chips?” Timber felt his brows puzzle.

  “Off the old block.”

  What the hell was he talking about?

  “You do your job well, Timber. I’ve heard you can sense an enemy coming before they are upon you. But it is a poor man who closes his eyes to the things that are not an immediate danger.” Sapphric pulled a rag from his robe pocket and dabbed Marian’s neck dry. “Ryder is blasting away rock to get to the diamond chips buried in the banks of the river. He’s been collecting for years, though they’re so tiny I doubt he has enough to sustain himself yet.”

  A sense of foreboding prickled the hair on Timber’s arms. “What the devil would Ryder want with diamond chips?” he asked, more to himself than Sapphric. The answer struck him. “They’re not just diamonds. They’re chips off the Mer stone...the stone that allows other shifters to breathe underwater like the mermaids.”


  “Yes, yes.” Sapphric dunked his rag in the water, wrung it out, then blotted Marian’s tan skin one last time. “You got it now.”

  “Each stone allows the user a few breathable minutes underwater. If Ryder’s hoarding the chips, he’s going deep...”

  To find the trove rumored to be at the bottom of the bay in Mer territory.

  Timber didn’t know for certain if that was the reason, but Ryder wanted power. He wanted wealth. He wanted territory to be able to make his own place on the isle, separate from the main wolf pack. The trove was rumored to hold the largest chunk of the Mer stone, along with other priceless gems that the Merfolk had hoarded over the centuries. Nothing would allow Ryder to bargain for more territory than those treasures.

  Suddenly, the urge to get Marian back to Mer territory and away from Ryder and the rogue pack overtook him. “I need to get Marian back home as soon as I can. How much longer?”

  “An hour hike through Were territory will get her to Lover’s Leap. The water is deep enough there for to her dive into the bay.” Sapphric nodded, his eerie white eyes glazing over. “Her sisters should have warned her not to swim this far inland. They should’ve learned how dangerous the territory is the last time they dipped their fins in these waters.”

  Timber’s gaze snapped to Sapphric’s. “You know Marian’s sisters?”

  “Aye.” Sapphric emptied the bowl and turned from the bed. “Her older sister, Mary Elizabeth, passed through here about, oh—” he set the bowl on a small wooden table “—three years ago? Maybe two. So hard to keep track of the years when you get to be my age. Anyhow, she and one of your pack mates had a fling until he fell into a deep part of the river and was never heard from again. Dangerous waters through here. Those maelstroms pop out of nowhere and wham! Suck you right down to the bottom of the sea.”

  One of his pack mates. Maelstrom.

  “Who was the wolf?” Timber asked, though he feared that he knew the answer.

  “I think his name was...ah, well, now I can’t think of it.” Sapphric brushed his hands across a beaded cloth, then spun around, facing Timber. “You should know the fellow’s name. It was Ryder’s brother.”

  A clamming, cold wave hurtled into Timber’s chest, nearly knocking him backward.

  “Rison,” he said, memories flooding him.

  Sapphric clapped, smiling with gaping teeth. “That’s the one!”

  Lost in thought, Timber dropped Marian’s hand and approached Sapphric. The old man was four foot tall, thin as a wisp with a brain like a sieve. Yet in his frail, old body, he held everything.

  The truth.

  “Rison and Marian’s sister were a couple?” Timber kept his words as gentle as he could. “Two years ago?”

  “Yes, yes.” Sapphric clasped his hands in front of him. His skin was oddly white, wraithlike, blending with the ethereal white gown draped over his body. “That’s what I said. Do you need me to mix a potion to help with your hearing?”

  “How do you know this for certain?” Timber couldn’t believe he was asking this. “That they were a couple, I mean.”

  Sapphric strode across the room to an open cabinet, and started fidgeting with the bottles inside. “They came to me one evening asking for a truth serum.”

  Timber shook his head disbelievingly. “I don’t understand.”

  “Ryder’s pack was meddling in things they shouldn’t have been meddling in, much as they are now. Rison wanted to administer the serum to himself, so he could prove his intentions to Mary Elizabeth, the mermaid he loved.”

  This was all sounding too familiar: a mermaid who didn’t trust and a werewolf who had things to hide.

  “Did they get it?”

  Sapphric spun around, a tiny amber bottle clutched in his crooked fingers. “Get what?”

  “The truth serum. Did you give it to them?”

  “Of course I did. It’s what they asked for.” He laughed, but it sounded more like he was hacking up a chunk of lung. “I healed your mermaid lover when you asked, didn’t I?”

  Timber froze. “She’s not my—”

  “Oh, shut your mouth before a lie sours it.” Sapphric tossed up his hands. “I don’t need young eyes to see young love.”

  Timber’s gaze flipped to Marian. She was lying still in bed, in the same position she’d been before. But she was awake. Timber could sense her stirring. Could almost hear her thoughts. Something struck him then. A vision of Marian in mermaid form, cerulean lights flaring off her tail as she swam down Feralon River, around a bend, and out of sight.

  Fin colors ran in family lines.

  The night Rison and Timber were on watch, the night Rison died... Could it have been Mary Elizabeth’s fin colors Timber spotted fishtailing through the water, and not Marian’s?

  “But why would Mary Elizabeth report the position of our lair to her Emperor?” Timber mumbled to himself, scraping his hands across his jaw.

  “If the one you loved was in trouble, and you knew you could only count on your own kind to save her, wouldn’t you seek help?”

  “Yes, but by reporting our position, she was betraying him and condemning the pack. There had to be another way to—”

  “Desperate times call for desperate measures and not everyone thinks logically in situations of the heart.”

  Could Mary Elizabeth really have reported the position of their lair in an attempt to save Rison? Even in a storm surge, she wouldn’t have been able to swim back to the bay and bring back help in time.

  “You’re right for thinkin’ the way you are,” Sapphric said softly, his expression bright with awareness. “But as your mermaid is the truest scout in the Mer colony, her sister was the fastest swimmer.”

  “Still...” Timber felt like he was swallowing nails. “I was right there, and still there was nothing I could do to save him.”

  “Yes, but you are not Mer. Her brothers were at the mouth of the river, waiting for her to return. She’d planned to bring them back. It’s the only explanation.”

  No, there was another explanation. Timber remembered the one he’d ruthlessly clung to all these years: Marian’s betrayal.

  But if Sapphric was right...if Mary Elizabeth and Rison were a couple and she’d reported their position to bring back help, maybe Marian had been telling the truth all this time. Maybe she hadn’t betrayed him after all.

  With so many uncertainties knotting and twisting in his brain, there was one thing Timber had to know for sure. One thing that would determine whether he mistook the cerulean lights shining off Marian’s tail for Mary Elizabeth’s.

  “I’ve got a question for you, Sapphric,” Timber said slowly, his feet firmly planted on the hardwood.

  “And I’ve got an answer.” Sapphric stood in front of Timber, the amber bottle extended in his shaky fingers.

  Timber’s stomach tightened. Everything hinged on this. His feelings for Marian. His past, present and future happiness. “Are you sure Mary Elizabeth and this mermaid are blood sisters and not just mermaids from the same colony?”

  Nodding slowly, Sapphric slipped the bottle into Timber’s hand. “Truth.”

  Chapter Seven

  Marian had heard everything. She hadn’t been the one who swam back and squealed the position of the lair, and it’d always bothered her that she couldn’t figure out who did it.

  Suddenly, it all made perfect sense.

  Mary Elizabeth had sunk into a deep depression a few years back. It had to be because she couldn’t save Rison. Marian would’ve felt the same way if she hadn’t been able to save Timber when she’d found him wedged beneath that rock in the river.

  Mary Elizabeth must’ve felt heartbroken. Helpless.

  Irritation pricked at Marian like a thorn. All along, she’d wanted Timber to believe that she wouldn’t have betrayed him that night. It didn’t matter now though, did it? He had a truth serum to make his mind up for him. When would he give it to her? Marian wondered. When would he depend on a stupid enchanted mixture to tell him the truth
he should’ve known in his heart all along?

  But the thoughts tangling in her mind weren’t about Mary Elizabeth, Rison, the wound on her neck, or the truth serum...they were about Timber’s rogue pack. He’d made it sound like he didn’t know about what they were doing on the southern edge of Were Mountain. Could he have been that oblivious? Could he have remained in the dark while Ryder blasted away and stocked up on Mer Stone chips or did he fake his surprise in front of the healer?

  She had to get back to her colony and report what was going on to her Emperor.

  The Emperor would report the information about Ryder and his plans to the main pack inside Were Mountain. They would deal with Ryder and the rest of the rogue wolves in their own way, leaving the Merfolk out of the mess completely.

  “Time to wake up,” Timber said, the edge of the bed registering his weight. “Marian, can you hear me?”

  Opening her eyes, Marian met Timber’s dark, seductive stare. She shivered, though her body blazed with warmth. “I’m awake.”

  “How do you feel?”

  “Fine.” The wound on her neck didn’t hurt at all. And if there was a scar, so be it. She had worse scars on her heart that she’d endured well enough. “I should go. I have to get back to my colony.”

  As she tried to sit up, Timber grabbed her arm. Though his touch was gentle, it stopped her, stunned her, as it always did.

  “Here, take this first.” He handed her a glass of water. “You need your strength before the hike. We have an hour to trudge across Were Mountain before we’ll reach a place deep enough for you to dive into the bay.”

  Marian eyed the drink carefully. He must’ve put the truth serum in the water. Why couldn’t he just believe her? Why did he need the truth to be proven this way? Although it was foolish, Marian felt betrayed.

  He had no faith in her, in them, and he never had.

  “I’m not thirsty,” she said, removing her arm from the warmth of his grasp. “But thanks.” She stood, pulling Timber’s shirt down. It draped over her hips, swallowing her frame. “Thanks for the pants. Are they yours?”