by Zoe Chant
She sighed, a twist of anxiety knotting her gut. Even though she knew she was making the right decision, she still had no idea how she was going to explain this to her pack. To her family. They’d probably think she’d gone stark raving mad when she announced that she was off to live with a shark shifter under the sea.
No sense putting it off. I have to tell them at last.
Finn put her down gently outside the door of her cottage, opening it for her. He started to follow her in, but she put a hand on his chest.
“I need to call my family. Tell them what’s going on.” She attempted to smile at him. “Probably best if you don’t listen in. There’s likely to be a lot of yelling.”
He hesitated, his eyes shadowed in the moonlight. “Martha-“
“No, go on, shoo.” She gave him a firm shove. “This isn’t something you can help me with, Finn. It’s okay. They’ll understand eventually.”
I hope, she added to herself, as he reluctantly left. Closing the door, she collapsed back against it with a sigh. She was strongly tempted to just fall into bed and call her family in the morning, but she’d never been one to avoid trouble.
Still, she could at least peel out of her clammy wetsuit and wash the salt out of her hair. She took a shower, for rather longer than was usual, until she could no longer deny to herself that she was just trying to delay the inevitable.
Steeling her nerve, she picked up her cellphone.
26 missed calls, said the screen.
Chapter 16
Martha!
Her distress jerked him from sound sleep to combat-readiness in a heartbeat. He snatched up his sword from beside his bed, unsheathing the blade in a single fluid movement as he charged out the door.
He could have followed her scent halfway round the world. This close, it pulled at him stronger than any tide. She needed him, now.
And he wasn’t there.
Teeth and sword bared, he hurtled over a low barrier with a sign reading Staff Only. Lights were flicking on in a long, low building up ahead, sleepy-eyed staff poking their heads out of windows to see what was going on.
“No, it can’t wait!” Martha stood outside the staff quarters, fully dressed despite the late hour. “I have to go!”
She seemed to be arguing with an elegant, red-haired woman that he dimly recognized through his blood-rage as Scarlet, the manager of the resort. Her scent was strange, ever-shifting, elusive yet powerful. He had no idea what sort of creature she was.
He didn’t care. He would rip apart anything that threatened his mate.
“Martha!” he roared.
“Finn!” She spun, hurling herself at him. “I have to leave, right now!”
“Then we are leaving.” He pulled her close to his side, his sword raised and ready. “And I will kill anyone who stands in our way.”
Scarlet made an impatient sound under her breath. “Put that thing away before someone gets hurt. As I was saying, Mrs. Hernandez, the next plane isn’t scheduled to arrive at the island until Saturday. I can’t get it here any faster than that.”
“I can’t wait until Saturday. I have to get home!”
“Martha, what is wrong?” He didn’t lower his blade yet.
“It’s Roddie, my youngest son. He’s gone missing. Nita called and called, she’s frantic with worry. He was last seen on rattlesnake territory and half the pack is baying for war and she doesn’t know how to settle them…” Martha took a deep breath, her jaw setting again into the firm line he’d come to know so well. “I have to go,” she repeated, more calmly. “Scarlet, please, there must be something you can do.”
“There might be something leaving from the mainland.” The resort manager took out her cellphone, frowning down at the screen. “Yes, there’s a flight out in four hours. Bastian?”
A man with the unmistakable smoke-and-metal scent of a dragon shifter stepped forward from the watching group of staff. “I can fly her there in time. We’ll have to leave soon, though.”
“Travis, Breck, go help pack up Mrs. Hernandez’s cases,” Scarlet ordered. “Mrs. Hernandez, I’ll book your ticket now.”
“Two tickets.”
All eyes turned to him.
“I think airport security might object to the sword,” Tex murmured from somewhere in the crowd. “Though I’d love to see them try to take it off him.”
He ignored the whispers, focused only on Martha. “I am coming with you.”
For a second, he imagined he saw a flare of relief in her eyes—but then she pushed him away. “No. This is my pack. My responsibility.”
“And you are mine. I am coming with you.”
“You can’t, Finn!” She retreated a step, holding up both hands as if to stop him from following. “They don’t even know about you! How on earth would I explain why a shark’s interested in coyote business?”
“You could tell them the truth.” The instant, slight shake of her head cut him to his heart, but he persisted anyway. “That I am your mate.”
“I can’t! Not now, not after this!” Martha’s face crumpled, her mouth trembling. “She was calling and calling all day, Finn, and I wasn’t here!”
Her words took his own away, as surely as if she’d slit his throat.
She hadn’t been there for her pack…because she’d been in Atlantis.
With him.
“I never should have left them,” Martha whispered, tears streaking her face. “I can’t do this. I’m sorry, Finn. I’m so, so sorry.”
She turned away. And he could do nothing but watch her go.
Chapter 17
“Ma!”
Nita flung herself into Martha’s arms the instant she stepped out of the airport gate. Martha hugged her eldest tight, feeling her shake.
“It’s okay, sweetheart,” Martha whispered, rocking her as if she was just a baby again. “I’m back now. Everything’s going to be just fine.”
She breathed in Nita’s familiar scent. Desert and dry grass, warm fur and sunbaked rock, just as always. The scent of pack, of family, of home. Yet she had a strange, nagging sense that something was different.
That something was missing.
“Where are the kids?” she asked, wondering if that was what was bothering her. “And Xo? Did you come all by yourself?”
“Yeah. I kind of suspected I might fall apart. Didn’t want an audience.” Nita released her at last, stepping back. She swiped the palm of her hand quickly across her eyes, and essayed a tremulous smile. “Some alpha I turned out to be. The first hint of trouble, and I’m howling for you like a lost cub.”
“There’s no shame in asking for help, honey. I should have been here in the first place.”
Despite her words, double guilt stabbed her heart. She shouldn’t have left home…but she shouldn’t have left Finn either. Especially not like that, all in a rush, half-mad with panic.
She felt hollow inside. She’d left her heart buried in Shifting Sands.
She set her shoulders. Her family needed her. That was all that mattered now.
“Tell me what’s happened since we last talked,” she said to Nita. “Anyone been able to pick up any scent of Roddie?”
Nita shook her head, taking her suitcase from her. “Not apart from that one trace I told you about, over on the far side of rattlesnake country. It’s been all I can do to hold Diego and Ethan back from launching a raid.”
“Those hell-raisers.” Martha clicked her tongue. “Well, your brothers had better listen to me, if they know what’s good for them. I remember the last war with the snakes. I’m not having another one. Have you tried talking to the rattlers?”
“Didn’t seem to be much point.”
“What makes you say that?”
Nita looked at her as if she’d started barking. “Because they’re snakes, Ma. Since when do we listen to snakes?”
Maybe since I started sleeping with a shark. Oh, Finn.
“Anyway,” Nita continued, “there was snake-stink all over Roddie’s trail,
enough to choke on. They had something to do with him disappearing, without a doubt.”
If that was true, then even she wouldn’t be able to stop her hot-headed pack from declaring vengeance. The bad blood between coyotes and rattlesnakes stretched back longer than anyone could remember. They were always just a spark away from a wildfire.
“I didn’t know what to do, Ma,” Nita said in a very small voice. “Thanks for coming back. I’m sorry you had to cut your vacation short.”
Martha hugged her again. “You did the right thing, honey. This is where I’m supposed to be.”
She buried her nose in Nita’s dark hair again. Desert and dry grass, fur and rock…
But no salt.
Home didn’t smell like home anymore. Not without the sea.
Her coyote howled, desolate and alone.
Chapter 18
“We will not tolerate these incursions into our territories!” The Lady of Seals slammed one fist down onto the shell-inlaid surface of the Sea Council table, her liquid brown eyes blazing with anger. “If you will not control your kin, honorable Lord Orca, then we shall control them for you!”
“I will not allow the wild whales to be starved.” The killer whale shifter’s bared teeth were white as his hair, a stark contrast to his jet-black skin. “What would you have me do, tell the non-shifter orcas to eat krill? Seals are their natural prey. You have no right to protect your kin at the expense of mine!”
“Lady Seal, Lord Orca, peace.” The Pearl Empress rubbed her forehead, looking weary. “We have been at this for hours, and you are still simply going in circles. Master Shark? What are your thoughts?”
Warm fur and laughing eyes. Sunlight and sand.
All his thoughts were only for her. But his Empress had called on him. With an effort, he forced himself to focus on the quarreling lords, though he had no heart for it.
He had no heart at all, anymore.
He rose. “My people shall claim the contested territory. And both your kinds are our natural prey.”
The Empress blinked across the table at him, as the council chamber erupted.
“You can’t do that-“
“Utterly unacceptable-“
The Lady Seal and the Lord Orca were finally united in agreement about one thing, at least. Their overlapping voices rose in outrage.
“Continue speaking,” he said flatly, his harsh voice cutting through the babble, “and I shall eat you.”
The Lord Orca’s mouth closed with an audible click. The Lady of Seals, younger and less experienced, looked mortally affronted.
“How dare you-“ she began.
He looked at her. She fell silent, shrinking back into her seat.
The Empress stood, causing a mass scraping of chairs as every other member of the Sea Council hastened to rise as well. “We will take a short recess. Master Shark, a word.”
The rest of the Sea Council gratefully fled. The Empress motioned the on-duty guards out as well, though the Royal Consort stayed by her side, as ever.
The Empress waited until the three of them were alone, then whirled to face him, her hands on her hips. “What on earth was that?”
“You wished me to resolve their dispute, Your Majesty.”
“Not with your teeth!”
“I am a shark. How did you expect me to resolve it?”
She raked her hand through her curly hair, knocking her crown askew. “With tact and subtlety and just the barest hint of threat, the way that you have always done. Master Shark, what is wrong with you?”
He stared at her, impassive. She knew full well what was wrong. He’d been forced to tell her, in the bare minimum of words, when he’d unexpectedly returned to Atlantis.
The Empress winced, biting her lip. “I’m sorry, Master Shark. That was thoughtless of me. Look, are you sure you don’t want to take some time off?”
“I took one vacation at your bidding, Your Majesty,” he said stiffly. “I will not take another. Now allow me to return to my duty.”
“No.”
Both he and the Empress looked around at the Royal Consort. The towering sea dragon met their stares steadily, his indigo eyes cool and unreadable.
“When last I checked, Royal Consort,” the Master Shark gritted out through clenched teeth, “‘Emperor’ was not among your many titles.”
“But I am still the Imperial Champion, responsible for the Empress’s well-being.” The sea dragon folded his arms across his broad chest, armored vambraces catching the light. “And you have become a liability.”
Blind fury filled him, the first emotion he’d felt since his mate had walked away. “You are the one who insisted I was needed here!”
“The Empress needs the Master Shark!” The sea dragon’s own voice rose, scornful harmonics scratching around his words. “Not some hollow, hungering husk. What good are you to her like this, coward?”
His control snapped. If he’d had his sword, it would already have been in the sea dragon’s heart. He lunged for the Royal Consort bare-handed, murderous with rage.
The sea dragon was less than half his age, and the finest swordsman in the sea—but he was the Master Shark. He barely felt the blow the Royal Consort landed on his face, returning one of his own that sent the younger man staggering.
“STOP!” The Empress’s shout stopped them both in their tracks—quite literally.
Her magic froze the blood in his veins, holding him motionless. All the seas were hers to command, and he was as much a part of her domain as the waves or the tides. Darkness encroached on the edge of his vision as his heart stuttered.
The Empress held them for a moment longer before releasing them. Both he and the Royal Consort fell to their knees, fight forgotten as they gasped for breath.
“Have you lost your mind, John?” the Empress demanded of her mate. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“What I wish someone had done for me,” the sea dragon knight panted. Despite the blood running down his chin, his mouth crooked in a wry smile. “Knocking some sense into his thick skull.”
“Men,” the Empress muttered under her breath. “Get up, the pair of you. Master Shark, much as I disagree with John’s methods, he’s right. You’re destroying yourself. You have to go to your mate.”
The Royal Consort leaped to his feet with the smooth agility of youth. A rather challenging gleam still in his eyes, he leaned down to offer his hand. The Master Shark stared at it for a second…and then clasped it. He allowed the sea dragon to pull him to his feet.
The brief fight had ripped away the numbness in his soul. The Royal Consort was right. He was a coward. He had fled from his mate, out of fear of being hurt further.
But nothing could hurt more than her absence.
Nonetheless, he hesitated. “But I am needed here.”
“Would you like me to strike you again?” the Royal Consort inquired, in tones of utmost politeness.
The Empress elbowed her mate, though a smile tugged at her full lips. “I think we’ve already established that you’re not entirely yourself at the moment, Master Shark. And Martha will be feeling the same way. What sort of pain do you think she’s in right now?”
Her words struck him harder than the Royal Consort’s fist had. The mere thought of Martha feeling even a fraction of this agony…
“She has the comfort of her pack,” he said, trying to convince himself. “They are enough for her. And…and she did not want me to follow.”
The Royal Consort’s eyebrows rose. “Does it truly take so little to turn aside a shark?”
“What does your heart tell you, Master Shark?” the Empress said softly.
He reached out for his mate’s blood-scent…and knew that no matter what she had said then, she was calling to him now.
“My Empress.” He went to both knees before her, bowing his head in the full formal show of respect, as befitted someone seeking a great boon. “I cannot be myself again without my mate. But she will not come here.”
“Th
en we will have to learn to do without you.” The Empress put a hand on his face, lifting his chin so he met her gaze. “Master Shark, if the Pearl Empire demands that we sacrifice our souls to it, then it does not deserve to exist. It has to be bigger than any one of us. Even you. Even me.”
He looked up at her for a long, long moment.
His oath-brother’s daughter. Human and sea dragon, the child of two worlds.
“Your father,” he said, “would be very proud of you.”
Tears brimmed in her eyes. Leaning down, she kissed his cheek.
“Go to your mate, Master Shark,” she whispered.
“Finn,” he replied, rising. “My name is Finn.”
Chapter 19
“If we’d seen your pup, then he wouldn’t be missing.” The rattlesnake leader’s lips stretched in a grin, showing off his inch-long, needle-sharp canines. “You’d know exactly where he was. You’d be carving his name on a stone to mark his grave.”
“Don’t you point those fangs at me, young man.” Martha folded her arms, shooting him a withering stare. “I’ve seen far scarier teeth than yours, thank you very much. Hiss all you want, but we know someone of yours knows something about Roddie. Now, I’ve asked you nicely who that might be. You going to make me ask again?”
The snake shifter’s eyes were hidden behind sunglasses, but Martha was fairly certain they flicked to her bristling escort. Her three older sons were in coyote form, unconvincingly disguised with collars and bandanas to look like ordinary dogs. Nita held her brothers’ leashes. Given the way her daughter was growling, Martha was somewhat regretting not putting her on a lead too.
The rattlesnake himself seemed to have come alone—though Martha wouldn’t have placed any bets on that. A snake was a heck of a lot easier to hide than a coyote, even in the dusty 7-11 parking lot they’d picked as neutral ground. He could have a whole passel of his kin within spitting distance.
If he did, he wasn’t calling them out yet. The young snake leaned against his motorbike in a way that he probably meant to come off as cool and menacing, but which screamed uneasy defensiveness to Martha’s experienced eye.