by Starla Night
He blinked several times. “I hope it will be more ordinary. I will have trouble concentrating if we are swallowed by another megalodon.”
“It’s fine. Aya knows how to blow them up.”
Kadir rubbed Queen Elyssa’s head. She giggled.
Soren rumbled softly to Aya. “You roused the cave guardian, defeated the megalodons, and routed the army.”
She patted his hand. “I knew I could do it.”
“How?” Gailen asked frankly, crawling up over a broken chunk of sanctuary petal. His eyes were permanently bugged, and he had terrible bloody bruises and scars as though he had been chewed on and spit out. “What were you thinking?”
“You always wanted to try megalodon sushi,” Aya said.
Gailen paused.
She gestured at the ocean floor, visible behind him. “I did this for you, Gailen.”
He looked down.
“What do you say?” she prompted.
“I have no idea.” He started laughing. “Are all brides like you?”
Soren growled and held her close. “My queen is like no other.”
“Thanks, Queen Aya. We have enough meat to feed an army.”
“It is good you do.” Balim descended through the broken sanctuary roof and checked first Kadir, tsking at a long scratch on his arm, and then Soren, poking at his injury. “You have a whole army out here. Most are injured. Many are seeking asylum.” He left them and moved to the new family.
“Our population problem is solved!” Queen Elyssa threw her arms around Kadir and kissed him with delight. Then, she got quiet. “Oh. Our castle is gone.”
It had been destroyed.
“And I don’t see Benji…”
“Your house guardian is there.” Gailen pointed.
The small orange octopus dangled a few branches away from Aya’s purple house guardian, safely ensconced in the Life Tree. Benji must have been exhausted after attacking the megalodon.
“Aw.” Queen Elyssa relaxed. “Okay. Now we’re back to being homeless.”
“The Life Tree will grow a new castle,” Kadir promised, nuzzling her. “Until then, we will rest elsewhere.”
“And it will not be long. Look, castles!” Gailen hung down the hole in the dais and pointed. “The Life Tree is putting out new castles. You can see them rising between the megalodon chunks. One, two, three…seven, eight…twelve, thirteen, fourteen! It keeps going!”
The others came and crowded around.
The bright, green bulbs of new castles pushed up through the soil in three expanding rings. One bulb even pushed up through the wreckage of Kadir’s castle as though absorbing its nutrients to remake itself. The city expanded with hope and promise.
“It’s like fairy rings,” Aya murmured. “Little puffballs. You can’t see them growing, but you almost can...”
“Incredible.” Faier stared down beside them. “I have never heard of so many in such a young city.”
The warrior’s brows lifted with hope. For the first time since Soren had met him, he looked young and full of vitality.
“Well, we did just super-charge it.” Queen Elyssa stroked her husband’s hand. “And with so many new residents coming in, we’re going to have a huge influx of new brides. Right?”
Faier frowned and rubbed the scars on his arm. New ones had joined the others from where he had rescued the Dragon Mar youth, who was sleeping in a lump, curled up in the entrance.
They would figure out what to do with the youth later. He had a story, like these other warriors. Kadir and Queen Elyssa would have a lot of sorting to do. Soren as well — as the First Lieutenant of Atlantis.
“Well, if we won’t be out of our home for too long...” Queen Elyssa grinned at Aya and Soren. “I guess we’re crashing at your place!”
“Oh.” Aya bit her lip. “I regret not having planted or sanded the ledges.”
“You’re still moving in,” Queen Elyssa said. “We’ll have a move-in party! It will be so much fun. We’ll do a sleepover every night. Starting—”
“Not now.” Soren drew Aya to him. “The heart chamber is open. Aya is mine. The castle is ours this night.”
Aya’s soul glowed red. She accepted his claim. They had done everything out of order, but they were bound now in body, heart, and soul.
Elyssa grinned and held up her hands in surrender. “It’s fine. We’re plenty busy out here. Take your time.”
He pushed off the dais, swimming Aya with him. “To the heart chamber, my bride!”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Soren crossed the warzone that had once been their city. Aya stared. So many things had happened
They were married now.
Elyssa’s castle was gone. Its wreckage made a fertile green lump for new growth, although it crushed the coral forest around it.
Chunks of megalodon, including the tail section, littered the forest floor like fleshy boulders. Mermen kicked between them in a daze searching for their units. The Atlantis warriors were organizing as best they could. Everyone was stunned, many were holding their heads or other body parts injured. Balim would have his work cut out for him.
Most importantly, they had survived. Aya and Soren, Elyssa and King Kadir, Lucy and Torun, their babies, and so many more. Her plan had worked.
She was awesome.
Soren kicked to her castle. New castles sprang up, swelling with the promise of new life.
Her own castle was shut tight, puckered closed. Soren pressed his palm to the pucker. The portal sparkled white and opened.
Anticipation sparkled in her belly.
They had entered together before. But now Soren carried her across the threshold as husband and wife.
He crossed the empty courtyard — Elyssa really was going to have to work hard to get it in shape for habitation— and down the hall. It no longer ended abruptly, but twisted deep, leading them down to a new dead end.
Soren shifted to human feet, stood with both legs apart, and placed his hand on the wall.
“Place your hand with mine.” His voice sounded rough. Her tough warrior, feeling tender?
Her anticipation tightened. She shifted to human feet, stood beside him in front of the wall, and placed her palm above his. Could he feel her thundering heartbeat?
The wall sparkled, shimmering, and then it opened inward.
He looked down at her. His expression turned from gentleness to heat.
She took his hand.
Together, they entered the heart chamber.
It was small for the both of them, especially with Soren so big. But it glowed with health, safety, and protection. Green walls combined a health spa, oxygen bar, and relaxation room. In this deepest core of the castle, they were surrounded by the energy that declared it home.
And she was here with Soren, who no longer pushed her away and declared she would be better off with someone else.
She swayed to him. “Soren.”
He caught her in his arms. She rested her palm against his chest. His heartbeat felt loud.
Soren held her for long moments. They had made it here, finally. After all the times it seemed this would never come.
“I wanted to protect you.” He stroked her curves, waist to hip. “Even now, I feel it is better to protect you from me.”
“I wanted to believe without reason. To stop thinking and feel.”
“I am a terrible male.”
Terrible to his enemies. Terrible to himself.
“But my brain and my heart both love you.”
He crushed her to him. She held him just as tightly.
He lowered his head for a kiss. The kiss of husband and wife.
Their mouths mated and tongues tangled, stroking each other with delicious discovery. She accepted him for all he had been and all he tried to be. Honorable, terrible, beautiful.
Hers.
This was not their first kiss. But it was the first in the heart chamber, together, married.
And this was not her first time pressed na
ked against Soren.
But this was her first time pressed naked against her husband.
She filled her palms with his bulging biceps, slid her fingers over the hard knots of his shoulders, and caressed the wide planes of his thick pectorals.
He pulled back to watch her. She enjoyed his hard abs, the sharp vee down to his thick cock, the ropey muscle around his waist, and his taut buttocks.
“Why do you like me?” she asked.
A brow rose and a smile curved his thick, kissable lips. “You do not know?”
She shook her head.
“I love to stroke your soft body.” His thick palm slid from her hip up the curve of her waist to her back.
“Your sinuous spine.” He slid his finger down and up again, raising delicious goosebumps on her skin.
“Your flowing hair.” He gripped her hair in a fist and brought her lips under his dominion.
While his tongue stroked her mouth, his words continued to seduce her, vibrating from his chest into hers.
“You are every good and beautiful thing, a light shining as pure and holy, beating in my veins and saturating my blood. With you, I am invincible.”
He lifted his head and glowed his eternal vow of honor into her soul. “With you, I am at peace.”
She heated to a thousand degrees.
His mouth lowered to her neck. He sucked her skin, owning her, and then her powerful warrior squeezed her slippery breasts and brought them to his mouth.
Heat enveloped her sensitive nipple. Sensation streaked to her center and kindled a throbbing fire.
She moaned.
He rumbled deep in his chest, pleased, and cupped her throbbing need, her mons.
She tightened around his hand, rubbing herself on his confident domination. Pleasure squeezed from her bud and the throbbing need turned to an ache.
She found his hard length and stroked him.
He groaned. His cock already pulsed hard and ready for her. He filled her hand and she wanted to be filled all the way with her male.
He was lean and strong, and she stroked his thick cock expertly, lovingly, giving pleasure with the same sweet dedication she devoted to all of her successes.
His eyes rimmed black with hunger. “I intended to savor this time with you.”
She nipped his lips. “Savor the next time.”
“Aya.”
“We have the rest of our lives.”
With a growl, part hunger and part triumph, he crushed her to him. The temperature of the water rose as his full passion unleashed.
She encouraged him, pressing her soft curves against his bulging muscles, and writhing. He palmed her ass cheeks, kneading her desire. She scissored his waist and rubbed her wet, throbbing bud against his hard length.
He groaned.
The head of his cock pressed against her honey-slick entrance. She guided his shaft, penetrating deep into her interior. He eased into her tight entrance and buried himself to the hilt.
They connected in their cores. Heart to heart. Faithful and eternal.
Aya wrapped her legs around his waist. She lost herself in his dark eyes as he pressed his cock deep within.
He kissed her thoroughly. Celebrating their union, cock to channel, tongue to tongue. They were one.
He thrust into her slowly, stroking her senseless with pleasure. She released his face and moved her grip lower, squeezing his taut butt with her hands.
The water tingled around them, electric.
He pushed his throbbing cock again and again into her yielding softness.
She lost her focus. Everything became Soren.
He thrust harder and harder, and she bucked against him. More.
Pleasure rose higher and sweeter. The whole room glowed green. The water turned white between them.
She shattered with orgasm.
Her release drove his. He poured his seed into her with a roar.
The quiet afterward was louder than every other sound in her life.
Her heart beat steadily in her chest. She heard every thud-thud, thud-thud. She stroked his tattoos, tracing secret lines and messages on his cooling skin. The radiance between them bathed her in warm satisfaction.
Soren, too, had a look of peace. Finding his home, finally, after long years of searching in the wilderness of his broken heart.
She held her husband close and kissed his brow. Mer didn’t have wrinkles or pruney fingers, but frown lines scored his forehead, even at rest, and he wasn’t very old. She kissed them gently.
“I realized something.”
He cracked open an eyelid. “Oh?”
“The most important thing isn’t proving someone else wrong. It’s having faith I can be right. I can try my hardest. Love doesn’t have to mean sacrificing my best performance.”
“Not at all.” He raised a brow. “That was an excellent performance.”
Heh. Look. Her furious warrior could tease and relax and just exist. No longer filled only with rage and torment. He could experience the full span of emotions.
And so could she.
She propped herself up on her elbows. “I have a great idea.”
“Of course you do.”
His simple faith, not even teasing, warmed her to her tingling core. “Keep that up and you’ll give me a different great idea.”
“If it is joining with me again,” he squeezed her buttocks, “I agree.”
“It is, but after that, I was thinking. How many cities are represented by the All-Council? Is it roughly equivalent to the number of cities in the army outside?”
He considered it. “The most important cities will be represented.”
“We should forge a new treaty.”
He rose on his elbows. “A new treaty? With the other cities?”
“Now that the Seven Cities Treaty has been broken, we have a unique opportunity to forge a treaty that celebrates the values of Atlantis.”
Because even though using a megalodon against an unrecognized city like Atlantis hadn’t broken the treaty, the All-Council threatening to use one against Dragao Azul – and probably other cities as well – if they didn’t cooperate did break the treaty. And it was so ironic because they were the enforcers of the treaty terms, and they had been created specifically to defend against the very megalodons they themselves unleashed.
“The warriors forced here will not have the power of kings,” Soren cautioned.
“Isn’t that okay? Atlantis is ruled by more than King Kadir. He asks for contributions from all his warriors. Collaboration, freedom, choice — these are all our values and the representatives who are here can carry them back to their own cities.”
Where, hopefully, they would flourish and grow.
“It is like a dream.” He frowned. “The All-Council will be angry. They may try to attack again.”
“What do they have that’s worse than three megalodons?”
His brows lightened. “Nothing.”
“Exactly.
He pulled her to her feet. “We must tell Kadir right away.”
His eagerness heartened her. “You like my idea?”
“It is brilliant, like you.” He flew her out of the corridor and across the bare castle, to the tunnel and bursting to the outside. “You will be our representative.”
“I do know a fair bit about parliamentary procedure.” Robert’s Rules of Order had been a familiar companion on her student government positions.
“You also know the writing. You will be careful and fair. Your sense of justice and your eye for detail will guide us well. And as you said, we will all agree to it. Not only Kadir and Queen Elyssa, but all the warriors, of all the cities, who will be represented.”
They flew across the revitalizing city. Atlantis had been trampled and nearly destroyed, but facing the danger had caused them to find their true inner strength. Now, they would shine that strength like a light across the entire ocean.
Across the entire world.
“What is your idea for the treaty
title?” he asked.
She huffed a laugh. “You knew I had a title already.”
He glanced at her with a satisfied smile. Yes, he knew her. Yes, he expected her to fully formulate her plan before she ever opened her mouth.
Very well. She trusted him. He would think it was awesome. Because it was. It embodied the yin and yang of mer and human, male and female, past and future. Hope and dream. Her heart swelled with her love for him. For knowing her so well. For the future they were about to share.
“I think we should call it, ‘The Treaty of Atlantis.’”
Dear reader,
Thanks so much for reading. If you enjoyed this story, please leave a review on Amazon. Nothing helps an author more, and your fellow readers appreciate your honesty.
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Sincerely,
Starla
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