Release (The Submerged Sun, #3)

by Garden,Vanessa

  “Who is this clown?” one of Damir’s men asked.

  Damir, his face still bleeding from the punches I’d dealt him earlier, regarded Blake with a sneer. “Shut your mouth or you cop a dagger in it.”

  Blake smiled and chuckled to himself before looking at Marko and me. “Told you I felt it in my bones.”

  Damir growled and pointed at the wall of Kraja’s room. “Do it. Open it up.”

  Marko waited until the others were out of sight before he pressed his hands to the wall.

  A minute or so passed.

  Nothing happened.

  He tried again and again to no avail. However, I thought I caught his lips moving, as though he were speaking to the wall. Perhaps willing it not to open.

  Damir shoved Blake in the back. “Get Miranda and my sister, if they haven’t left already.”

  Marko nodded, warning me not to act just yet. I itched to reach for my dagger, but knew I’d have to wait until the right moment.

  Blake returned a minute later with Miranda and Sylvia.

  Marko swore beneath his breath and shook his head.

  “The others?” He raised his brows at Miranda and she nodded, her eyes red- raw from crying.

  “They’re gone and there’s only one more shuttle left,” Miranda said, shaking her head. “It’s only a small one. Lily said it will fit only three. There are five of us left. Too many.”

  Marko and I shared a look and I knew then that he’d never planned on leaving Marin.

  Damir nodded to two of his men. They seized Marko by his arms and held him while he struggled.

  “One of you must be able to open it,” Damir said to Miranda and Sylvia, giving them both a shove towards the wall with his boot heel. “And if you fail...” He unsheathed his dagger. “Marko’s dead. I mean it.”

  “Don’t open it, Miranda. Remember what I said.” Marko’s eyes bulged with silent meaning. “It doesn’t matter if they kill me. Just don’t open it.”

  Miranda turned to him and mouthed “sorry.” She was going to do it.

  “I know how,” Miranda said. She stepped forward and placed her hands on the wall until it glowed beneath her palms and shot up to disappear into the ceiling. It was even more impressive now that I could see it with perfect eyesight.

  “Remember what you promised,” Marko said, his eyes trained on Damir who had now sheathed his weapon. “You said you’d let everyone go.”

  Damir ignored his brother’s words and entered Kraja’s room.

  I stood beside Marko and the men who held him, waiting to make my move if Damir didn’t follow through with his promise.

  Blake moved towards the entrance to Kraja’s room, clearly intrigued.

  Damir whistled and turned around in circles, the multi-coloured light crystals painting rainbows across his unshaven face.

  “You were right little brother, this thing, our city, looks like it might actually be a space ship.”

  He stepped over to the wall of rainbow-coloured buttons and pressed one of the larger ones.

  A strange, low noise erupted around us, followed by a hiss.

  The guards holding Marko let him go and stepped back, cringing at the walls.

  “You idiot. I said don’t touch anything. You’ll get us all killed,” Marko spat.

  Damir laughed and moved towards the large light crystal lever in the middle of the room.

  “What’s this?”

  “Just step away from it,” said Marko, his voice tight. “I think it raises the ship. We’ll all die if you pull it.”

  Damir nodded. “Okay.” He stepped away from it and I sighed with relief. But seconds later he spun around and put his hand back on the lever.

  Marko edged closer, his hands out in front of him as though in truce.

  “Don’t do it, Damir. Please.”

  Damir released a long sigh.

  “You know, Lauren is dead now, my mermaids have all drowned because of the stupid, greedy people in this city. So...” He grinned and shrugged. “I don’t exactly have much to live for.”

  “No!” Miranda and Sylvia shouted.

  Damir grinned like the Devil and pulled the lever.

  A rumbling started beneath our feet.

  The walls began to shake.

  Marko elbowed one of Damir’s men in the face while I punched the other and together we pushed Miranda and Sylvia out of the room and ran, Blake following.

  Damir’s guards stumbled behind us, but Miranda pressed her palms on either side of the open doorway and it came shooting down, sealing Damir and his men behind solid stone.

  We ran to the chutes where the last shuttle sat waiting. Miranda was right. It was a small one, smaller than the one she, Lily, Marko and I had travelled in.

  “Get in,” Marko shouted.

  “No,” Miranda shouted back, tears streaming down her face. “I won’t.”

  The ground trembled again, knocking Miranda and Sylvia off their feet.

  “Get in, please.” Marko eyes filled with tears as he wrestled with Miranda and forced her into the machine.

  Eventually she gave up fighting and lay there sobbing so hard it broke my heart.

  “There’s no time for drugs or goggles. Just keep your eyes shut,” Marko shouted over the loud rumble.

  After Sylvia climbed in beside Miranda, Marko turned to me.

  “You’re next.”

  I shook my head.

  “No way. I’m your head guard. My priority is you.”

  Marko’s blue eyes bulged. He gripped me by my shoulders and shook me.

  “This place is about to collapse around us, I need you to take care of Miranda. Get in or I’ll force you in with a dagger if I have to!”

  My eyes burned with the sting of unshed tears.

  “No.”

  Marko swore and grabbed me by my shirt collar. “This is my last order to you as my head guard. Go and protect Miranda. Now. Go. Or she’ll die too.”

  The floor rumbled again. Louder this time.

  “No,” I shouted. “You get in. She needs you more than me.”

  Marko swore.

  “We could do this forever Rob. But we don’t have forever. This shuttle has to leave now. And I’m ordering you to get inside it!”

  I got in, hating myself. If I fought Marko and tried to force him into the shuttle instead of me, I’d waste valuable time and risk Miranda’s life as well.

  Marko slammed the lid shut.

  Miranda screamed as pieces of light crystal started to break away and ping against the shuttle.

  “The city’s breaking,” wailed Sylvia. “It’s going to collapse on top of us.”

  But before it could happen, the shuttle shot off down the chute, away from Marko—my best friend—and away from the crumbling underwater city I called home.

  32

  Miranda

  Hours later, we got spat into the ocean, and though I held onto Robbie’s hand for dear life, we became separated. Luckily, when my head broke the surface I spied him only fifty metres away and quickly swam to his side.

  While the afternoon sun beamed against my skin, hot, fat tears spilled from my eyes down my cold, wet face. I still couldn’t believe what had happened. That Marko was gone.

  “That way,” he shouted, pointing to land up ahead. I could see a couple of tiny, orange rooves but apart from that just an empty bay, lots of trees and a mammoth cliff face behind it all.

  This definitely wasn’t Bob’s Bay.

  More tears sprang from my eyes. I couldn’t get the image of Marko’s face out of my head, the terror in his eyes just before he’d slammed the shuttle shut. He must have felt so alone in that moment, so frightened.

  As we swam closer to shore, I noticed my grandparents floating on their backs and Lily too, with Angelina resting on her chest. I hoped the baby was okay, that she’d survived the trip through the chutes and the tumble into the ocean, without permanent damage.

  “We’re nearly there,” Robbie said, smiling at me with encourageme
nt. My arms felt like they were about to drop off, but I continued slicing through the water and kicking my near numb legs. All the while I thought only of Marko, of the castle crumbling around him and the light crystal dome shattering to pieces.

  I almost passed out by the time I reached the shore and had to rely on Robbie to drag me out of the water and onto the pebbly beach.

  We didn’t say a word as we collapsed on our sides and stared out to sea, but we were both thinking the same thing.

  Marko was gone. And we’d never get him back.

  I dropped my head into my hands and bawled, but stopped only when Lily crouched down beside me.

  Angelina gurgled in her arms.

  “Miranda, open your eyes please,” she said between breaths. “Look who’s running towards us.”

  I opened my eyes, expecting Marko to come running, but instead I saw... I couldn’t believe it... I saw Lauren, and she was heading towards me with both a frown and a smile on her face.

  “Lauren?” I whispered incredulously, before leaping to my feet. My bare heels splashed against the lapping water as I ran to her, a soft breeze whipping my wet hair behind me.

  “Miranda? Miranda!”

  “Lauren!”

  I threw myself at her and squeezed her to me, wrapping my arms tightly around her body.

  “I’m Lauren!” she shouted in my ear, as though she’d only just discovered this and turned to the man standing behind her. He was tall and blonde, with vivid blue eyes. “I’m Lauren. I’m Lauren!”

  She spied Nana and Pop, who were flat on their backs like star-fish staring up at the perfect blue sky, and squealed before running to smother them both with kisses. She stopped and turned around only when the baby started to cry in Lily’s arms.

  Lily moved towards Lauren, taking careful steps.

  Angelina’s cries grew louder.

  Lauren choked back a sob and clutched her sagging belly.

  “The baby’s mine.”

  “She is, Lauren, this is your baby daughter,” Lily said.

  Lauren gently took the hysterical baby into her arms, tears streaming down her cheeks.

  “My baby,” she whispered and pressed her lips to Angelina’s forehead.

  Angelina stopped crying.

  33

  My Twenty-first Birthday, three years later

  Life was difficult without Marko. Though I kept myself busy helping Lauren and Ivan with Angelina during the day, the nights were agonisingly long and lonely, filled with thoughts of only him.

  Robbie, Lily, Nana and Pop did their best to keep my spirits up, but as each year passed the hole in my heart grew larger, just as my desire to return to Marin grew stronger.

  Though I knew the city had been destroyed, the compulsion was alive and well, torturing my heart on a daily basis. The others were experiencing the same urges. Robbie explained that although the city had been destroyed, shards of light-crystal still remained at the bottom of the ocean.

  Because being close to the ocean was so difficult, I chose to stay away from it for most of the time. Robbie and Lily did the same, renting out an apartment in the city. Lily said the people and traffic helped to drown out the call of the ocean.

  The only time I allowed myself anywhere near the sea was on the night of my birthday.

  Though Marko could not have possibly survived the crumbling of Marin, I couldn’t help but hope to see him emerge from the water again, like he had on the night of my eighteenth birthday. It was the one day of the entire year I allowed myself this indulgence.

  And today, my twenty-first birthday, was no different.

  “Drive safe,” Nana said, patting my cheek with a floured hand. Lauren and Angelina had come to spend the weekend with them while Ivan was away with work.

  Angelina raised a doughy hand and I high-fived it.

  Pop kissed me on the cheek. “Ring us when you get there.”

  I adjusted the strap of the small backpack I’d packed for the two nights I’d be spending at Bob’s Bay.

  “I will.”

  * * *

  The clock on the shack wall told me it was five minutes until midnight. Five minutes before I became a twenty-one-year-old. Like the year before, I carried a wine glass with me as I stepped outside onto the soft, cool sand.

  The soothing hush of the calm ocean was both a source of pain and a healing balm to my sad heart. I’d missed it. But being near it again was hard. Too many memories were now attached to it.

  It wasn’t simply a beautiful piece of nature. It was so much more than that. It had become a part of my life—the most important part. I met the love of my life in the ocean. And that same ocean stole the love of my life from me.

  I stared at its silky smooth surface and narrowed my gaze, willing Marko to appear. Willing him back into my life.

  Come back to me, Marko, please.

  But the minutes passed, as they had done last year on my twentieth birthday, and the year before on my nineteenth.

  By the time I’d drained my wine glass, midnight had come and gone.

  I was alone again.

  Another year without Marko.

  The wine glass slipped from my fingers and my knees gave out. I collapsed onto the sand, my head in my hands.

  A flock of seagulls came to land at the edge of the shore, right in front of me, annoying me with their shrieks. I was tempted to hurl my wine glass at them to scare them off but they suddenly took flight, as though they’d read my mind.

  When I raised my head, I saw that they’d been frightened by a man emerging from the sea.

  A man I recognised.

  Time stopped, and so did my heart.

  “Marko?” I wanted to leap to my feet but I couldn’t move. The sight of him had paralysed me.

  My hands flew to my mouth. “Is it really you?”

  Beneath the light of the half-moon his beautiful face broke into a wide smile.

  “It’s me, Miranda.”

  A sudden surge of adrenaline had me on my feet and in Marko’s arms.

  He was cold and he was wet... he was alive.

  “How?” I asked, wrapping my arms around him as tightly as I could. “The city collapsed.”

  His glorious chest rose and fell while he caught his breath. I couldn’t believe it. Marko, right here, right now. In the flesh. I was touching him. He was really here.

  “There was damage to every light crystal channel, but the city itself didn’t collapse.”

  His blue eyes drank me in from head to toe. He shook his head as though he couldn’t quite believe I was here in his arms.

  “Oh Miranda, I spent every day of the past two years rebuilding those channels, with help from the good citizens of Marin, so that I could see you again. So that I could take you back home.”

  My stomach quivered when his heated gaze locked with mine.

  “I’ve thought of nothing else but seeing you again, Miranda.”

  He brought his lips to mine and kissed me tenderly at first and then with an eagerness that took my breath away.

  I kissed him back, my hands exploring the sharp lines of his jaw, then the breadth of his shoulders and the hard muscles of his chest and stomach. I couldn’t get enough of touching him, because if I kept touching him, then maybe he wouldn’t disappear on me. Vanish like some beautiful dream.

  Marko drew back suddenly, his face animated with excitement. “You should see the city. It’s more beautiful than ever. And Kraja’s moon isn’t a moon. It’s a sun. It was a sun all along. There are babies everywhere, Miranda. Marin’s a different place from when you left it. A better place.”

  I smiled and did a little jump in his arms. His enthusiasm was infectious. But I couldn’t help but wonder if hidden dangers still plagued the city.

  “But what about Damir?”

  Marko’s smile died and the light in his eyes dimmed at the mention of his brother.

  “Blake and I found them, my brother and his men, in Kraja’s secret room several days after you left. All de
ad.”

  “Oh... I guess I’m sorry.” I didn’t quite know how to tactfully express my feelings on the subject. “But I’m not sorry as well, if that makes sense.”

  “It does.” Marko smiled sadly. “I feel the same.” He sniffed and stared at the seagulls squawking beside us. They were fighting over something. “Have you seen Sylvia? Is she alive?”

  One of the seagulls, the alpha-seagull, puffed up his feathers and warned the others off with a strange cry, his tiny neck bent so that his beak faced the sky.

  “None of us have seen her since that day. She disappeared from the beach, from the bay in Croatia where your grandmother’s relatives live, and hasn’t been seen or heard from again.”

  Marko absorbed this knowledge for a few seconds before finally nodding.

  “That’s all I need to know. I doubt we’ll ever hear from her again.” He met my gaze. “Let’s promise to not speak of her. Ever.”

  “Agreed.”

  He smiled softly. “The others? Your grandparents? Robbie? Lily? Lauren and Angelina? Are they well?”

  “They’re all great. But they miss Marin... and you.”

  I slid my hands around his neck and drew him down so that I could press my lips to his in a loud, smacking kiss.

  “I can’t believe that you’re alive.” I tossed my head back and screamed so loud that the seagulls decided to abandon whatever they were fighting over and leave the beach altogether.

  Marko laughed and scooped me up into his arms, like a groom holding his bride. He bent his head and pressed his lips to mine, kissing me long and deep.

  “Oh Miranda, I missed you so much,” he said, his voice hoarse with emotion.

  “Me too.” I pressed my face into his neck and breathed in his scent. “I’m never letting you out of my sight again.”

  Marko groaned. “And I’m never letting you go, ever.” He pressed his lips to my ear, his breath warm. “The others can wait. I’ll return for them soon. But right now I want only you Miranda.”

  My heart fluttered against my chest. I squeezed Marko to me and raised my head to stare over his shoulder at the moonlit ocean.

  It had delivered my one true love back into my arms.

  I whispered a thankyou then locked eyes with Marko. Under the silvery light of the half-moon, Marko’s blue eyes seemed to hold an ocean of depth. I wanted to dive right into that ocean and stay there forever.