Nemesis

by Anna Banks

  “Make me believe it.”

  “You’re a Lingot,” she says. “You know what I say is true.”

  “What you say is what duty requires of you. But what do you say, Sepora? If you were not the princess of Serubel, if I were not the Falcon King. If you could walk away from this without any sort of consequence. Would you walk away?”

  Pride of the pyramids, but why would he ask such a direct question even as his heart squeezes at the answer on the tip of her tongue? But he has to know. He must know. Because everything he’s about to do, every action he’s about to take hinges on her answer. On her real answer.

  He uses his finger to push her chin up, to look at those silver eyes of hers. They are on fire with things unspoken, with emotions swelling just below the surface of her collected poise. “Sepora, would you walk away?” he demands.

  “Yes.”

  A truth.

  And a lie.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I think I’m not alone in saying that the acknowledgments are the most difficult part of the book to write, and not because I can’t think of anyone to thank, but because of the sizable village of people who deserve my gratitude and special appreciations. If you are not mentioned here, it is not because I’m ungrateful; it is because sometimes my gray matter lets me down, even when it’s time to recall important things, like you.

  To begin, I’d like to say that Nemesis was written during a dark time in my life. I lost loved ones, endured medical issues, and even lost my love for writing. I wouldn’t have regained that love if it weren’t for my good friends Jessica Brody, Emmy Laybourne, and Leigh Bardugo. You know what you did, ladies. And I love you for it.

  Also, I wouldn’t have opened another Word document ever again if it weren’t for my sisters, Lisa and Teri, whose endless encouragement would not be set aside, even while our family suffered through so much loss. I want the world to know that my sisters are fearless; they will cry with you, laugh with you, and laugh at you, even at inappropriate times. For this, I cherish every moment with them.

  There are people who come into your life that you know will change it forever. On January 27, 2011, I received a call from an agent, Lucy Carson, and I knew, just KNEW, that she would be one of those people. She’s strict, she takes no BS, and she demands only my best. But she’s kind, generous, and quick to laugh, and for all these things, Lucy, I thank you. Without you, there would be no book, no career, no success, no hope of a Sasquatch romance. Thank you!

  Not to be outdone, though, I could not have made it to where I am now without my beloved editor, Liz Szabla. Liz, your patience and insights and ideas and sheer talent have been invaluable to me. I don’t know how you balance keeping my writing in place with giving me such creative license; truly it’s a gift you have. When I get notes from you, I feel so blessed, like I’m exactly where I should be.

  Acknowledgments wouldn’t be complete without including the outstanding publicity team at Macmillan Children’s. Their ingenuity, thoroughness, and absolute enthusiasm for their work set them apart in every way. Thank you for hearing out my crazy ideas, and for taking the lead and showing me by example how successful a good marketing plan can be.

  For Anna Booth and Rich Deas, this cover is amazing. I don’t know what kind of sorcery you use to keep coming up with stunning covers, but there isn’t a book yet that hasn’t caused me to lose my breath when seeing my cover for the first time. Thank you.

  To my critique partners, Heather Rebel and Kaylyn Witt, you are awesome and you pretty much know it. And now I’ve put it in writing, so you can hold it against me when I’m defending myself against your notes.

  And last, but not ever (NEVER!) least, a huge group hug to all my fans and readers and book bloggers and supporters. Without you, there would be no acknowledgments. Without you, my world as I know it wouldn’t exist. Thank you.

  All My Best,

  Anna

  1

  I SMACK into him as if shoved from behind. He doesn’t budge, not an inch. Just holds my shoulders and waits. Maybe he’s waiting for me to find my balance. Maybe he’s waiting for me to gather my pride. I hope he’s got all day.

  I hear people passing on the boardwalk and imagine them staring. Best-case scenario, they think I know this guy, that we’re hugging. Worst-case scenario, they saw me totter like an intoxicated walrus into this complete stranger because I was looking down for a place to park our beach stuff. Either way, he knows what happened. He knows why my cheek is plastered to his bare chest. And there is definite humiliation waiting when I get around to looking up at him.

  Options skim through my head like a flip book.

  Option One: Run away as fast as my dollar-store flip-flops can take me. Thing is, tripping over them is partly responsible for my current dilemma. In fact, one of them is missing, probably caught in a crack of the boardwalk. I’m betting Cinderella didn’t feel this foolish, but then again, Cinderella wasn’t as clumsy as an intoxicated walrus.

  Option Two: Pretend I’ve fainted. Go limp and everything. Drool, even. But I know this won’t work because my eyes flutter too much to fake it, and besides, people don’t blush while unconscious.

  Option Three: Pray for a lightning bolt. A deadly one that you feel in advance because the air gets all atingle and your skin crawls—or so the science books say. It might kill us both, but really, he should have been paying more attention to me when he saw that I wasn’t paying attention at all.

  For a shaved second, I think my prayers are answered because I do get tingly all over; goose bumps sprout everywhere, and my pulse feels like electricity. Then I realize, it’s coming from my shoulders. From his hands.

  Option Last: For the love of God, peel my cheek off his chest and apologize for the casual assault. Then hobble away on my one flip-flop before I faint. With my luck, the lightning would only maim me, and he would feel obligated to carry me somewhere anyway. Also, do it now.

  I ease away from him and peer up. The fire on my cheeks has nothing to do with the fact that it’s sweaty-eight degrees in the Florida sun and everything to do with the fact that I just tripped into the most attractive guy on the planet. Fan-flipping-tastic.

  “Are—are you alright?” he says, incredulous. I think I can see the shape of my cheek indented on his chest.

  I nod. “I’m fine. I’m used to it. Sorry.” I shrug off his hands when he doesn’t let go. The tingling stays behind, as if he left some of himself on me.

  “Jeez, Emma, are you okay?” Chloe calls from behind. The calm fwopping of my best friend’s sandals suggests she’s not as concerned as she sounds. Track star that she is, she would already be at my side if she thought I was hurt. I groan and face her, not surprised that she’s grinning wide as the equator. She holds out my flip-flop, which I try not to snatch from her hand.

  “I’m fine. Everybody’s fine,” I say. I turn back to the guy, who seems to get more gorgeous by the second. “You’re fine, right? No broken bones or anything?”

  He blinks, gives a slight nod.

  Chloe sets her surfboard against the rail of the boardwalk and extends her hand to him. He accepts it without taking his eyes off me. “I’m Chloe and this is Emma,” she says. “We usually bring her helmet with us, but we left it back in the hotel room this time.”

  I gasp. I also try to decide what kind of flowers I’ll bring to her funeral after I strangle the life from her body. I should have stayed in Jersey, like Mom said. Shouldn’t have come here with Chloe and her parents. What business do I have in Florida? We live on the Jersey Shore. If you’ve seen one beach, you’ve seen them all, right?

  But noooooooo. I had to come and spend the last of my summer with Chloe, because this would be our last summer together before college, blah-blah-blah. And now she’s taking revenge on me for not letting her use my ID to get a tattoo last night. But what did she expect? I’m white and she’s black. I’m not even tan-white. I’m Canadian-tourist white. If the guy could mistake her for me, then he shouldn’t be g
iving anyone a tattoo, right? I was just protecting her. Only, she doesn’t realize that. I can tell by that look in her eyes—the same look she wore when she replaced my hand sanitizer with personal lubricant—that she’s about to take what’s left of my pride and kick it like a donkey.

  “Uh, we didn’t get your name. Did you get his name, Emma?” she asks, as if on cue.

  “I tried, Chloe. But he wouldn’t tell me, so I tackled him,” I say, rolling my eyes.

  The guy smirks. This almost-smile hints at how breathtaking a real one would be. The tingling flares up again, and I rub my arms.

  “Hey, Galen, are you ready to—” We all turn to a petite black-haired girl as she touches his shoulder. She stops mid-sentence when she sees me. Even if these two didn’t share the same short dark hair, the same violet eyes, and the same flawless olive skin, I’d know they were related because of their most dominant feature—their habit of staring.

  “I’m Chloe. This is my friend Emma, who apparently just head-butted your boyfriend Galen. We were in the middle of apologizing.”

  I pinch the bridge of my nose and count to ten-Mississippi, but fifty-Mississippi seems more appropriate. Fifty allows more time to fantasize about ripping one of Chloe’s new weaves out.

  “Emma, what’s wrong? Your nose isn’t bleeding, is it?” she chirps, enjoying herself.

  Tingles gather at my chin as Galen lifts it with the crook of his finger. “Is your nose bleeding? Let me see,” he says. He tilts my head side to side, leans closer to get a good look.

  And I meet my threshold for embarrassment. Tripping is bad enough. Tripping into someone is much worse. But if that someone has a body that could make sculpted statues jealous—and thinks you’ve broken your nose on one of his pecs—well, that’s when tripping runs a distant second to humane euthanasia.

  He is clearly surprised when I swat his hand and step away. His girlfriend/relative seems taken aback that I mimic his stance—crossed arms and deep frown. I doubt she has ever met her threshold for embarrassment.

  “I said I was fine. No blood, no foul.”

  “This is my sister Rayna,” he says, as if the conversation steered naturally in that direction. She smiles at me as if forced at knifepoint, the kind of smile that comes purely from manners, like the smile you give your grandmother when she gives you the rotten-cabbage-colored sweater she’s been knitting. I think of that sweater now as I return her smile.

  Galen eyes the surfboard abandoned against the wood railing. “The waves here aren’t really good for surfing.”

  Galen’s gift is not small talk. Just like his sister, there’s a forced feel to his manners. But unlike his sister, there’s no underlying hostility, just an awkwardness, like he’s out of practice. Since he appears to be making this effort on my behalf, I cooperate. I make a show of looking at the emerald crests of the Gulf of Mexico, at the waves sloshing lazily against the shore. A man waist-deep in the water holds a toddler on his hip and jumps with the swells as they peak. Compared to the waves back home, the tide here reminds me of kiddie rides at the fair.

  “We know. We’re just taking it out to float,” Chloe says, unconcerned that Galen was talking to me. “We’re from Jersey, so we know what a real wave looks like.” When she steps closer, Rayna steps back. “Hey, that’s weird,” Chloe says. “You both have the same color eyes as Emma. I’ve never seen that before. I always thought it was because she’s freakishly pasty. Ow! That’s gonna leave a mark, Emma,” she says, rubbing her freshly pinched biceps.

  “Good, I hope it does,” I snap. I want to ask them about their eyes—the color seems prettier set against the olive tone of Galen’s skin—but Chloe has bludgeoned my chances of recovering from embarrassment. I’ll have to be satisfied that my dad—and Google—were wrong all this time; my eye color just can’t be that rare. Sure, my dad practiced medicine until the day he died two years ago. And sure, Google never let me down before. But who am I to argue with living, breathing proof that this eye color actually does exist? Nobody, that’s who. Which is convenient, since I don’t want to talk anymore. Don’t want to force Galen into any more awkward conversations. Don’t want to give Chloe any more opportunities to deepen the heat of my burning cheeks. I just want this moment of my life to be over.

  I push past Chloe and snatch up the surfboard. To her good credit, she presses herself against the rail as I pass her again. I stop in front of Galen and his sister. “It was nice to meet you both. Sorry I ran into you. Let’s go, Chloe.”

  Galen looks like he wants to say something, but I turn away. He’s been a good sport, but I’m not interested in discussing swimmer safety—or being introduced to any more of his hostile relatives. Nothing he can say will change the fact that DNA from my cheek is smeared on his chest.

  Trying not to actually march, I thrust past them and make my way down the stairs leading to the pristine white sand. I hear Chloe closing the distance behind me, giggling. And I decide on sunflowers for her funeral.

  2

  THE SIBLINGS lean on their elbows against the rail, watching the girls they just met peel the T-shirts off their bikinis and wade into the water with the surfboard floating between them.

  “She’s probably just wearing contacts,” Rayna says. “They make contacts in that color, you know.”

  He shakes his head. “She’s not wearing contacts. You saw her just as plain as you’re seeing me. She’s one of us.”

  “You’re losing it. She can’t be one of us. Look at her hair. You can’t even call that blonde. It’s almost white.”

  Galen frowns. The hair color had thrown him off too—before he had touched her. The simple contact of grasping her arm when she fell dispensed any doubts. The Syrena are always attracted to their own kind—which helps them find each other across miles and miles of ocean. Usually that attraction is limited to water transmission, where they can sense the presence of one of their own. He’s never heard of it occurring on land before—and never felt it so strongly, period—but he knows what he felt. He wouldn’t—couldn’t react that way to a human. Especially given how much he despises them.

  “I know it’s unusual—”

  “Unusual? It’s impossible, Galen! Our genes don’t come with the ‘blonde’ option.”

  “Stop being dramatic. She is one of us. You can see how bad she is at being human. I thought she was going to brain herself on the rail.”

  “Okay, let’s say by some off chance she figured out how to bleach thousands of years of genetics out of her hair. Now explain why she’s hanging out—no, vacationing—with humans. She’s breaking the law right in front of our faces, splashing around in the water with her obnoxious human friend. Why is that, Galen?”

  He shrugs. “Maybe she doesn’t know who we are.”

  “What do you mean? Everyone knows who we are!”

  “Obviously not. We’ve never met her before, remember?”

  She snorts. “Are you dehydrated? She can see our mark. It’s not like we were hiding it.”

  “Maybe she thinks it’s a tattoo,” he offers.

  “A what?”

  “Look around, Rayna. See the markings on that human girl’s ankle?” He points toward a man walking up the stairs. “See that male? He’s got markings—humans call them tattoos—all over him. Maybe she thought—”

  Rayna holds up her hand. “Stop. She’d recognize the trident. If she was one of us.”

  Galen nods. She’s right. A Syrena knows a Royal by the small blue trident on their stomach—and dressed for the human beach, it’s visible on both of them right now. So, she has blonde—white—hair, and didn’t recognize them as Royals. But he knows what he felt. And she does have the eyes.…

  Rayna groans. “Oh, no.”

  “What?”

  “You’re making that face.”

  “What face?”

  “The face you make when you think you’re right.”

  “Am I?” He watches Emma straddling the surfboard, splashing waves of saltwater in her fr
iend’s face without mercy. He grins.

  “We’re not going home, are we?” Rayna says, propping herself against the rail.

  “Dr. Milligan doesn’t call for just anything. If he thinks it’s of interest, then it probably is. You can leave if you want, but I’m looking into it.” Dr. Milligan is one of the only humans Galen trusts. If the doctor were going to tell anyone about the Syrena’s existence, he would have done it the day Galen had saved his life all those years ago. Instead, Dr. Milligan returned the favor by denying he’d ever seen Galen—even when his scuba companions called the press. Since then, they had built a friendship by sharing sushi, afternoon swims, and most importantly, information. Dr. Milligan is a well-connected and highly respected oceanographer and the director of the Gulfarium here on the coast, in a prime position to monitor the activities of his professional colleagues.

  When Galen received Dr. Milligan’s urgent voice mail yesterday about a blonde Syrena visiting the Gulfarium in human form, he swam the gulf in a day. If Dr. Milligan is right about Emma’s abilities, he’s found more than just a rule-breaking Syrena. The good doctor might have found the key to uniting two kingdoms.

  But since Rayna’s specialty is not discretion—she would even tell on herself when she was younger—Galen knows he must keep this secret from her. Besides, he’s not sure he believes it himself. Even if he did believe it, if he could confirm it, would Emma do what she must? And where has she been? And why? Everything about Emma is a mystery. Her name doesn’t originate with the Syrena—or her hair or skin. And the way her lips turned red when she blushed almost knocked the breath out of him.

  “What?” his sister asks.

  “Nothing.” He wrenches his gaze from Emma. Now she’s got me muttering my thoughts out loud.

  “I told you, you’re losing it.” Rayna makes a phlegmy gagging sound and wrings her hands around her neck. “This is what Father will do to me if I come home without you again. What should I say when he asks where you are? When he asks why you’re so obsessed with humans? ‘But Father, this one is a pretty blonde with nice contacts’?”