Under (Titans, #0)

by Lazu, Sotia

  Under

  Titans, Volume 0

  Sotia Lazu

  Published by Acelette Press, 2018.

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

  UNDER

  First edition. December 20, 2018.

  Copyright © 2018 Sotia Lazu.

  ISBN: 978-1386206378

  Written by Sotia Lazu.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Chapter One - Halie

  Chapter Two - Halie

  Chapter Three - Delphinos

  Chapter Four - Halie

  Chapter Five - Delphinos

  Chapter Six - Halie

  Chapter Seven - Delphinos

  Chapter Eight - Halie

  Chapter Nine - Delphinos

  Chapter Ten - Halie

  Chapter Eleven - Delphinos

  Chapter Twelve - Halie

  Chapter Thirteen - Delphinos

  Epilogue

  Chapter One - Halie

  Ten more steps. She could take ten more steps. She wasn’t that out of it.

  “You okay?” asked a girl in a black-and-white dress.

  The colors twirled together, making Halie’s head spin. She should have stopped before the fourth martini—or was it the fifth? She didn’t even like martinis; Joss said they were sophisticated, and she needed Joss to love her.

  No. She loved Joss. And he was behind his bedroom door. Nine steps away.

  “I’m fine,” she said, only it came out mfine. The girl said something else, but it was drowned in the music. The loud beat thudded in Halie’s chest. It wasn’t an entirely unpleasant feeling—easier to focus on that than on the swaying floor.

  Her stomach lurched. Bile, alcohol, and cheese burned up her throat, and she swallowed it back down. Bleh. Not many things were more disgusting than throwing up after eating cheese.

  Three steps.

  Two.

  She grabbed the door handle at first try, and things were looking up, because it turned easily.

  A beam of red light from the party behind her sliced through the darkened room, illuminating the figure on the bed for a split second, before spinning to the right. The broad back and rounded butt were unmistakably Joss’s.

  Halie’s drunken brain stalled. Was he doing push-ups? Naked?

  No, idiot. He was fucking someone else.

  Her stomach flipped in on itself and gave her heart a kick on the way.

  It couldn’t be.

  Joss was a gentleman. He took in damsels in distress and gave them shelter from the rain, and stayed up with them all night, talking about his hopes and dreams. He was patient and kind and understanding, and he didn’t push when she wouldn’t kiss him even though they’d been seeing each other for a month now—she wasn’t a prude or something; she just had to make sure he was The One before she gave him true love’s kiss.

  His offer to wait for her seemed like less of a sacrifice when he was screwing someone on the side.

  Halie opened her mouth to yell. To curse at him. To ask him why on earth he’d fuck another woman, when tonight was supposed to be their big night. He’d invited her to his party and suggested she stay the night. Granted, her reply was a drawn-out maybe, but she’d also given him that long, sideways look under her lashes. It was meant to be fraught with promise.

  Tonight, he’d say he was falling for her, then they’d kiss, and...

  She doubled over and emptied the contents of her stomach.

  Joss tensed, looked at her over his shoulder, and jumped out of bed with that dancer’s grace she admired from the first moment she saw him on the beach.

  “Halie? What—? I didn’t see you come in.”

  His intellect wasn’t what she loved about him.

  What was, then?

  “Joss?” The naked woman in his bed sat up, but neither he nor Halie looked her way.

  “Shit, Halie. My shoes,” Joss said.

  Halie followed his horrified gaze to the floor. She’d barfed on his handmade Italian loafers.

  Suited him right.

  “You’re a piece of shit,” she spat out.

  The woman on the bed called Joss’s name again. He kept ignoring her. Of course he did. She didn’t mean anything. Neither did Halie.

  Joss was the wrong guy. Again.

  “We only had four dates,” he said with a scowl.

  “Six. In four consecutive weeks.” She’d done everything right. Was mysterious and alluring. Why hadn’t he fallen for her?

  Did she care?

  “We never said we were exclusive.” His attention was fully on his shoes. Priorities.

  “We never said we weren’t.” The accusation would sound more scathing if she didn’t slur the words. She spun, and so did the walls, but she didn’t let a little dizziness stop her from strutting out of his bedroom. The situation was unsalvageable, and she’d just wasted another month. She was cutting it close, damn it. She had to find the one before her time was up, or her people would pay for it. Stupid prophecy.

  She weaved her way through the dancing crowd and outside, to the beach. The cool night air cleared her head a little. She was in no condition to walk to her hotel. She’d call a cab there, pack her meager belongings, and then—

  Go where?

  As if with a sharp tug, the thread holding her sense of self together snapped. Panic clawed at her gut. Where was home?

  She had one. She didn’t always live in a hotel room. Maybe it was the alcohol muddling her thoughts? Head trauma? She gingerly touched her head. No pain, and she didn’t remember bumping it anywhere. Plus, she recalled every detail of her time with Joss, from meeting him on the beach four weeks ago, to all the handholding and soul-gazing and strolling in the moonlight, to seeing him fucking someone else.

  Selective amnesia? You’d think her subconscious would delete the useless, Joss-related bits, if his betrayal had the power to erase memories. But no. What eluded her was where she’d been before that.

  Worse—who she’d been. She knew seconds ago; she remembered remembering. She was part of a whole. Had a family.

  But what did they look like? Where did they live? Would they come looking for her if she didn’t call them in the morning?

  What was happening to her?

  Maybe someone spiked her drink. Was a would-be rapist watching, waiting for her to collapse before he pounced? One glance toward the large screen windows showed nobody was coming after her. Not a mystery drink-spiker, and definitely not Joss.

  The fucker.

  Salty air tickled her nostrils and made her lungs expand. The breeze caressing her face soothed her nerves, and the sound of waves breaking on the shore lulled her.

  Her memory lapse was due to stress. She’d relax, and it would all come back.

  A sense of longing washed over her and made the emptiness inside more pronounced. It felt like she was mourning a lost love, but it had nothing to do with Joss. Was she forgetting someone important?

  The logical thing to do was call 911 and have an ambulance take her sorry ass to a hospital, so they could assess her for brain damage.

  But she’d left her clutch at Joss’s, and the sea called to her like an old friend. A splash of cold water might shock her back to normal.

  She slipped off her platforms, and sighed with relief when her feet made contact with the cold, wet sand. She’d walk to the edge of the water and let the foam tickle her toes. Then she’d do the logical thing.

  The waves stroked her feet, soothing away her worries. Another step or ten minutes longer wouldn’t hurt.

  She didn’t realize she’d waded into the water until her mini dress clung to her thighs, heavy and soaked.

  An
d she kept walking.

  She trailed her fingertips along the surface, caressing the water. She didn’t want to die. Joss didn’t have the power to make her want to end her life. Come to think of it, he didn’t mean that much to her—there went that true love prospect. The farther behind she left him and dry land, the starrier the sky was. The better she felt. It was past midnight, and she should be freezing, but she felt warm and loved and comfortable, even when the water brushed her closed lips and her long hair swam around her in blood-red tendrils.

  She blinked, and she no longer saw the stars above.

  “Another failure, huh?” The deep male voice came from behind her.

  Halie kicked her legs, to turn toward the sound. When had her feet stopped touching the bottom of the sea?

  A man’s face hovered a couple feet away, pale and gorgeous. He arched an eyebrow. His eyes looked like gems, but it could be the water washing them in green-blue hues.

  Had he spoken? How could she hear him, underwater?

  He smirked, and Halie tilted her head and watched his full mouth. He was about to speak, and whatever he said next would be important.

  The gorgeous man shook his head, and long dark-green tresses swirled around him. “Found her,” he yelled, without moving his lips.

  How? And who was he talking to?

  Halie didn’t linger on the thought, because she had more urgent things to worry about. Like her urgent need for air. She turned her face up, following the bubbles that escaped her nostrils. She was fully submerged, but not by much. Her legs stuck together when she tried to scissor them. She kicked hard, but the man closed the distance between them with one long stroke and wrapped an arm around her waist.

  He buried his face in her hair and somehow whispered, “Relax.”

  She couldn’t. Her chest ached for a breath. Get me out of here, she wanted to scream. She tried to move her legs again, to help him to the surface, but his grip was made of steel and anchoring her in place.

  Killing her.

  Her lungs constricted painfully. She had mere moments before she blacked out and drowned. Her arms were pinned between her and the man. She tried to dig her nails in his leg—anything to loosen his hold—but he wore something slippery, and she couldn’t find purchase. He didn’t budge.

  She resisted taking a breath, until the burn was unbearable. Until her head swam, and the world darkened, and the man’s sparkling eyes were all she could make out. Until she lost the fight against her body.

  And then she inhaled.

  Chapter Two - Halie

  Water rushed down her airway, cold and dark and salty and relentless. Halie gasped and gagged, and then gave in to the sea around and inside her. She floated, weightless, anchored only to the hard body of her killer

  “Good girl.” He caressed her cheek tenderly. “Breathe. You’re over the hard part.”

  Her lungs felt like they’d burst, and then... they didn’t. They expanded? The sea still filled her, but it felt right. Who’d have thought drowning was so peaceful?

  “You won’t drown. You can’t drown, Halie. Relax. Your body remembers.” His words made no sense, but she had no strength left, so she inhaled again. There was no pain. No panic.

  Was she dead? Did she seriously just go into the sea and get herself killed because of a worthless jackass? Did the man with the gem eyes even exist, or did her alcohol-soaked brain conjure him while she lay face down, dying in shallow water?

  “If I let go, promise not to hit me?” he asked.

  She nodded. She might somehow breathe underwater—or in this disturbed near-death hallucination or afterlife or what-fucking-ever—but she didn’t trust herself to speak.

  The moment he let go, Halie spun with impossible speed and aimed a punch at his face.

  He easily sidestepped—sideswam?—her and closed his large palm over her fist. “After the first couple-dozen times, I learned to avoid this,” he said with a chuckle.

  Did he often drown helpless women?

  He looked offended. “You’re not helpless, and all my practice has been with you.”

  Okay. Totally a figment of her imagination, if he could read her mind.

  “I’m not reading anything. Your thoughts are louder than a foghorn. Try not to project them, until you remember everything.”

  Right. The memory loss. Her gap. Was he from her past?

  Was the underwater mind-reading green-haired hottie from her past? Halie snorted, and this time the water didn’t bother her as it slid down her nostrils. Odd, how her last thoughts in this life—or the first in the next—were the stuff of fairy tales.

  “I’m not a fairy. I’m a... Shit. You have to remember the basics on your own. Anyway. Come. Nereus and Doris are waiting. You cut this one close.” He clasped her wrist.

  Where were they going?

  “Down,” he said, and she looked there instinctively.

  Gasp. More water down the gullet. But hey, she barely noticed now. She was too preoccupied with the— “You have a tail.” She spoke the words, but the sound reached her ears garbled, so she pointed at the shiny, scaly, blue thing and thought really hard, “You have a tail.”

  The guy let go of her, to clasp his head with both hands. “The entire Vythos heard that. Try to focus your thoughts, please.”

  She concentrated on thinking at him, “But you have a fucking tail. A fucking tail. Like a fish. Are you a... mermaid?” And what was a vythos?

  He crossed his arms over his admittedly impressive sternum, and his lips twitched. “You said mermaid first, so I’m cleared to tell you that no, I’m not a mermaid—or merman. I’m a sea daimon.”

  A demon? She flapped her arms, trying to get away, but he grabbed her by one wrist.

  “Not a demon, a daimon. They mean the same nowadays, but I’m the sort supposed to lead people to their destiny,” he sent her.

  Okay... “Like, to my death?”

  “Like, to Vythos.” He let go and held out his hand with a wink. “Delphinos, as you’ll soon remember.”

  She ignored his gesture. “What’s all this remembering crap? What am I supposed to remember? And why can’t I?”

  “Nereus or your—or Doris will tell you what you need to know, if the memories don’t kick in immediately.” He flexed his palm. “Shall we?”

  She could try to swim to the surface, but the darkness beneath called to her. Tugged at her heart.

  Reluctantly, she put her hand in his. A jolt spread up her arm at the contact. This was familiar. Easy. Neither of which made sense.

  “It all will, soon.” He ran his thumb across her knuckles. “Make sure to sway your tail left to right. The up-down motion only works on TV.”

  Her tail? She leaned forward and took in the shimmering silvery scales that covered the bottom half of her body. “What the actual fuck?”

  Delphinos laughed and darted downward, pulling her with him.

  He might be a jerk, but he was right; her body did remember things her conscious mind couldn’t grasp. It remembered to swish her hips from side to side, so after the first few lengths, she swam beside him. It also remembered they swam faster when she held on to his back. She glanced at him, and he nodded and held still long enough for her to plaster her body along his back and wrap her arms around his neck. If she still had legs, she’d spread her thighs around his hips.

  She’d done that before, too.

  She didn’t know how, but she remembered being wrapped around him, only her breasts hadn’t been pressed to his back...

  His body vibrated with his laugh, and he dove deeper. Faster.

  All light disappeared, and Halie squeezed her eyes shut. This was it. Her soul or whatever was leaving her body, and the fantasy would end.

  “Open your eyes,” Delphinos said inside her head.

  She was tempted not to—why delay the inevitable?—but the sense of familiarity made her do as he asked and peek over his shoulder.

  Someone spiked her drink, earlier, at the party.

 
It was the only explanation.

  She was passed out on Joss’s leather couch, making all this up.

  Because she couldn’t really be seeing an underwater city, bathed in a pale golden light and filled with mermaids.

  “Wait till we’re inside the bubble,” Delphinos said.

  Bubble?

  Bubble.

  What looked like a huge crystal dome surrounded a golden castle in the middle of the city. It wasn’t the only one—more bubbles glistened around smaller constructions that resembled sunken boats—but it was the largest. And Delphinos steered them straight for it. Literally. He didn’t slow down even when they were inches from the dome, and Halie buried her face in his back and braced herself for impact.

  It never came.

  Instead, it felt like they pierced a wall of water and tumbled down on velvety pillows on the other side.

  She lifted her knees to Delphinos’ sides and clung to him for dear life, until they stopped rolling.

  Knees?

  She had knees again. And she breathed through the nose. Like, real air.

  She looked up and scampered away from him. Shit. She was naked from the waist down, since the magic that gave her a tail before also made her thong disappear, and her tattered dress barely covered her upper body. She squeezed her thighs together and crossed her arms over her breasts, where the soggy fabric clung to her hardened nipples. “What the...?”

  Delphinos rolled on his back and propped himself up on his elbows, making no effort to hide the hard-on he sported. “In the bubbles, we have our human form. Give it a couple seconds.”

  “To what?”

  He didn’t have to say anything, as the answer to his question slammed into her in a bazillion of fractured memories.

  Living in the palace with way too many—forty nine?—sisters and a brother.

  Her mom and dad, crowns on their heads.

  The merpeople—her people.

  Herself as a child, playing with a dolphin.

  Her first time on dry land.

  And men.

  So. Many. Men.

  At one point or another, she’d thought she might love each and every one of them.