Kingdom of Villains and Vengeance: Fairytale retellings from the villain's perspective (Kingdom of Darkness and Light Book 2)

by Laura Greenwood

  “What do you mean?”

  “You no longer breathe as you did when you were a human. Mermaids do not have breathing sicknesses. And you will certainly be able to swim. Were you able to walk as a human?”

  Jae nodded.

  “Swimming is to mermaids as walking is to humans. You must swim, and so you will. Do not worry about that.”

  Jae didn’t know how not to worry about that. It was all she’d worried about for her entire life—whether or not she would be able to breathe. But she would trust Naunet, because she had no reason not to. The mermaid had saved her from a watery grave, after all, and apparently healed her in the process, even if it changed her. It would be amazing to be able to breathe freely and make decisions based on what she actually wanted, not limited by the weaknesses of her frail human body.

  Jae looked past Naunet toward where she thought the ocean was, and saw nothing but sparkling blue water and white sands of the island’s beaches. “Do you know what happened to the others on the ships?”

  “The pirates?” Naunet waved a hand. “They can fend for themselves, just as the mermaids look out for their own.”

  “Why did you save me, then?” Jae asked.

  Naunet produced the pearlescent shell hair comb that Jae had been wearing. “Because of this. I recognized it as a hair comb that my grandmother gifted to Wendy Darlington many moons ago. You were no pirate.”

  “Wendy was my grandmother. Wren is my sister.”

  “I assumed as much. Anyone descended from the creator is a friend to the mermaids. I could not honor your grandmother or mine by letting you die.”

  Jae took the hair comb from Naunet, studying it as the words sank in.

  So, this was her new reality, then. It would do no good to rage or cry, no matter how much she longed for legs to carry her home. She would never see Starlake again. Never be able to sit on the couch with her sister and read a good book. Never kiss James, no matter how much she longed for it, even against her better judgment. But she would live, and that was the important thing, wasn’t it? Not just live, but swim, and breathe without the help of medicines and nebulizers, and make her own life for herself, away from Astanrog and the Frostwater and whoever else might want to control her or order her around.

  Steeling herself against any tears that threatened to fall, she looked over at Naunet. “What do I do now?”

  “We wait. The water will rise around Marooner’s Rock with the tide and soon be high enough that you’ll have no choice but to swim. It’s better this way for new mermaids, a gradual submersion.”

  That was a relief. Jae didn’t know if she would be able to force herself off the rock and into the water, not after almost drowning twice in as many days. To fill the time, she was going to ask Naunet to tell her about the mermaid world beneath the water where she would be living, but she didn’t get the chance. Because just then, several figures erupted out of the water nearby.

  “Queen Naunet!” someone shouted.

  Queen? That explained the crown. It was not just a fancy hairband after all. What protocols had she already broken by not realizing her savior’s rank?

  The group of newcomers approached through the water, led by a stunning young mermaid with long curls the color of fire. Behind her were two other mermaids, one small with pink hair and dark skin, the other with black hair and eyes to match. They seemed to be struggling with someone between them that Jae couldn’t see.

  “We tried to detain her, your highness,” said the one in the front.

  Naunet—Queen Naunet, rather—didn’t seem bothered or even surprised by their appearance. She waved a hand nonchalantly. “It’s fine, sister. Let her through.”

  The other two mermaids relinquished their captive and Wren burst forth, looking much as she had the last time Jae saw her at the lake—wet and angry. Her mouth worked for a moment like a fish and then she turned to the mermaid queen.

  “What have you done?”

  “Do not address her—”

  “It’s fine, Mara,” Queen Naunet said, cutting off the one she’d called sister who was clearly objecting to the disrespect Wren showed the queen. Then, to Wren, she said, “I turned your sister into one of us so she would not perish beneath the sea.” Her face turned harder, and Jae thought she caught a glimpse of the monster she’d seen the night before. “After your attack sent her into the water.”

  Wren did not—could not—object to that, but Jae could. “She didn’t mean to,” Jae said. “She was coming for me, to save me. She couldn’t have known.”

  There was a jingling sound and Bell alighted on Jae’s shoulder. The fairy was Wren’s stalwart companion ever since Wren had rescued her from Pan, but she’d always seemed to have a soft spot for Jae, too.

  The queen softened when she looked back at her newest subject. “Perhaps you are right and I am not being fair.”

  Wren ignored all of this. “How do we turn her back?”

  “Turn her back?” Naunet asked.

  “Human. How do we make her human again?”

  “Impossible,” Mara scoffed.

  Wren glowered at her. “There is no such thing.” Then, to Queen Naunet again, “I will just dream her back to her human form.”

  This time, the queen turned her pitying gaze on Wren. “It won’t work, not how you think it will.”

  “Why not? I am blood of the creator. I can do anything.”

  “You can’t bring back the dead.”

  “She isn’t dead.”

  “Her human body is. You change her back, and she’ll be just as dead as she was when I found her in the water.”

  Wren didn’t seem to have a response to that, so instead, to Jae, she said, “I’ll find a way, I swear it.”

  Jae was considering how to respond, whether or not to tell her sister that she didn’t want her to find a way, when Naunet spoke again. “Or perhaps you should leave her to adjust to her new life. Let her live as you have done. Maybe it is her turn.”

  Bell took to the air and circled Wren, letting golden pixie dust fall on her friend’s shoulders. That was all it took for Wren to rise out of the water. She spun in place, looking back down at the mermaids. “You don’t know anything about us.”

  As she flew past, she let her fingers trail over Jae’s hair. Jae closed her eyes at the familiar touch, and when she opened them, Wren was gone, without an apology and without a look back. It was probably a good thing, too, because she thought maybe the mermaid queen knew more about Wren and Jae than either of the two girls cared to admit, even to themselves.

  Chapter 5

  Weeks passed without word from Wren, and Jae found herself thinking of her sister and her human life less and less as she adapted to life beneath the waves. Assana—the black-haired guard—had become her fast friend and mentor. Mara treated her with barely disguised contempt, kind of how she treated everyone, while Tal, the smaller, pink-haired mermaid, barely sat still long enough for Jae to learn her name. But Assana was patient and kind, and had no problem showing Jae the ropes. She even let her room with her, sharing a cave in the reef not far from the palace where Naunet and many of the others lived.

  It had been Assana who taught her how to swim. Naunet had been wrong—it hadn’t come naturally to her. A lifetime of panic wasn’t erased in one day. Just because she couldn’t drown didn’t mean her brain understood that. It helped that Assana had once been human, too. They were called sirens, the mermaids who had been made rather than born, saved from watery graves as humans. Assana had helped her learn not to breathe through her mouth, had shown her how to use her powerful tail, how to use the currents to her advantage.

  Once she could swim, the next thing she learned was how to hunt. It had been strange to learn that she had an affinity for hunting. When she’d been a ward in Astanrog, she’d learned how to fight with all the other noble girls. Later, Archer and some of the other pirates had taught her how to shoot. Those two skills combined made her a crack shot with the spear that most of the mermaids carri
ed.

  Now, Jae slunk along the ocean floor, the spear held lightly in her fingers, just the way Assana had taught her.

  “Hold it too tight, and you won’t be able to let go,” she’d said. Sage advice, perhaps, for many things in life.

  Jae had been reluctant at first to catch her own food and eat it as mermaids did. She’d tried that first day to return to the lagoon and start a fire, but had been chased away by the rotten boys. The bit of charred fish she’d managed to eat had sat like a rock in her stomach.

  “Unnatural,” Assana had said with a laugh when she’d told her.

  She trailed behind her quarry, having lost Assana some ways back when the girl had gone over the shelf after a crab. The fish seemed to have no idea that Jae was on its tail, which was a testament to how good Jae had gotten at swimming. Her movements were quiet and graceful, barely stirring the water around her unless she needed to put some power behind it, which she didn’t now, not while stalking her prey.

  The fish reached a rocky outcropping and weaved happily through the seagrass. Jae waited patiently for it to reemerge, her hand drawn back, ready to strike when it did. Soon, the blue fins became visible, and then . . . She took a deep breath, waited for the perfect moment, and—

  “Jae?”

  The fish startled at the sound, darting away, and the spear landed in the sand, sending up clouds of dust that hid the fish’s escape from view.

  Jae turned to snarl at whoever had interrupted her and found herself face to face with her sister. She quickly closed her mouth over her sharp teeth and hid her claws by clasping her hands in front of herself. “Wren?”

  As the weeks wore on, Jae had assumed that Wren would not return again, especially since the other mermaids all seemed to think she was on an impossible mission. And besides, Wren still had enemies on the island. Every time she came here she risked a run-in with the pirates or the Lost Boys.

  “What are you doing here?” Her sister wore a sort of bathing suit, a long pantsuit that was plastered to her skin, and she treaded water, not particularly graceful in her movements. Not to mention, her gills were at her neck, just as she’d described to Jae when she told her of her first visit into mermaid territory. Her long hair was pulled back in a braid that twisted behind her like a snake. Jae had grown used to mermaids, so seeing a human seemed strange and unnatural now, just as the mermaids had been at first.

  “I have news,” Wren announced. She cupped her hands as she swept her arms back and forth. All Jae had to do was give a flick of her tail every now and then to stay in place.

  “You do? Does Naunet know you’re here?”

  Wren shook her head. “You’ve technically gone outside her territory. You didn’t even know, did you? You could be in danger and have no idea.”

  Jae tried not to roll her eyes. “I’m not in any danger.” But just in case, she did swim over and pick up her spear to be safe. She still didn’t know what other threats were out there.

  “I’ve been asking around, and finally ended up with the Golden Lands with a witch named Jinx.”

  “Jinx?” Jae asked, hoisting her spear over her shoulder into its holster. “I know that name.”

  “She was friends with Granny.”

  “Friends with Granny? Is she very old then?”

  “Very. But that’s beside the point. She said that when she lived here, she made a potion for a fairy who had fallen in love with a pirate. The potion was meant to change the fairy’s form—to make her human. She never took the potion, and so Jinx hid it away for safekeeping.”

  A potion? Jae didn’t particularly relish the idea of drinking some unknown witch’s old potion. In fact, she didn’t really relish the idea of changing form at all. “Where did she hide it?”

  “She doesn’t remember.”

  Jae gaped at her sister. “This is your news?” She secretly felt a bit of relief, but didn’t dare tell Wren that. She didn’t hate being a mermaid. She had friends, independence, confidence, health. But how did she tell her sister that she didn’t want the life she’d made for her?

  “But she made a map.”

  “Do you have the map?”

  “No.”

  Jae laughed, small bubbles of air escaping her mouth and drifting up past her head.

  “It was stolen from her by a handsome man who fancied himself a treasure hunter.”

  “Someone on Never Island?” Jae asked.

  Wren nodded. “Who on the island do you think might call himself a treasure hunter? Who might dare to steal a map from a witch?”

  “A . . . A pirate?” she guessed.

  Wren pointed at her. “A pirate. And not just any pirate.”

  “Jame—Captain Hook?” Jae guessed again.

  Wren grinned. “That’s right. Your good friend, the captain.”

  Jae didn’t even want to go there with her, but there was one thing she needed to clarify. “Did he make it back to the island?”

  “Yes. He and Smee are holed up in the village again, probably plotting their next stupid idea.”

  The captain was alive, then. She had thought about him often over the last couple weeks but hadn’t known who or how to ask. The mermaids didn’t seem to detest the pirates as they did the Lost Boys, but they didn’t seem to particularly care for any land-dwellers. Naunet had alluded to him being able to care for himself, but nothing else was said about the island’s inhabitants.

  “Are you going to get the map?” Jae asked her sister, not overly excited about Wren and James being together.

  Wren shook her head. “Not me. Hook and I didn’t exactly part on good terms.”

  “Right, I can’t imagine why.”

  Glaring at her, Wren said, “He was never good to me, either, or did you forget that he kidnapped me. Just because you went willingly—”

  “You had your revenge, though, didn’t you? You stole his dreams, you stole his ship, you blew up his boat.” Jae didn’t know why she was defending him, except that Wren could be so self-righteous sometimes that it felt good to take the opposing side.

  “Look, about that, it was a misfire. I didn’t mean to hit—”

  Jae waved her off. “It’s fine, it doesn’t matter. So, who’s going to get the map?”

  “I thought you could do it.”

  “Me?” Jae looked down at herself. “In case you haven’t noticed, I can’t exactly walk up there and talk to him.”

  “But you can swim up there. You’re a siren, Jae. Sirens are supposed to be able to manipulate men with their voices. Can’t you, I don’t know, sing it out of him?”

  Jae didn’t even really want the map, and now her sister wanted her to be the one to get it. But she was nothing if not compliant. “Fine. I don’t know what that means, but maybe I can talk to him.”

  Wren left and Jae found Assana already returning to the colony, a blue-shelled crab dangling from one fist.

  “Where’s the fish?” Assana asked teasingly.

  Jae rolled her eyes. “He swam carefree off into the sunset.” She didn’t tell her about Wren’s visit, like doing so might betray her sister. Though not telling her felt like its own kind of betrayal.

  They ate the crab outside their cave, entertaining visits from some other mermaids who lived nearby. There was one merman, Leven, who seemed particularly interested in Assana, though the mermaid seemed blind to his affections. Tal stopped by once, talking quickly about some shipwreck she and a group of scavengers had discovered not far from the island. Assana declined a visit but Tal promised to bring her the largest, gaudiest jewelry that she could find.

  When they were finally alone, Jae asked Assana about what Wren had said. “I heard that sirens have . . . I don’t know. Powers with their voices?”

  Assana was drifting lazily, hands behind her head, black hair a pool of shadow around her shoulders. “Sure. The siren’s call.”

  “What does it do?”

  Assana sat up and leaned toward Jae. “It’s our gift from the moon to compensate for the viole
nce of our deaths. We have the power to manipulate men with our voices.”

  “To do what?”

  “Lure them to their deaths, mostly,” she said matter-of-factly. “We died at their hands, they’ll die at ours.”

  “Oh. Can it be used for other things?”

  “Like what?” Assana smiled. “Convincing Leven to go catch me a tuna fish?” She shrugged. “Maybe, I’ve never tried.”

  Jae hesitated, before asking, “How does it work?”

  “Are you thinking about using it?” Assana asked, eyes narrowed on Jae.

  “No,” Jae answered quickly. “I just want to know everything about this new life of mine.”

  Assana twisted her lips as if thinking, and then seemed to come to a decision. “Follow me. I’ll show you.”

  They swam away from the colony and the palace and into the lagoon. Jae hadn’t been back since that first day, and didn’t necessarily relish the idea of a confrontation with the Lost Boys.

  “Don’t worry,” Assana answered Jae’s unspoken concern. “The Lost Boys don’t come here at night.”

  They came to Marooner’s Rock and pulled themselves up, sitting side by side though keeping somewhat flat so that they wouldn’t be readily visible to someone on shore.

  “Ready?” Assana asked.

  Jae nodded, not sure what she was agreeing to.

  That was when Assana started singing. She didn’t use words—at least, not words that Jae knew—but Jae understood it anyway. She felt Assana’s pain, betrayal, and fear as if it were her own.

  And then, there she was on the shore, Assana, but not the Assana who Jae knew. This was a human girl, with black curls that fell to her waist, and a long white gown. She walked on two legs, her feet bare in the sand.

  Jae turned to her friend, stunned, but Assana’s eyes were closed and her mouth opened in song. The apparition on the shore sang, too, and Jae wasn’t sure which of the two was more real.

  A movement in the trees drew Jae’s attention. A boy emerged, one of the ones who had been with Pan earlier. His orange-red hair caught the light of the waning moon, and she could see even from here that his wide eyes were fixed on the apparition.