Death Beyond the Waves

by Aleera Anaya Ceres

  We stayed like that for a moment, wrapped in each other’s arms. In that moment, everything fell apart, fell away. I could forget who I thought her to be, and what she was inside. None of it seemed to matter then, because all I cared about was this.

  Being in the arms of family.

  ~~

  “I CAN’T BREATHE,” I gasped.

  Odele ignored me and yanked the strings tighter. “Suck it in,” she ordered unkindly, yanking once more.

  My hands were on the curved ivory edge of her bed for support while Odele was behind me, pushing and yanking as she tried to fit me into, what she called, a corset. It was more like a torture device that threatened to squeeze my bones until they snapped.

  “Why do I have to wear this?” I asked breathlessly.

  Odele finally stopped pulling and began tying. When she finished, she spun me around unceremoniously and pulled a thin shift over my body. She was making noises that ranged between approval and disapproval, but didn’t answer right away. She grabbed for a dress, a solemn looking thing in black and pulled that over me as well.

  As if I was a child that needed help dressing.

  “You’ve been half-tailing the way you dress for months now. It’s embarrassing, and you’re making me look bad.” She started fixing the dress at the hem, and then straightened to fix the low neckline.

  My face heated at her honesty. I knew I wasn’t Princess-like, the fashion critics on the telly had made that abundantly clear after my first anniversary dinner. I just hadn’t expected her to say it with such disgust. It made me want to bury my head in the sand.

  “It’s not my fault you don’t have maids,” I grumbled.

  Odele clucked her tongue. “I don’t have maids because I don’t want them snooping around my stuff. Also, no one does a better job at dressing me than me. Now, let’s brush your hair.” She pulled me away from the bed, and sat me in front of her little vanity table. It was of Thalassarin make, a blue clamshell opened, the edges rimmed with jellies glowing a natural light, and a mirror in the middle.

  I avoided staring at myself while she got to work, instead focusing my gaze on the pins and brushes she picked up and set back down in a pattern.

  She worked in silence for a while, before I couldn’t take it anymore.

  “If you were hiding in the palace the whole time, why didn’t you ever make yourself known before now?”

  Her fingers paused on my scalp before she resumed working, pulling apart strands to comb them out. “I wasn’t sure if I could trust you yet. If you would tell the Queen about me or not.”

  Perhaps I would have, those first few weeks. I was miserable enough to want to end the whole charade, to go back home to Lagoona and never have to set fin in Eramaea again.

  “What made you decide to trust me?”

  “I saw the broadcast on the telly, where you saved the Black Blade.” I felt the hair begin to tighten, and stole a small glance in the mirror to see her braiding it. “I thought, anyone who publicly defies the Queen and the law like that is deserving of my trust.” She bent over me and picked up a string of pearls that were a mixture of white and pink, and one by one, she began integrating them into the braids.

  “But you still didn’t show yourself right away.”

  “No,” she agreed. “I couldn’t find the right time to do it, and I was nervous you’d dislike me.”

  My eyes widened as I took in her reflection. Her? A Princess of the realm nervous I’d dislike her? I couldn’t fathom it.

  “There.” She placed the last pearl into place and took a stroke back. “Stop ogling at me and look at yourself.” She gestured at the mirror.

  I tore my gaze away from her to finally stare at myself.

  I froze.

  “Pretty, right?” Odele’s face appeared next to mine, but all I saw was my own.

  She’d taken the stubborn strands and pulled them back, creating braids at my sides in a way that kept the strands floating in what looked like magical curls behind me. Pearls shone, pink-white, against the dark strands of my hair, forming a discreet, yet beautiful, crown around my head.

  “You have elegant cheekbones and a slender neck that should be showed off. Your eyelashes are dark enough to not need cosmetics, and your eyes are super intense. I wish mine were that dark.” Odele sighed wistfully into my ear. And each word she spoke, I saw. I saw what she meant, what I’d never seen in myself before.

  I was beautiful.

  “Thank you,” I whispered, emotion tight in my throat. I never thought I could be beautiful. Even as I spent months in her fins, wearing her dresses, I’d never felt the sensation I was feeling just then.

  She waved me off. “You’re beautiful, cousin, I mean, duh, you’re a Malabella. Our mothers were gorgeous.”

  They were. I’d stared so often at their portraits in the hall that I knew it for a fact. Even if I hadn’t been able to see a royal in myself then, I did now.

  “I look like her,” I said, so quietly that it wasn’t meant to be heard.

  Odele heard it anyway, her smile radiant. “Of course you do. Although your nose is a bit straighter, and your cheeks aren’t as round, I suppose you get it from King Dorian.”

  “Do you know what he’s like?” I asked. “King Dorian, I mean.” I couldn’t refer to him as my father, like I couldn’t refer to Princess Odessa as my mother. Not yet.

  Odele nodded. “He’s very beautiful, so I hear.”

  I hadn’t ever actually seen any recent recordings of the King of Kappur, but I didn’t doubt her words. Most royals were quite beautiful, and even if he’d waged war with Thalassar for years, I didn’t doubt the truth of his appearance. I’d seen him promise himself to Odessa. He’d been young then, probably younger than me at the time. He’d been handsome in his youth. But I couldn’t help but wonder if, like King Xristo, the light had extinguished from his eyes, if he was nothing but a simple, hollow shell of a merman.

  “Anyway, I’m done now. You can get up and go about your duties.”

  I got up slowly, getting a good look at myself and the dress she forced me in, I couldn’t take my eyes off my reflection.

  The dress was scandalous. Perhaps the most revealing thing I’d ever worn. The neckline was plunged relatively low, and the corset pushed my breasts up, holding them firm. The decolletage was low, the edges trimmed with a thin pattern of sea lace. Despite the revealing neckline, the dress had long, sheer sleeves, a cinched waist and a long, light train that flowed down to my fins.

  I tugged at the neckline, trying to pull it above the swells of my breasts, but it didn’t budge.

  “Just leave it,” Odele ordered with irritation. “You’ll rip it if you keep doing that. Here...” She was in front of me suddenly, swatting aside my hands and—to my numbing shock—grabbing my breasts. She stuck her fingers in the neckline and adjusted, then pushed my breasts up so far, it seemed like they’d spill out.

  “Why?” I beseeched, crossing my arms over my chest. “Why is this dress necessary? And why black?”

  Odele rolled her eyes. “It’s not black, it’s violet.”

  I looked down at it again with raised eyebrows. At first glance, it looked black. But I obviously hadn’t been paying much attention to it. When I moved, the dress seemed to shimmer, and it was violet. A violet so dark it looked black, two colors clashing together in every strand as I moved, battling for dominance.

  It would look absolutely perfect with…

  I whirled away from Odele and rushed to the spot where I’d hidden Elias’s ring, my ring, now. It matched perfectly with the dress, too.

  Odele eyed it and smiled. “I was just about to suggest jewelry. Give it here.” She held out her palm, and when I hesitated, she pulled the ring from my fingers. She looked at it curiously for a moment, obviously noting that this piece wasn’t hers, but after a moment, she merely shrugged. I watched as she went and rummaged around in one of her drawers and produced a dark, delicate chain from which she slipped the ring onto. “So riptide
,” she smiled as she went behind me to clasp the chain around my neck. The heavy weight of the ring settled in the curve between my breasts. Just the sight of it there felt intimate. Odele circled back to face me, eyes bright. “The tides will love it, cousin.”

  I looked down self-consciously. “The cleavage is a bit much.”

  “Nonsense. You look like a confection.”

  An eyebrow rose. “I look like a pastry?”

  Odele pointed. “Exactly. A delectable, sweet and delicious snack.”

  I’m sure what she said was meant to be a compliment, but all it did was make me flush and look down, where the first thing I saw was the rise and fall of the swells of my pink skin, and the color was only darkening. I bit back the groan that tumbled up my chest. Yes, I did look good, but I was also embarrassed by it.

  Odele must have sensed the turn my thoughts were taking, because she swam into my personal space, so close our noses touched. She brought her hands up and clapped them on either side of my cheeks. “Own it,” she commanded. “You’re a Malabella, a Princess, and you’re beautiful. I know for a fact you’ll have Tiberius ensnared in seduction the moment he sets eyes on you. Be confident.”

  Her words sunk into me, into the hollow pits of my mind and heart right next to my insecurities. A million protests sprang to my lips. I am not beautiful. I have a limp. I am a waitress. I’m not royalty.

  None of them came out.

  I saw myself as she did, pressing those words so tightly into my chest until in my heart, I believed them. I was beautiful, limp or no. And I was descended from two beautiful mer. I carried their blood in my veins, the blood of greatness, of two mer who loved each other.

  And for once in my life, I felt that swell of power rise in me, shifting me entirely.

  Odele smiled. “Good.” And she took a stroke away.

  I felt the change in my posture, the straight back, and the tilted chin. It wasn’t just because I’d perfected that pose in order to be her. It was a pose of confidence and regal command.

  Mine alone.

  “Go forth and prove to them how much of a royal you truly are.”

  ~~

  I SWAM OUT into the hallway, closing the door behind me, while Odele’s words echoed in my mind.

  Show them how much of a royal you truly are.

  I wasn’t a royal, but I sure felt like one, for the first time since I’d come here. It was all thanks to Odele. Funny that, how the royal I thought I’d come to despise had become an ally of sorts, a tentative member of my family. I still couldn’t read her as well as I hoped, she was still somewhat of a mystery, though not quite as selfish as I imagined her to be.

  Oh, her vanity was there and strong, like the crashing pull of a vicious wave. Yet I couldn’t help but wonder—hope—that there was more beneath the surface of her. The way Captain Saber had hoped as well.

  “Princess…”

  So engrossed in my thoughts, I hadn’t noticed the guards surrounding me, Captain Saber leading them in the middle. Every single one of them took me in with wide, surprised eyes.

  I did not feel an inch of shyness as I lifted my chin and smiled at them each in turn. Some of them flushed and looked away. Others had their eyes focused on the revealing decolletage and couldn’t seem to look up. Captain Saber took one look at me, and his expression shuttered into one of scrutiny. Just as quickly as he took me in, he fixtured his gaze on his mermen and snapped at them.

  “Eyes ahead, soldiers. You have a job to do.” His tone held a hint of irritation, which I couldn’t help but find amusing.

  The soldiers all assumed their positions surrounding me, like mer-shields on my every side. The captain took his place stiffly to my left, and we began to swim.

  As the hallways widened, so did the mermen’s stances. They put space between us, giving me an illusion of privacy, though they were undoubtedly close enough to hear anything I had to say.

  Captain Saber was the only one to stay by my side, and he didn’t say a word.

  “What’s on the schedule today, Captain?” I broke the silence between us.

  “The Queen requests a meeting with all of the royals currently present.” His blistering reply thawed at the confidence I’d so surely built. There was no trace of the caring warmth he’d displayed that morning in my—Odele’s—room. He was back to his rigid old self. Someone who couldn’t be bothered with me at all.

  Just as I started to retreat into my silence, I felt a warmth slide across my knuckles and the tips of my fingers. I looked down slowly, finding Captain Saber’s own fingers ever close to mine. He flexed them, and the tips grazed across my skin.

  It was a simple touch, but one that seemed to melt me from the inside out.

  My own fingers reached for him, not to hold or to grasp, but to convey a silentious message between our hands. A message I couldn’t really decipher at all, and I doubted he could either. But we were there, and we were touching.

  And that was enough.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Tiberius

  I COULDN’T GO another moment without touching her. Not a second passed when I didn’t want to feel the warmth of her skin pressed against my own. The selfish, reckless part of me surfaced and demanded. It wanted me to disperse of the guards, pull her into an abandoned room or other, and claim her for my own.

  Today, Maisie was not that simple, conservative mer. Today, she was a seductress. She was alluring. Whatever spell she’d weaved through the threads of the clothes on her body was working. They held, not only me, but every single guard under its enchantment.

  Jealousy seared through me every time I caught them staring down her front. But I could say nothing, do nothing but shoot them commanding glares, reminding them of their duty and task at hand.

  Protect her. Like I should be protecting her.

  But her body was distracting, inviting.

  She always had been.

  It wasn’t just that the dress did wonders for her figure, and pushed her breasts up to almost impossible heights. It was her posture, her expression. It was no longer practiced perfection. It was no longer a mask.

  It was her, wholly, entirely, and seductively her. There was a confidence in the set of her shoulders, the tilt of her chin, the steady stride. It was new. Like somehow, within the span of a few hours, Maisie had found herself. Her beauty.

  My fingers grazed along the skin at her knuckles once more, and she responded in kind. To touch her was a privilege, one I shouldn’t possibly take, but selfishly wanted.

  So we touched. Light caresses back and forth, back and forth. A dance. A rhythm. A challenge. Like this stolen, secret intimacy was a game we’d both just invented with rules that were unclear, and the goal too far away to reach.

  Yet we both wanted to make it to that end.

  Victorious.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Maisie

  A ROYAL MEETING it was.

  Everyone was in attendance. The Queen and King sat at their respective places, a chair empty next to King Xristo for me to take. Mister Shallows was there, glaring from across the span of space at Ichiro and Lee—Kai’s advisors—and Prince Kai himself. Prince Ytgar and Valmundur of Iol sat side by side, away from the rest of the royals, and far away from Mister Shallows. Advisors and diplomats from foreign kingdoms all sat around the table, eagerly awaiting my arrival, so this meeting could get on and over with.

  I’d not donned a crown for this meeting, but it was unnecessary. The way Odele had done my hair, the pearls woven in each strand pushed close enough together to form the illusion of one on my head.

  The Queen glared at me as I swam in.

  The mermen all got up, and bowed.

  I smiled at them. “Please, do not trouble yourselves.” When they sat back down, I swam around, escorted by Captain Saber, to take my seat next to King Xristo.

  The King gave me a soft smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes, and for a moment, my heart hurt for him. What must he be feeling? I wondered if the loss of his w
ife and daughter were what had snuffed the light from his eyes. Did King Dorian look like that as well? The thought physically hurt, building an ache in my chest until I had to look away.

  My eyes met Prince Kai’s from across the space that separated us, and my skin flushed brightly, hotly. His dark eyes glowed as he took me in, pupils becoming thin slits. The hand he had rested on the table curved, nails lengthening into black talons.

  Ice and heat warred on his features, and I felt every myriad of emotion, of sensation he conveyed.

  “Thank you all for coming on such short notice, and please forgive any inconvenience it may have caused.”

  I tore my gaze away from Kai with difficulty and turned to look at the Queen. From the look on her face, I knew this wouldn’t be a pleasurable meeting. Her bright eyes were mutinous, her jaw working furiously, like she had to physically fight back the urge to spit and scream. Her long nails tapped impatiently against the table, and everyone eyed them cautiously.

  “What is this about, your Majesty?” Ytgar asked, his voice charismatic, despite the tension roiling through the room.

  The Queen’s nail scraped along the table, creating a screeching noise as she forced a smile onto her mouth. “I gathered you all here to announce that in two weeks’ time, we will be witnessing—at Prince Kai’s incessant behest—the union of Draconi and Thalassar.”

  My throat tightened painfully.

  What?

  “Once my daughter comes of age, as you all know is within two weeks, she will marry Prince Kai Li and ascend the Thalassarin throne.”

  My tongue felt as heavy as an anchor, and I couldn’t swallow past it. I could only stare numbly at the Queen, a torrent of emotions going through me until I didn’t know what exactly I should be feeling.

  “Well,” Mister Shallows broke through the array of my emotions with his greasy, disapproving voice. “I believe congratulations are in order?” Though he said it as if he meant anything but.