Saved by the Sea Lord (Lords of Atlantis Book 9)

by Starla Night

  If anything happened to her…

  They beat Elan nearly to death. Queen Zara’s furious gaze crackled in his memory. They took my newborn son and forced me to the surface, still bleeding. I nearly died.

  King Ankena looked regretfully after his son. After I defied my father, he stole my son and raised him. Although it was only a few years, my son still struggles with the hatred he was taught. It is my greatest regret.

  And Queen Zara again. No one cared about the brides. The mer made them produce, stole their children, and forced them to the surface.

  He hugged Hazel.

  There was still time. Time to stop his brother’s assassin. Time to heal Oska.

  But…

  If danger threatened, she would go.

  He would protect Hazel.

  More than he’d protected his brother.

  No one would ever take their young fry.

  No one.

  Thirty

  Shouts echoed through the castle.

  Lotar awoke in an instant.

  “In there,” a warrior vibrated outside the castle. “Get them out.”

  Danger was coming.

  The guard, an impassive warrior, saw he was awake and stopped at a respectful distance. “You must come.”

  Hazel awoke with a yawn and a stretch. “Huh? What?”

  “The king summons you to the Life Tree,” the guard vibrated.

  “Already?” She finished her great yawn and obediently kicked to Lotar’s side, scrubbing her eyes and shaking off her exhaustion. “I could use another few hours.”

  “There is no time,” the guard said.

  Lotar’s stomach dipped.

  The guard concealed something. He turned and kicked out of the castle.

  Lotar flew after him, his senses on the highest alert.

  Hazel became more alert as they wove through the rings of castles and approached the Life Tree. A crowd had gathered.

  His brother labored to breathe, his chest rising and falling unevenly. The red streaks now shot over his whole body. Dark shadows pinched him. Death clawed at his heart.

  The king knelt at his side and shook with sadness.

  “What happened?” Hazel murmured. “Is that normal after blackthorn coral?”

  “No.” The healer floated in the crowd. Oska’s sickness had gone beyond his abilities.

  “Where was the guard?”

  “Here.” The healer chewed on his lower lip, angry but also pensive. “Prince Oska was, and has been, under guard since his first injury. I have never had a warrior collapse this completely from blackthorn coral. And to have it be the prince…” He glanced at Hazel, and his eyes narrowed with suspicion on her fingertips, but he pulled his gaze away and focused again on the distant patient. “It is vexing.”

  Hm.

  “Someone did this,” Hazel said.

  Her vibrations crossed the open area.

  His father jerked and whirled to her. Rage contorted his trembling face. “You did this!”

  She stiffened in Lotar’s arms. “Me?”

  “You pretended to heal him, but you killed him.”

  “Wait a minute. I did heal him. You saw me.”

  “I saw him convulse. And now this.” His father pointed at Oska’s chest.

  They had pulled off the poultice. In the center of the injury was a small handprint.

  “The heck?” Hazel kicked forward. “What is it?”

  Lotar shadowed her, and the guards kept their tridents close, but allowed them both through.

  “Your hand,” his father sniped.

  “What? That’s not me. Look.” She held up her hand. “It’s the wrong size. They made my middle finger shorter than the rest and forgot my thumb.”

  “He is deathly ill, and your hand burned him.”

  “I just told you—”

  “Silence!” His father rose, his soul black with rage and grief.

  Lotar pulled Hazel behind him protectively. “Father. Calm.”

  “I was starting to believe that I had been mistaken about you.” He jabbed his index finger at Lotar. “But you have only ever wished your brother ill. And so you ordered your bride to hasten his journey into the blacknight sea. Well, you can both get out! Before I have you executed for treason.”

  This wasn’t right.

  If he left now, Lotar abandoned his brother to an assassin. His father might never see beyond his hatred of Lotar to realize that someone else was endangering Oska.

  But Hazel’s safety took precedence.

  Hazel and his young fry.

  Lotar backed away from his seething father, through the stiff, silent, accusatory glares of the other warriors of the city. Hazel clung to his back. She trembled, not from terror, but from suppressing the logic even she must know would fail to reach his father.

  “My king.” Warlord Yashu floated gravely at the edge of the dais equidistant between Lotar and the king. “I have long held my counsel when you have spoken to Lotar in this way, but in this time of confusion and tragedy, I cannot remain silent.”

  Hmm?

  Warlord Yashu was publicly taking his side?

  “He is innocent of any wrongdoing.” Warlord Yashu gestured at Lotar’s brother. “He cannot have injured Prince Oska from the surface, and it is obvious from his actions he cares only for Oska’s recovery. If you banish him, I believe you banish an innocent warrior.”

  His father stared as if his oldest friend had announced an intention to capture and keep the kraken as a house guardian. “This is your belief? But he brought a female who injured my son.”

  “I did not,” Hazel insisted.

  Lotar squeezed her hand.

  Warlord Yashu lowered his head. “I do not know the powers of queens. In the myths, they are incomprehensible and vast. Lotar’s bride confessed she has limited control. Perhaps she made a mistake.”

  “Which costs Oska his life!”

  “But a warrior cannot deny his soul mate, no matter her intentions. An honorable warrior believes that every warrior he meets is also honorable. And so, of course, he would also think the same of his bride.”

  His father pondered the words for a long, hard moment. “Lotar. As you know, I place a great deal of value in Warlord Yashu’s words. Especially now, when I am not…”

  He gazed over his shoulder at Oska, squeezed his eyes shut, and returned a hardened focus on Lotar.

  “But if you desire to grieve here during your brother’s final hours, I will overlook these mistakes. So long as you send your murderous bride to the surface before she finishes her dark task.”

  His heart pounded.

  The ocean stilled.

  “I can still heal Oska,” Hazel protested.

  “Get her away from here.” The king turned away in disgust.

  Guards surrounded them, waiting on Lotar’s move.

  “He’s not dead,” she said. “I’m recharged. I can heal him.”

  Lotar must find the real culprit.

  Until he stopped the poisoning, Hazel could not heal Oska.

  And every time she failed, his father would grow more dangerous.

  Hazel would be safe on the surface.

  She would be safe.

  “Lotar, tell him.” Hazel clung to his shoulder. “There’s a traitor here, but it’s not me.”

  He turned slowly and removed her hands.

  She gaped.

  He untied his necklace and pressed it into her hands. “I am sorry, Hazel.”

  Shock gave way to hurt. Her soul blackened, and it nearly undid him.

  Then she flared with rage. “You jerk! How could you?”

  The guards moved her along without touching her, without even raising their tridents. They were experts at herding targets. They forced her across the city and around the first row of castles.

  He turned his back on her screams.

  “This isn’t how things end. I’m coming back for you. You’re going to be sorry. Lotar!”

  He welcomed her return. By th
en, he would have caught the traitor, and she would understand.

  He did this for her protection.

  Hazel kicked hard for the surface cursing the whole way.

  She’d awoken in Lotar’s castle dreaming about carrying Lotar’s baby and how sweet he could be…

  And then he’d coldly sent her to the surface.

  “I will never forgive you!” she shouted into the current. “You jerk! You idiot! You cold-blooded reptilian fishman!”

  One warrior who silently escorted her to the surface glanced back at her.

  “What?” she snarled.

  He turned around. Then, as though he couldn’t get the question out of his head, he fell back. “You told First Lieutenant Anik that a ‘jerk’ meant someone who should know better, but now you use it against your soul mate, a warrior who knows everything about you.”

  “Yeah, he knows about me, but he just has to do everything on his own. And after we came so far.” She grabbed her hair and yanked. “Argh! He knows I’m not the traitor. He decided he’d be better off searching on his own. Which I blame you for, by the way, since you guys always made him do everything on his own, and now he doesn’t know how to work with a partner.”

  The escorting warriors traded skeptical glances.

  “And who’s going to heal your brother after you find the traitor and I’m still on the surface?” Hazel demanded from the Lotar who was not here. “Hello? Augh! I can’t believe you’d do this to me. After everything we’ve been through.”

  “You are the traitor,” one warrior in the back said smugly.

  “Oh?” She swung to face him. “And how the heck can I be the traitor, genius? I haven’t even been here.”

  “You made Prince Oska worse.”

  “Yeah? Well, who made him sick in the first place?”

  The quintet of escorting warriors pondered her question.

  “Lotar, perhaps.” The smug warrior wasn’t so smug now.

  “Literally how could he have done that?” Hazel demanded.

  “He could have charged another warrior, his secret friend, to attack the prince.”

  “Then his ‘secret friend’ is the traitor, and you still have a traitor. Do you guys think anything through, or do you rely on spying and eavesdropping to figure it out?”

  “We are not Undines,” the smug warrior said. “We need not float and think.”

  “You say that like it’s something to be proud of.” She shook her head at the lot of them and faced forward again, swimming for the surface for all she was worth. “Who was on guard duty last night?”

  “I was,” a slender, angular warrior with avalanche-blue tattoos said.

  Everyone looked at him.

  He hunched uncomfortably. “And other warriors.”

  “Like who?” his smug friend asked.

  The guard listed off the others who had been on shift with him. It sparked a mild discussion about potential alternative traitors, but they eventually looped back to her as the only one with strange powers and a “dark task.”

  “But you are the one who is not smart,” the smug warrior said. “Even if you murder honorable Prince Oska, you will never be the queen of Syrenka.”

  She flubbed her lips. “I would not be the queen of Syrenka if you begged me.”

  Their brows rose. Then skepticism narrowed their eyes.

  “Did Lotar ever, ever, ever, ever, ever even say he wanted to be a prince? Or king, or anything?”

  “Yes,” the smug one said. “Many times.”

  “Oh, yeah? Describe them.”

  “When he beat Prince Oska at the race. He did so to be chosen as prince.”

  “Did he ever say that?”

  They searched their memories. Silence pervaded the latter half of the interminable swim.

  Finally, the smug guy dismissed her. “The real traitor is you. Only a traitor would try to convince us she was not. Prince Oska bears your handprint.”

  She could scream. “My fingers, which were the wrong size, and not my thumb. When I touch someone to heal them, I give whole-hand coverage.” She reached out to demonstrate on one of them.

  They darted back.

  Oh, whatever. She demonstrated on her chest. “Look. All four fingers plus the thumb, but that print had no thumb, which means the real traitor is an idiot who doesn’t know what a hand looks like.”

  The smug warrior pulled his lips to one side. “Perhaps your thumb has no queen power.”

  “What?”

  “Perhaps only your fingers glow with the resonance.”

  “My thumb has resonance. My thumb is very resonant. Look.” She flooded her rage energy into her hand, and the whole darned thing glowed like a torch. “See? The glow comes from the whole hand.”

  They scattered as if she was going to fry them with a death touch, which wasn’t even a queen power.

  She dropped her hand with a moan and extinguished the light. “God, why am I arguing with you? You’re the ones who are like, ‘Lotar is too good, we have to knock him down so he leaves us forever.’ Jeez. Which let a traitor run free in your city, killing off your prince and who knows who else. God.”

  And Lotar was going to try to stop it on his own.

  Like always.

  The warriors escorted her to the crashing whitecap waves, and the smug one ordered, “Go to the shore.”

  She peered through the furious water. “You’re not going to dump me, are you? I could die, you know.”

  “This is where we always return humans,” the smug warrior said. “You will find them. Do not linger in the water, though. A human sailor will harpoon you for a fish!”

  They all laughed as if that were hilarious.

  Gross.

  They zoomed off, leaving her alone.

  She fought the waves over the rough slope and stumbled ashore.

  Snow and arctic ice covered the rocky shoreline.

  This must be the North Pole.

  And it was only a fraction as cold as Lotar’s heart.

  Thirty-One

  Lotar’s gut churned.

  He could hear Hazel’s shouts long after she left. Her anger, bright and furious, echoed even though she must have reached the shoreline of the ancient sacred brides by now.

  All the curses he had most feared hearing, he had finally caused her to cry.

  It was for her own good.

  She was on the surface.

  She was safe.

  But…

  A very small, very real pit in his stomach warned that he had gone too far. He had pushed her, tortured her, broken her. The other warriors had called his good actions bad, but in this case, he had truly wronged her, and her accusations were real.

  I will never forgive you.

  The words lanced him.

  He had done it. He had done it to her.

  To himself.

  He lingered near his father, keeping vigil, and studied every warrior who passed.

  Although he was no former Undine like Second Lieutenant Ciran, he had to consider how he would have committed this crime.

  The traitor must have poisoned Oska after Hazel’s healing, during dinner or their rest.

  First Lieutenant Anik had entered and exited frequently. He had looked panicked. And now he was nowhere to be seen, absent on a quest when he should be close to the prince he had pledged and failed—perhaps deliberately—to protect.

  Warlord Yashu waited patiently with the other elders.

  His brother was a fighter. He did not die quickly. Despite the new poisoning, he carried on, his soul sometimes only a flicker within his chest, and other times it appeared to go out entirely, but he would rally with a gasp, making the watchers jerk with fright. Except for their father, who gazed on with unshaken devotion.

  Under so much scrutiny, Lotar could not move much, but he did approach the guards under the guise of changing positions and vibrated quietly. “Did you watch over my brother after the healing?”

  The guard’s jaw flexed. “If you think I did
not do my duty, say so to my first lieutenant. Unlike others, he acts with honor and would never bring in a stranger to betray us.”

  Hot anger flashed over Lotar.

  No. He must control himself. This should be a familiar pain.

  But since bringing Hazel into his heart, Lotar had found it increasingly difficult to endure the old insults.

  The healer broke through the crowd and knelt at his usual place. “My king, I have identified the new poison. And I have a treatment.”

  Lotar’s father dragged his heavy, shadowed gaze up to the healer. He had been through too much to react now.

  Lotar floated at Oska’s feet. “What is the poison?”

  “A rare one from a mussel shell that thrives only near Djullanar.” The healer used a small paddle to spread a thick amber resin on the odd print. It foamed. “There. It is working. Now, he will still suffer from the earlier effects, but this antiseptic resin neutralizes the main toxin. It may even have a small effect on the blackthorn coral.”

  The king’s shoulders slumped. “Another delay.”

  “Yes. Perhaps.”

  His father rubbed his face, massaged his temples, and glared at Lotar. “You entered Djullanar.”

  Lotar braced for the accusation.

  But his father frowned. “Your bride could have touched the mussel. Gotten its shell on her hand and…” He gestured with an open palm at Oska. “An accident.”

  Surprising.

  “Oh, no.” The healer laughed in a dry way that held little mirth. “She could not have done this by accident. This type of poison requires careful containment. The mussel shell is ground up with several toxic plants. It is dangerous to create and carry. The Djullanar warriors apply it to rocks for their slings using special tools or they become painfully sick. The onset of illness is immediate.”

  His father frowned. “She is human. Her tolerance is different.”

  “Not that different, my king.”

  “You do not know the powers of queens. None of us do.”

  Lotar did.

  And the healer seemed to think he did as well, but he glanced at his king’s black expression and focused silently on applying the resin. Oska’s jagged pulls of water stabilized and evened. The darkest shadows left his cheeks.

  The healer had bought Oska a little more time.