Deep within the caves in Nepta, Dryad was pacing in panic. It seemed that was all he did nowadays. Pace the floor bare. Salamanders had been instructed to take the dragons to stage the first attack on Zolar. They would weaken the Capital for his grand appearance. So it was not the impending war that frightened him. It was the call from his mother that filled him with dread.
He shivered and wondered how one could be so cold inside a volcano. Knowing he could not delay her any longer, he made his way to the depths of his castle, where the stench of the rotting sea grew strong. There, inside the crypt, his mother sat silently looking into a dark pool of volcanic water. He waited patiently for her to acknowledge his presence, knowing the price if he interrupted.
His mother was called Tatiana and a psyren wytch. Psyrens were notorious creatures compared to their cousins, the mers. Where the mers helped preserve life in the sea, psyrens were vultures, whose singing would bring sailors to their deaths along with stealing the spoils of rich merchant ships. But Tatiana was born to magick and that made her one of the most powerful psyren wytches that had ever existed.
'You know King Marlon's daughter is coming for you,' she sang into the silence.
The sound grated through Dryad like nails down a chalk board and he had to take a deep breath to calm his insides.
'I don't really care about her,' he said. 'It’s Zolar I want.'
'Do not be so foolish,' Tatiana snapped her head still hovering over the pool she was gazing into. 'You cannot underestimate her. She travels with a power I cannot read.'
Dryad edged closer towards where his mother was sat, resisting the urge to gag from the stench that emanated from her.
'What do you mean you cannot read? What does the pool say?' he asked uneasily.
She grunted as she looked up at him, her face thankfully hidden behind black masses of oily hair mixed with seaweed.
'She sails with the prince of Zolar. They are betrothed, but not in love. If you offer the princess her land's safety in exchange for her hand, you could very well have the whole of Celestia.'
A lump of seaweed fell from his mother’s hair, hitting the floor with a thud and he felt repulsion tug at his stomach.
'One, how does that get me Zolar and two, what makes you so sure she will marry me? She could easily fight me to the death,' Dryad said.
He had heard stories about the Zilva princess and none of them involved her being reasonable. She was far too much like that father of hers. Dyrad had the misfortune of meeting him once. He had the audacity to pitch up his damn boat and ask for supplies. The man was beyond arrogant and had no mind for rules and regulations. He was too busy being the wandering king, until the queen came along. And if rumour was correct then this daughter was no different.
'Because my son, I hold the key to breaking the princess and once the prince is dead, she will have no choice but to take your offer.'
Tatiana pulled herself from the floor and slivered towards her chair, causing it to squelch and squeal as she sat down and Dryad let out an involuntary shudder. He considered what his mother had just said and the idea of ruling Celestia with a beautiful princess at his side was more than he had expected when he decided to take revenge on Zolar.
'What about this power?' he asked.
One thing amidst several that worried him in his mother’s grand plan.
'I will try again much later, but whatever it is, we will make it work to our advantage,' she said.
Dryad wanted to trust Tatiana; she was his mother. But after his father lost the battle for his throne in Zolar, he quickly became ill and died and he suspected over the years it had been by his mother’s hand. The woman craved power and prestige. The reason he was sure she married his father. His bloodline to the throne of Zolar would be a tantalizing temptation, but he failed.
He turned and made his way back through the caves towards the comfort of his own rooms. He needed to delay the princess' arrival and knew just how to do it. But first he needed to go to the Scales. A simple switch of the plates would buy him time. He just needed them to be steered off course and then his mother may find out what the hidden power was that the princess held.
Chapter Nine
Celestia's Tales: The Lybiria Scales Page 9