Page 17 of The Kraken's Queen

As I flip the egg, the front door to the house opens up. I drop the spatula and turn around to see Atina waltz through the door. “Brother mine,” she says dramatically, shrugging off her black coat. “Did you miss me?”

Atina strolls into the kitchen and eyes my sorry attempt at breakfast. Too-runny eggs and burned salmon. She tsks. “I don’t know how you managed to keep your wife alive if this is the food you’ve been serving. I bet you're missing that fancy kitchen staff you have right about now, huh?”

“Have you always been this insufferable, or have the land dwellers rubbed off on you?” I frown, which earns me a rag to the face. Atina barrels past me to toss my attempts at breakfast and start anew.

“I hope you have information.”

“Oh, do I ever.” Atina gestures to the cupboard. “Hand me a few plates and join me for breakfast. Then I’ll tell you, but I need food first.”

Ten minutes and three plates of food later, Atina and I sit in her living room. I take the couch, leaving the extra plate of food next to me in case Erin wakes up and wanders out here. Atina makes herself comfortablein her chair, kicking her feet up to rest on the coffee table.

“Well,” she says after taking a bite of her egg salmon sandwich. “Whoever gave you that information about the singing coming from the deep ocean was, unfortunately, correct.”

“You heard it? Where? Delmare hasn’t made much progress.”

“Of course he hasn’t,” she scoffs. “I told you, this surpasses Delmare’s expertise. He might be a good guard, but he’s a shit explorer.”

I hate to admit it, but she’s right. Delmare is a great guard and will lay down his life for me and my people, but this is bigger than what he can handle. Hell, it might be bigger than what I can handle alone.

“We stopped at different ports and hung out at the local pubs there. Drunk people like to talk. There have been whispers about voices coming from the water, but no one could tell us much more than that. Not until we started to intercept ships at sea?—”

“Please tell me you didn’t kill these people.” I know my sister and her lack of patience for answers. The people who live their lives on boats are usually the sons and daughters of merpeople and land people. They are technically mine to protect.

Atina rolled her eyes. “Please. And get blood on my favorite boots? Not even you are worth that, Brother.” There’s a wicked gleam in her eyes as she smirks.

“Fine, fine. Go on. What did you find?” I chuckle but instantly get serious again at her next words.

“Most of the ships we stopped admitted to feelinguncomfortable or sick around this area.” Atina removes her feet from the table and rolls out her map. She points to a spot in the ocean nestled between Lycan Forest and Fae Court, marked with a large X.

“We sailed here to see if the stories we heard were correct and…” Atina trails off. If I didn’t know my sister better, I would have thought she looked nervous. But Atina Eldridge rarely gets nervous, only even.

“Go on,” I urge, discarding my mostly untouched breakfast.

“There was a sound. Almost like singing, but like no siren song I’ve heard before. This was deeper and mournful. It affected everyone on my crew. It almost felt like invisible hands around our bodies, wanting to pull us down to join them.

“But the song was weak and only lasted a few minutes at a time,” she goes on. “Easy to ignore for a crew like mine, experienced with sea creatures. For a lesser crew?” Atina shakes her head. “I’m not certain they would have been able to ignore it.”

My stomach churns. A simple tale from a dying man holds more merit that I originally suspected. “And you believe this to be the Leviathan?”

“I have no other explanation.” Atina shrugs. “If these are those creatures, then I think they are trying to follow in the footsteps of their cousins, the Nephilim, and break out from whatever prison they’re rotting in. They are, unfortunately, succeeding.”

A threat is in my ocean, and I’m not there to defend my people. I had hoped to make more progress with Erin so I could be back by now, but I’m not certain she iscompletely comfortable around me yet. Throwing her into a situation where she’d be completely reliant upon me sounds disastrous.

But I also can’t sit on my ass and do nothing while I know about the Leviathan. Truth of the matter is that I can’t stay on land any longer, not after the information Atina has brought me. I need to check on my kingdom and look into anything I can find in our libraries about the Leviathan and their alliances with the Nephilim.

“Atina, I need you to do me a favor.”

“You usually do,” she sighs, with no real malice behind her words. “What is it this time?”

There are very few people I would entrust Erin with. My sister happens to be one of those people. She will make sure Erin is safe and be the one to get her out of here if things go south. She knows how Erin arrived, all bruised and broken, but I haven’t gone into detail of her past, mostly because I know very little. It’s also her story, not mine, to tell. Atina’s smart though. She can guess at the horrors Erin went through.

“I need you to stay here with Erin while I go back to Tetria. I don’t know for how long yet, but I need to check on things. Catch up with Delmare and speak with the scholars.” There are many other things I need to do too, but these are the most pressing matters.

I know my sister doesn’t like staying in one place for too long. She has this home out of necessity, but her true home is aboard her ship, sailing the open sea. She isn’t pleased by my request but nods all the same.

She’s a far better sister than I deserve.

I stand, itching to leave. The sooner I leave, thesooner I’ll be back with Erin. “Good. Thank you, Atina. I will be back just as soon as I can. I’ll leave now?—”

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