Page 42 of Whispers Beneath the Deep
She accepted their gratitude with a smile on her lips. I’d grown angry at the mention of that criminal, but it soon dissipated. I saw what their thanks did to the princess. I saw her eyes light up, and I saw just what it all meant to her. And to them.
The Black Blade had been a hero to these mer, and because she saved him, she was now one too. And because I swam at her side, hand protectively at her back, they kissed the tops of my knuckles, as if I’d done anything to warrant it.
Word had gotten around that two of the most popular royals were swimming through Eramaea. The crowds had gotten bigger, and news conches followed us. It was easy to pretend they weren’t there.
When we finished our rounds, going through nearly every vendor in the capital, Odele had pulled me to the park and sat me on a bench. I had never sat on a bench before, had never watched children play without restraint. I’d never seen a life lived so simply.
Back home in Draconi, the royals were confined to palaces. The walls of ours had been my home, and my prison, for as long as I could remember. We saw little beyond it, except for the battlefields we shed blood on and the grounds where we bred our beasts.
Needless to say, the simplicity of this was enjoyable. I was full, content, and one look at Odele told me that she was as well, if a little thoughtful.
Her gaze lingered on where the children played and there was something akin to longing on her features.
I wondered what she thought of. Was she imagining her own childhood, or perhaps a foolish hope, to think she imagined the children we would have together one day?
Before, I would have relished in that fantasy. But after discovering what she was doing on her spare time, asking questions about marriage contracts, about mine and hers, I was nervous. Before, there had been plenty of time to break off the engagement had she wanted to do it. Our kingdoms desperately needed the Draconi-Thalassar alliance. Now, our joining went beyond duty. For me, at least it did. I had agreed to marry her, to sire children, and to be gifted their secret magic against two-leggers plaguing our homes. Then I fell in love with her, and I couldn’t help but wonder if she didn’t feel the same.
“If you could do one thing in the world right now, what would you do?” I asked.
She broke slightly out of her reverie to blink at me. Silence, as she bit her bottom lip before trailing her tongue across it. I followed the gesture with hungry eyes, but forced my gaze back up to her own.
“I’d stop a war.” There was raw honesty in her voice.
The war between Thalassar and Kappur obviously affected her a great deal. My father was a war general, and I wasn’t too far behind his swim strokes, going in that direction. He’d spoken of battles, and I’d lived through a few myself, in my short twenty-five years of living. The mer in Draconi grew up faster than in Thalassar. By fourteen, the females were considered adults fit for marriage, while the males were prepped for war at thirteen.
I knew the hardships. I’d lived to gain my own scars and tales of battle. I’d ridden fearsome dragons into the oncoming onslaught. I’d skewered mermen with sword, had let my dragon devour them in gruesome bites. I’d fought by my sisters’ and father’s sides, had mourned the dead and rejoiced for the living.
War with mer was a simple thing. It was something I had been trained for since my birth.
What I was not prepared for was war with the two-leggers. Whispers in my kingdom said a war was coming, unless I could stop it, with the help of Thalassar and the princess at my side. So I understood what she meant. I understood all too well.
“Once we are wed, the dragons of Draconi will swim here. Our alliance will be a fearsome thing to behold, and Kappur will cease to attack. The Selection will be no more, and the war will finally end.” It wasn’t just empty promises. It was truth and strategy.
She sighed. “I don’t want towaituntil marriage,” she muttered. “I want the war to endnow. I want the bloodshed to be over.”
My fingers twitched before curling tightly into the palm of my hand. “Without the war, you and I would never have come to pass.” I wondered if those words had sounded cruel, if she would turn and slap me for such insolence. To say I was glad her mer were dying if it meant we could be together. But the deepest desires in my heart were dark things. I was forged in ice and jewels, in blood and war. Chaos and darkness.
She smiled though, the gesture rather sad. “There is that, my prince.”
I reached for her hand, grasping it in mine. “Princess, if it is a war you want to stop, then stop it.”
Her eyebrows rose, and her voice trembled. “How?”
Gods. She didn’t know what power she wielded. “My gem…” I trailed a nail down the side of her cheek, relished in the sight of her leaning into me, closing her eyes. “You are blind to what you are. You are formidable. You are caring. You are fearless.” Each attribute was punctuated with me trailing over different spots on her skin. Cheek. Neck. Lips. My fingers stopped there, and I felt rather than heard the gasp push from her mouth. “If anyone can stop a war, it’s you.”
“No, Prince Kai. If only you knew what I truly was…”
I pressed a finger to her lips. They were smooth against my calloused fingertips. I longed to bend across the space that separated us and take a taste for myself. “I know who you are, my gem. You are not the same princess you were before. You are better. Kinder. And I love—”
She shot back, not allowing me to finish my sentence. She knew what I was going to say, and she rejected me before the words were even out of my mouth.
She shook her head back and forth. “You can’t, Prince Kai.Please.”
I frowned, and something rose in me. A battle of ice and heat, gorging its way up my body. A dragon awakening to roar and claim what was mine. “Don’t presume to know what I feel, Princess.” My voice was dark, face glowering. “I know what I feel for you, and your denial will change nothing.” My hand encircled her wrist, and I felt the pulse beating there. “You are mine, my gem. You arebenitoaito,the dragon stone, one of the most precious and valuable gems in Draconi.” Her pulse was frantic now, and there was this sudden maddening urge in me to lick that spot on her wrist. But I let her go, and turned. Calm settled over me once more. “You do not have to love me back.”
Please love me back.
She did not reply, so I got up from the bench. News reporters were watching our every move. I’d nearly forgotten they were there, and wondered if they’d heard the display, if they’d seen me practically tear my heart out and set it gently in her lap only to have her knock it over with distaste.
