Vast and Brutal Sea

by Zoraida Cordova

  “Patience,” she told Gwenivere, “for soon we will rule the entire seas.”

  •••

  “My king,” Nieve said. She had not spoken in so long that the Rebel King marveled at the sound of her voice. “You know quite well who is behind these disappearances. For who else would want to take the daughters of our court except the man you took me from?”

  It was easy, stoking the fire that was already lit. The Rebel King armed himself with his best men and his golden armor and charged the true king.

  The Silver Queen was left alone on the throne, and she watched it carefully, patiently. She resumed the feasts, but this time, no one would die. Instead, she gave them gifts—shark skin armor and jewels from the king’s caves and food. There was always food for the people on the outer lands, the ones as skinny as coral. They praised her kindness, her beauty, and they loved her.

  When the Rebel King Amur did not return, they loved her still, bowing and willing to give their lives for their generous Silver Queen. And she drank their love the way they drank her gifts. From miles and miles came strange tribes of the sea, uniting with her against her father, the true king. They heard of his heir, King Karanos, leading his father’s armies. But Nieve did not fear her father or the brother she had never known.

  When her father came to the Golden Palace, he demanded she unite with the northern kingdom.

  “I am your eldest child, Father,” she said. “Will you take the trident from Karanos and give it to me?”

  She waited, staring at the frightful face of the man who sent her away and now wanted her back.

  “I didn’t think so,” she said, when he answered with silence.

  They came from the shadows, each and every one of her army. They surrounded the king and his small fleet in the great hall of the Golden Palace.

  “What are you doing?” he said, succumbing to the fear he’d always felt around her. “My son is on his way. He’s bringing the entire Sea Guard.”

  He babbled, twisting and turning. But the king was too old, and the sword in his hand weighed him down.

  “Let him come, Father,” she told him. “I’ve been waiting.”

  NOW

  Chrysilla doesn’t scream.

  But I do.

  I know I shouldn’t because if they hear us, we’re dead.

  But I do.

  I grit my teeth as I feel the crystal of the scepter break her skin. Her blood flecks my hands, gushing from the wound.

  And then brilliant light floods the core of the crystal, hot and red and blinding. The floor is the ceiling, and the ceiling is the floor. My head spins like I’ve been shoved down a whirlpool, like I’ve been swept into a dream.

  It has to be a vision because I’m still me.

  I’m me looking at me.

  I’m king, sitting where my grandfather sat the first time I stumbled onto Toliss Island. The people are somber and there is no singing. At first, I don’t recognize my face. I’m old. Like thirty at least. Considering how merpeople age, I might look thirty, but I could be one hundred. There’s a woman beside me on the throne, and she talks and talks. She’s beautiful with hair the color of corn silk and amber eyes. Her lips are as red as roses, and she places a hand over mine. My stomach is all knots when I look at her, and the me that is king leans over to kiss her. Then I lean back and she’s quiet, as if all I wanted to do was shut her up.

  I realize that the court isn’t sitting idly. They’re all dressed in armor, waiting for me.

  I hold the trident in my hands. Thick white scars decorate my skin. In the king’s chamber, I fiddle with a picture. It’s faded and wrinkled like it was left in water for too long.

  Someone walks in behind me and I drop it.

  “It’s only me, Cousin,” Brendan says. He doesn’t look as old as I do, but white streaks his hair. “The guard is ready.”

  “I’ll be right out,” I tell him, but my voice is so distant.

  “It wasn’t your fault, you know,” Brendan says. “You warned Thalia not to go fight him, and she did so on her own. Her death wasn’t your fault.”

  “Is that true of all of them?” I start naming people I haven’t met yet. Then I get to the ones I have. “Dylan and Layla? Are you going to tell me those weren’t my fault?”

  Tendrils of lightning circle the prongs of the trident. Brendan steps back.

  “We must go,” I say and walk past him.

  Brendan doesn’t follow right away. Instead he picks up the photograph. It’s of me and Layla, but her face is nearly washed away. He puts it back in the hiding spot I took it out from.

  The dream changes, vertigo returning. I’m charging headfirst in the water, my guard behind me. I can’t see my enemy’s face, but the fury in my eyes scares me. I’m a wild thing, cutting down mermen. They turn to surf and become part of the wave that takes me to him. His hair is long, down to his hips. A white scar marks his face like a crescent. But the violet eyes are still the same.

  Kurt wields another trident. It’s one piece and solid and new. The silver catches the sun.

  I’m shouting. The dream-me. Not the king-me.

  I tell myself to stop because I know that this is the wrong thing. This is not what is supposed to happen. Not to me, not to all of us. Not after we’ve worked this hard.

  The image dissolves and I stand on my shore. Toliss. The white sandy beach. Bright blue waters that you can see right through. Something about the way I stare at the sky unnerves me. I’m waiting for something. Or someone.

  She comes out from the patch of forest that leads inland. I didn’t expect her. A leaf is caught in her crown. I look back at the water.

  She wraps her arms around me and I let her, but there is no warmth. She talks to me. Her voice is sweet like a songbird. Pleasing, consoling me over my stalemate with the bastard king. We’ll get him soon enough.

  Who is she? Where is Layla? Why do I keep looking at the sky?

  Something in her hand glints. I want to reach out to stop her. I can feel the stabbing pain in my side. Her blade digs deep into my skin. She twists the knife and stares into my eyes as I fall back onto the sand. I’m not surprised. I’m not anything.

  I’m lying on the sand, bright red blood tainting everything around me. I try to stand but poison spreads in blue lines across my skin. I reach a hand out to my queen, but she keeps on walking.

  Maybe it’s watching myself die.

  Maybe it’s the chill of the room or the painful pulse that runs through my body. But I can feel a change. I roll over on my side, sure that I’m not going to make it out of this room alive. Maybe I’m already dead.

  I taste copper in my mouth and I spit it out. My tongue is dry and my lips are swollen.

  In my hand is the Scepter of the Earth. I’m afraid to look at the end of it, but I force my eyes to open. The nautilus maid is gone. In her place is a tall coral the same shade of pink as her eyes. A lone fish is swimming in the shallows.

  I hold my side where I saw myself get stabbed and replay the vision in my head. It couldn’t have been a vision because that’s not how my life is supposed to be. And then I think really hard about what another oracle—Lucine—showed me the time I watched her give Kurt the Trident of the Skies. She showed me the same thing. Me, dead, with a crown on my head.

  Thalia’s words ring like a bell: killing an oracle is a curse.

  And then I feel it. The ground is shaking, trembling like an earthquake. The quartz in my scepter lights up, and I know I’ve done it. I’ve released the Sleeping Giants.

  The sensation is thrilling, pushing every thought of death out of my head. It is the lightning and current that flows through the earth. I hold my scepter horizontally, and the energy that flows through it is like ten shots of adrenaline in the chest. I could swim for miles, for days. I hold out my scepter, and a blast of light crashes into the wall, b
reaking it down.

  I concentrate on pushing the lightning straight through the rock of the ceiling until it’s a single beam into the sky. The room is flooded white and the walls are crumbling around me, but I don’t care. I hold the beam as long as I can.

  The island trembles all the way through. Pieces of stone break away from the ceiling. I have to get out of the chambers and find Nieve and Kurt. But I’m high on adrenaline and the power of the scepter. The ground is shaking so hard that it knocks me off balance and I fall forward, right on top of the pink coral.

  That sobers me up.

  Focus, Amada said. Focus.

  I dive back into the main artery that leads to the tunnels and swim down. The shark guard is all gone. Instead three prongs wait for me, pointed right at my throat.

  Kurt’s violet eyes glow fiercely; his mouth is an angry snarl.

  My mind flashes to us fighting in the vision Chrysilla gave me. I shake it away because that can’t be how we end. Not after all we’ve been through.

  Chunks of the island break off from the tunnels, and the hungry chatter of merrows echoes through them.

  “You can’t go that way,” Kurt says, lowering his trident. “They’re coming for us.”

  He swims along the base of the shaking island. The ground beneath us is also trembling, splitting like a hairline fracture across glass. First a nick, then with every shake, it keeps going and going.

  When I don’t follow, Kurt turns around. “Please.”

  This could be the worst idea I’ve had in a while, and I have a lot of bad ideas. But when Kurt gives me his back, I know he’s not worried that I’m going to skewer him. So I follow him where he leads, back to surface that is overgrown with vines and trees. It’s a part of Toliss where I’ve never been before. A waterfall breaks the landscape and rushes into a narrow stream full of multicolored fish. We trip over broken branches and scratch our legs on jagged rocks until we’re under then behind the waterfall. It’s relatively dry, and a hole in the ceiling of the cave provides some light.

  “Why are you doing this?”

  “I have to!”

  I shield my eyes as birds take flight around us. “That’s a non-answer!”

  But we keep running through the Toliss jungle, and I fluctuate between wanting to bash him in the face and hug it out like bros because he came back to me.

  “Where are we going?” I shout as branches and boulders fall all around us. I duck out of the way as lightning strikes the ground near us and three trunks fall sideways, narrowly missing me. A few hours ago, I couldn’t get the quartz scepter to conjure any power, and now it’s made us target practice for the angry sky gods. Kurt’s screams get drowned out in the rumble of thunder, the ripping apart of solid rock.

  “Kurt?”

  He falls forward, flat on his face.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “She’s calling to me—” He grits his teeth and screams through it, clutching the Trident of the Skies. His unfiltered power blows through it in sparks of lightning. His breath is labored, like someone’s got their hands on his lungs.

  “What do I do?”

  He shakes his head and pushes himself up, like he’s wading through cement. “I have to go to her.”

  “No!” I pull on his arm.

  He wavers on his knees, gasping for air. He gulps it down and it sounds easier. He grabs my shoulder for support. “It’s like she’s squeezing my lungs.”

  “She can do that?” I hope I’ve never seen Kurt complain about pain before. “As your friend, I’d like to point out that this is what we call an abusive relationship.”

  “Lucine wants what’s best for me.” He leans on a tree trunk for support, pressing his hand to his chest like he’s making sure his heart is still beating.

  “We have to get back to the others,” I say. “Shelly’ll know how to make it stop.”

  “No. We have to finish this. Nieve has weaknesses just like everyone else.” He breathes normally again.

  The sky is dark and so are our paths. We follow the light of our weapons and the animals that scatter away. I scream as I feel the ground fall beneath me. Kurt grabs on to me by the back of my harness and pulls me back. With one foot out to sea, I’m a step away from free falling off a cliff and into the crashing waves.

  “Only way out is down,” I say.

  And he goes, “Together.”

  “On three,” I say, retracing our steps and getting ready to jump.

  “Tristan, I’m sorry,” Kurt says.

  The wind is screeching in a fury, bringing the sea over the cliff.

  “One—” I say, but neither of us waits. We run, run, run, and then jump.

  It feels so long since I’ve taken a dive. I’ve come a long way from Karel pushing me in the Vale of Tears. I tuck my head between my shoulders and straighten my legs.

  But I don’t reach the sea.

  Searing pain digs into my shoulders. Something warm runs down my chest and back. In the dark, I see a slick body and massive wings flying beside me. A sea dragon. It wasn’t the wind screeching; it was the sea dragons. Thick black talons grab Kurt by the shoulder and fly away. Talons, cutting me and dragging me away.

  I scream, and as I feel my body being lifted into the sky, I know no one can hear me.

  My body is cold. There’s a void that is getting bigger and bigger. It’s like losing a part of myself. I can feel a piece of me missing. Gone. The scepter is gone.

  I try to lift my arms. Feel my chest. Move my legs.

  Except I can’t move my legs.

  I hold my breath and brace myself to look down. My vision is doubled and my temples pound. I lift my torso up and even that’s a challenge. The ground has stopped shaking, but I feel a wave of nausea hit me and I turn my face to the side and puke last night’s pizza.

  When I see my tail, I could cry tears of joy that it’s there and I’m in one piece. I search the room and I must be dreaming because I see Adaro. His face is right in front of mine.

  I shut my eyes to make his face go away and it does. When I open them again, I see Gwen. She presses something warm and smelly on my shoulders. I blink and she’s gone.

  Off to the side, Kurt’s hands are chained against a wall. His blood is smeared all over his torso so that with my fuzzy vision, it looks like he’s wearing a shirt.

  “Don’t say it,” Kurt says. He shuts his eyes and I picture him trying to retrace his steps to see what he could have done differently.

  “Say what?” It hurts to talk.

  “I told you so.”

  “I didn’t say it, you did.”

  He closes his eyes and leans his head back. “They’ve been coming in and out. Gwen healed you. She loves you. She won’t let Nieve kill you.”

  The combinations of being without my scepter and the beatings I’ve taken have left me quiet. I did it. I killed the nautilus maid. I can feel the sleeping giants stirring awake. I signaled my army.

  But I messed up badly. “How did we get here?”

  “My father told me that if we follow our hearts to the very end, we’ll find what we’re looking for.”

  I laugh and it hurts. “If what you’re looking for is death.”

  “You don’t believe that.”

  He’s right, I don’t.

  “What made you change your mind?” I ask. “What made you come back?”

  “Lucine herself.” Kurt lifts his legs and swallows the pain. “She told me to give the Trident of the Skies to the sea witch so we could be together in peace, away from all this. All I had to do was kill you myself. Now she has it anyway.”

  I sit up like I’ve been set on fire. In the back of my head, I can see Kurt and me as mortal enemies. We can’t end up that way. Perhaps this is how it starts. Perhaps this is how it ends.

  “Where was this when I was warning you
, huh?” I could kick him. “We were together, Kurt. We were together from the beginning, through all of this. We watched your father die. And then you still went back to her.”

  “Do you think I wanted this?” He leans forward, pulling on his chains. “I’ve spent my entire life doing what the king asked of me. Then I find that he’s—was—my father, and despite that, he chose you. Forgive me, Tristan, but that hurt me more than I’ll ever want to say. You have been in a land where time is unmoving, but it has only been a day of mine.”

  Look at us, the mighty champions.

  “Nieve promised me that my loved ones would be alive at the end of this,” he says. “And Lucine—I’ve loved her since I met her. When I was searching for vengeance for my parents’ deaths, she gave me a path. She gave me a reason to live for that was all consuming and wrong, but I wanted it. If she had told me to chop off my limbs and give them to her, I would have without question. Then she cast me aside because her mind isn’t right. I know that. When I saw her again, it was like she had never left me in the first place.”

  “To be fair, you seemed to enjoy it,” I say, laughing.

  He squints and gives me his cheek.

  “The king was right,” he says, “in the end. You and I are not very different.”

  I agree.

  “Though now I have better hair.”

  I point to my head. “This is your fault.”

  “Tristan, why did you go to get the nautilus maid again?”

  How do you change a future that seems to be laid out for you? Here I am, looking at my friend turned family turned enemy turned ally once again. He’s asking me to trust him. I’ve had too many misses with the trust thing recently. I never knew how much it would hurt to have someone betray me.

  “Because I had to kill her.”

  The fog lifts from my head when I say that.

  “No one can do that.” He’s startled. “There’s a curse. If you kill an oracle, you’ll die a young king.”

  “Well…I did. With the scepter.” I reach for a weapon that isn’t there and the emptiness grows tenfold. “She was in bad shape when I got to her. After you and Gwen came to get her—”