“What happened?” Naclana asked with worry.
“We’re retreating,” she said, her voice laced with shame. “Captain Jove, please order all of our subs to go home.”
“Yes, Queen Aazuria,” said the captain.
“I must admit that my heart skipped a beat when I saw all of their bombs,” Naclana said nervously. “I wasn’t expecting that.”
“You were right,” Aazuria said with a sigh. “It’s not worth it. Today is not the day. But at least they admitted to having Callder. He seems to be safe. I suppose they knew we wouldn’t attack with him inside.”
Naclana leaned against the wall of the submarine, rubbing his forehead to relieve his stress. “I can’t believe this. Thank Sedna that neither of you were men. This would have been a senseless bloodbath.”
Aazuria smiled. “I’m not opposed to a justified bloodbath, but this was not the time or the place.”
Shaking his head, Naclana exhaled. “I’m sorry that I couldn’t say or do the perfect thing to make this mission work. Maybe if Vachlan was here, we would have been successful…”
“Nonsense,” Aazuria told her cousin fondly. “You did your best. No one else could have done any better. We didn’t know that they had so much firepower.”
“Agh,” Naclana growled. “If only…”
“Shh,” Aazuria said. “Do not worry, cousin. Do you still speak Greek? I think I might like to take you up on that spa idea.”
Chapter 6: She Finally Relaxes
Aazuria was having a good time, for the first time in a while. She had not realized how much she had needed this. Her cousin had chosen a five-star spa resort near the historic site of Ancient Olympia, which was not too far away from Fort Triton. They had gotten massages, done a bit of shopping, and now they were sitting in their new clothes at a lovely little bar. Aazuria’s hair and skin had tanned considerably due to their afternoon in the sunshine.
“You should drink as much as you like tonight,” Naclana urged her. “We have a room, so if you pass out, I can just throw you over my shoulder and carry you upstairs.”
“I really should not do that,” Aazuria told him weakly. “I have such a busy day tomorrow, and I have to get back to Atlantis…”
“We need to talk about your divorce,” Naclana informed her. “We need to get this stuff out of the way so that you can focus on your work tomorrow, and not be distracted by the mess in your personal life.”
“You’re right,” she told him, taking a generous gulp of her wine. She smiled at him quizzically. “You’re doing an excellent job of replacing Vachlan. Why haven’t you and I had more conversations in the past few hundred years?”
“For one thing, you’re always working,” he told her, “and then there is the matter of… Well, since we’re sitting down for a real conversation, with wine, I suppose I might as well be honest and straightforward with you.”
“You should be,” she encouraged.
“Before you killed Kyrosed,” Naclana said in a low voice, “I did not think much of you. I thought you were just another girl. I watched your mother die, because of King Kyrosed’s cruelty. She was my beloved cousin, and she was the most intelligent and wonderful woman I had ever known. Then Kyrosed took my sister as one of his brides, on a whim… and what he did to her. My poor sister was never the same. After losing those two women, who were both so strong, so amazing, and so important to me… I kind of gave up on life.”
“Oh, Naclana. I did not know.”
“You were young and sheltered. I could not expect you to know, or do anything about it. But then you stepped up. Then you did the unthinkable, and you freed us from that man and his tyranny.” Naclana shook his head in wonder. “I could not believe what you had done for years afterward. It just did not sink in that such a sweet and gentle girl could be capable of such strength. To murder your own father! What resolve that must have taken.”
Aazuria could not respond. She lowered her eyes. “I should have taken action much sooner.”
“Better late than never,” Naclana told her, staring off into the distance. “You don’t even know what you did for me, Zuri. You gave me my life back. You gave me my freedom. I felt like I had a home again; a family. I felt like I was part of something great, and I felt… proud. I felt patriotic again, for the first time since I had left Europe. You amazed me with every word, every action. You fought for us, and you kept us strong against our enemies. You inspired us all to stand together, and stand tall.” Naclana leaned forward and placed his hand on hers. “You gave me purpose.”
Feeling her eyes fill with tears, Aazuria gazed at her cousin. “Naclana…”
He smiled at her with admiration. “I never really had a sense of purpose, until you. Now, my purpose is to help you. So, please let me. Let me be your family, and let me be your friend. Let me take care of you, and let me stand by you during this difficult time. For once, I will try to keep you strong.”
Blinking away her tears, Aazuria sprung out of her chair and moved forward to give her cousin a hug. “Thank you for being on my side. Thank you for being here for me. I’ve lost so many people; so much of my family is gone. My mother, and so many uncles and aunts, cousins and sisters… Corallyn. Sometimes I worry that I’m going to lose Elandria. Her heart is so fragile and paper-thin that I fear a fierce gust of wind could tear her to shreds. It means the world to me to have you here, right now.”
He hugged back. “I always will be. You know, we probably have a few remaining family members scattered around the European seas—relatives of your mother. Maybe we could search for them someday, when things quiet down.”
“That would be nice,” she told him, settling back down into her chair and retrieving her wine glass. She took a sip and smiled at her cousin. “So, Naclana. I have a question for you.”
“Go ahead.”
“Did you find Marina attractive? You seemed to be staring at her a great deal.”
He sighed, taking a heavy gulp of his own drink. “No. It was her name that bothered me, at first. My sister was named Marina, as well. I know it’s a common sea-dweller name, but I could not help feeling nostalgic. Then, as I observed her more and more, she began to remind me of my sister. The yellow hair and yellow dress, and the way she moved.”
“Ahhh,” Aazuria said in understanding.
“My sister was beautiful,” Naclana said. “Do you remember her?”
“Only vaguely,” Aazuria responded.
“Yes,” Naclana said, in a faraway voice. “Marina was much older than me. She was very good friends with your mother. They grew up together. Undina and Marina, the inseparable cousins. Sometimes I wish that we had never heard of Kyrosed Vellamo.”
“He is gone now,” Aazuria said gently. “For good. He will never bother us again.”
“But it’s like he said,” Naclana mused, “his legacy will outlive him. The things that man did… they are not so easily erased or forgotten. They’ll leave dark marks on all of us for as long as we live.”
Aazuria shook her head. “No. We must be strong enough to overcome our history. We are not mere products of our upbringing, our trauma, our failures, or even our genetic material. We are constantly in the process of producing our new selves—with each choice we make, with each thought we think and phrase we speak, in each new chapter of our lives. Every single day is an opportunity to do something great, and redefine our destiny.” She smiled and glanced toward the window of the bar, feeling lighter than she had in years. The Greek sunset was flooding the sky with color, and it was difficult not to feel hopeful. “Those dark marks on your soul? Let the sunrise erase them. If you go to bed broken in the nighttime, you can still wake up whole in the morning.”
Naclana stared at her for a moment, letting her words wash over him. He lifted his glass into the air to toast to her words, and drank deeply. “You’re a wonder, Zuri. That you can be positive after everything that you’ve been through. That you can even smile after a day like this!”
“It wa
s a rough day,” she agreed. “It does bother me that we wasted so much time, waiting on that infuriating man. And my decision to call the subs—all that wasted effort for a whole lot of nothing!” She sighed. “I must admit that I thought coming to this resort would be a further waste of time. I didn’t think we could solve the problem, us accomplishing nothing, with doing more of nothing. But I was wrong. I really needed this.” Aazuria sipped her wine and continued to gaze at the sunset appreciatively. “My favorite cousin just took me to a lovely spa! How could I not be smiling?”
Naclana grabbed the bottle and refilled both of their glasses to the brim. Signaling the waiter, he ordered another bottle in fluent Greek, before turning back to Aazuria. “Okay. Now that you’ve gotten a little lubrication in your system, start talking. What are you going to do about the divorce papers?”
Aazuria quickly put her glass to her lips and drank so that her mouth would be occupied and she could be saved from responding for a few seconds longer. “I don’t know,” she finally said. “He caught me completely off guard. I didn’t know he was even thinking about divorce.”
“Do you still want to be with him?” Naclana asked.
“I don’t know,” she repeated. “Yes. I do love him, but it’s complicated.”
“You’ve spent a lot of time avoiding him lately,” Naclana observed.
“Yes. I thought it was because of Elandria at first—and maybe sometimes it is.” Aazuria sipped more wine as she tried to search her feelings. “Maybe sometimes I am afraid of stepping on her toes, and taking what belongs to her. So I steer clear, and hope that they’ll be happier that way. They were so happy without me, when I was abducted. I know. I came back and I saw them. I snuck into Trevain’s birthday party… and I watched from the shadows. Elandria was happier than I’d ever seen her.”
“It wasn’t easy for them to get there,” Naclana told her. “It took years for any of us to feel okay again, after we lost you. But we had to try, you know? Elandria and Trevain… they were the ones closest to you. They felt the loss more keenly than any of us. They needed each other, and to be honest—we pushed them together. We all encouraged them to get married. It was our way of gluing the pieces back together. But they’re not happier without you, Zuri. They’re just really upset at the thought that they have hurt you.”
“They have not hurt me,” she responded. “I’ll be perfectly honest with you, Naclana. The problem is inside me. Even when Elandria was gone, training with the priestess—I had my husband all to myself, and I was terrified to go near him. Dr. Rosenberg helped a lot, but I just can’t feel the way I used to feel. I can’t fully relax. I can’t let go and love someone, because I’m scared that it’s going to get ripped away from me again.”
“You need to relax,” Naclana told her with worry. “I brought you here because I know that you’re really stressed out… but this isn’t going to help. One good day isn’t enough. You need to relax on a regular basis—a daily basis. I swear, when you took a nap earlier—you looked super tense the entire time. It’s like you never actually sleep—you just close your eyes and pretend to sleep, because you know that you should.”
“I was dead for months, cousin,” she reminded him. “Sleep has lost some of its charm since then.”
“Fair enough,” he said with a frown. “But remember what you said about the dark marks? Zuri, you need to take your own advice! You’re not going to die if you let yourself fall asleep. You’re not going to get abducted if you let yourself be happy and love someone. Just relax, and trust that things are going to be okay.”
“Maybe if we get to a comfortable place, where war is not an issue,” she said softly. “Maybe… if Varia comes home. I’ve been a bad mother to her. I’ve hurt her. In avoiding Trevain, and never being at home… I pushed away my daughter. Naclana, I spent every day with her for most of her life. We used to be so close. But since I came home to Adlivun, everyone else has needed me. They needed me to stop the horrors on the bridge. To fight the Clan of Zalcan. To liberate and unite all the undersea kingdoms, and rebuild all the broken cities. How can I possibly do all of that and be a good parent to Varia at the same time?”
“The gods themselves could not be a better parent than you, Aazuria.”
“I appreciate the flattery, but that is not true. I must be a mother to my people. A mother to all of Adlivun, and Oceanus; to millions of people across the seas. Is it no wonder that Varia left? I had no time for her. I was too busy taking care of the world. I was mothering everyone but her.” Aazuria closed her eyes tightly. “If I get another chance, I’ll do better. I’ll make sure she knows how much I love her.”
“She does know,” Naclana assured his cousin, refilling her wine glass. “I promise you, she knows.”
“I hope so.” Aazuria gratefully took the refilled glass, and brought it to her lips. Like magic, the wine caused the truth to flow forth unrestrained. “I just miss my baby,” she murmured. “I put so much pressure on Varia to be grown-up, accountable, and strong—and indeed, she is very smart and mature—but she’s still just a little girl. She still needs me, and I still need her.”
“You’ll be together again, one day soon,” Naclana promised. “She’s just being a little rebellious. She’s just seeking independence to find out who she is. But believe me, once she sees a little more of the world—she’ll realize how important family is, and she will come home.”
Aazuria nodded, closing her eyes briefly. The sun had set, and more people were filtering into the bar, talking and laughing. The atmosphere had gone from a quiet evening of reflection to lively nighttime revelry. She looked around at the people in the bar, jealous of their simple lives and lack of responsibility. “Visola would have loved this type of place,” Aazuria said wistfully. “I miss her so much. Almost as much as I miss Varia. There are few people in this world that I ever needed or depended on as much as I did her.”
“Well, you can depend on me for now,” Naclana told her. “I’m not going to abandon you—for what little it’s worth. I’m not sure what Trevain was thinking in giving you divorce papers at this moment in time. He could have waited until things had settled down.”
She smiled sadly. “It doesn’t matter. He’s not my primary concern, and I need to ignore the issues with him for now. I just want Varia and Visola to come home. Not because anyone has forced them to return, but because they both genuinely choose to be at home. Sure, the divorce is painful. It hurts my insides, like a constant burning sensation. I grew up without divorce, so the concept makes me feel ill. I feel like such a failure. But to lose Trevain, on top of losing Varia, and Visola… all at once. It’s just too much. At least when I was abducted and completely alone, I had Varia. Every day, I poured all my love into her. But I cannot go through that again. I’m not strong enough to do it a second time, Naclana.” She took a long swig of her wine, finishing off her glass. When she looked back at him, there were tears in her eyes. “I cannot be without Visola.”
Naclana stared at her thoughtfully. When the new bottle of wine arrived, he thanked the waiter and turned back to his cousin. “I know I’m a lousy replacement for Vachlan, and I could never hope to replace Visola—but I think I know what she would do if she were here.”
“What’s that?” Aazuria asked curiously.
“She would find a handsome man and throw you at him so that you could forget all about Trevain for a few hours,” Naclana said with a mischievous glint came into his eyes.
Aazuria choked on her wine. “Yes, that is precisely what Visola would do. But do not even think of trying such a prank. I am not that type of woman. I am not interested in such shenanigans.”
Naclana cleared his throat and rose to his feet. He made a loud proclamation in Greek, gathering the attention of everyone in the bar. He spoke another sentence while pointing at Aazuria. All of the customers began cheering and applauding.
“My Sedna, what did you say?!” Aazuria asked her cousin in shocked embarrassment.
“I just to
ld them that you were my cousin, and you were rich and single and newly divorced,” Naclana informed her with a wink. “I encouraged any interested men to feel free to sweep you off your feet.”
“Naclana!” Aazuria hissed, lifting a hand to hide the blush on her cheeks. “That’s unacceptable.”
“No,” Naclana said with a frown. “You being alone and unhappy while Trevain gets his rocks off with your sister is unacceptable.”
“I’m happy for Elandria!” Aazuria protested. “I love her dearly.”
“Stop being so selfless for one minute, and think about your own life. You’re a woman, not a machine. You have needs.”
“Me? What about you. I have never seen you with a woman, in all the years that I’ve known you,” Aazuria accused.
Naclana’s cheeks darkened with a slight blush. “Ah, yes. About that. I have been wanting to explain…”
“Explain what?” Aazuria demanded, emboldened by the wine.
“I never really intended to tell anyone,” Naclana said shyly. “But after Sionna… I figure I might as well. We’re all just going to die anyway. The reason you have never seen me with a woman is because I like men.”
“Ohhh,” Aazuria said, sitting back in her chair as though she had been struck. Several things suddenly clicked into place. “How did I not know that, all this time? How could I have missed it?” She smiled. “You taking me shopping and insisting we go to a spa makes a lot more sense now.”
Naclana laughed. “And now that you finally know my secret, we can check out guys together.”
Maelstrom Page 8
