Shattered by the Sea Lord (Lords of Atlantis Book 8)

by Starla Night

  “Did she make it?” Dannika’s limbs trembled. Maybe from cold, but maybe from shock. Her teeth chattered and her bones vibrated against their sinews. “Did she get free?”

  “I cannot concentrate on two humans.” He strained and then gave up, shaking out his limbs and staring at the chair as though trying to see a new problem.

  “I know, I know. But, did she?”

  Ciran ducked under the water.

  Water gurgled and bubbled. Waves slapped her window, engulfing the plane like an aqua snake. The light dimmed and changed to blue. Saltwater sprayed from the cracks.

  Water splashed up to Dannika’s chest.

  She gasped.

  Ciran surfaced again. A dangerous knowing filled his gaze.

  Uh oh. “She didn’t make it?”

  “Val is on the raft.” Ciran stared at her very hard. “I cannot remove the metal rib.”

  “What about the seat?”

  He shook his head.

  “You got most of the screws. I bet a strong push with the crowbar, you could pop them.”

  “Another piece of metal has twisted around the plate securing your chair to the floor. It is as though the plane is holding onto you with metal tentacles.”

  Oh.

  Wow.

  That was…

  Huh.

  How could she survive a crash and drown when everyone was trying to save her?

  With Ciran trying. Desperately. To save her.

  “Dannika.” He threaded his fingers through her wet hair. His thumb stroked her cheek. “I am sorry.”

  “No.” She swallowed. “You did your best. I mean, you’ll think of something. You always do.”

  “I have.” He dove beneath the water again. Subtle waves brushed her ankles. He struggled to free the seat from the twisted wreckage of the plane. She sensed him deep within the water.

  Because he was still here, deep calm filled her.

  He would figure something out.

  He always did.

  For a long time after Eliot died, she’d cried so hard she’d thought her heart would stop, but it had always carried on, and she’d believed there must be a reason. And when she’d started matchmaking her friends successfully, watched the bloom of interest flower into full, abiding, selfless love, she’d known. She had a calling, a mission. She’d experienced the greatest love, and others deserved to experience it, too.

  She’d fought her unstoppable feelings for Ciran, but at this critical moment, she rested her faith in him.

  He was her one.

  “Ciran?” Her voice wobbled. The water rose to her neck. She gasped for air. “Ciran!”

  He burst to the surface holding a bottle of water.

  No, that wasn’t bottled water. That was Sea Opal elixir.

  Of course.

  See? He always came up with something.

  She reached for the bottle.

  Ciran held it. “Dannika, you have not pledged to become my mate, but you must—”

  “Give it to me.”

  His brows lifted. “You know this is—”

  “Elixir.” She sucked in another breath. “And after I drink it, you have to activate it. You have to kiss me, Ciran. I’ll become yours.”

  His gaze smoldered. The iridescent threads in his eyes glimmered with possession.

  He uncapped the bottle and tipped it into her mouth just as the seawater rose to her cheeks and flooded in her ears, carrying with it the usual odd muffling, and extra-loudness that was so unsettled.

  She fought the shock reflex. Swallow. The order came from inside. She choked.

  Ciran’s steady gaze mesmerized her.

  He had total faith.

  She was his one.

  He was hers.

  Swallow.

  She gulped.

  Seawater splashed over her head.

  The bottle pulled out of her mouth as the water closed over her face, leaving her with cold, dark, salt. She coughed. Bubbles erupted in the heavy, viscous blue. Water strangled her, pouring down her throat and into her lungs.

  Air.

  Spots danced behind her eyes.

  Air. Air!

  She convulsed.

  Trust in me, Dannika. You are transformed. I am your one.

  Ciran’s strong fingers cupped her cheeks, calming her, and his lips brushed hers in their first kiss.

  Her heart stilled, and then the pressure of the water eased. Her chest swelled with warmth, truth, heat.

  He was right.

  She had transformed.

  The spots in her eyes faded. Blackness turned to light, and the sea opened around her.

  Ciran appeared first, floating as a warrior. His iridescent coffee and green tattoos gleamed, and his unearthly two-tone eyes filled her with dangerous desire.

  The darkness beyond him fled to show the whole interior of the plane. Detritus floated, chumming the water with metal and chaos.

  The plane rotated and the tail cracked. The walls bent, and the metal rib released her seat. The weight lifted off her. She slipped out and into Ciran’s strong arms.

  He crushed her to his chest. His body trembled with feeling. Words thrummed deep in his chest. “Praise the Life Tree.”

  She “heard” the vibration in her own chest in some sort of echo chamber beneath her sternum.

  He was so torn up, so grateful. The wreckage and her unfortunate situation had put him in so much pain.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Me as well.”

  They talked but did not talk. The timbre of his vibrations was pleasingly firm, the same as the surface, yet deeper and richer melodies interlocked with new meaning. Nuanced emotion inflected his vibrations.

  He pulled back and stroked her cheeks with his thumbs. Subtle music, pianissimo, infused every touch. “Our first kiss should not have been forced. I wanted you to choose me.”

  Her heart thudded in her chest.

  Because she did choose him. She had.

  Dannika pulled him close and pressed her lips to his.

  He pulled away in shock.

  She clung to him. I choose you.

  He kissed her back. His mouth explored, questioned, redefined. His upper lip felt thinner and flatter than she’d expected, and his lower lip was thicker and perfect for nibbling. He opened and sought her, chasing and claiming her. She accepted it all, yielding to his embrace, bathed in a hot, fizzy glow of perfect safety, of having found her home, of sanctuary.

  Heat swirled into her soul.

  He tasted like hope and fury, desperation and renewal, salt and male. Their lips united and the shock of shifting faded away. Heat and warmth and life kindled within her.

  While they kissed, his chest vibrated fiercely, “You are mine.”

  She was his.

  And she also belonged to the ocean.

  New exhilaration filled her, just like when she’d survived the plane crash. She laughed with delight. And because she was underwater, her laughter vibrated in her chest. There was no air to bubble within her anymore. The water wrapped around her like an embrace.

  Ciran pulled back.

  This weightless sensation felt magical. She twirled inside the small compartment, dancing with the debris, an undersea astronaut with perfect form.

  Ciran grinned, tired and happy.

  He was so adorable. So sweet.

  Outside the broken windows, the ocean spread out, lighting up for miles. Ordinary sunlight filtered down from the surface, where the tail of the plane still poked out, but beneath it, a depthless, breathtaking infinity spread in all directions.

  Every sea creature, from the tiniest speck of sparkling plankton to the mightiest nova of a humpback whale appeared in sharp relief. Dannika was a falcon and the ocean was the shorn grass.

  And music flooded in. Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony played around her in pieces. Distant whales hummed in a melancholy A-minor, and closer, a pair of mako sharks wailed in descending sirens as they darted and interwove. Jellies burbled like happy French
horns, schools of tiny silver fish trilled like excited piccolos, massive groupers bellowed like tubas, and swarms of squid jetted across the sea with the low doot-doot sounds of the classic contrabassoon in high G.

  The fish formed a swarm of glowing musical instruments absent a conductor, and so they played backward, forward, and all at once.

  It was chaos, and yet, it was beautiful.

  Her fingers suddenly itched to pluck the strings.

  She had given up harp after Eliot died. Harp took a short time to sound nice and a lifetime to master. She’d loved playing with her mother so much as a child.

  Ciran bumped her shoulder.

  Even though her senses had changed to sense lights in the animals, nothing unusual showed on him. Just a broad, powerful chest, lickable abs, a promise of more beneath the Bermuda shorts, and swirling, iridescent tattoos marking him as an honorable warrior.

  “Val’s raft is drifting.” He vibrated in that almost-ticklish way deep inside. “We should surface before the current takes her too far. Can you make your fins?”

  Dannika wiggled her human feet. “Not yet.”

  Bending over made her belly ache. She pulled out the loose caftan bodice. Red welts bruised her abdomen.

  The Sea Opal elixir would heal her. It probably already had fixed the worse injuries. She needed to give it time.

  Oh, and Val’s forehead hadn’t looked too good.

  “Get some elixir for Val,” Dannika said.

  “Down here.” He kicked through the broken floor into the baggage area.

  His broad quads strained the Bermuda shorts and his feet elongated to fins. His shirt floated up and a series of gills lined his lower back.

  Gills!

  She must have those, too. She pressed the flowing caftan at her lower back, but it was ticklish too.

  The tone of the animal symphony changed. Minor keys shifted to majors, and stately adagio sped to frenetic vivace.

  That couldn’t be good.

  Dannika floated to a window.

  A heavily tattooed warrior stared back at her.

  Adrenaline surged.

  She scrambled back. “Ciran!”

  Another face poked in the opposite window.

  Ciran zoomed in front of her and brandished the crowbar.

  “Undine,” the warrior said calmly, identifying the mer city that Ciran had come from. His tattoos were cornflower blue. A long trident rested against his side.

  Ciran’s grip tightened and he said the word she most dreaded. “Lusca.”

  Chapter Nine

  Ciran hefted the unbalanced human metal rod.

  What he wouldn’t give for a real weapon. The dinged, bent trident of this Luscan aggressor. His own familiar trident and daggers.

  But they rested in safe storage in the reef off Bermuda.

  “Can you use your queen powers?” he vibrated to Dannika.

  She pinched her fingers together. “No. I’m sorry.”

  Then it was up to him.

  The Luscan warrior watched them. Unusual. Normally they attacked furiously without a strategy.

  Ciran cast a quick glance around the interior of the plane. He needed more. More information, more time, more distraction. “What do you want, Luscan?”

  The Luscan tilted his head. His words were unnaturally calm. “Why is an Undine in a human airplane?”

  “Why is a single Luscan investigating?” Ciran tested a feint with the metal rod. “All the cities you have wronged will hunt and execute you.”

  “I am not your enemy, Undine.”

  “Oh, no?”

  “Father.” A plain-faced trainee with almost no markings paddled to the opposite side of the plane and peered in the windows with a second, similar trainee. Stubby coral daggers, more a play weapon for a young fry than a proper weapon for a trainee, hung from his skinny biceps with fraying kelp. “The patrol is coming.”

  “Inside.” The Luscan eyed Ciran and swam in the open door. The two trainees swam at his fin-tips. To Ciran, he quieted his vibrations to what would be the surface equivalent of a whisper. “No, I am not your enemy, Undine. They are.”

  Three tattooed Luscan warriors jetted toward the plane. Sharp tridents gleamed at their sides. Finely honed daggers rested flush against their biceps and thighs.

  The warlike leader circled the slowly sinking wreckage.

  “What are you looking for, Lieutenant Orike?” one warrior asked.

  “Why did the metal bird crash so close to the island of exiles? It is suspicious. Especially since we did not bring it down.”

  “Any humans inside are dead,” one of his warrior said. “The metal bird has flooded. There was a human floating on the surface, though.”

  “Yes, after we deal with the escaped exiles, we will ensure there are no survivors.” The warlike leader raised his vibration to shout at the plane with rage. “Itime? You dared to escape your prison, and now you hide in the human wreck like a coward. The king will shred your traitorous flesh and feed you to the kraken.”

  The cornflower blue warrior squinted out the window. “Come and get me, Orike.”

  “Lieutenant Orike!” the other warrior shouted.

  “Call me Lieutenant Itime and I will extend the same honors.”

  “You lost everything when you turned your back on our noble king, you weak-skulled, toothless, coward.”

  The warriors insulted Itime while their leader, Lieutenant Orike, studied the plane. He apparently considered Itime enough of a challenge not to rush the wreckage, despite their better numbers and weaponry.

  Good to know.

  Itime glanced over his shoulder at Ciran, his trident never wavering from the threat outside. “Now you understand. We came to rescue you. This is my son, Tulu.”

  One trainee nodded. He had the same serious eyes as his father. Only one tattoo marked his body: an eel creature holding a flaming ball in his claws, on a background of flowers and scales, drawn with fine lines.

  How strange.

  “And that is Hadali.”

  The second youth floated forward, an eager smile breaking over his face. He was perhaps the same age as Tulu but seemed younger, with a similar intricate heart-tattoo of a foreign creature and unfamiliar plants. “Hi there. What happened to your plane, anyway?”

  “It crashed,” Ciran said.

  “Sabotage,” Dannika said behind him, and shared their names, finishing the introductions. “What do we do?”

  “We have to get back to Sanctuary,” Hadali said. “You’ll be safe. They’re not allowed on the island.”

  “How do we get there?”

  “It’s that way.” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “We just have to get past Lieutenant Orike first. Oh and the rest of the patrol left behind.”

  Ciran combed his mental inventory. A fight inside the wreckage was not ideal. “How many warriors in total?”

  “Five,” Itime answered. “Three here. Two more circle Sanctuary.”

  Ciran rotated to Dannika. “Still no powers?”

  She flexed her fingers. “Sorry.”

  “Do not apologize. The first queens developed their powers after weeks of effort. I only ask because you are exceptionally bright.”

  Her lips quirked to the side and her soul light brightened in her chest. “And we have an exceptional need.”

  “You understand.”

  The plane moaned as it sank into the depths. Creak. The sound shivered in the water, a visceral warning.

  “Plan quickly, Undine,” Itime said, his vibration still as casual as if he were commenting on skipjack migrations. “Before Orike gets bored of this standoff and decides to murder your surface human.”

  “Dannika, get two bottles of elixir.” Ciran remained within the shadows. From here, it was likely that the outside warriors did not know of his existence or Dannika’s. They had an element of surprise. “Lieutenant Itime, how fast are you?”

  The warrior blinked then hardened. “They will expect me to fight.”

&
nbsp; “Then think how upset they will be when they see you escaping with attractive salvage.”

  Dannika handed Ciran one bottle.

  He poked it out of her waterlogged bag and passed it to the warrior. “Make it look like something you were willing to sacrifice your son for.”

  Itime took it. “There is nothing I would sacrifice my son for.”

  Clearly, since he had already given up everything and defied his king. “Do your enemies know that?”

  Itime measured him with a long look, then shouldered the bag. To Tulu, he quietly vibrated, “Trust your instincts. I will meet you at the coral.”

  Tulu nodded solemnly.

  “Good luck, Itime,” Hadali vibrated. “We’ll wait for you.”

  “You will not need to.” He nodded at Ciran and Dannika, squeezed out the window on the opposite side from where the trio of Luscans were still tossing insults, and jetted away, his practiced strokes effortless.

  Ciran motioned for the trainees to drop out of sight and remain silent.

  “Quiet.” Lieutenant Orike’s vibration silenced his warriors. “Something is different. Itime?”

  The trainees held still. Dannika pinched her fingers, open and shut. Ciran closed his fist over her hands. She relaxed into his firm hold.

  “Itime, you are welcome to hide in silence while I send my warriors to destroy another of the surface humans you exiles love so much.” Lieutenant Orike’s vibrations grew louder as he floated closer to the plane. “Itime?”

  His sharp profile appeared over the rim of the windows.

  Orange-yellow tattoos, a similar shade to the acidic loquat fruits Ciran had eaten with Indigo’s family this afternoon, shone on the lieutenant’s skin.

  If he peered the correct direction, he could see Ciran or the trainees. But he fully focused on the last spot where Itime had been. “Itime?”

  Hadali tensed. Tulu gripped his coral play daggers.

  One of his warriors shouted. “Lieutenant Orike, look. On the other side of the metal bird. The exile flees!”

  “Curse it.” Lieutenant Orike veered over the plane. “With me, my warriors. He will not escape.”

  “What of the surface human?”

  “She will succumb. Most do.”

  “Hey, he has something. Look, his arm. He is carrying away human things.”

  “Itime! Do not evade us. Fight like the warrior you once were. Coward!”