Breakwater

by Catherine Jones Payne

  The guards at the city gate gave me a curt nod as I darted onto the open reef. I didn’t see Maximus among them, and I hoped they wouldn’t hassle me on my way back in.

  Dismissing the thought, I soared across the coral gardens—pausing for just a moment to inspect the growth of a crimson-and-yellow plant I’d been admiring for a year—until I reached the spot in the reef where I usually met Kiki.

  “Kiki?” I called. I clicked my tongue. “Come swim!”

  She didn’t respond, and a surge of panic raced through my veins.

  “Kiki?” I shouted. Please be here.

  I’d been absent from the reef for over a week. What if she’d thought I wasn’t coming back? What if she’d moved on and joined a pod? I clicked as loudly as I could.

  “Kiki!” I called again. Flicking my fin, I moved forward, away from the city in search of her. “Come here, girl!” My heart shipwrecked. I couldn’t have lost her. I just couldn’t have. I screamed, “Kiki!”

  Seconds later, I heard a frantic clicking, and then Kiki surged through the water from the south and brushed up against me. I giggled, relief flooding my body.

  “Hi, girl!” I said, wrapping my arms around her. “Oh, I’m so happy to see you.”

  She whistled.

  “I’ve missed you, too. Let’s swim.”

  I raised one hand above my head, and she sank downward to the perfect level for me to grab her dorsal fin. I scratched the spot I knew she loved, right behind her fin, and she surged forward, slicing through the water.

  “Good girl,” I cooed. Life inside the city wouldn’t be normal again for a very long time, but at least I still had this.

  She let out a squeal and arched her body toward the surface. A moment later, we broke out of the water into the warm, yellow sunlight. I squinted against its brightness, and we dove back into the waves.

  When I readjusted my grip on her fin, she took off toward the deep ocean with me in tow. A thrill of excitement tingled throughout my body.

  We darted through the cut in the reef, and I looked at the dark, forbidding water that extended hundreds—perhaps even thousands—of fathoms beneath me. It was colder here, and I’d start shivering if we stayed out too long. But defying conventions and embracing danger made me feel alive.

  Something brushed against my fin, and I suppressed a little scream as I looked back. It was just a school of tiny silver fish, flashing in the light that pierced the water.

  Kiki headed for the surface again, this time just long enough to suck in a breath of air, and then we plunged into deeper water. We never went far down—not more than ten fathoms or so—and we didn’t stay down long, but I always loved this part of our swims.

  “I don’t know what to do,” I said to Kiki as the water grew murkier. “There’s something strange going on with Felix’s business. Something illegal. I just wish I knew what it was.”

  She clicked at me.

  “I know, I know. You don’t like it when I’m stressed.” I brushed my hand against one of the plants growing along the side of the cliff. “Ow!”

  I drew my knuckle to my mouth and saw a jellyfish emerge from its hiding place in the seaweed.

  Kiki squealed, and I thought I detected a hint of amusement in her tone.

  “Shut up,” I said.

  She squealed again, lower this time.

  I shook my head as she continued our descent. We’d descended deeper than usual, but I didn’t make any move to rein her in.

  Of course, we never ventured deep when anyone else was with us, not even Kora or Rhea, lest a report somehow get back to Mother. She already thought I took too many risks.

  And yet, being with Kiki is safer than swimming in the city canals these days.

  My stomach dropped at the thought of Rhea. But she’d made her choice, and I’d made mine.

  Just when the cold became unbearable, Kiki turned back up toward the surface. Moments later, she broke through into the sunlight and air one more time, and then she started to make her way back to the reef.

  I rubbed her belly. “Good girl. I wish I’d brought Pippa out to swim today. She wants to meet you, you know. But I don’t know if she even wants to talk to me right now.”

  Kiki whistled.

  “No,” I said. “I don’t think I’m going back yet. I’d rather stay out here with you today.”

  She blew bubbles out of her blowhole.

  “Yeah.” I planted a kiss on her snout. “I wish I was a dolphin like you.”

  We cavorted on the reef for another two hours, playing tag in the seagrass and riding the currents. I felt more relaxed and carefree than I had since that awful, awful party where everything fell apart.

  “Lady Jade?” called a male voice from behind me.

  Startled, I whirled around.

  Maximus floated several yards away from me.

  “What are you doing here?” I asked.

  “I suppose I could ask you the same question,” he said. “But I’m here to find you. The guards at the gate reported that you came out here several hours ago. The king would like an audience with you.”

  “Now?”

  He nodded. “May I escort you back?”

  “Yeah.” My shoulders drooped. “Yeah, I guess.”

  I whistled at Kiki and patted her side. She rubbed her head on my shoulder and darted away.

  “Why does the king want to see me?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “I don’t question His Majesty unless I need to know the answer.”

  “Fair enough.” I envisioned the king’s severe eyes and bushy beard. “I probably wouldn’t either if I were in your position.”

  The corners of his mouth curled upward. “You ready?”

  I cast one final glance in the direction Kiki had gone. “Yes,” I said, swimming past him toward the city. “Let’s go.”

  When Maximus caught up with me, he asked, “Do you often dance with wild creatures on the reef?”

  I wrinkled my nose. “Kiki isn’t wild. I rescued her when she was tiny.”

  “She isn’t domesticated in the way the merchants’ dolphins are.”

  I laughed. “No. I can’t imagine her pulling a cart. But I try to come out and see her a couple times a week. Recently, it’s been less often, of course.”

  We drifted into silence, but it seemed more companionable than I’d expected. After a lengthy period of quiet, right before we reached the city gate, he turned to me.

  “I’m sorry I doubted your story. After hearing Rhea’s testimony . . . well, the retraction of her testimony, I’m afraid I misjudged you. Misjudged the whole situation.”

  I looked down at the coral reefs below us. “I just wish none of this had happened. It isn’t something I’m happy to be right about.”

  “The whole city shares your sentiments.”

  “Not the whole city.” I gave a dark chuckle. “I barely avoided another of your brother’s rallies today.”

  His eyes hardened. “Andronicus fancies himself a revolutionary. He’s always looking for a new cause to use to stir up trouble. Really, he’s just anti-monarchical. He opposes everything the king does because he wants to set up a new form of government. You know, the ideals of democracy and all that.”

  I shrugged. “I have no opinion on the question in principle. But it seems to me that the king is a fair ruler.”

  “I serve at the pleasure of the king.”

  “Would you want anything else?” I raised my eyebrows.

  “You know how to ask dangerous questions. But no, I wouldn’t. I’m committed to the great legacy of Thessalonike.”

  We passed under the arched gateway. The guards on duty glanced at us but said nothing.

  “Do you think Tor’s father is involved in illegal business dealings?” I asked.

  “You really do have a talent for questions that could get you killed, don’t you?”

  I swallowed the lump in my throat. “So you do think something’s going on?”

  “Those sorts of things exce
ed my pay grade. But you could ask your little naiad friend. The sister of the girl who got killed. If the dead girl knew something, the sister might too.”

  Yes, she does know something. Or at least she suspects something. I couldn’t fathom any other reason she’d go to such great lengths to hide the tablet.

  Instead, I said, “We haven’t spoken since the verdict and sentencing. She’s grieving.”

  “Or afraid.”

  “Maybe that, too.”

  We turned onto the most opulent canal in the city. The palace lay at the far end of it, near city center. We swam in silence down the canal, and Maximus turned away from me as we entered the courtyard.

  “The king is in the court,” he said. “I must return to my post.”

  I rounded the corner to the court’s entrance and stared at the doors as I summoned the courage to enter.

  Steeling myself, I pushed open the polished obsidian doors and approached the king, who sat on his throne on the far side of the room. As I drew nearer, I realized he was scratching something on a tablet.

  “Lady Jade,” he said, “I’m glad you’ve come.”

  “I wasn’t aware that I had the option, sir.”

  He chuckled. “No, I suppose not. But you must know that I don’t rule by fear and intimidation.”

  “That is why your subjects love you, Your Highness.”

  He sighed. “Not all of them.”

  “Most of them, then.”

  “Perhaps not this week. The mer are angry that Tor was convicted without a witness to the act of murder, and the naiads are enraged that his sentence was so light.”

  “Aunt Junia called it a verdict to anger everyone.”

  “Your aunt is wise,” he said, running a finger through his beard and staring at me.

  “If it is not too forward of me to ask,” I said, shifting my body, “to what do I owe the honor?”

  “I have a favor to ask of you,” he said, “for the good of the city.”

  I studied his face and quirked my eyebrow. “I can’t imagine what position I could be in to impact the whole of Thessalonike.”

  “More than you know.”

  I dipped my head. “How may I be of service, Your Highness?”

  “Sir Tor, as he’s now known after his expulsion from the Royal Mer Guard, will soon extend another offer of marriage to you.”

  I blanched. You can’t be asking me to . . .

  “I was hoping you would accept.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Silence stretched between us for a full minute.

  “And why—” My voice had grown cold, but I couldn’t help it. “—would I be compelled to do such a thing, Your Highness?”

  “I hope you don’t see this as a command, Lady Jade,” he said, his voice deep and steady. “Your family has served this throne and this city too faithfully for that. Call it an opportunity to heal the city.”

  He pressed his fingertips together and peered out at me from underneath his bushy black eyebrows.

  I clenched my jaw to stave off panic.

  “As you know,” he continued, “the naiads are rioting. The mer are calling for their expulsion from the city. There is fighting breaking out in the canals.”

  I swallowed and looked down at my hands.

  “Much of this could be mitigated—eliminated, even—if you announced the rekindling of your engagement to Sir Tor. His connection to your family would ensure the continuation of his own position in society.”

  “Be so good as to explain to me, Your Highness, how this solves any of the violence in the canals?”

  “It would be a symbolic way to assure the mer that their way of life is not threatened by those they see as interlopers. When they calm down, they will cease their continued persecution of the naiads. Eventually, the naiads will settle as the attacks in the quarter become less frequent,” the king said. “Things can return to normal.”

  “I’ve been led to understand that attacks in the quarter have been going on since the naiads arrived a decade ago.”

  He tilted his head. “You and I both know they’ve intensified since all this began.”

  “What if you’re wrong? What if it doesn’t help?”

  He gave me a bemused smile. “You’re a lot like your mother. I firmly believe the violence against the naiads will abate if Tor can resume his place in society. The rabble in the canals will be forced to regroup and come up with something new with which to foment malcontent. That gives time for tensions to mend, if not heal.”

  “You’re putting a lot on the shoulders of a single mermaid. And if I refuse?”

  “I will not speak another word of it, good or bad.”

  I stared past the king at the walls of the court. A carving of the warrior queen Eliana caught my eye. Be brave, she seemed to say.

  But what was brave here? It seemed so clear-cut in the histories.

  “There is something else you should know,” the king said. “The naiad William died last night of the injuries he sustained in your canal.”

  I froze. The room spun around me.

  “His sister tried to bring him back to the house of healing when his condition deteriorated. Perhaps he could have been saved. But with the tension in the city, the physicians were afraid to let a naiad in.”

  “The naiads are being denied medical care?” My voice squeaked.

  “When I heard of the situation, I forbade them to deny entrance to the naiads. Too late for William, I’m sorry to say. Your mother said he was a friend of yours.”

  “Yeah.” I swallowed, struggling to keep my voice steady. “I mean, I didn’t know him well. We met after Anna’s murder.”

  “Tell me about him,” the king said softly.

  I stared at the floor. “He was in love with Anna. After Pippa’s house was attacked and vandalized, he rebuilt it so her landlord wouldn’t come after her. She couldn’t pay him anything, but he did it anyway.”

  The king tilted his head toward me. “Then you understand the stakes.”

  My fingers tingled. He’s wrong. He has to be wrong.

  “Take some time to consider it.” He waved his hand at me. “I understand that it’s overwhelming.”

  “That’s an understatement,” I said, my voice quiet.

  “You are dismissed.”

  I turned around and fled from the court and the palace as fast as I could, trying to outswim the fear that clung to me.

  I tore through my front door, still shaking all over.

  Mother jerked upright. “Jade? What’s the matter?”

  I began sobbing before I could get out the first word. In broken sentences, I managed to convey the king’s request.

  Her face was blank when I finished.

  “D-d-did you know?” I demanded.

  “Of course not, my dear,” she said, drawing me into a hug. “I would never have let him suggest it to you.” Her expression hardened. “That must be why he sent the advisors home early. He knew I wouldn’t tolerate it.”

  “Is he r-right? Would an engagement between Tor and me put everything to rest?” I started to regain control of my voice, but turbulent emotions still stormed in my head.

  She looked at her hands. After a long time, she said, “It’s not your problem to remedy. I won’t have you marry a monster in hopes that it might quell the conflict.”

  I looked her in the eye for a moment before I softly said, “That’s my decision, not yours.”

  She stiffened. “Jade, don’t throw away your whole—”

  “I haven’t made a decision yet.”

  “Your father wouldn’t want you to marry him under duress like this.”

  “Father would want me to be brave. Whatever that means. He knew about self-sacrifice.”

  “Jade—”

  “He knew the risks,” I said, my voice tight, “when he went to try to negotiate with the liberationists.”

  She grabbed my arm. “Stop being melodramatic. Our family has suffered enough already. We’ve given up a lot f
or the city. Do you think for a moment that Tor will ever forgive you, even if he marries you to save face? Your life might be in danger.”

  “I’m not a battered woman who can’t give up her lover. You know I’d never marry Tor if the stakes weren’t so high. I just want the hate and violence to stop. Before more people die.”

  “Is this about William?”

  “It’s about everyone.”

  “Do you really think you’re so significant in this?”

  “The king seems to think so.”

  “The king is a fool,” she spat with venom in her voice.

  I drifted backward, startled. I’d never heard her criticize the king.

  Glancing at the corridor, I wondered if Benjamin was in the house or still at school. I didn’t have a clue what time it was. I hoped he was at school; I didn’t want him overhearing this conversation.

  “Don’t fancy yourself a martyr, Jade. If you marry Tor and any harm befalls you, we’ll be no closer to peace than we are now.”

  “If he kills me, he’s the fool. He might be able to get away with murdering a servant—especially a naiad—but to kill your daughter? A high-ranking noble? One of the king’s favorites?”

  “You underestimate the motivating power of rage.”

  I remembered Father’s funeral. The moment we’d floated on the edge of the reef and cast his body to the depths. The white-hot anger that coursed through me, and how I’d wanted nothing more than revenge.

  But, over time, grief fades. And so did my lust for vengeance.

  Kiki hadn’t understood why I’d wanted to stay away from the drop-off after that, for almost a year. But eventually I went back. In a way, I felt close to Father out there.

  And somewhere in the midst of it, I’d realized that Father wouldn’t have wanted me to carry that blinding anger against the naiads—or even the liberationists. He’d chosen to risk his own life to try to set the city right. He’d preferred to die than to hate.

  “I don’t know what I’m going to do,” I said. “But I’ll hear him out, at least, when the time comes. He’s under house arrest at his parents’ home for the next year, so a marriage can’t occur until he’s served his sentence. Perhaps he and I can agree to announce an engagement and then quietly back out once things have settled. That might serve both our purposes. I can’t imagine he really wants to marry me any more than I want to commit myself to him.”