by Hazel Grace
The handle itches in my palm, remembering the first time I held it. On why I possessed it in the first place. At the life I took to be in this spot, right here, defending my kingdom, my sisters, my father, and my home.
Staring down the barrel with both eyes open, I don’t hesitate like I did the last time, I just pull the trigger. The heavy gun fires off my one shot of gunpowder that Tobias left behind and catches Taysa’s left side. She flinches, hand going to the spot where I hit her, and that’s when a lightning bolt hits the sand right in front of me.
Startled, I stumble back, catching myself before my butt hits the ground. My sisters flank my sides a moment later, pulling me back even though we need to move forward.
We need the water.
A shift of gray appears in my peripheral, and I shove my sisters back, as many as I can reach with my arms, while trying to find the head of the second eel. Its body wraps around the front and sides of us, which means it’s behind us.
A wicked hiss vocalizes, and I don’t bide any time, climbing over the body of the creature and straight in the direction of Taysa. The injured eel wails in agony back and forth, thrashing in the water, but she doesn’t miss my movements.
Extending both her hands to her sides, she lifts them, making the air pick up in a frenzy. My feet dig into the grains of sand as I sprint toward her, the metal of Dagen’s blade chafing my skin.
Another flash of light hits the turf at my right side, jolting me away from it as the smell of salt becomes richer in my lungs.
My vision stays locked on Taysa, determined and blood-hungry. I’m doing this for them, both of the men that gave up everything for me to be able to fight and not lose.
My body barrels into hers, but I don’t knock her down. Instead, it was like she was waiting for me to touch her. Tentacles wrap around my waist and throat, lifting me off my feet as I land a foot to her gut before they extend the distance between us.
My hands go to the velvety skin, slipping right off them as I regain some sort of grasp.
“Your mother was fierce and feisty like you,” Taysa alludes calmly. “Trusted too easily as well. You’re the spitting image of her, that’s why I brought you this.” The red bottle appears in front of me as she cocks it from side to side. “You appeared there first but not before I took her powers and bottled them up in here.”
I throw another leg in her direction but miss. “You’re a backstabbing who—” The tentacles tighten around my windpipe, cutting me off.
“Not until I’m done with the story,” Taysa tsks. “The cuffs would only come off once she was sucked of all her godly potency, but then you showed up.”
“How did...Tobias get the other...cuff?”
“It goes to the closest bloodline of the person that killed the god, which was him. I was long gone before you could even sense me near. And since then, I’ve let him keep it, not that he knew what it was, but I couldn’t keep it in the sea. Your father would perceive it, and I couldn’t be linked with it at the time. Then you had the other one locked away safely for when I was ready.”
“You shouldn’t have told them,” I choke, clawing at the slippery limbs that hold me. “They were more fearless than you gave them credit for.”
Taysa averts her eyes from me. “I know. I was so proud of them. ” Black eyes fall back to me. “And then you took them.”
The conviction is back, I can feel it right to my bones. And with both of us digging into the hollows of my soul, my heart cracks another fragment.
“Once I have the other cuff,” Taysa imparts. “I’ll have your mother’s godly and paramount power.”
“Going to have to find it first,” I retort.
Another squeeze to my neck while another thick arm wraps around my middle.
“I would’ve let you marry him,” she consents with a frown. “If it would’ve made Dagen happy and stay within our deal of ruling over the land and Vikings, I would’ve allowed it.”
My hands go to the tentacle coiled around my stomach, feeling the meagerness of air making my lungs want to burst.
“I would’ve had to soak up all your power, but regardless, you’d still be alive along with your sisters and have both—” The dagger in my back is already in my hand and slicing into the tentacle gripping my neck.
A sudden intake of air fills my lungs as I slash downward, hitting the second arm wrapped around my body, and I’m immediately dropped to the sand.
Gasping for air, I coerce myself to get to the water. I haven’t touched the sea since I got my voice back, and since the veil and its magic is now faded or gone, I should be able to go in without a problem.
Stumbling to the water, I’m tripped by a body part belonging to Taysa as I notice the waves being sucked back from the shore, seizing my gaze to the midsection of the sea.
A giant whirlpool forms, making a pit that is now hauling the wounded eel within its clutches as it tries to swim out of the strong currents.
Suddenly, bulky tentacles loop around my chest and under my breasts, hoisting me off the beach and into the air again, meeting Taysa’s brows knitted together.
“Which one did you kill first?” she seethes inches from my face, her breath smelling like raw fish. “And how?”
I attempt to push the slick arm off me but to no avail as it tightens itself around my rib cage.
“Use your witchy powers,” I carp. It only alludes more pressure against my bones, forcing air from my body from the pain that I need to breathe.
“Which one?” she snaps. “Those were my children.”
“You obviously didn’t care too—” Another squeeze as I keel over in pain.
“Answer me.”
My eyes catch the dagger I dropped when I was discarded to the ground, remembering the time I ran it down Dagen’s face to see how much he’d flinch behind his massive body and dark hair. How much man made up the facade when only defiance glinted in his eyes. His cocky attitude, the way he tried to taunt me as I watched blood seep from his flesh.
“Enjoying yourself?” he asked me.
At the time I was, yes, his blue eyes barely left me the moment I walked into that room. I felt the heaviness of them, the way they travelled up and down my body without abandon while I ignored it.
Tried to ignore it.
He got so deep underneath my skin that I wasn’t able to pry him out nor would I ever want to now. The only thing I have left is that dagger and the painful, lovely memories that haunt me every second of every day.
“Dagen,” I stifle, pulling my gaze back to her and shoving the next words from my lips. “I drowned him.”
Her eyes gloss over in an opaque shade with fury and an inhuman glow as the tentacle squeezing me compresses more strain around my body.
I can’t focus on anything else but the pain and lack of oxygen, coercing myself to peer back up at the ocean where Tobias and Dagen came to this island from. Watching the waves crash into each other, the eel now nowhere in sight, which makes me peer over my shoulder to find out where the other went to and how my sisters were faring.
I don’t get to turn my head fully around because Taysa and I are propelled toward the sea by a collision of water from behind me. The element fills my nose while a hint of a burning sensation hits my skin the moment my body is fully emerged within it.
Breaking through the crest, I feel my body start to transform into my original being. My feet fuse together into my tail, the scales on my neck that help me breathe starts to develop, opening and closing at the air above the water.
The veil is just about gone, it’s the only explanation of why I’m able to evolve back into what I was born to be.
Feeling the salt seep into my pores, the water immersing around me gives me confidence. I move my hands forward, playing with the water to see if it moves to where I want it to, and it does.
My powers are back, and Taysa is now at another inconvenience.
As Tobias would say, “She’s in a heap of trouble.”
But as
Dagen would say, “She’s fucked.”
A bulky hand clasps over my shoulder, yanking me backward into a hard chest. My heart fleets a few beats, recalling the same feeling. The muscles and the ocean blue eyes as I turn around to find my father towering over me with worry displayed all over his features.
He doesn’t speak, just pulls me into the crook of his arm, gently pressing me into his bare chest as I breathe him in. Tears burn the back of my eyes, everything hitting me all at once again.
In the hold of my father, this would be the worst time for me to have another panic episode of loss and grief. I can only imagine the disappointment he must be feeling for the things I’ve done and kept from him. I would never want to lose his trust and respect—it means the world to me.
But so did the men that I kept and protected from him.
“You alright?” my father prods, still holding me into his frame.
I nod, relieved and thankful that Nesrine was able to find him. Without him I don’t know if my sisters and I would have a chance.
I don’t know why it didn’t hit me that the whirlpool would be his idea. I’ve heard stories of him sucking down fleets of ships that have passed into our realm and not sparing a single person to get home to share the story.
“It’s dead,” I hear Nesrine inform, placing a wet hand onto my back.
“Help your sisters with the other one,” my father orders. She doesn’t answer, just places a cold metal object into my hands and, I assume, leaves.
Gripping the rod, I know it’s the trident she used to take down the other eel, and I brush my thumb up and down the warm metal for more comfort.
“Where is she?” my father prods.
“We were both thrown into the sea,” I convey.
Breaking away, my father stares down at me, his crown exhibiting the capacity of his being. The King of Lacuna, the son of Poseidon. “I’d tell you to stay back, but we both know that’s not happening so be on your guard.”
He moves a few feet away from me, lifting his golden trident and spinning it in the air. The water immediately moves, parting from itself right down to the bottom of the sea as it continues to widen at my father’s command.
Together, we back up, as the water quickly dismantles itself until a moment later he halts.
“Taysa,” he bellows, peering downward through the gap. I come to his side, seeing fish flopping on the wet ocean bottom until my eyes fall on the black figure glaring back at us.
“Triton,” she answers back, tone laced in disgust. “I was wondering if you were going to show.”
“Surrender yourself or die, your only two options.”
A mirthless chuckle cackles upward. “You underestimate me, Your Majesty.”
“I did,” he confirms. “And now you’ll pay the price.”
“And so will you.”
Instantly, my father is dragged underneath the depths of the water, leaving me alone to feel the gratification of Taysa’s smirk.
“Daddy dearest won’t be around much longer to save you, my love,” she taunts. “Get ready for round two.” The water collides back together, hiding her from me and sending a swell of water in my direction.
Raising my hand, I stop it under heavy strain, weak from not being able to exercise my powers of the sea for over the course of many years.
Using everything I can drain from within me, I shift the water underneath me, raising me toward the sky so I can have a better look at everything. Toward the shoreline is my sisters finishing off the other eel, struggling to get back to the water. It’s inches from death as my sisters repeatedly stab the beast with their weapons.
Again on our home turf that was never a safe place to begin with.
Due to a veil that was never meant to protect us in the first place until Taysa was ready to sink her claws into all of us and use her sons against me. Ones she put in my life to care for and protect and vice versa.
Not only did she betray us but them, her own flesh and blood. The ones she made a promise to, as a mother, to always have their best interests at heart because that’s what mothers were supposed to do. Put their children’s needs before their own, give them love to help them grow and support to help them succeed and feel confident in this harsh world.
But she did none of that.
Instead, she sentenced them to death because it was the only way to make her lose some of the power that coursed through her veins that she planned on using against us.
And now they’re dead by my hands.
By her design.
And I have to live with it for the rest of my life.
The blood that splattered on my face that was Tobias’s. Watching his lifeless body fall to the ground as a splintered wail broke through my lips at his death. How he told me he loved me and I was the only thing he didn’t regret.
While I had to feel Dagen’s lips pressed into mine as the air expired from his body while he clutched on to me as long as he could.
No one should ever have to experience what I had to—twice. Never have to see or feel the life leave the body of someone they love by their own demise to help the greater good.
The more I ponder back, the more I can feel the rage start to boil within my veins. The prickling anger that hits the back of my neck and propels down to my spine as I watch the giant creature attempting to slither back into the depths of the sea to hide.
My immediate thought is a wall of fire, blocking its entry into the water, and when my arms jerk ahead of me on their own accord, that’s exactly what happens.
Through the trident in my right hand, a barricade of flames ignite, sending the monster cowering back from the heat. Then movement from my peripheral snaps my attention, and it’s Taysa below me, a green mist floating around her body.
The glimmer of gold hits me next, my father standing feet from her as he thrust his weapon in her direction. She dodges it while the green aura wraps around his trident and attempts to yank it from his grasp. Thankfully, my father holds on to it, using the sea to collide into both sides of her body to make her let go.
Taking another glance to the beach to quickly count the bodies of my sister’s, all six of them are now there—all moving around, appearing uninjured.
The sound of a loud explosion echoes underneath me, snatching my attention downward. My father is nowhere to be found, which sparks worry, but my fury overpowers any other emotion. It actually exceeds all my thoughts of movement because my arm is already cocked back and aimed at Taysa, thrusting the trident into any part of her body.
Before I even know if it hits her, my hands move to boost the witch upward with the sea so I can get a hold of her. She aligns with me in no time, the prongs of my weapon protruding through her gut before I yank it from her flesh. A pained shriek slips from her lips, which only increases the need to finish this.
Hand on her throat, I think back to Edda. The sudden urge and frenzy that overtook my body as I burned her alive, according to my sisters. The smell of burning flesh filling my nostrils as I stayed grounded and somewhat focused.
“You took away what was mine,” I smolder in her face, feeling my palms heat. “You made me make decisions I should’ve never needed to make. Now I’ll have to live with that for the rest of my life but you—” I return the favor of squeezing her throat. “—you’ll get the easy way out. So you’ve won in some sort of way, and you’ll die knowing that.”
“I’m not done with—” I hear the singeing of her flesh as she yelps in pain, fingernails digging into my forearms. I can feel the pain, the slicing of my skin as she slides along it so I’ll let go.
But it’s too late.
I feel too much loss and pain, the enduring way I’ll never be able to touch Tobias and Dagen ever again. How my life was always planned to end and be taken away by a woman who perceived to love us only to murder my mother and strategize to take away my father’s kingdom.
“Not another word,” I warn, looking into her brown eyes, which are no longer black. “I took aw
ay your power, I butchered it from you. You’re not as strong as you used to be without them, are you? You felt your power slip away from you the moment I took each of their lives.”
The familiar froth of tears hits my eyes, but I don’t hold them back. Instead, I welcome them because it means that they still make me powerful.
“I’ll always have them,” I sneer. “They both loved me over you, and you, you foolish hag of a witch, will die knowing that too.” She opens her dry lips to say something, but she doesn’t get to express the weak words that she wants me to hear.
Instead, I shove her away from me, still on top of the water that arranges her vertical with me.
With every ounce of love, hatred, betrayal, and sorrow, I close my eyes and compel every emotion into Taysa. The burst of igniting flames sounds in front of me, followed by an ear-piercing scream.
Opening my eyes, Taysa is on fire, the water not putting any of it out as her whole body starts to char in front of me. The horrific smell of searing flesh smokes from her body and into my lungs, and I demand the process quicker, wanting to be ceased of her hollers and screams.
The moment she stops, is the minute I drop her back into the sea. My body feels drained of every last drop of energy that I possess, but I hold myself upward, raising my chin in silent triumph over killing the woman that murdered my heart and soul in one day.
And now I can bury Tobias and Dagen in the peace that I’ll never have.
I’m pulled into a million hugs from all different directions. Some hard and gripping, others soft with faint sobs that follow, but my father’s is the most fierce of them all. Almost bowing my shoulders as he tightens his hold around my body.
I know that he’s aware of everything that has transpired. The secrets I kept from him of Tobias, the trust I built with Dagen, and the love I felt for the both of them.
As well as the aftermath of what happened to keep us all together.
The sacrifices I made hit me all in different influxes, teeter-tottering myself side to side with what-ifs. But the end result of all of it wouldn’t be something I could find myself wanting to give up, regardless of how it ended.
