by Starla Night
The.
Heck.
Healer Hobin rolled up his tools and swished to the exit, passing the slow-moving Elder Bawa and disappearing into the sea.
Harmony felt pissed.
“What is with you mermen and your ‘misunderstandings’?” She glared at the remaining four. “Are we speaking the same language? Or are you a bunch of truth-twisters who don’t own up to your lies?”
Tibe’s voice snapped with cold. “King Kayo. It is time to put away your confused bride.”
King Kayo nodded at the elder. “Elder Wida. See my bride back to my castle.”
Elder Wida collected the seaweed rope harness.
“No,” Harmony said. It came more easily.
King Kayo blinked. “Harmony?”
“I’m not going back to the castle.” Harmony sat cross-legged next to Faier, bouncing on the hard rock. “I’m staying right here.”
“You must leave.”
“I refuse.”
King Kayo descended to the rock and knelt to her level. His vibrations dropped to intimate concern. “I will not endanger your rebel. My vow is unbroken.”
“I’m still staying here,” she told him.
Faier’s eyes flicked between them. His aura darkened.
“There are no comforts,” King Kayo protested.
“Sure there are. I’ve got my ‘house guardian’ over there.” Her stomach growled, and she pointed to the three boxes she had forced Warrior Zaka to tie to the harness. “And I’ve got my food.”
“A sacred bride cannot dwell in prison.” King Kayo’s aura fluttered with hurt. “You reject my castle?”
“I would rather be with Faier in prison than in a thousand castles alone.”
“You will never be alone.”
“That doesn’t exactly help. You got mad at Warrior Zaka and he was only ever nice to me. Prison feels safer.”
“Safer than my castle?!”
Elder Wida vibrated with a low, throat-clearing rumble. “I believe I might know the root of your sacred bride’s fear, my king. Just after you left the wedding feast, Warlord Sao attempted to take her.”
“Warlord Sao?” King Kayo reared back. “Take her where?”
“He would not answer. Moving her was not your orders?”
King Kayo whipped to Tibe with accusation in his expression. “You ordered your top warlord?”
His first lieutenant returned his gaze coolly. “To do what?”
King Kayo looked beyond him to the back of the still-lingering elder. “Elder Bawa!”
The elder jolted. “I am leaving, my king!” He flew out.
King Kayo grimaced. “I will ask Warlord Sao myself.”
“Sao has already left the city. He clears the hunting route of exiles.” Tibe turned to Elder Wida. “Remove his sacred bride.”
Elder Wida looked straight back at Tibe. “First Lieutenant, I did not hear the king issue that order.”
“He needs to.” Tibe glanced at King Kayo. “The hunt begins. Now.”
King Kayo looked down at Harmony.
She crossed her arms tighter.
He sagged, exhausted, and scrubbed his face. Then he motioned for the warrior and elder to leave. “She will stay.”
“With the rebel?” Tibe’s normal certainty fell to shock. “But, my king—”
“Our city is well patrolled. She will be safe enough here.”
“She insults you. She disgraces your castle.”
“Tibe. Please.”
“You cannot allow this insubordination to—”
“My bride needs time.”
“She will have all the time she needs inside your castle.” Tibe hovered over her and barked, “Your king gave you an order. Do not disrespect the king’s orders!”
She glared right back. “I am not his warrior to order and obey.”
Tibe’s eyes widened. “You dare—”
“And decisions about me are his to make. Not yours.”
Shock and then wrath darkened Tibe’s aura to deadly.
He was the true danger. Like Jean-Baptiste, he twisted reality to suit his desires and forced King Kayo to come along. Now, she stood in his way.
Harmony hunched closer to Faier.
Her little octopus flew in front of her, tentacles balled into warning fists.
Tibe’s lips peeled back from his teeth. “You dirty, surface-dwelling—”
“Tibe,” the king growled. He lifted his trident in warning. “Do not threaten my sacred bride.”
Tibe pulled himself back from the abyss. Barely. “My king, when you chose me as your first lieutenant, I vowed to let no one disrespect you. Not even your sacred bride.”
“I do not feel disrespected.”
He blinked. “But…she…”
“Go.”
“She is flouting your orders.”
“And you are frightening her. Can you not see that much?”
“One who disobeys me should be frightened.”
“First Lieutenant—”
“Because you order it, my king, I obey.” Tibe wheeled away. “Xarin will lead the first phalanx of the hunt.”
“Leave Xarin at the prison. He has shown adeptness as a guard.”
“My king, I do not think the prisoner deserves such a talented hunter.”
“Tibe, I order you to take another warrior. Do you hear me?”
Tibe flew out the exit without answering.
King Kayo looked up at the remaining elder. “Elder Wida? You were leaving?”
“Yes, my king.” He reluctantly flew out.
Then, it was just her, King Kayo, and a bound-silent, still-injured Faier.
As though knowing it was finally safe to do so, Faier closed his eyes. His head tipped and his lips parted. If air moved in and out of his lungs, she was sure he’d be snoring.
King Kayo descended again to Harmony’s level. The hot-pink accents in his eyes glowed with promise. “I will discover Warlord Sao’s motives. You will be safe in my city.”
“Thank you.”
“I will assign you more guards. Trustworthy guards. Even, if you demand it, Warrior Zaka.”
“Okay.”
“We patrol our borders, but there is still a risk. Will you not return to the castle? It has thick walls. The heart chamber is reinforced.”
“I’m not afraid of walls. I am afraid of the warriors who lie and undermine you.”
His jaw clenched. “Xarin is—”
“I mean Tibe. And Elder Bawa.”
The anger drained out of him. For the second time, he looked exhausted. Beyond wrecked with tiredness. His shoulders sagged, and the deep furrows in his face made him a much older, world-weary male.
“Elder Bawa has always treated me like a child.”
King Kayo rubbed his forehead. Red vessels swelled in his bloodshot eyes.
“But he is our representative to the All-Council. He has the most knowledge of their laws and ways. In my father’s time, he devised a petition to reconnect with our sacred brides. And we are so close now. Your rebel is correct that our city is failing and we are only a few generations from dissolution. I will not distract Elder Bawa from the work that holds so much importance.”
She respected King Kayo’s mature attitude. He had put more thought into the dynamic than she had realized.
“And Tibe?”
“Tibe is Tibe.” King Kayo rose. His human feet extended into long fins. His gaze fixed beyond her on sleeping Faier. “Rest well, rebel. I leave my sacred bride in your care.”
King Kayo kicked for the exit.
“His care?” Harmony rose onto her knees. “Then won’t you at least untie him?”
He disappeared out the exit.
Oh, jeez.
She struggled with the bonds but they were tied in such a way that she couldn’t even wedge a finger under them. She tried until her fingers bruised and then she didn’t know what to do.
“I won’t leave you,” she promised sleeping Faier. “I couldn’t save Evens or Monsieur Jo
seph or even Lifet. But I will save you. We’re going to figure this out together.”
It might have been her imagination but she thought his chest rose and fell a little easier.
This day had been a million years long. Harmony laid her head in Faier’s lap. He didn’t wake up.
She had to think. How could she get Faier out of here alive? Tibe would murder them as soon as King Kayo turned his back. Elder Bawa was just as bad. A bunch of other warriors were under their control rather than King Kayo’s. And King Kayo was in denial. Especially about Tibe.
His hunt wouldn’t last forever.
She had to think. Plot. Strategize.
For just one second, while she was wracking her addled brain, she closed her eyes…
Chapter Nineteen
Something gnawed on Faier’s wrist.
Sharp pricks—pinch—and real pain, as if a small animal was chewing off his skin, and snarling.
Danger.
“Ngh!” He came awake with a shudder. His side twinged. But there was no stabbing pain.
He searched for the source of his unease.
Harmony’s head rested on his bent knees. She lay on her side, the gentle swell of her hips and breasts undulating against the harsh prison floor.
Relief mixed with impending doom like two colors of oil on water.
Pinch.
He grunted. It felt like his tendons were separating. He strained against his bindings.
Shhhip. His wrists separated. The seaweed cables frayed apart.
He flexed his strained shoulders, brought his hands around to the front, and twisted them. Pain and heat radiated up his forearms. Pins needled his fingertips.
He strained to look over his shoulder without disturbing Harmony.
A small green tentacle waved in the corner of his eye. The unmistakable gurgling of an atonal, but otherwise pleased, house guardian scratched his eardrums.
Pinch. Pinch. The binding at his ankles loosened.
All bindings loosened. He expanded his lungs, flushing in fresh water. His mind cleared.
Neat bites on his wrist reddened where the house guardian had pinched him. Beneath, the wounds of his last battle with Tibe had closed. Swollen and dark, they were not as painful.
Strange.
He leaned forward to lift the bindings to a better angle for the house guardian and to reduce her bites.
“Freeze, rebel.” Warrior Luin—that was the name—startled as if he’d been snoozing on guard duty. He thrust a trident in Faier’s face. “I do not know how you got free, but release the king’s sacred bride and remain still, or I will—I will end you!”
Red lines, thin with inexperience, inked his skin.
“Shhh.” Faier lifted his palms in surrender and gestured at prone Harmony. “She is sleeping.”
“Yes.” His throat apple bobbed. “I could not make her move. But you can! No warrior may touch another’s sacred bride. But you will die for your crimes!”
“Please lower your voice,” he murmured.
To no avail.
Harmony stirred, rising and yawning. She saw the trident and froze. Her soul light darkened. “What do you want?”
Warrior Luin didn’t answer. He looked at Faier.
“He wants you to move away from me,” Faier said wryly.
“Why doesn’t he just say so?”
“Because they forbid speaking to another warrior’s sacred bride in a traditional city. It is a safeguard to prevent another warrior’s soul from resonating with a sacred bride and changing her allegiance.”
“That’s not happening.” She dismissed Warrior Luin with amusement. “No way is he stealing my ‘allegiance’ from the king.”
Faier’s heart squeezed.
Her soul had resonated with the king’s. They were very similar. He listened to her. In this short time, their souls flared the same color.
And she had earned the approval of a house guardian. This city called her soul. This Life Tree.
King Kayo.
Not Faier.
“Oh, yes! You’re awake. I’m so glad you’re okay!” She flew into Faier and wrapped him in a thrilling hug.
He grabbed her arms as he fell back, over his still-tied ankles, and bumped his head on the ground as he rotated with her. Her softness filled his arms and her joy filled his soul with rightness. “Thank you, Harmony.”
Warrior Luin protested. “You must not touch. He is not your husband.”
“Huh? Oh.” She kicked her feet and finished the somersault so he rested on the floor again. So close, they could almost kiss.
Then, she glanced at the other warrior and floated back. “I was so worried. I begged them not to hurt you, but they wouldn’t listen.”
“I know.”
“Only Xarin even heard me. Oh, no. You’re hurt again.” She touched the scar running across Faier’s face from his temple to his nose.
The red-limned Warrior Luin protested again. “You must not touch.”
“We touch on the surface.”
“A sacred bride must not. You disrespect King Kayo.”
“And you disrespect her,” Faier reminded him. “No talking.”
He reddened like his tattoos. “Silence, rebel prisoner!”
“Okay, okay. Calm down, Warrior Luin. It’s true that I don’t like to break rules.”
“Then you should return to the king’s castle,” a lime-green warrior who floated in from the entrance called.
She turned. “Is that a rule or tradition?”
“Tradition is a rule, Sacred Bride Harmony.”
“Hush, Warrior Poro. Do not speak to her. She is a sacred bride.”
“I know she is, Warrior Luin. I can see with my own eyes.”
“Then do not speak. S’ai ala oo, Poro.”
“Ti kanis, Luin.”
Both warriors bickered in their own language. Their inexperience swayed and confused them. Perhaps the only warrior with less experience was their absent King.
The city was in desperate straits.
“I appreciate the truth,” she whispered.
“I will always tell you the truth, Harmony.”
“Yeah, I know. You’ve told me plenty of things I’d rather have not been true.” She looked at the other warriors. “Here, I don’t know who to trust.”
Warrior Luin swallowed.
“You can trust King Kayo,” the lime-green Warrior Poro assured her. “You are his treasured sacred bride. He will treat you honorably.”
“You like the king,” she noted. “He seems young.”
“The youngest warrior,” Warrior Poro agreed, talkative. “His father should have lived longer and trained him thoroughly.”
“I’m sorry. What about Tibe? What’s his story?”
“He—”
“You must ask King Kayo.” Warrior Luin nudged Warrior Poro. “We must not speak to his sacred bride.”
“I’ll ask, but I wish you would speak to me. Otherwise, it will be a long, lonely year.”
Warrior Poro sought her gaze. “Sac—”
“Tut.” Warrior Luin blocked his view and clinked his trident against Poro’s.
They lapsed into silence.
Ocean sounds filled the chamber. The house guardian’s yowls mixed with pleasant fish songs on the other side of the prison walls.
Harmony’s soul light wavered.
“You are right,” Faier said, drawing her attention back to him. “Insist on speaking as you wish. Flex your will.”
She suppressed a smile. Her soul glowed with amusement she concealed from her face. “You always say crazy things.”
“Crazy things?”
“As if I could control my destiny when I am as much a prisoner as you.”
Both warriors gaped. Did she consider herself a prisoner? She shocked them.
“You are no prisoner.” Faier voiced their confusion. “The king asked you to return to his castle. Yet here you are. You controlled your destiny.”
“Well…but…you’re
still tied up.”
“The reason I still live is you. Believe.”
“I wanted to save you.” Her soul light brightened to blinding, and her eyes reddened with feeling. She swallowed. “Okay. Um, can we untie your ankles?”
Warrior Luin snapped out of his stupor. “No one can untie you. First Lieutenant Tibe’s orders.”
“Maybe you should ask the doctor.”
“First Lieutenant Tibe’s orders overrule everyone.”
“King Kayo’s orders are for Faier to heal. He’ll heal better if he can rest. So untie him.”
Again, the warriors looked at each other.
“King Kayo will listen to reason,” she said. “I mean, look at me. Here I am.”
Warrior Poro muttered something in his language. Warrior Luin’s eyebrows shot for the ceiling with surprise. They chatted again in their language.
Harmony broke in. “Yes, the king told Tibe to leave instead of forcing me. Why is that so surprising?”
They both jolted and stared at her in shock.
“You learned their language?” Faier’s heart sank deeper. “Already?”
“Oh. That was in their language?” She thought about it. “I wouldn’t say I know the words. But I kind of got a feeling of the meaning. Somehow.”
Knowing their language would be useful to escape their captors.
Except it meant she resonated more and more with the Aiycaya Life Tree and its king.
She rose and bounced to Warrior Poro. “Well, have you at least given him food?”
“We must not, Sacred Bride Harmony.” Warrior Poro ignored Warrior Luin’s “silence” gesture. “Tibe ordered—”
“He’s supposed to heal.”
Again, the warriors seemed nonplussed.
Her small house guardian flew around her and tangled her tentacles playfully in Harmony’s hair.
She knelt to untie him.
“You must not!” both warriors protested.
“First Lieutenant Tibe ordered…” Warrior Luin repeated weakly.
“I’m sure he only ordered you not to do it.” Her fingers whisked against his ankles like fluttery kisses. “No way did he say a sacred bride couldn’t untie Faier.”
“He did not specify…”
“So, that’s fine, then.” She hummed.
The warriors argued in their language, eying her furtively.
He enjoyed her light touch on his bonds.
At least he could have that much.
