I refused to answer and only glared back up at him; the fire burning in my eyes.
“Oh, I’ve missed this,” he said, grazing his finger along my cheek. Somehow I couldn’t help but think he was trying to break my will. He wanted me to speak, to destroy whatever façade I was holding onto. “But you know that, don’t you?”
How could he see into me so easily? He knew I was holding onto every last bit of courage I had left in my body.
He clicked his tongue and stepped back, just enough to give me space to breathe. In the past, when he had backed me up against a wall, I had always been outside. I had been trapped then, but it was nothing compared to the way he made me feel moments ago. There had been nothing, no other sound, smell or sight, but him. He had me entirely at his mercy and knew it.
The fright reigned inside once more and with it came the siren. She raged, spreading through me until she cried out to him again. He fought back, winning with a resistance I had never met before. As my voice grew weaker, he slapped me across the face. My head whipped to the side and I gasped, trying to catch my breath. Again I gathered the song, desperation winning over reason, as I did all I could to pull him under my will. Exhaustion was filling my body and Morven seemed to only grow in strength with each try.
I was crying out to Morven, to Patrick, to anyone who would listen. I was trapped and I knew it. I had known it before I had even begun. There was nothing in this voice to gain power over the merman before me and he watched, as I strained with all I was worth to attempt something I could never do.
Finally, I gave into the exhaustion in my body and let everything fall apart. I was hanging forward, my head fallen between my shoulders and my arms straining against the weight of holding my body. The candle Gell had lit on the table was nearly extinguished; I hoped it would disappear to leave me in darkness.
Morven shifted away to grasp the armrests of the extravagant chair. He turned it, forcing it into place, so it might face me. He strode to the fire place, his boots ringing against the stone floor, and bent forward with practiced movements to light a spark in the stone grate. In a matter of minutes, the flames were flickering with tongues of grasping fire, and as their warmth reached me, my throat constricted.
Straightening back to his full height, he turned toward me. His eyes were ice; sharp blades cutting into my flesh.
“Now that you’re finished, shall we begin?”
23. Condemned
I had never known true fear until he spoke those words. I felt them inside me, curling and spreading with an unrestrained devouring of my composure. It unfurled, flooding my veins, making my body go rigid against the wall. My throat constricted as I tried to force air in and out of my lungs and my chest heaved while my legs shook beneath me.
There was nothing in this world except the space between us. He was going to do what needed to be done. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I remembered playing a similar role when Verna was my victim. The world had narrowed down to individual breaths and twitches, until everything around us disappeared. He was here for me and I was all he needed.
Remaining near the fire, he separated his feet and I swallowed heavily, waiting for the first onslaught to come.
How did you survive this? The thought kept coursing through my mind as my body locked in terror. A small twitch of Morven’s lips gave away his pleasure.
Lifting my chin, I did the only thing I could think to do. My voice was worn from my earlier attempts, but it wouldn’t stop me from speaking.
“What’s taking so long?” I taunted. “Not sure how to begin?” His mouth twitched again in response, but this time his jaw locked, if only for a moment. There was more than one way to annoy him. “I should be an easy target after Patrick; he’s much stronger than I am. Although, it did take you almost a year to capture me again. Why did it take so long?” I cocked my head to the side and ran my tongue across my bottom lip. “Is that why Bolrock turned on you? Did he think you had grown weak? After so many of your plans were ruined by Zale, I can see why he turned against you.”
Surprisingly, I sounded nonchalant; the longer I spoke, the more my confidence stirred and began to build. The words pouring from my mouth were nowhere near as smooth as usual, the earlier trials to break into his mind had left my vocal chords scratched, but it didn’t mean I was unable to use my voice. Once upon a time, I had made him lose focus for a fraction of a moment when I pleaded with him.
“Is that why we’re alone?” I beckoned to him and was pleased to see his head tip forward, if only slightly. My voice was getting to him. No sooner had the thought entered my mind then his eyes snapped up again, the dark gray pupils churning with unsuppressed resentment. “Are you afraid you might fail?” I whispered, and the words hung between us. “Wouldn’t your mother be disappointed?”
By the mere mention of Nerissa, he finally reacted. His eyes kindled with fire, the dark depths turning to storming clouds. I knew I had gone too far, and his reaction wasn’t something I wanted. As his lips spread into a smile and he braced his shoulders, dread gripped my gut. His silence was unnerving. I lifted my chin in defiance.
“Your mother tried to turn Patrick into her warrior, and failed. Like mother, like son?” I smiled even though the pulse in my neck was pounding. “He remembers. Everything.”
The side of his mouth twitched again and he clicked his tongue. “It was only a matter of time,” he rumbled and shrugged his shoulders, as though it was of little concern. He took a few steps in front of me, pursing his lips before turning back. “Did you think it would bother me that he remembers you?”
My mouth opened and I tried to say something. Nothing came to mind and I was left with my jaw hanging open. How had he turned the tables so quickly? All the ground I had gained was pulled out from me in an instant.
Retreating to the chair, he sat, his eyes grazing over my face for a few minutes before he spoke again. I worked to tighten my features and feign courage.
“I knew I would find him someday,” he leaned back, one arm resting on the wood, the other in his lap. “After years of searching, others gave up, but I never did. I knew the Lathmorians were still holding him. I just didn’t know where.” He shrugged. “And then I finally found you. Do you remember?”
Swallowing, I tried not to think back to when I had first heard the murmur over the water—the cool crisp whisper of a creature hidden in the depths below. Even now, thinking of it made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.
“Your voice was perfect. It reached down through the water to where I was, and when I broke through the waves, I wondered if you would be able to hear me too. And you did.” He chuckled. “You shouldn’t have been able to hear me that night, and somehow you did.”
Shaking my head slightly, I tried not to hear the waves, slapping with gentle pats against the Lady Marie, as I sang beneath the stars. The musical murmur had joined my voice, catching my curiosity enough that I saw Morven’s tail for the first time, even though I hadn’t known what it was.
“I had you watched after I let you return home.”
“After you already claimed me as your own,” I spit the words at him.
“Naturally,” he waved his hand in the air as though it could dispel the memory. “But when I visited you for myself, I presumed you were too frightened to do anything worth a risk. I couldn’t have been more wrong. You played me for a fool.” He gave a harsh laugh again, making my insides turn to ice. “When you left your home and disappeared, I had no means of finding you. I never could’ve guessed I would see you when we raided the princess’s wedding.”
Gritting my teeth, I pushed back the lump in my throat. I wouldn’t think of Nixie or Daggin, not now.
“No one was more surprised than me, to see you step into the clearing with Verna.” He rubbed his hands together. “I couldn’t have been more thrilled, I never imagined finding both of you in the same place.”
“But you made sure to separate us,” I bit the words.
“Of cou
rse,” he shrugged. “His love for you was my biggest weapon; although, it did make the whole process much longer than I had predicted.”
“Process? Beating him within an inch of his life was a process?”
“What else should I call it,” his eyes were like shards of metal digging into my own. “Patrick was never going to give in to my methods, so I had to force his hand.”
“By faking my death.”
“Yes,” he nodded, and the gleam in his eyes was back, even as bile built in my throat. “He let go after that. For him to forget you so quickly, well, it must have been painful.” He cocked his head in my direction and when I locked my jaw shut, his lips twitched again.
“It doesn’t matter now.” I glared back at him.
“Doesn’t it?” He stood up once more and paced in front of me. “He might remember, but that’s only because I’ve allowed him to.”
“That’s not possible,” I rebutted.
“Oh, but it is.” He paused, giving me a look which begged me to challenge him. I kept my mouth shut. “He was powerful as Zale, exactly what my mother had predicted. But when he began to break my control, I struggled with whether or not to correct him. I knew he was searching for you. Meeting you had reminded him of something in his past. I wanted to see what would happen if he found you.”
“Meaning you wanted him to kill me?”
“Quite the opposite,” he turned to me. “I wanted to know what you would do.”
My palms began to sweat as his gaze lingered on me longer than necessary. When he returned to pacing the breadth between the table and the fireplace, I shifted, the chains jingling with a remote twinkle above my head.
“And you didn’t disappoint.” He clicked his tongue and turned to stare into the fire. “Somehow you were able to bring him under your control. For a time, I was jealous of the hold you had over him, but then you were foolish enough to make him angry.” His words brought back the threat Zale had given me before the Hyven massacred Lathmor. I still didn’t know how I had worked up enough courage to defy him.
“By now, I’m sure you’ve realized the anger is what controls him.” It was a statement, not a question, but I answered regardless.
“Not anymore,” I retorted stubbornly. The words came out of my scratched throat in a rasp.
“Really?” He lifted one eyebrow. “Then the soldier fighting out there was simply Patrick?” He pointed in what must be the direction of the shores.
He had me there. Even in the midst of the battle, I had been able to see the weight of the fury building inside him. With each passing moment, he had become more like the warrior he used to be. My mind scrambled for something else, some foothold to regain what ground I had lost.
“Why didn’t you come for me?” I asked, turning the questions on him. I had always wondered why he had let me roam free for the last year. “You always found me, and still you let me stay where I was.”
“It’s simple, really. I needed you to come to me on your own.” His words sent a chill up my spine even as I couldn’t believe their truth.
“Then why now? You took me from the battle,” I pointed out.
“Did I?” His brow furrowed, as though puzzling a difficult question. “You didn’t have to follow Ressa.”
I bit my tongue to keep from retorting even though I knew he was right. A part of me knew I was supposed to stay next to Patrick; I hadn’t intentionally moved away from him, it all just happened so quickly.
“No,” he turned back to me. “I needed you to give yourself to me. If I had wanted to bring you back to Hyvar I could’ve done it months ago. All I needed was to fetch you from your home, or use your family as ransom. You would’ve come willingly then.”
He was right. If he had even dared to hurt anyone in my family I would’ve handed myself over to him freely, without complaint. Ever since the night he had saved me from the storm, this had been my burden to bear. I had saved my brothers and father once; I would do it again without question.
“Then why didn’t you force Zale to bring me back?” There was no denying Zale had had plenty of opportunity to take me to Hyvar with him. In his warrior state, he had believed Morven was just and true. Why then wasn’t he allowed to take me to Hyvar?
Clicking his tongue once more, he admonished me. “You aren’t listening, I needed it to be your choice to come to me. I knew I only had to be patient enough to wait for the right opportunity. It’s not a matter of force, but a matter of wills. I wanted yours to align with mine.”
My head spun, trying to figure out how he could ever think I would agree with his motives. There was no denying I had made the decision to go after Ressa during the battle, but that in no way made me ready to hand myself over to him. He was mistaking an accident for a change in judgement.
“No,” his gaze drifted, guessing my thoughts. The fire cast flickering shadows across his face, “I wanted to see if you would give in to Zale’s will and follow him here.” He heaved a sigh as though he was a spoiled child. “But you impressed me with your ability to turn him against me.”
“Should I say thank you,” I spit the words, and he chuckled enjoying himself.
“If you want. You see, you believe you did this amazing thing in making him remember, when in reality I knew all along he would recall his past. I was simply waiting to see which side he would take, when his mind returned. And I guessed right, I thought he would choose you.
“It’s all a game, really. I saw him pulling away from me and knew there was only one way I could get him back. And that was through you.” My breath caught in my throat and he licked his bottom lip. “Through you, I will control both.”
His last words were spoken under his breath, and I wondered if I was even supposed to hear them. My thoughts whirled from what he was telling me, and yet, everything seemed to fall into place. Hadn’t Zale said the very same thing? He had been aware of his master’s desire for dominance over those around him. Power was nothing to him because it was given by those beneath. But dominance was a stolen treasure, lorded over those too weak to fight back or threatened in a corner to the point of no return.
So suddenly, I realized all of it with a startling clarity. He no longer needed Patrick beneath his control because he had me in his clutches. I was the key to dominating both the siren and the warrior.
Only if you let him break you. The thought passed like a beacon through my mind, and I knew I was fighting for more than my own freedom. Even as the siren raged inside me, I pushed her back, keeping my mind clear for what was to come.
“If you wanted me alive, why did you let Bolrock attack me?” I asked, stalling for time. Was there any way I could scream and someone would hear?
“Ah,” he cocked his head to the side and folded his arms across his chest; the motion similar to the way Zale had stood in my kitchen back home. “I consider myself adept at reading merfolk,” he glanced my way, “but Bolrock’s betrayal took me by surprise. We were both lucky you weren’t lost during that little encounter.”
I scoffed. He made it all sound so trivial.
“It would have been a shame if he had succeeded.” His chest rose and fell with a heavy breath. “However, it made me realize the strength you had. Not just anyone could have made Zale turn so fully against his own.”
“He was acting off of lies you told him,” I said, remembering Zale’s claim of Bolrock as the one who had beaten him senseless. It was, in part, true, but only by Morven’s command.
“I won’t deny it,” the Hyven leader shrugged.
My nerves were stretched nearly to the point of breaking. I couldn’t fully comprehend what he was telling me. The past year seemed different now, as though I wasn’t making my own decisions but simply playing out a role he had specifically designed for me.
“You couldn’t have predicted all of this,” I said, shaking my head in disbelief. Maybe it was my turn to speak out loud to myself. “It’s not possible. There’s no way you could’ve guessed he would fall for me again,
and remember his old self. No, you couldn’t,” I continued to shake my head, my words running together. “If you knew he would go to my house and begin to pull away from your control, then you would’ve stopped him. If you had wanted him to leave, then you wouldn’t have come to me, asking where he was.”
I shot the words at him as though they were weapons. I desperately needed to believe they were true.
“I only wanted you to believe I needed him back.” He smiled again, and once more I shook my head.
My memory of his last visit along the beach of Coveside was not one I cared to remember. He had threatened me that evening, but it was also the moment I knew Zale was free of his control. Seeing the memory from Morven’s point of view, placed it into a whole new light.
“No, you wanted to know where he was, and you had no idea where he’d gone.”
“It’s true, I didn’t know where he was. But I wanted you to know he was fully yours, and it worked. I’m guessing the next time you saw him, you welcomed him with open arms?” When the heat rose in my cheeks, he chuckled.
“But you told him to kill me.”
“To drive him away,” he shrugged. “I don’t think you really understand what I’m saying.”
“I understand perfectly.” I lashed out, lacing my words with as much venom as I could manage. “You’ve designed this whole thing to turn me into your siren so you can control me, and then control Patrick again. You’re telling me all of this was your plan? My waiting at home, returning to Hyvar, fighting Bolrock, learning to use my voice, Patrick remembering his past, all of it, you predicted? I’m sorry, but I just don’t believe it.”
“You don’t have to,” he said, and I hated the way my body pressed further into the wall as he came closer. He stopped just before me, and I fought the urge to kick him. When he leaned in, I could smell the tangy sweetness upon his breath. “I didn’t predict everything, I simply understood one important fact. Patrick loved you more than life and would do anything for you. His love for you became my weapon. I didn’t predict everything, but it doesn’t matter does it? Because you’re here, and there’s no one to save you.” He ran a finger along my jaw and my stomach dropped.
Torrents (DROPLETS Trilogy Book 3) Page 33
