“You hate Callie. You don’t even know her,” I remind her, spiteful in my intent but she, regardless, disarms me as she crosses her arms and narrows her eyes.
“True, but hate is a strong word and I don’t have to like her to respect her.” She doesn’t deny anything and it leaves me off balance. She continues, “You know it’s funny. I don’t like Callie, but right now I can see that she is prepared to do what you are not. She is prepared to put the needs of this city before her own. That’s why I voted for you as Crowned Ruler. We need someone like her now more than ever.” Starlet makes this spiel and my stomach falls in horror.
“You voted for me?” I ask her rising from the chair.
“Yes.” She bats her eyelids.
“You knew I didn’t want this job.”
“Yes, but suggesting Callie as crowned ruler wasn’t going to fly. No-one around here is going to vote for a maiden.” She locks eyes with me.
“That doesn’t make you trapping me in this stupid regal façade okay, Starlet. You know I didn’t want this job!” I whine at her. I may sound like a small child but I’m so enraged I lack the ability to care.
“You need to calm down. Whether or not you wanted the job, it’s yours now. There’s nothing you can do.” Starlet looks at me and sighs, turning towards the door. “I’ll see you later,” she says wistfully, leaving in a flurry of sickly sweet pink sparkle. I run my fingers through my tousles trying to calm my nerves and move back over to the bar where I was hanging before. I start to take out my frustrations on my body, sculpting each muscle to the point where I am unbeatable. To the place where, finally, nothing and nobody but me can touch my maiden.
CALLIE
As I descend through the Alcazar Oceania I see the bloody red mane of Saturnus beneath me. I let myself fall through the central column of the shard like building until I am before him. He has a lovely fist shaped bruise on the side of his face. I cringe.
“That looks painful,” I say reaching up to touch, trying to take on the caring maternal role everyone expects of me. He brushes my hand sideways like it’s dangerous with a curious look in the grassy pastures that lay in green behind the surface of his eyes.
“I’m sure I’ll be fine,” he mutters, looking angrier that I’ve mentioned it.
“Did Orion find you? I told him to apologise.” Saturnus shakes his head in response and I curse internally.
Dammit Orion, do I have to take responsibility for everything around here!
“I’m sorry. I know he is too. He’s just busy I guess.” I make the excuse but I hear how unconvinced I sound.
“I don’t need you to apologise. You didn’t do anything wrong and you are a woman. You do not speak for Orion.” I watch his expression and I can see that he’s deadly serious. Since when did being a woman become such a damn ball and chain around here? He didn’t mind me being a woman when he asked me to die to save his sorry ass. I become irritated and he just looks bored.
“Don’t you have somewhere to be?” he asks me and I am instantly transported back to a duck egg blue kitchen. My step-father asking me the very same question, a similar feeling of absurd offence taking over me. I swallow hard and feel my mind clear with a certain and sudden tranquillity.
“Yes. I’ll be going to meet the mermaids for the pre-coronation preparations now,” I say to him and he nods. I’m glad he won’t be there tonight. I’m glad he has to stay in this stupid palace. Rat bastard. I cuss at his back as he moves away from me with a slight, and now I’m sure entirely fake, smile. I descend further through the palace and see Azure skulking in the hall again.
“There are mermaids outside looking for you,” she says wistfully. Her eyes are diluted again and I brush past her, not wanting to deal with any more insanity.
“Thanks, I’ll see you later,” I mutter and she skulks away with a distracted nod. I knock on the jade crystal of the doors lightly and they swing open. I’m greeted by something like a scene out of a Greek Musical, plus of course the tailfins, as the doors swing open and mermaids move forward in a flurry of dreamy pastels.
I move outward, sighing internally.
Great… more people.
I’m not an introvert by any standard but I feel momentarily claustrophobic by the amount of sparkling gemstone eyes staring at me.
“Hey guys,” I mumble and they all come forward at once. A babbling, rambling, overly-excitable mess of mermaids headed right for me like a gossip seeking missile. It’s hardly surprising they’re so excited, the coronation is the kind of event that’s only ever happened once before, and they didn’t even have curling irons back then. I can’t understand what they’re saying so I put up a hand and they silence instantly. Putty in my hands.
“Whoa! One at a time!” I exclaim and a girl named Alannah starts back up with her babble. She has ink black hair and pale green eyes. Her tail is mint green with splashes of coral and baby pink on the tips of her fins.
“Orion left you a gift.” She is moving up and down in tiny hop like movements. I remember her from before but I don’t ever think I’ve really talked to her in depth. I think she kept asking me about Orion’s courting skills.
The mermaids move back, there’s around thirty of them in total and they disperse haphazardly around me, rounding on me, so they’re at my back in force pushing me forward. Standing, puffing, and padding from hoof to hoof at the end of the palace garden’s path stands Philippe. I sigh inwardly at the magnificence of the Equinox, standing with leathery-scaled wings and eye scale blinkers in royal blue. I knew this was Orion’s way of keeping me safe, being here when he could not physically be. I smile to myself, giddy.
“Philippe,” I whisper the animals name like a magic spell and I hear a stir from behind me.
“Is that really an Equinox?” I hear the beguiled voice. It belongs to a stunned young mermaid called Skye. Her hair is a chestnut brown waterfall of thickness and her facial scales match her tail in a pale lemon.
“Yes. Haven’t you guys ever seen Philippe before?” I ask them feeling confused. They’ve been alive so much longer than I have. How is it none of them have ever seen Orion’s steed.
“No! Oh! Isn’t he darling? My other half, Jeremiah, he told me but I never believed him.” Skye cannot keep her gaze on me any longer as she becomes overtaken by tears. “He’s just so beautiful!” She sobs. Oh for the love of the Goddess. I snap internally. Why is she crying? It’s just a kickass, magical, aquatically immortal pony! Something inside me realises how I’m severely underwhelmed after the last few months and so I lead the flock of mermaids behind me, trying to be patient and kind, to live up to what they expect.
“You guys can pet him if you’d like. Just don’t get behind him and stay where he can see you,” I warn them and they dart past me in a cloud of calm, graceful tailfins, and long lustrous hair. They make movement look effortless, even more so than the faster mer I’ve been around. They move with a kind of ethereal invisibility, whereby nothing can displace the things that make them beautiful; their hair is never out of place and their garments never skewed, I wonder how they do it. I hear them squeal as Philippe snorts and shakes his head.
“You’re going to make a fine Queen,” I hear the whisper in my left ear and I swivel, turning my back on Philippe and his admirers.
“Marina!” I squeal, throwing my arms around her.
“Hey,” she breathes with a sweet smile.
“How are you and Christian?” I ask her and she nods.
“Very well, thank you. He’s wrapped in research as usual. Trying to find a scientific explanation as to how our magic works. Silly man.” She shakes her head and looks me in the eyes. “You’re a bundle of emotion aren’t you?” She exclaims with enthusiasm.
“You have no idea,” I reply putting my hand on my hip.
“Actually, I do. I’m vibrating right now at how much is going on with you emotionally, darling.” She reminds me of her empathic perceptions and I shake my head.
“I’m sorry…” I
begin to apologise but she cuts me off in her usual Italian way.
“Don’t you apologise for one single bit of what you’re feeling, Callie. You have a lot going on.”
“Ain’t that the truth,” I admit and she laughs slightly at the expression, her red scales shining.
“Don’t you worry, darling,” she whispers to me. Placing her hands on my shoulders she turns me back toward the Equinox, “My Claude will unravel you in a single moment. I promise.”
Marina’s Claude, as it turns out, is an extremely blonde, Swedish masseuse who works in the spa, housed in the right wing of the Lunar Sanctum. I lay out on his table under a towel, after my underwater horseback ride to the sanctum, surrounded by excited, gossiping mermaids. Marina feeling my need to be alone, had swept me away to the spa and to Claude the second my feet had hit dry land, telling my gaggle of groupies that we would meet them in the salon in a few hours. I am splayed out naked, but for the first time totally at ease under the hands of a man. I think back to the sex from last night and then banish it away, not wanting to relive the desperation of it all. It wasn’t that the sex was bad. No that wasn’t it at all. I suppose it was just the fact that Orion was using it to replace the talking in our relationship. As evidenced this afternoon when he was more than willing to resort to violence in the face of having sex become an inviable option. I want to worry about him, but I feel those worries fall away as Claude starts to work on my shoulders.
“Oh my God, how did I not know we had a spa…” I moan as Marina sits back in a white love seat, watching me. The spa is coated in beautiful aqua and white décor. The colours of purity and wellbeing alone make me feel slightly better. I look up at her from the hole where my face has been laid the last few minutes.
“You’ve been getting your massages from the Spa of Orion I would imagine.” She winks at me but I pout back. “What no massages?” She asks me and I shake my head.
“Not lately.”
“Trouble in paradise?” The sentiment is one I’ve heard used in a bitchy tone before, but I can sense she’s genuinely concerned.
“He’s just messed up. His Dad died and then I died all in one night. I figure he’s allowed to be messed up. If sexing me to death is how he chooses to deal then who am I to tell him he’s wrong,” I admit.
“Oh darling, no. That’s not good for anyone.” She shakes her head and I put my face back into the massage table.
“I know, but what can I do? He won’t talk to me. I try to talk and he just starts… you know.” I am speaking to the immaculate white floor and actively ignoring the fact that the masseuse who is rubbing me is listening to my every word.
“Men are so tricky darling. If you could feel what I do coming off them, you would know why. They’ve got the weight of the world on their shoulders, but it’s like they think they’re not allowed to admit it, or it will crush them flat,” Marina sighs to herself and I wonder what it is like for her being in a relationship where you can constantly empathise with what the other person is feeling.
“I know. He’s just struggling. I’m trying to let him ride it out, but I don’t know how much longer I can deal with him being so angry. It’s madness,” I confess and I can feel the empathy roll off her.
“I understand sweetie but he’s still very much a self-contained creature. He was alone for a long time, remember.” She reminds of the fact that everyone always brings to my attention at the idea of Orion.
“Yeah I know. He doesn’t let me forget it.” I bite down on my lip as Claude reaches the base of my spine with his thumbs, releasing any tension that could be mounting. He jumps slightly.
“You okay back there?” I ask him over my shoulder.
“Yes Miss. Is just small electric shock.” He kisses his thumb, his accent rolling out as thickly Swedish and continues to rub me.
“I won’t lie to you, I felt him earlier, I swam past the window of Atlas’ old study and I could feel it coming off him in waves.” Marina looks at me and frowns as I raise my head again in surprise.
“What did you feel?” I ask her and she contorts the redness of her lips into a grimace.
“Pretty much what you’d expect. Rage, sexual frustration, regular frustration… but more than that: fear. He’s carrying around a lot of fear.” Marina looks me square in the eye.
“He’s scared,” I repeat and she nods.
“Yes darling and I think we can guess why. He waited with one goal in mind. Finally getting to have you, be with you, and love you. Now he has you…” She stops and I finish the sentence for her with a sigh.
“He’s afraid to lose me.”
“Yes and he did lose you. You didn’t see him carrying your body through the streets, Callie. I have never felt such despair. It was like there was a hole in him.”
“But mermen have lost their soulmates before. They live through it,” I muse, trying to shed the familiar guilt that’s settling over me.
“Yes. But those mermen have had hundreds of years of memories with their maidens. In some ways, that makes it harder yes. But for Orion, it’s like giving a giant plateful of spaghetti and meatballs to a starving man and then taking it away after he’s had a single bite.” She uses the analogy of food and I raise one eyebrow to hide the palpitations in my heart.
“I know I hurt him, but I did what I thought was best for everyone,” I spit out the words, they taste sour in my mouth.
“In saying these things you’re assuming Orion sees this from your point of view. He doesn’t.” She reminds me and I drop my head so it hangs as I prop myself up on my elbows.
“So what do I do?” I ask her and she shrugs.
“Keep him happy, but don’t let him do anything insensible. This isn’t the time for him to make drastic changes. He is not thinking clearly.”
“I wish he hadn’t been voted in as Crowned Ruler,” I admit to her, she does not look surprised.
“I think you’d be surprised at how many people feel the same way, Callie.” She smiles and I pinch my brow, confused as to what she is implying.
“He won the vote by a landslide, Marina. It can’t be that many,” I think aloud and she gets up from the sofa.
“You forget, Callie, behind every great man is an even greater woman. Surely you do not believe those votes were only for Orion?” She smiles at me and exits the room silently, leaving me to think under the waves of relaxation that Claude continues to create as I relinquish to denial once more, letting them pull me under.
“Girls! The irons, stat!” I wince as Alannah pulls on my hair with a paddle brush and I ponder if she’s asking for hot irons or the kind pirates were once clad in to stop them escaping. Well she does keep telling me to stop fidgeting, I note, as I fear for my freedom with a half-hearted smile at the thought.
I’m sitting in the ‘salon’, or so this is what the maiden’s call the gargantuan room walled by mirrors and stuffed full of plush seating. It’s all very pink, very girly. Powders and pastes are scattered around the metre-long boudoir that lines the walls of the room and behind me is a colossal wardrobe filled with corsets and undergarments that fit under specific dresses. There are women everywhere, elegantly limbed, shiny skinned, long-haired women, each as beautiful as the next in their own unique way. They’re all clad in corsets and panties running around with faces half made and hair falling out of rollers. I watch them flurry about, caught up in a self-made energy and excitement.
“OW!” I scold as Alannah snags another knot. I am so not cut out for this high maintenance crap.
“I know it hurts, Princess. Just sit still and it won’t pull so much.” A maiden called Rose who stands behind me with long, muddy blonde hair rolls her eyes, she thinks I can’t see her.
“I can see you rolling your eyes, Rose.” She looks instantly confused and mortified. “In the mirror…” I enlighten her pointing toward the reflective surface before me with an unimpressed sigh and watch her blue eyes dart from left to right guiltily before she scurries away. I hear a cacophony of girli
sh chatter behind me as Alannah begins to straighten my hair with irons before she intends to start re-curling it. I personally don’t understand why she can’t just leave it naturally curly, but when I suggested this she rolled her eyes too. Apparently I’m an eye roll inducer. I hear a familiar tone and then a large amount of successive gasps. I crane my neck and Alannah tuts as she quickly has to turn with me, continuing to straighten my hair and beginning to pull them up into those big rollers you see on women who were born in the fifties. I turn to see what the gasps were regarding. Marina has entered the room with my dress, the one Orion paid for, the one I’ve been waiting to see for months with relish.
“Oh my Goddess…” I hear one of the mermaids breathe as they glance through the clear panels of the garment bag. I stand and Alannah sighs at my lack of cooperation in playing Barbie for her, ignoring her I step across the plush plum carpet and walk toward the gathering of mermaids.
“Hey back up girls, let the Princess through.” Marina makes the request and I wonder when everyone started calling me Princess.
“It’s Callie, Marina,” I say to her and she bows her head, lustrous black hair falling forward.
“Of course. Now come see this dress, darling. It’s perfect.” The maiden’s part and I move past envious and admiring eyes. Marina takes the bag down and pulls the zip over metal teeth, pulling out the dress and hanging it on the curtain rail that lines the top of the room’s walls. I step back and admire the work of the seamstress, this dress is nothing like the gown I wore to my initiation ceremony, nothing like the dress I was murdered in. This is not a Princess dress, but rather a dress fit for a Queen.
ORION
I stand at the foot of the staircase of the Lunar Sanctum on the jade green runner, I never liked the colour personally, thought it looked like mould, but today it’s particularly bothering me. Mainly because I’ve been staring at it for longer than I should be. I’m the man of the hour and for some reason, after everything that it’s taken to get here, I feel calmer than I thought. Well mostly calm anyway, except for the fact that I can’t quite understand why women are always late. It can’t take that long to get ready, can it? She’s beautiful anyway. It’d be like asking an art student to recreate the Mona Lisa. Pointless and completely unnecessary. The other maidens have been gathering in the ballroom for hours… where the hell is she?
The Kiss That Saved Me (The Tidal Kiss Trilogy Book 2) Page 5
