Kingdom of the Sea

by Isobel Robertson

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  The Selkie Kingdom Book 2

  Isobel Robertson

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  Kingdom of the Sea: The Selkie Kingdom Book 2

  Independently published.

  Copyright © 2018 by Isobel Robertson

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission

  ISBN-13: 9781977066275

  Visit isobelrobertson.com for more information (and free books)

  Kingdom of

  the Sea

  The Selkie Kingdom Book 2

  Isobel Robertson

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  In his house by the sea, with his children tucked into bed upstairs and his wife dozing by the fire, Cormac sat and thought about magic. It seemed to seep into every crack of his life, like the sea air, soaking into every plank of the old house and creeping into the wool fibre of his clothing. He looked over at his wife, the firelight turning her hair a blazing red, and tried to remember how much he loved her. Lisbetta was beautiful, kind, strong, loving. But everything about her screamed danger. She was his children’s mother, but she might also be the greatest threat to their safety.

  He slipped out of the room, suddenly unable to sit still. He had to do something, had to act. The house was full of magic and he had to root it out so that his children could be safe.

  He started in their bedroom, a single candle lighting his way as he fumbled through their clothes and toys, stored in two small storage chests. He didn’t know what he was looking for, but he would know it when he found it. A magical talisman, perhaps, or unusual herbs. Any sort of proof that his strange selkie wife or his witch sister were still practising their magic.

  “What are you doing, Cormac?”

  Her voice was soft but furious, sending shivers up his spine. His heart pounded so quickly it made him dizzy. How did she always know?

  “I’m just tidying,” he said.

  “Liar. I know what you’re doing. I know what you think of me,” Lisbetta said, her voice louder now. Their children began to stir.

  “Dinnae make a fuss,” he hissed at his wife, willing her to back away and leave. But he knew very well that Lisbetta had never backed down from a fight in her life.

  “How dare you act like this!” she said, shouting now. “You don’t trust me, you lie to me, you sneak around my own house. How dare you! Get out!”

  “I’m no’ doing anything wrong,” Cormac began, righteous anger pushing past the fear.

  “You’re lying to me, Cormac King, and that’s enough! Get out of my house before I do something I’ll regret!”

  “Calm down and talk tae me aboot this.”

  “I’m too angry!” she shouted at him. “Get out and give me some space! I’ll talk when I can bear to look at your lying face!”

  So he left, grabbing his heavy overcoat and his hat, slamming the door behind him as he stepped out into the rain. He glanced back up at the house, its windows shrouded in darkness. A small white shape appeared behind the glass of the upstairs window. His little daughter Rona, his beautiful firstborn. His heart ached to think that she was watching him leave like this.

  All he really wanted in life was to protect his children. Nothing unusual about that - and yet it seemed to be a task he was carrying out all alone. Protecting three children by himself was a difficult burden to carry. Lisbetta loved their children, he knew that. But could a half-wild creature ever truly be trusted? Could a shape-shifter from ancient stories truly make the right decisions? He tugged his hat down lower and headed out into the rain, headed for the warm lights of the inn.

  Seven years had passed since the day Cormac and Lisbetta married in the little village church. Their daughter Rona had been born a mere eight months later. An early, unexpected baby, she was a tiny little thing, so small that the midwife had not expected her to live. But, like her mother, Rona was a fighter. She had made it. Joseph followed a few years later, and then little Patrick, still only a baby.

  Cormac loved all three of his children more deeply than he could ever have imagined. But his feelings for their mother… those were harder to understand. He had loved her madly at first, of course. How could he not love a woman with that much fire and beauty? But, over time, he had come to understand the scale of their differences. He was a fisherman turned smuggler and sometime pirate. She was a princess with uncanny powers and the ability to breathe underwater. What business did they have living in the same home, raising the same children? Sometimes, Cormac felt like he was trapped in an old story he only half remembered and barely understood.

  His old friend Red sat slumped over the bar, so deep in his ale that he barely grunted when Cormac pulled off his coat, spraying water everywhere. Red had never been especially friendly, but recent years had made him harder and colder than ever.

  “Problems with yer wife as well?” Cormac asked. Red just shrugged and took another swig, so Cormac ordered his own ale and sat down beside him.

  “Lisbetta threw me out again,” he began, but Red cut him off.

  “If ye’re going tae leave her, just leave her. Stop complaining. You kenned well what ye were getting into when ye married her.”

  “Things have changed.”

  “No’ that much,” Red said, hi voice dark. “Ye’re nae the one wi’ six children and nae money tae pay for them. But ye willnae find me complaining about my lot every day. I’d consider myself lucky if I had a good house and a good business.”

  “It’s yer business as much as mine,” Cormac pointed out, but Red just scoffed.

  “Much good a half share in a second-rate shipping company is doing me. You know what we should be doing instead.”

  “Smuggling isnae worth the risk,” Cormac said, keeping his voice low. “Wi’ that new customs man in town, we have tae be careful. Who would care for yer children if ye hanged?”

  “You need to take a few risks now and then, Cormac!” Red shouted, banging his ale mug down on the bar. Cormac hushed him, but his old friend wasn’t done.

  “I need more money, fast,” he said. “Ye’ll never understand what it’s like to be short on money for rent, not wi’ that house ye inherited.”

  “I have bigger problems than a wee bit o’ rent,” Cormac said, stung. “Besides, what’s the point of money if it ca
nnae keep ye safe or make ye happy?”

  “I’ll say it again,” Red said, still sober enough to keep his voice low. “Ye kenned well what ye were getting into when ye married a shape-shifter selkie princess. Learn tae handle yer own problems. Men shouldnae dabble in old stories unless they’re ready tae face the consequences. Forever. Ye got what ye asked for.”

  “Ye’re not worth the effort,” Cormac said, feeling his lips curling in disgust. He swigged his drink down in one gulp, and slammed the mug down. He walked out of the inn without looking back.

  As he reached his front door, it burst open. He squinted for a moment, trying to make out the silhouetted figure past the glare of the suddenly bright candlelight.

  “What the hell has happened here?”

  It was his sister Moira, her voice furious as she reached out to grab his arm and yank him inside, slamming the door shut to cut off the raging storm outside.

  “I dinnae ken what happened between you and Lisbetta, but I could feel it all the way down at my house! What did you say to her?”

  “I dinnae need tae be reminded about yer special little gift,” he said, pushing past Moira into the parlour. “My relationship with my wife is none of yer business.”

  “If there’s strong enough magic in the air that I cannae sleep, then it’s definitely my business,” Moira snapped. What sort of luck had left him with a selkie for a wife and a witch for a sister?

  “Yer sleep quality is none of my problem,” he said, and shut the parlour door firmly in her face. There was a second of silence, then he heard her footsteps on the stairs. She’d no doubt gone up to sympathise with Lisbetta. He shook his head and opened the cabinet, reaching for a bottle of whiskey. He poured a little into a glass, the familiar smell soothing him instantly. After a few glasses, the world would seem like a better place.

  The parlour door flew open.

  “Cormac, where is she? What did you do?”

  “She’s upstairs, o’ course,” he said, trying to understand the question. “We had a wee fight, nothing more than usual. What do ye mean, where is she?”

  “She’s not anywhere upstairs,” Moira said, her voice urgent. “But the air in your room is full of magic, so thick I couldnae hardly breathe. Something’s happened to her, I know it. The children’s room smells of the sea.”

  “She must have left,” Cormac said, staring up at his sister in disbelief. “She must have finally left me.”

  Could she really have gone? For one single, thrilling moment, he felt free.

  Moira shook her head furiously. “Lisbetta would never leave the children, no matter how cruel you were to her. She loves them.”

  Cormac wanted to believe that Lisbetta was the kind of woman who would just walk out on her responsibilities. But he knew it wasn’t true. Despite all his doubts, all his fears, he knew that his wife loved her children more than life itself. His excitement vanished in a flood of guilt, panic gripping every inch of his body. How could he have ever wanted her gone?

  He was on his feet in seconds, calling Lisbetta’s name in every room of the house, checking the back yard and the street outside. He tried the attic and the cellar, even searched under and behind all the furniture in case she had collapsed. He ran up and down their street, shouting her name until all their neighbours came out to stare at him.

  At last, he stood beside his bed, gazing down at the empty floorboards where she should have been. Even without his sister’s special powers, he could feel the magic that filled this room, swirling in to fill every empty space. In the background, he could faintly hear his children crying. For all his efforts, magic had struck right here, in his own home, and he hadn’t even been here to stop it. He fingered his wedding ring, the metal cold against his skin, and thought of Lisbetta’s smile on the day he’d married her.

  He tried to tuck his children into bed, wiping away their tears and assuring them that everything was fine, but the words stuck in his throat. He blew the candle out at last, leaving them to sleep. The last thing he saw before the light winked out was Rona’s face, pale, tear-stained, and afraid. What had happened? What had she seen?

  Cormac stood on the beach, gazing out to where shafts of light broke through the cloud to dance on the waves. Everything around him was familiar; the landscape he’d grown up with. The dark hills that rose up behind him were as well-known as the back of his hand. Without even looking, he could picture the sheep, drifting like tiny clouds, and the sparse hawthorn trees clawing up towards the sky. But that wasn’t the way she’d gone.

  If he wanted to find his wife, only the sea could show him the way.

  He pulled off his boots and let his toes sink into the sand, rooting him fast on the boundary between land and sea.

  “Lisbetta!” he screamed into the sea air, his voice already harsh and rough. “Can you hear me?”

  There was no sound except the steady roll of the waves and the answering call of a sea bird. He tried again, but the sea gave no sign it had heard.

  How mad had he become, that he stood here shouting at the sea? He shook his head, almost laughing at the mess he had made of his life. Perhaps it would be better to cry.

  But even as he doubted himself, he knew that the sea was listening. Someone - or something - could hear him, although it might not be Lisbetta. Surely someone in the sea knew what had happened.

  He began to wade into the water, his teeth chattering in the autumnal chill. He didn’t know what he was doing, but it felt right. How could he stay in his home without her? Their children needed her - he needed her.

  As a child, growing up on the edge of this wild sea, he would never have imagined that selkies really existed. They were something from a story - the beautiful women who slipped back into their sealskins and escaped into the sea just as the lovestruck fisherman approached. Everyone knew the stories - and the endings were never good. Of course it would be Cormac, the man who hated and feared magic, who met a beautiful selkie and found himself desperate to protect her. He’d fallen hard in love with the woman, ignoring the fact that she was also a seal. What else might he have overlooked in his determination to pretend that his life was normal?

  The water was deep now, waves hitting his waist and then his shoulders, but he couldn’t stop. Some strange force had hold of his body, pulling him onward. Was that Lisbetta’s voice he could hear, calling to him over the waves? He tried to call back, but water crashed into his mouth, drowning out the words and cutting off his breath. He tried to gasp in air, but all he got was seawater.

  Fighting against the pull of the current, he launched himself back towards the beach, but some invisible cord seemed to be wrapped around his ankles, tugging him further out to sea and holding him just below the surface of the water. He fought hard, trying to escape whatever strange undertow had seized him.

  Spluttering and gasping, he tugged himself onto the beach, his fingers clawing at the sand, feeling it wet and smooth under his hands, but the next wave was huge, surging right over his head and pulling him away. It was too strong, the water swamping him and the current dragging him under.

  His fingers grasped for the sand - nothing. Too far. He fought for breath, but there was only water, filling his mouth and his lungs.

  This was it. He had always guessed he would die by drowning.

  But then he felt his body begin to change, pinpricks of pain sparkling along his veins. His throat tightened and then eased. His hands burned like fire before settling down to a cool ache. Even as he fought against the water, he realised that there was no need. His body still thrummed with panic, but he could somehow, impossibly, breathe underwater.

  Hesitantly, he reached up to feel his neck. Something had changed. Did he have gills? The water around him seemed clearer than before, as well, and the light brighter. His eyes were seeing underwater far more clearly than they had ever seen on land. Almost too afraid to look, still gently treading water, he raised one hand up in front of his face. It was webbed. Only a tiny flap of skin, but his own han
ds suddenly looked unfamiliar, foreign.

  True panic gripped him, his entire body screaming at him to escape. He threw himself back towards the land, his body cutting smoothly through the water, but that same current caught him again, flinging him backwards. He tried again, and again, but each time the water swept him further than before. After a few moments, he could no longer tell which direction would lead him to the shore. He finally stopped fighting and let the current lead him as it wished, with just a lazy kick of his legs to speed the journey.

  He could not quite believe the beauty of the world around him. Colourful plant life, nothing like the dull grey he knew on land, swayed and twisted in the water all around him. Tiny little fish darted from shelter to shelter, or brushed past his cheek in huge shoals. He drifted past massive rock formations, mighty as the Highland mountains of his own home, and into a deep forest of seaweed so thick that he lost sight of the surface.

  The same insistent current tugged him along for hours. He let himself play in the water, first tumbling head over heels, then learning how to swim more efficiently. Whatever changes his body had gone through, he felt more at ease in the water than he ever had before. He seemed able to breathe effortlessly, even though it must have been the best part of a day since he left the surface. How long had he been down here, in this fantastical underwater world? Hours? It could surely not yet have been days.