Wyrmrider Vengeance: An Underwater Magic Urban Fantasy (The Fomorian Wyrmriders Book 2)

by Theophilus Monroe

  Unless Enki and I could take them out...

  Where the hell was Tahlia and Tohu? Was Tohu really that much slower than Enki that they hadn't caught up with us yet?

  "Can you take these things out?" I asked Enki.

  I can... I mean, they are all bite-sized... if I crush their heads with my mouth...

  "I think that will work," I said.

  I didn't have to speak twice. As the merlegion formed a sphere near our position, we circled the merlegion, Enki chomping his way through the sharks.

  Disgusting! Enki said, spitting a demolished zombie shark out of his mouth. I can taste their rotting flesh...

  "Gross," I said.

  It's okay. It's our best shot...

  Using my Trident to guard Enki's sides, my wyrm took out three more and rapid succession.

  But for every shark we took out, it seemed like three more swam into the vicinity. How many of these could there be?

  I suppose a zombie plague spreads fast...

  And if these sharks were turned, everything they bit would turn too...

  The bokor who controlled them, whoever he might be, could remain at a distance while these shark corpses did his dirty work.

  It was brilliant. In the maniacal super-villain sense.

  But we were outnumbered, even with the advantage of a wyrm...

  "We have to retreat!" I shouted.

  "We can't!" Titus yelled back. "They're too fast. They'd hunt us down..."

  On my back! Enki shouted in my mind.

  "Ride the wyrm!" I screamed.

  "All of us?" Titus asked.

  I can take about half of them... any more than that... I won't be able to slither my body enough to swim faster than the sharks.

  "Half of everyone!" I shouted

  A loud roar sounded from deeper waters. Then out of the darkness, Tahlia and Tohu blasted into the scene.

  Tohu chomped her way through shark after shark.

  There was no telling how many more there were. But Tahlia and Tohu bought us time. And they represented a second ride.

  "We need you guys to take half the merlegion!" I shouted.

  "Got it!" Tahlia said, gripping Tohu tightly as they turned quickly toward the merlegion.

  Several jumped on Tohu's back. The other half jumped on Enki.

  Titus was right behind me.

  Under normal circumstances, it would have been awkward. A hulk of a merman holding on to little 'ole me around my waist. But when you're being attacked by zombie sharks, you don't tend to focus on things like that.

  "Quick!" Titus shouted into my ear. "Back to Fomoria!"

  "Enki," I said. "Can you cast a wyrmhole back?"

  I could, Enki said. But I don't know how we'd keep the sharks from following us. I think we're better off trying to outrun them...

  I nodded. "Good thinking, Enki. Quickly, then. Take us home!"

  Chapter Five

  We rode straight into Fomoria. We'd take Enki and Tohu back to the wyrm fields later. But we needed to speak to Agwe.

  Sure, I was queen. But he was a Loa. He wasn't a Ghede Loa, like Baron Samedi. His aspect couldn't be used to create vamps or zombies. But he knew far more about them than I did. Besides, Agwe was the Admiral of the merlegion. While Titus acted as a field commander, Agwe was the one ultimately responsible for Fomoria's defense.

  Not to mention, I was needed to keep wyrms under control.

  Not that they'd misbehave. They were intelligent creatures.

  But inside the city limits, their presence tended to make a lot of merfolk uneasy. They didn't know the wyrms like I did. They couldn't speak to them or hear them in turn.

  But so long as I was nearby, it gave most of the understandingly anxious Fomorians enough confidence I had things in control. It prevented widespread panic.

  Titus left to brief Agwe. You'd think, since he was my husband, hearing it from me first would be the way to go. But in matters of state, our marriage is mostly irrelevant except, of course, for the fact that if it wasn't for matters of the state, there'd be no reason for us to remain married at all.

  I mean, we only did it so I'd become Queen of the Sea, so I could tap into Papa Legba's aspect and speak to people on the other side. It was a crucial part of how we were able to defeat the voidbringer.

  And now that I was the queen of Fomoria, I was a queen anyway... and I didn't need Agwe to access Legba's aspect.

  Add to that the fact I hadn't seen any benefit of his aspect since the one and only time I'd used it.

  Usually, Agwe and I would have this discussion inside the royal spire. I figured we'd come up with a strategy once the wyrms went back to the wyrm fields.

  But Agwe came out of the spire, swimming with purpose, a determined but somber look on his face.

  "Wife, we must speak in private," Agwe said.

  "Wife?" I asked.

  Agwe nodded. "That's who you are, are you not?"

  I huffed, crossing my arms in front of my chest. "Whatever."

  "La Sirene," Agwe said. "Is that better?"

  "In public," I said. "That'll do. But you've always called me Joni. If this marriage is going to work..."

  "We'll talk about that later," Agwe said. "For now, I'm gravely concerned about what Titus says you've encountered."

  "Zombie sharks," I said. "I figured you'd be concerned."

  Agwe put his finger to his lips and shushed me. First, he called me "wife," as if I was his property. Then, he shushed me? Seriously, dude?

  "We shouldn't talk about that out loud," Agwe said. "The people, if they knew..."

  "Then they'd take precautions," I said, nodding my head with confidence. "They'd know not to leave the firmament until the problem is resolved."

  "Or they'd panic," Agwe said. "And we don't need that right now."

  I shook my head. "You should give the merfolk more credit. They survived the voidbringer. They stayed here, trapped, while nonexistence itself nearly swallowed the whole kingdom."

  Agwe scratched his head. "Perhaps. But this is different. A looming, slow-moving darkness is a very different kind of threat than murderous animated shark corpses."

  "Zombie sharks," I said. "Calling them animated shark corpses is... just weird."

  "Fine," Agwe said. "The zombie sharks represent a different sort of threat. The voidbringer's presence was overwhelming. It didn't have a face. At worst, people would suddenly cease to exist. At least, that was what they feared. But if the zombie sharks attacked..."

  "They'd be turned, too," I said. "I can see why that would be terrifying."

  Agwe nodded. Then he cocked his head to the side. "What's wrong with Enki?"

  "Enki?" I asked. "He's fine, we just..."

  Then I saw Enki's body go stiff as he started to sink to the ground.

  I quickly dove after him and, drawing on some magic from the firmament, cast a bubble around him, catching him before he crashed into some of the lesser spires below.

  I chased after him, even as Tohu swam down and nuzzled her face against his.

  What's wrong with my nephew? Tohu asked.

  "I don't know," I said honestly.

  "Let me give him a look," Agwe said, sliding his hand down Enki's body.

  Enki started shaking. And then he unleashed an ear-piercing shriek.

  "Enki!" I said. "What is wrong?"

  My... check the end of my tail... I think....

  "He's been bitten," Agwe said. "And the rot is already setting in."

  "What?" I asked. "Enki, why didn't you say something?"

  I thought maybe the bite didn't get through my hide... but I think...

  "Fomorian magic should heal the rot," I said. "When my family was attacked by a caplata," I said, cringing as I said it. "When she sent the zombies after us, and they bit my parents... magic is how we saved them."

  "We can try," Agwe said. "But these are creatures born of the void. Our magic heals humans because it is a part of the magic that made this world, that made the bodies of all the
earth's creatures... the wyrms... I can't say..."

  I shook my head. "Like you said. We can try. I can amplify the magic, and here, in the city, we have plenty to draw from."

  I inhaled deeply, drawing in as much magic as I could. I could wield crazy amounts of power. But even I had my limits. And I suspected I'd need as much as I could muster to stop the rot.

  I formed my trident in my hand. If I were in human form, it would be a wand. But here... it still had the same function. It could help me focus my magic, force it all into a precise spell, right at the wound on Enki's tail.

  I shot a forceful beam of healing Fomorian magic into the wound.

  Enki shrieked.

  It shouldn't hurt... but...

  La Sirene! Stop! Enki cried.

  I stopped channeling... and where the wound was, where the rot had been...

  It hadn't healed at all.

  It had spread.

  I'd accelerated the process.

  "No!" I said. "This shouldn't have..."

  Agwe put his hand on my shoulder.

  "Agwe," I said. "We have to heal him. There has to be a way."

  "I don't know that we can," Agwe said.

  "But Nammu... she'll lose her mind... after everything we did to save him... we can't let him turn into a zombie."

  Kill me, Enki said. I will relax my scales... you can use your trident.

  "No," I said. "I'm not killing you, Enki."

  Enki shrieked again.

  I'm sorry, La Sirene...

  "No," I said. "I'm sorry... I..."

  Tell mother I love her...

  "Wait, Enki, what are you..."

  Before I could speak, Enki threw his body toward one of the spires. And he drove it through his own head...

  "Enki!" I cried, releasing my trident.

  Agwe put his hand on my shoulder again.

  I shrugged it off.

  I kicked my tail hard. Re-summoning my trident, I inhaled and cast another bubble to catch his body before he crashed to the ground.

  "Enki..." I clung to his body as life left him.

  I didn't even know a wyrm could die...

  And Nammu...

  How could I even begin to tell her about this?

  I can't imagine... as a mother... to lose a child...

  It has to be the worst kind of grief imaginable.

  And she had more children coming... she couldn't afford to lose her mind. Not now...

  But Tohu saw it. She swam down slowly, whimpering. Wyrms can cry, too.

  I'll tell my sister, La Sirene... allow me to remove this burden from you.

  "No, Tohu," I said. "This is my fault. My responsibility. I have to do it."

  Chapter Six

  Nammu curled her body tightly around her eggs. Her whole body shook as she wept.

  A part of me half expected she'd lose her mind. I imagined she was torn in a thousand different directions. She probably wanted to unleash her rage on the zombie sharks and, more, on the boker who'd done this. But her maternal instincts turned her attentions to her eggs. She'd lost one child. She couldn't sacrifice six more for his sake.

  In my mind, Enki died a hero.

  He fought the sharks. Without him, the whole merlegion would have died. And rather than hold onto the vain hope that we'd be able to heal him from the bite, rather than let the rot take him over, he ended his life.

  A wyrm turned into a zombie... it would have been a nightmare on a cataclysmic scale.

  I tried to tell Nammu that...

  But she wasn't ready to hear it.

  I suppose there are stages of grief. And she wasn't at the point, yet, where she was ready to start honoring her son's sacrifice. She was still aching from his loss.

  I wasn't about to demand anything more than that.

  I returned to the castle spire dejected. I ordered Tahlia to prepare the Fomorian rites for fallen warriors. If any Fomorian gave his or her life for the sake of the kingdom, they were accorded special honors.

  As the high priestess, having inherited Cleo's position, she'd offered the rites for Cleo's sake already. But it had never been done, before, for something other than a Fomorian.

  Still, I wasn't going to allow Enki's species to be a cause to discriminate. He fought valiantly. He saved the merlegion. And he gave his life for the betterment of the kingdom.

  He was worthy of all the honors we could bestow.

  And since Tahlia, herself, was not a Fomorian—even though in mermaid form she looked like the rest of us—and I was half-human, I suppose our regime was more open-minded to bestowing honors without consideration of species.

  I had to hand it to Tahlia.

  Until recently, she'd been an illegal immigrant. A refugee, of a sort, without asylum. Now, she was the primary person in all of Fomoria responsible for maintaining the kingdom's traditions, conducting their most important rituals and rites, and other such matters.

  The priestess was, for Fomoria, something of a ceremonial figure—the merfolk weren't religious, at least not in the traditional sense. In their minds, Agwe and I were the closest things to deities they revered.

  The whole idea I was divine, at all, was absurd in my mind. I was a simple girl who was, frankly, in over her head. And not just literally—since we were so far beneath the ocean's surface—but in terms of responsibility and expectations.

  Still, I possessed Legba's aspect. I was married to a demigod, which made me, by proxy, something of a demigoddess.

  Not at all comfortable with the idea. But that's how the Fomorians saw it.

  And I was their queen, not by virtue of my supposed divinity, but by popular acclaim. My role in saving Fomoria from the voidbringer, it seemed, had made me the prime candidate for the position.

  A single act of heroism...

  No other credentials were required. The closest thing I'd ever been to being in charge of anyone was serving as president of my old high school's culinary arts club. And I was, briefly, the captain of the girls' soccer team.

  Hardly qualifications for ruling a kingdom of merfolk.

  Which is why I had to depend on Agwe—as did Tahlia. He'd helped both of us, in several ways, adapt to our new roles.

  We were like fish out of water... despite being mermaids in an underwater world.

  A part of me felt terrible. I hadn't exactly made it easy for Agwe. Not just in matters of state. In terms of our relationship. I'd been bitter. Angry that I hadn't married for love. Ticked off that I was still, deep down, in love with my baby's daddy and now he had moved on and was raising my baby with the girl he loved long before I came into his life.

  More than that, I was furious that my lack of attentiveness, my paucity of experience, had led to Enki's death.

  Of course, I blamed myself.

  When you're a king or a queen, no matter what, you're responsible.

  I was responsible.

  And Cleo's loss still stung. Now, to add Enki's death on top of it all?

  Tahlia, usually playful, snarky, and a bit of a flirt, looked like a totally different person when she vested herself in the priestess' regalia.

  A long gown, lined with pearls, was draped over her body. The gown was made from sea silk—a thread taken from pen shells and woven tightly together. The stuff was soft but insanely durable. Some of the legionnaires, I was told, wore it as a form of armor. It was lightweight and almost impossible to pierce. The stuff didn't rip easily.

  Durable and luxurious. Think Daluth Trading Company meets Gucci.

  I didn't know a lot about how the Fomorian textile industry worked. There were those in Fomoria who'd been assigned the vocation of gathering the shells, extracting the threads from the shells, and others tasked to weave them together into textiles.

  As queen, I'd commissioned several pieces to be made for myself. The former monarch, King Conand, had a few pieces we recovered from the rubble of the former royal spire. However, most of it was much too big for me. I could get into it, but I'd look ridiculous. I'd get my ve
stments eventually. They prepared a few of my items already—nothing proper for funerals. I told them to wait on the rest. A shark bite would still hurt. It could be crushing. But if the teeth didn't penetrate their sea silk armor, at least the legionnaires wouldn't turn into zombies. Obviously, given the new threat, re-armoring the new merlegion was a higher priority than ceremonial gowns.

  Most mermaids didn't wear sea silk. They typically wore garments woven from seaweed. Only mermaids, technically, required clothing. And then, only something akin to a bikini top.

  I had to settle for seaweed since my garments weren't ready yet. I felt under-dressed...

  Of course, when you're a mermaid, being under-dressed isn't a thing. Wear much less than what we wore, and you would be naked. But I felt like I should have had on something black, something more modest, at least. Perhaps it was the fact I'd grown up and lived most of my life as a human. I grew up with certain customs. No one else seemed to notice.

  Typically, a funeral would occur at an asphalt volcano, about ten nautical miles, give or take, from Fomoria.

  However, with zombie sharks on the prowl, we had to make a few adjustments to the usual plan. Rather than lead a procession of merfolk to the volcano, we conducted the rite in the wyrmfields.

  It also meant Nammu could attend.

  That was important.

  She had a right to be there.

  But she shouldn't have to do so at the cost of leaving her eggs unattended.

  I don't think an asteroid from space, zeroed in exactly at her position, could have convinced Nammu to move.

  Not that I blamed her. These were her babies... and she'd just lost a child...

  I'd probably be the same way if, heaven forbid, I were ever in a situation like that.

  I mean, I knew what it was like to see my child go to his death. But when I saw it, it was a future version of Merlin. A version of my son who'd lived his entire life and chose to end his life on his own terms, doing something to save the world...

  And in a way, Enki had done the same. Only for him, his life had barely begun...

  Too young...

  Especially for a species that, so far as I knew, didn't die of old age.