by Starla Night
Three twinkling lights appeared. Bright like stars. These were the souls of warriors. Not a single unit, but a whole group, vibrating with noise and energy.
He slowed to a stop.
Hazel craned her neck. “What’s that?”
“A war party. Or…”
The tones changed. The bright spots moved chaotically, and vibrations crossed the distance. “Hi! Hello! We’ve come to meet you! Hello! Welcome!”
Hazel grinned, and her chest glowed brightly, resonating with the other queens. “A welcome party.”
The queens waved. Their warriors paced them, a proud and sedate guard. Lotar released Hazel to greet the others properly. The group enveloped them, and the queens talked over each other while touching Hazel’s arms, welcoming her after the long swim, saying she must be tired, or maybe starving, come this way, and they’d planned to meet her but everything took so much longer when you had kids, you know. Three young fry paddled around with shrieks.
They turned en masse to the distant Life Tree.
Lotar collected Hazel and kicked to the edge of the group.
Everyone asked questions at once.
“Wait, guys, wait.” The youngest queen held out her arms and quiet descended on their group. “We forgot to do introductions. I’m Milly. That’s Jen.”
Queen Jen enveloped Hazel in a warm hug. “You must be exhausted.”
“And that’s Sydney,” Queen Milly said.
“My turn.” Queen Sydney nudged Queen Jen out of the way with her hip and enfolded Hazel in an even more generous hug. Her kinky hair glittered in a sparkly halo. “Welcome, girlfriend! You’re going to love it here.”
“Thank you.” Hazel examined the sparkles. “How in the world did you do that?”
“Okay, so, step one is to give up on your hair routine. Step two, grow an afro.”
“Step three, be fabulous,” Queen Jen chimed in. Her curly black hair was shorn close to her head.
“And then?” Sydney pointed at her sparkles. “Magic.”
“Oh my God. I love it.” Hazel flexed her feet. “I’m still struggling with the foot thing.”
The queens made sympathetic yet encouraging noises and promised she would get it soon.
Queen Milly continued the introductions. “This is my husband, Uvim.”
A quiet warrior with amethyst tattoos nodded to Hazel and Lotar. His young fry silently kicked by his side.
“Dosan is Jen’s husband.”
“And our young fry.” Dosan captured his son before the young one yanked his mother’s close-shorn curls. “Watch for the hands. He is strong for his age.”
His young fry squirmed.
“And Xalu is Sydney’s husband,” Queen Milly continued.
The final warrior was large and broad, with tattoos the color of smoke and a deep, resonant vibration. “Welcome.” His young fry nestled in one arm and studied them with curiosity.
“You must have seen a lot,” Queen Milly said as they swam. “I’ve been wondering. Are all the cities like this?”
Hazel looked at Lotar. “Nobody else sent a welcome wagon.”
He nodded.
“Well, we swim here every day.” Queen Sydney gestured to Queen Jen. “We’re walking buddies. Just like in the old neighborhood.”
“Jen and Sydney were already best friends,” Queen Milly said. “They met their soul mates because of a snorkeling trip. I was their dive instructor. Can you believe it?”
“Uh, yeah,” Hazel said. “Sure. Why not?”
The women laughed. Queen Jen and Queen Sydney whirled around each other, showing true synchronicity of mind.
“It was my honeymoon,” Queen Jen said.
“Which she took without her husband,” Queen Sydney said. “Because he was a dirty, lying, cheating—”
“And I didn’t marry him,” Queen Jen continued, “but the tickets were nonrefundable.”
“So she roped me in, and she’s been roping me ever since.” Queen Sydney twirled to her husband, Xalu, and nestled into the smoky warrior’s capable arms. “And now I’m a queen.”
Her chest glowed.
The other women’s chests echoed the brightness, their friendship amplifying their powers, and they all smiled. Queen Jen giggled, Queen Milly snorted, all three laughed, and a glittering brightness shone from their group, showering the land.
They reached the main city, Dragao Azul.
This city had been the birthplace of King Kadir and First Lieutenant Soren. Once, it had been a traditional city loyal to the All-Council, but since embracing queens, it had flourished. And more young fry flew through the city. Elders shouted to warriors, trainees formed behind trainers, and the usual sounds of a traditional city mixed with the very untraditional sounds of the queens laughing, greeting warriors, and even singing.
How unique.
Atlantis had drawn together the warriors of all cities in what was sometimes an uncomfortable melding that constantly had to strive to create new traditions to make the disparate warriors work together.
Unlike Aiycaya, which had lost its sacred brides for a generation, Dragao Azul had continued to grow slowly. There had been no breaks in tradition. Many cities could become like this once they opened to modern queens.
“Have you gotten to see a Life Tree up close?” Queen Milly asked Hazel.
“Not really.”
“Come check it out.”
Queen Sydney flew with her. “You can scoop up the Sea Opals and bathe in riches. It’s opulent.”
“You’ll feel so refreshed,” Queen Jen said.
“Like the queen you are,” Queen Sydney said.
Hazel glanced at Lotar. They had traveled together for so long that her checking with him was natural. She trusted his opinion, and he trusted her to accept it.
This city was vibrant, energetic, and safe.
He released her easily. She swam with the other queens, her fins small but mighty in comparison to their beautiful flowing tendrils. The young fry played with them, darting beneath the branches of the Life Tree and squeezing through too-tight gaps, shaking the branches so the hard, pearly-white resin rained down.
“It is a beautiful sight.” Dosan echoed his unspoken thoughts. “One that has never happened in our city.”
“Perhaps,” Uvim said quietly. “Before.”
Before the Great Catastrophe, when queens had ruled beside warriors and mer and humans had been friends.
“We should have fought for Kadir’s change generations ago,” Uvim said.
From the Life Tree, the women squealed and suddenly hugged Hazel.
“We’re going to be there,” Queen Jen promised.
“Oh, heck yeah. We’d never say no to a party.” Queen Sydney danced in place.
“We’re still figuring out who’s not going to go,” Queen Milly said. “Put us down for yes at least twice.”
All the women laughed.
Hazel’s chest glowed. She peered at Lotar and grinned.
He understood.
“We will represent Dragao Azul,” Uvim said.
“This is the future. Cities ruled by the All-Council will see it.” Dosan’s mouth quirked. “Someday.”
Xalu turned to Lotar. “You know other cities. Do they understand what they have lost? It is hard to guess from echo points. Much seems untrue.”
“Like the rumors about you,” Dosan said.
Ah.
His heart palpitated. Tension pinged into his fingers and toes.
He had never confessed his shame to anyone before Hazel, and here he was, working up the courage to confess it to strangers.
Uvim and the others waited patiently, as though they sensed the struggle no matter how he tried to outwardly appear calm.
“My brother is Syrenka’s prince,” Lotar forced out. “But I showed more skill. It endangered his succession.”
A long silence followed.
Xalu’s brows drew into a heavy frown. “They expelled a second prince? When a city should treasure eve
ry warrior? How archaic.”
“They did not expel me. I left.”
Xalu traded glances with Dosan and Uvim. All three warriors regarded him with something approaching sympathy.
Uvim reached out and clasped Lotar’s biceps, careful of the sheathed weapons. “Honor us by joining our feast.”
The other two warriors nodded.
Another hard lump formed in Lotar’s throat, so it was lucky he could give his thanks by vibrating. “The honor”—to be among these good warriors, these caring fathers, these kind males—“is mine.”
Uvim’s lips curved into a slight smile as though he heard the words Lotar could not express, and he led Lotar to the castle for a welcome feast.
His queen, Milly, zoomed to Uvim, their young fry squealing in her arms. “Hazel does karaoke! Do you know what that means?”
He shook his head with a tolerant smile and hugged them both close, clearly used to their enthusiastic attacks.
“Dance party! Oh, man, we have to practice. I’ve only done karaoke, like, once in college, if that. This is going to be the best! I cannot wait.”
Hazel curled against Lotar’s side, concern tempering her bliss. She rested her palm on his chest. “Are you okay?”
The other queens and young fry swirled around him. Elders shouted about logistics for defending the emptied city during the party, and trainers barked at trainees. The mix of new and old, traditional and untraditional, cracked open his heart a little more.
Hazel revealed herself to all. She made herself vulnerable without hesitation.
Lotar had never done so.
But he must consider doing it more. It was good to speak his thoughts.
“Yes.” Lotar pressed his lips to hers. She giggled in surprise and melted against him, yielded to his tasting and teasing. “I am very okay.”
For now.
Twenty-Six
Things were going super well.
Lotar looked peaceful for the first time, everyone in Dragao Azul was raring to go to the party, and if no one else showed up, it would still be worthwhile. Plus this was the future Hazel someday looked forward to: hanging out in Atlantis with her new best girl pals, laughing at each other’s jokes and finishing each other’s sentences, while also being a mom to a kid everyone in the city loved and being completely supported by her devoted husband.
Also, bathing in a tub of million-dollar Sea Opals. Just because.
Jen, Sydney, and Milly got it. They lived underwater full time, so they never really felt their wealth, but they knew about it. They were rich.
Yeah. That would be awesome.
And they also allayed her fears about being pregnant underwater.
“It’s not like on the surface,” Jen reassured her, while Sydney and Milly nodded. Then she frowned. “Well, I think. I’ve never been pregnant on the surface, but all three of us had the same great experience, so it must be different.”
“You will feel like you can kick major butt,” Sydney said. “Like you can face down sharks with laser beams.”
Nobody had puked their guts out for months. Nobody had gotten weird nosebleeds or fat ankles or joint pain. Nobody had gotten weird cravings.
“My glam has never been better.” Sydney patted her magical glowing fairy forest afro. “Every day is a good hair day.”
“The only thing,” Milly said, interrupting the cheery recitation, “is that you might get a jolt or a stabbing sensation right when things are, uh, kicking off. If you know what I mean.” She patted her abdomen. “So don’t freak out and think you’re dying. Don’t scare your husband or start making out your will. It’s just a weird cramp.”
“From implantation,” Jen said clearly. She was the practical, levelheaded one. “Of the ovum.”
“Right.” Milly squeezed her eyes shut and grimaced. “And don’t freak out. It’s embarrassing.”
After a nice feast and a rest, the welcome party guided them back to the edge of the city.
Milly conferenced with them as a farewell. “Now, you’ve met Zara before, right?”
“We’ve talked on the phone.”
“Then you already know she can be a little abrasive.” Milly bit her lower lip. “Don’t hold it against her too hard, okay? We had a wretched childhood, and the only reason our criminal ‘parents’ didn’t traffic me into literal slavery is because Zara sheltered me from them. And after she finally found love and happiness with her mer husband, traditionalists ripped her away and forced her to the surface, where she nearly died. So she’s less a ‘glass half empty’ person than a ‘I can crack the glass into a shiv to protect my family from the enemies lurking outside’ person.”
“I’ve talked with Zara,” Hazel repeated. “And if I went through what she’d gone through, I’d also have PTSD. But she didn’t seem that bad.”
“Good. I only see her every six months because she’s mostly on the surface.” Milly rolled her lips between her teeth. “Zara was my whole world, and I want everyone to see her how I do. That’s all. Thanks, Hazel.” She swam back to the rest of her group and waved. “See you in Atlantis, Lotar.”
The whole group waved, and it was an amazing sight of chaos, laughter, noise, and, well, awesome.
“What a send-off.” Hazel nestled against Lotar.
He smiled.
They zoomed along Dragao Azul’s well-traveled route up to the ancient sacred islands now known as the Azores.
Humpback whales soared beside them, their beautiful eerie songs deeper and more orchestral, as though what she’d heard in tinny mono above the surface she now heard in surround sound.
They surfaced at dusk among a cloud of small blue-striped creatures with feathery fingers and toes like a watery gecko with stinging spines. He warned her not to touch. Then he navigated around a school of frilly Portuguese men-of-war, and he was pretty blasé about their stings, so she paid a lot more attention to the blue gecko things.
They met a Dragao Azul warrior stationed as a liaison between the city below and the Azores above. He led them over surface currents toward their chosen island, and as the twilight turned to night, bioluminescence sparkled after their strokes like turquoise fireworks.
The Dragao Azul warrior got them clothes—two pairs of Bermuda shorts and T-shirts—and led them, dripping wet, onto an empty beach. He opened a lockbox and used the cell phone inside to call Zara.
Zara was on another island, but she arranged a car and hotel for the night.
“Queen Zara and Warrior Elan will join you tomorrow.” The warrior locked up the phone again. “I will wait with you. Beware anyone who offers you a ride without knowing your name. The Sons of Hercules are not welcome by the humans on this land, but be vigilant.”
So they were a problem here too.
Hazel thanked him, and when a car came to pick them up, the Dragao Azul warrior recognized the driver and confirmed it was safe. He bid them farewell to return to his station. The driver had covered his seats with plastic—so this wasn’t an unusual request, obviously—and dropped them at a Spanish-style villa.
The driver wore a coat and hat and shook his head like they were crazy for walking around in shorts and a T-shirt, but she didn’t feel cold.
Another perk of being a mer.
The receptionist let them into the villa without a question, and they enjoyed small cakes, fresh cheese with chips, and other snacks. Hazel peeled off her dripping clothes for a shower. Lotar joined her.
She bumped his growing hardness. “Why do we always do sexy things in the shower?”
Her gray warrior shrugged.
She slathered herself with a bar of nice lavender soap.
His gaze trailed over her breasts, her belly, and down to her vee. He made her tingle and throb with awareness. How funny that she could be naked with him for months underwater, but five minutes of nudity on the surface and everything was sexy again.
She paused, the bar on her taut nipple. “Are you just going to watch?”
An adorable grin flashed acr
oss his face, and he sauntered closer. “What do you want me to do?”
She pressed the soap to his chest. A dusting of gray hair enticed her down his washboard abs and toward the hard, ready cock springing from a thick mat of gray curls. “Scrub-a-dub-dub. Do you feel dirty? Haha, so dirty…”
His mesmerizing eyes captured hers. He licked his lips.
Heat throbbed into her breasts.
She lifted onto her toes and kissed him.
He dedicated himself to her kiss, sucking her tongue into his mouth and releasing her again, rough and hot. A wave of sensual need awoke her pussy with a throb. His wide hands kneaded her breasts, fitted her waist to his, gripped her hips. His cock prodded her belly.
They had united so many times under the water, and her first instinct was to wrap her legs around him and let him pound her straight into a mind-shattering orgasm.
But she tore her mouth free. “I want to suck you.”
He paused, uncertain.
She curled her fingers around his hard length. “You’re going to love it so much. Trust me.”
He closed his eyes and thrust into her hand. So responsive, so much fun. Then he focused on her, iridescent threads in his irises gleaming silver amid the gray. “I trust.”
“Good.” She pressed kisses to his angular cheek, nibbled at his hard jaw until he groaned, and kissed down his dynamic wall of muscle until she knelt before him. His cock flexed in her hand, long and swirled with gray tattoos like the rest of his body, to the broader tip. She clenched the base nestled in gray and teased her tongue up the vein of the shaft to the sensitive head.
He made a sound and leaned forward, resting his hand on the wall above her head.
Nice.
Hazel stroked from stem to tip and back, then drew his head into her mouth.
He groaned louder.
Her pussy ached, throbbing with reaction to his guttural pleasure.
She wasn’t a porn star or anything, but she’d always tried hard and was a little proud of what she could do. She bobbed, slurping and sucking and stroking, coating him with their juices. He tasted like salt and heat, like the ocean before a storm, and his moans lashed the walls, bringing her to the rim of her sensual pleasure. He was almost there…almost there…
