She flexed her fingers, power crackling faintly in thewater around her. Ariel was missing. Triton was desperate. The prince was expecting a wide-eyed, innocent princess—but what he’d get was someone far more cunning.
With a dark laugh, Ursula slipped into the depths, her plan fully formed. By the time she surfaced, she would no longer be the outcast sister. She would be married to the prince and return to her throne as queen.
CHAPTER FIVE
The morning sun burned too brightly. Its golden light slanted through the high-arched windows of the palace halls, warming the polished stone floors beneath Eric’s boots. Outside, the sea stretched calm and endless. The waves were gentler than his thoughts as they rolled toward the shore in a steady rhythm.
Today was the day he was supposed to meet his future wife. He should have felt restless. He should have been preparing. Instead, Eric's mind drifted back toher—a woman who did not exist.
The dream had burrowed into him, lingering in ways he didn’t understand. He saw her face every time he closed his eyes. He felt the way she had looked at him—not with reverence, not with duty, but with challenge.
Those crystal blue eyes hadn't challenged him to live. They'd dared him to defy her. He wanted to laugh. He did, a low chuckle that was more desire than amusement.
For the first time in his life, Eric, the Prince of the Coastlands, had wanted something just for himself. It was a good thing his dream girl wasn’t real. Because if she had been, he would have seriously considered shirking his duties. That thought unsettled him more than any shipwreck ever could.
All of these duties to run the kingdom should have belonged to the king—his father. But the man hadn’t been a ruler in years. Eric liked to believe his father was grieving. The truth was he’d simply given up and then given in to his vices.
Five years ago, the queen had gone to sleep for the last time. The once-vibrant king had begun to rot from the inside out. Grief gave way to gambling. Guilt to gluttony. The crown remained on his father’s head, but the weight of it had shifted—onto Eric's back.
At an age when most young men were still finding their footing, Eric had been forced to wear his father's boots. He balanced the books while his father spent lavishly. He sat on the throne to resolve disputes between bickering merchants and land-hungry nobles.When the navy faltered, it was Eric who oversaw their patrol routes. He hadn’t even been of age to serve, but they'd handed him the reins of the military like the birthright it was instead of a burden.
And he had done it all. Without a word of complaint. Even as it cracked his spine and ground down his youth. Even when the council came to him with the treaty his father had signed, asking—no, expecting—him to marry a foreign princess he’d never met. A woman who wasn’t even human.
He’d said yes. Of course he’d said yes. Because Eric knew his duty. Because his kingdom came first. Because someone had to care.
But today...
Today, something shifted.
For the first time in his life, Eric, the Prince of the Coastlands, had wanted something just for himself. A selfish, reckless, impossible thing. A girl from a dream. A phantom with eyes like the sea and lips that tasted like freedom.
She'd breathed life back into his lungs. He hadn't been awake for it, but he'd been conscious of it. It was what his mind clung to as death squeezed him in its grip. What his heart listened to as it regained its rhythm.
She had been a phantom, maybe even a figment of his imagination. But she hadfelt so real.
A sharp, irritated voice from the corridor snapped him out of his thoughts. Eric turned toward the commotion just as Grimsby entered the chamber, pinching the bridge of his nose, his usual restraint clearly fraying. Behind him, a sea emissary followed.
Sebastian's hard crimson shell gleamed in the morning light, his bug-like eyes bulging, darting around the room. His clawed hands tapped out a quick, staccato rhythm against his own forearm, an anxious, impatientclick-click-click.
Eric had encountered sea folk many times before. They had free rein in the market, trading alongside humans, fae, and shifters alike. But there was something particularly animated about this creature.
Grimsby exhaled sharply, straightening his coat as he approached. “Your Highness, it seems we have a delay.”
Eric raised an eyebrow. “A delay?”
“The princess’s arrival has been… postponed.”
There was a beat of silence.
Eric knew he should feel annoyance. He should be irritated, should be concerned about what it meant for the alliance, should be wondering what message this sent—whether the Sea Kingdom was playing politics or simply being careless.
Instead—relief. It flooded through him beforehe could stop it, before he could remind himself of what was at stake, what was expected of him.
Maybe... maybe it wasn’t a slight. Maybe it wasn’t political maneuvering at all. Maybe it was the princess who was having second thoughts.
The idea bloomed quietly in his chest, lifting some of the heaviness he'd been carrying. Not because he wanted her to break the deal—they still needed this treaty. Because dream or not, he didn’t want to start his marriage by clinging to another woman in his thoughts. Even if that woman had only existed in the depths of a dream... or was it a memory?
He still wasn’t sure.
