“This is chaos,” I muttered under my breath.
“Happens every time.” Queen Peisinoe turned her dark eyes on me. “We will go to war in the end, as the stronger houses like Niveus and Neptunus support it, but first we must sit through this charade.” She sighed and reached for her husband’s hand.
My stomach clenched as I noticed the deadly veins had crept further down the king’s neck. My eyes shot to Finn, who was wearing his silver arm cuffs. When his dark gaze met mine across the room, it seemed filled with something—fear and...sadness.
“Silence!” King Neptunus’s cry rumbled through the room like a crashing wave. His ebony hair rippled behind him, and his golden tail glittered as he glided to the stage, holding a silver box.
My stomach dropped to the soles of my feet as my gaze snapped back to Finn. He had left his seat to follow his father to the circular stage, his eyes carefully avoiding mine.
No—it couldn’t be.
My breathing turned ragged. It had been in my room... We were supposed to open it together.
“Isn’t that your box?” Edward gripped my arm as King Neptunus raised it into the air. On its lid was the opaque black stone, a heart.
I nodded, my stomach too nauseated for words.
“My people, there is hope.” King Neptunus kept the box held high above his head for all to see, and Peisinoe, recognizing it, shot me a quizzical glance.
Panic clogged my mind as I watched the man who had caused my grandmother’s death present the box to the son whom I was now sure had helped him. I gripped the edge of our dais, afraid that if I didn’t hold on, I might collapse.
“My son has found one of the items of Poseidon’s Trinity.”
King Neptunus handed the box to Mr. Inegar, and he produced the silver key I remembered from the pawnshop. “He is a descendant of the god and will release the fragment of power.”
I swallowed. “Fragment of power.” I turned to Peisinoe. “What does he mean?”
“There’s an old legend,” Peisinoe whispered hurriedly. “When Poseidon stripped the Mer of their powers, he left a chance for them to reclaim them, usingA?tlanticus magic to store fragments of them in three items: a ring, a box, and a necklace. It’s said that when all three are reunited, the Mer’s full power will be restored.”
“Some of you have been whispering about me, saying I may not be of sound mind.” A smile twitched King Neptunus’s lips as he scanned the room. “But just remember, when one-third of your powers are returned to you, the Neptunus Kingdom andmyson were responsible.”
“The poem,” Edward gasped from my other side. “‘When my artifacts are united in holy trinity, my people will reclaim their power, and my son, Mer Prince Kyano, will be free.’ But what does this have to do with Kyano?”
I didn’t care about the poem, Kyano, or this trinity. My world was fading in and out of focus as a dark mist consumed my subconscious. Finn had lied to me... and I’d let myself fall for him again.
On the speaker’s circle far below, Mr. Inegar handed Finn the key. He slid it into the box, which trembled in King Neptunus’s webbed hands. With a sudden jolt, a ripple of power erupted, undulating through the chamber like a shockwave. The force rolled through the water before sweeping into each Mer like a tide returning home.
The Mer in the room glowed beautifully for a moment, as if remembering something long forgotten. I leaned forward, mouth agape, as Proteusgasped, the fragment of magic pouring into his being. He slumped forward, then shot upright, shoulders thrown back.
A stillness hung over the chamber. The light faded, but something had changed. Power. The air was charged with it.
“Finn dragged me around the ocean looking for this... this box, when I could have been searching for the prophecy?” My throat was so dry that the words would barely come.
Peisinoe turned to me, kindness softening her dark eyes. “He needed you. He couldn’t have opened it without you. The legend says the box can only be unlocked when two descendants of the gods make love before it—a symbol of unity.”
The old man’s words from the church swam into my mind.The question remains: Can you do what needs to be done to open it?
Edward grabbed my hand. “Please don’t tell me you lay with him in front of the box?”
I clutched the stone dais, drawing breath after shuddering breath as my heart fractured into a million tiny pieces, each sharp and slicing as they cascaded through my veins.
“Oh, good lord. You did, didn’t you?”
I ignored him, a storm of nausea, grief, and rage erupting inside me as the black mist rose to consume me. I fled from the chamber, shoving past Edward and the other Mer, the world a mess of blurry outlines in an all-consuming nothingness.
Behind me, a swell of movement and noise erupted as the crowd rose in cheers for the Neptunus royals still standing on the stage.
57
