The wave weavers bow before they swim away.
The water is still as glass. I bow my head before the King, even if I don’t want to, but I can feel his gaze cutting into me like a blade of ice.
“I have never felt more disappointed in you,” he says, his voice as frigid as the deep trenches.
“If I had stayed, my death was written,” I answer, lifting myeyes to meet his. “You let Maerina, Kalina, and your Queen treat me worse than a servant. They did what they wanted, and you allowed them to. There were times I barely survived.”
I’ve been poisoned more times than I can remember, and although there was no solid proof, I knew it was them.
“You’re alive, though, aren’t you? Our mercy kept you alive!” he roars, the water rippling around him. “Would you rather have shared your mother’s fate instead?”
My heart thrums against my ribs. “Is that what you call living?” I whisper, each word trembling with barely contained rage.
“Yes,” he spits. “Better than you deserve. You are cursed, and your very existence brings ruin to all who draw near.”
The weight of his hatred feels suffocating. For a heartbeat, I wonder if he ever really loved me… did he? I am his daughter, and despite everything, I once wanted to believe that. But that was long ago, a delusion I can no longer pretend is real.
“So why not just kill me, then?” I ask quietly, bitterness seeping into my tone. “You would have, wouldn’t you? You sent the wave weavers after me, and you ordered them to end me.”
His brows furrow. It’s only for an instant, but I see a flicker of confusion, though it’s gone as fast as it came.
“If killing you were the solution,” he says at last, “I would have done so the day you were born.”
His words cut deep, although by now I should be used to his callous dismissal.
My voice is a whisper when I answer him, “Then what do you want?”
He circles the cell, the shadows moving with him, his handsclasped behind his back. The currents stir, brushing against my arms like ghostly fingers. The water is murky and bitter down here.
“How much do you know of the curse you carry?”
“The so-called curse due to my dark scales? The curse that everyone speaks of, how I’m bad luck simply because I’m different? Yeah, I’ve heard about it all my life.”
He laughs humourlessly. “You are far worse than bad luck. Far more dangerous.” He looks at me with hatred again.
“Then why am I not bound?” I demand. “If I’m such a danger, why am I swimming freely in here? Surely, I can’t be that bad?”
A slow, serpentine smile curls his lips. “I don’t think you realise how it works. You can’t do anything from within here, and this curse shall end with you.”
“What do you mean?”
He stops, his expression turning grave before he looks away, as if debating if he should reply or not. “I think I can fill you in now; you deserve to know exactly what you’re responsible for. Long before these waters were ruled by a king, sea sirens lived in small pods scattered far from one another. There was once a sea siren who fell in love with a witch of the deep, but he betrayed her and chose another sea siren as his partner. The witch, cheated and broken, cursed her beloved, and with her dying breath, she laid her vengeance upon your ancestors, their iridescent scales turning as dark as lucid poison. Since that day, every firstborn of the betrayer’s bloodline who dared to fall in love has triggered the curse. The cursed sea sirens end up poisoning their beloved, just as your mother was poisoning me.”
I shake my head, unable to believe it. So, there’s an actual story behind this curse? “No. There’s no proof of that. Motherloved you; she would never have hurt you.”
He bares his teeth, eyes glinting like obsidian. “From the moment she first kissed me, her love began to rot me from within. Poison disguised as affection. I was dying long before she realised it.”
“No! Then she didn’t know, she truly loved you.”
“Oh, she knew of the curse. Don’t paint her as innocent!” he snarls. I open my mouth to reply when a sudden thought enters my mind, making an icy cold seep into my veins.
Is this true? A memory of Kai flashes in my mind: his gorgeous molten eyes, those perfect plump lips, his breath against my skin, as he leaned closer.
From the moment he first kissed me…
My heart twists.
“How can you be sure this isn’t just fear and superstition?” I plead, not wanting to believe it. Father’s eyes are shadowed, lost in thought.
