I huffed in frustration, bubbles in the steaming bath popping from my lips.
I thought of the captain and those kind honey eyes that he hid behind hard looks and orders. Was he afraid, wherever he was?
I sat up, leaning against the back of the tub. Tendrils of red covered my breasts and floated in the soapy water like rivulets of blood. With a deep breath, I steadied my thoughts. I needed answers, and it appeared those would come with meeting this siren ruler and figuring out what he wanted.
All rulers wanted something.
The water lost its heat as I devised a plan.
Nixie had laid out a dress made of lustrous green material for me. It was shorter than anything I’d worn before, hemmed just above the ankles and tied at the nape of the neck, leaving my arms bare. It was lovely. The material was light and swished as I made my way to the tall gold mirror in the bathing room, a table with brushes laid out beside it.
So human. So normal. Selecting one, I noticed the image of Nymphaea embossed in gold on the handle. Because like us, even they prayed to the Guardians. Or at least to one.
I worked the brush through my wet curls, uncertain who I was trying to impress.
Leaders were an unpredictable lot. I’d learned that firsthand in my father’s court. Though I’d encountered few, Vega had taught me that with nobility it was crucial to begin on sure footing. To be palatable at all costs. At which I had failed miserably at Highthorn.
Even so, I would follow these creatures’ lead in tone and manner. Patience wasn’t my forte, but it was necessary now more than ever.
“Are you ready for breakfast?” Nixie twittered from the doorway of her room, returning as promised.
I nodded a yes.
Ready as I could be.
We walked down an expansive hall, illuminated by the surface sun beaming through the latticed windows. I looked out over an entire world of life appearing and disappearing in metallics or splashes of rust-colored fins flicking in the cloudy water.
“Far better than any view on land, but I’m biased,” Nixie said, sharing the vista with me. I watched her cautiously as she drew near.
She was right. It was beautiful in its strange, saturnine way. Dark and cold as I read the North Elder Sea to be. But from this level, everything glowed in a soft green light and life shimmered everywhere, making itself known.
Creatures like Nixie swam in the distance, their bodies aglow in different pale shades as their legs, tightly together, propelled them.
We were so far away from everything I knew, in a castle beneath the sea. It was incredible but technically horrifying. Then why was I not absolutely petrified? In fact, something about this place felt oddly calming.
We proceeded through a towering archway marked by a hanging track of blue fabric and entered a room dominated by a long table made of glass. Seated at the center, I recognized Raylik, as Nixie called him, from the night before, with his hulking broad shoulders and muscles that rippled beneath his brown skin. He still wore only that small bit of red fabric around his waist.
The other being was positioned at the head of the table. He was more dressed, but his appearance far more unearthly. He ran a steady, finned hand through a wave of blue hair, long on top and sheared on the sides. His pale skin was imbued with a subtle blue tone and covered in intricate navy tattoos that swirled around his arms, up his chest, and faded into the white tunic that twisted over his shoulder.
The two sirens rose politely.
“Thank you for waiting for us,” Nixie said.
“Of course,” the blue siren at the head of the table answered with a charming smile. Then he bowed in my direction. “Thank you for being a guest at my table.”
So he was their leader. But he seemed so young. Surely, younger than me by a few years. His face was smooth and unlined, the dimples in his cheeks boyish.
I tipped my head in return, determined not to allow his unusual coloring to unsettle me. I needed to be strategic. Diplomatic. Even if my pulse was racing.
“Really, Hylos … a bow?” mocked another siren so stark-white he glowed like a full moon. He sailed through the room, dressed in a bright-yellow cloth wrapped low around his hips, similar in style to Raylik’s.
He sat and began picking fruit off a platter on the table.
“You can’t wait for our guest to be seated before you stuff your face?” Nixie sneered, gesturing with her chin to the open seats beside him and ushering me to join the table.
I sat, trying not to stare at the utter lack of color in his flesh and hair. Even his eyes seemed devoid of hue beneath his icy white lashes.
“Nix, darling, I am famished. She had us all waiting for—”
