"A week?" I turned to look at him, and his face was closer than I expected—close enough that I could see the individual flecks of lighter color in his dark eyes, close enough that I could count his eyelashes if I wanted to. "You've been planning this for that long?"
"Since the moment you gave me the pearl." His voice was barely above a whisper, intimate in a way that made my chest tight. His pale fingers brushed against his hip, where the pouch containing my pearl still hung. "I knew then that I wanted to show you everything. Wanted to bring you into our world, make you part of it." His eyes held mine, dark and deep and endless. "Make you ours, Lily."
The words hung in the water between us, heavy with meaning I wasn't sure I understood. Make you ours. The claiming gesture. The ribbons they wore against their skin. I should have been afraid. Should have felt the familiar panic rising, the desperate need to flee from any alpha who wanted to claim me. Instead, I felt something else entirely. Something warm and wanting and terrifying in its intensity.
"Show me more." My voice came out breathless, trembling. "Show me everything you want to show me." Something flickered in Kaelan's dark eyes, satisfaction, maybe, or hunger, or something deeper and more dangerous. His hand pressed more firmly against my back, and he nodded once, sharp and decisive.
They took me deeper. The light faded as we descended, the golden shafts of sunlight thinning and weakening until they were nothing more than a faint glow above us. The water grew colder, the pressure building in ways that should have been uncomfortable but somehow weren't. The potion, I realized. It was protecting me from more than just drowning.
"Don't be afraid." Thane's voice was soft in the darkness, and I felt his hand squeeze mine reassuringly. His amber eyes seemed to glow slightly in the dim light, warm and comforting. "We would never take you anywhere dangerous. We would never let anything hurt you."
"I'm not afraid." It was true, I realized. With their hands on me, their bodies surrounding me, I couldn't find fear anywhere inside myself. Only wonder. Only anticipation. Only a desperate, aching need to see what came next.
Vale laughed, that silver-bell sound that made my heart stutter. "Good. Because this is going to be spectacular." We emerged from the darkness into light.
No, not light exactly. Bioluminescence. A cave that stretched out before us, every surface covered in creatures that glowed. Blue and green and purple, pulsing gently like heartbeats, painting the water with color and radiance. It was like swimming through a galaxy, like being surrounded by stars.
"Oh." The word was inadequate. Everything I could think of was inadequate. I turned in a slow circle, trying to take it all in, and felt tears prick at my eyes despite the water around me. "Oh, it's... I don't have words. I don't have words for how beautiful this is."
"You don't need words." Riven's voice was close to my ear, rough and warm, and I felt his arm wrap around my waist from behind, pulling me back against his massive chest. His heat was a contrast to the cool water, a solid anchor in the shifting light. "You don't need to say anything. Just feel it."
I leaned back into him without thinking, let my head rest against his shoulder, let my body relax into his hold. It felt natural. It felt right. Like I'd been doing this for years instead of minutes. Vale swam up to us, his silver hair trailing behind him, his iridescent tail flashing in the bioluminescent light. He reached out and touched my face again, his cool fingers tracingthe curve of my cheek, the line of my jaw, the corner of my mouth.
"May I?" His voice was softer than I'd heard it before, almost hesitant. His blue-green eyes searched mine. "There's something I've wanted to do since the moment I got my voice back."
I nodded, not trusting myself to speak. He leaned in and pressed his lips to my forehead. It wasn't the kiss I'd expected, wasn't heated or demanding or hungry. It was gentle. Reverent. A blessing more than a claim. His lips were cool and soft, and they lingered against my skin for a long moment before he pulled back.
"Thank you." His voice was thick with emotion, his sharp smile trembling at the edges. "Thank you, Lily. For waiting for us. For trusting us. For wanting us to stay."
Behind me, Riven's arms tightened. To my left, Thane drifted closer, his hand still in mine, his shoulder pressing against my arm. Somewhere in the darkness, I felt Kaelan's presence, his eyes on me, his attention as heavy and warm as a physical touch.
"How long does the potion last?" I asked, not because I wanted to leave—I never wanted to leave—but because I needed to know how much time I had. How much time we had.
"Eight hours." Kaelan's voice came from behind Vale, and then he was there, swimming into the light, his pale skin almost glowing in the bioluminescence. His dark eyes found mine, and I saw something fierce and tender in their depths. "Eight hours of breathing underwater. Eight hours of being in our world."
Eight hours. It seemed like forever and not nearly enough all at once.
"We should return you to the ship before it wears off." Kaelan's voice was reluctant, his jaw tight with something that looked like pain. His hand reached out and touched my hair, fingers threading through the wet strands with surprisinggentleness. "We don't want anyone to notice you're gone. Don't want to put you in danger."
"Not yet." The words burst out of me, desperate and wanting. "Please…not yet. Just a little longer. Show me more. Show me everything you can." They exchanged glances, those silent communications that spoke of centuries of knowing each other. Then Riven's arms tightened around me, and Kaelan nodded, and Thane's smile returned in full force, and Vale laughed with pure delight.
"As you wish, Lily." Vale's voice was silk and silver, wrapping around her name like a caress. "As you wish."
They showed me more.
They showed me schools of fish that moved like single organisms, thousands of individuals acting in perfect harmony. They showed me an octopus that changed colors as it watched us, flashing patterns of red and white and purple like it was trying to communicate. They showed me sea turtles gliding through the water with ancient grace, and rays that flew through the depths like underwater birds, and sharks—actual sharks—that circled at a distance, kept at bay by their presence.
Through all of it, they touched me. Constantly. Endlessly. Hands and tails and shoulders and arms, a never-ending circuit of contact that made my skin tingle and my heart race. Thane held my hand like he was afraid I'd float away. Riven kept me pressed against him like he couldn't bear any distance between us. Vale's fingers found excuses to touch my face, my hair, my shoulders. Kaelan's hand stayed on my back, a constant pressure, a steady anchor.
I should have felt crowded. Should have felt overwhelmed. Instead, I felt cherished. I felt wanted. I felt precious in a way that had nothing to do with my designation and everything to do with me, with who I was, with what I meant to them. I never wanted it to end. Eventually, the light above us began tofade, the golden shafts turning orange and then red and then disappearing entirely. Night was falling on the surface, and I'd been underwater for hours, and there was a ship up there with people who might notice my absence.
"We should take you back." Kaelan's voice was soft, reluctant, and I felt his hand press more firmly against my back as if he was trying to memorize the feeling. His dark eyes held mine with that intensity that made my breath catch. "Before it gets too late. Before anyone comes looking for you."
I wanted to protest. Wanted to demand more time, more wonders, more of this feeling that filled my chest until I thought I might burst.I nodded, because I knew he was right. Because the ship was still my prison, and I couldn't escape it, not yet. Not until I figured out where to go, what to do, how to build a life that didn't involve hiding.
They swam me back toward the surface, rising slowly through the darkening water. The pressure eased. The temperature warmed. And then we broke through into air, and I gasped—actually gasped, my lungs switching back to breathing air with a strange, lurching sensation that left me dizzy. The ship loomed above us, a dark shape against the star-filled sky. I could see the railing where I'd jumped, hours ago, a lifetime ago.
"Can you climb back up?" Thane's voice was worried, his amber eyes scanning the hull. His hand was still in mine, and he seemed reluctant to let go. "There's a rope ladder near the stern. We've seen the crew use it."
