Vellamere Palace buzzed with anticipation. The servants strung decorations, polished silverware, and made food look artfully not like food. It wasn’t often that the kingdom of Vantillios had cause for celebration, and the excitement was infectious to everyone but me.
Tonight, I would be expected to put on a display I’d spentnearly twenty-two years preparing for. I’d deny it if anyone asked, but my body was a hornet’s nest, humming with nerves. Now that Mae had kicked me out of the kitchen, I needed a new distraction. I needed to go to the ocean.
My bare feet sunk into the white-gold sand of the palace’s private beach as I marched towards the beckoning water. The day was only in its infancy, but the overcast sky promised rain. Some interpreted it as a good omen, but, considering what was in store for me, I had my reservations.
Without stopping, I shucked off the simple silk dress, discarding it near a rocky tidal pool that housed crabs, starfish and thickets of sea urchins.
As I made my way forward, small waves playfully tickled my calves and tried to lure me back to the shore. I kicked them away, in no mood for their games.
The prickle on the back of my neck told me I was being followed. But the guards would not stop me; they never did.
Ignoring their presence, I kept moving. As soon as the warm water skimmed my thighs, I dived in.
My legs bound together and flesh gave way to scale. The momentary discomfort of the transformation was a small price to pay for the unfettered bliss of gliding through the ocean and its mosaic of aquatic life. The rhythmic motion of my tail against the water brought me the kind of peace I could never find on land. An escape.
My iridescent gold tail propelled me forward as I swam above Vell’s Crown, the coral reef encircling all of Vantillios. An underwater garden alive with colors and textures.
A school of bright yellow fish scattered when they sensed me, hiding amongst branched coral. Curious, orange fish with black stripes peered out at me from the tentacles of a vivid pink sea anemone. Pale seahorses no bigger than my smallest finger flittered between a tangle of red seaweed and a patch of orangesponges. A stone-colored stingray with blue spots hovered above the sand near a purple starfish that looked like a thorny flower.
It was quiet—the only sound was my body moving through the water. But, no matter how far I swam, I couldn’t escape my thoughts.
I didn’t consider myself a dreamer. I kept my head on my shoulders, not in the clouds. But, on days like these, it was hard not to fantasize about swimming away. Escaping on an adventure like the heroines in the books I secretly read.
A fantasy was all it would ever be because escape was not an option. Not for me, nor for anyone who called Vantillios home.
An enchanted barrier wrapped itself around the kingdom to hold us all captive and prevent outsiders from getting in. Over the years, hundreds had tried and failed to break through the enchantment.
I sometimes wondered if the outside world still remembered us. It was impossible for Vantillios to forget the outside world when things were growing increasingly dire on this side of the barrier.
Not that I had anything to compare it to. The days of freedom and peaceful prosperity were bedtime stories that occasionally followed me into my dreams. This charmed existence of imprisonment was all I’d ever known.
There were those like Mae, who’d spent over two decades separated from their loved ones. Her son had been exploring the outside world when the curse fell. The pain of losing him ran deep. She’d never show it, of course, but I knew it was there. If I actually believed in birthday wishes, I might have asked for things to be different. For Mae and for me.
I was so lost in my own thoughts that I almost didn’t notice I was overlooking the undersea canyon separating the cursed from the free. Here, at the boundary of the enchantment, sat one of the many monuments they’d erected to commemorate lovedones who had been on the other side of the barrier when we were cursed.
Not far from where I floated stood a stone cenotaph inscribed with some of the names of those we had lost. It bore the epigraph, ‘May Vell guide you safe passage home.’
These monuments—cenotaphs, effigies, columns, all manner of stonework that could withstand the ocean currents—were found around the twelve islands that made up the kingdom of Vantillios. Even now, grief-stricken Mer would visit the monuments to mourn their lost loved ones as though they had died. Those loved ones could be right on the other side of the barrier, but the magic made it impossible to see.
As always, I tried to swim past the enchantment, but my body only ricocheted off the invisible barrier of the glorified fishbowl containing us. I’m sure it looked quite comical, but it fucking hurt—like crashing head first into a stone wall.
Rubbing my throbbing forehead, I squinted beyond the narrow walls of jagged rock stretching out in front of me. All I could see for miles was a craggy seabed with honeycombed boulders. In the distance, the occasional meandering fish was the only sign of life. High above me, the surface of the ocean gently undulated like a rippling turquoise sky.
It was another world. A world where silence reigned, serenity its consort.
Being confronted with the endless ocean was a reminder that there was still life out there somewhere, even if I couldn’t see it. When I was here, I could admit that I was aching to know what was beyond the barrier. Would the reality be much different from what I had created in my mind? I supposed I would never know.
Enough brooding—my guards had caught up with me. Nice enough males, but divine goddess they were slow. Not that guards needed to be all that fast; the barrier made threats fromoutside Vantillios impossible.
“I’d say today is a new record, Your Highness.” Deniz’s breathless voice was accompanied by tiny bubbles.
I snorted at the sight of the panting guards, releasing bubbles of my own. “Let’s go,” I announced with a clap. At the alarmed glances the two of them exchanged, I rolled my eyes. “You can both relax. I have no intention of rushing back.”
I couldn’t hide out here forever, but that didn’t mean I had to hurry home.
Chapter 2
I knew I would find him in the palace greenhouse.
