“Merrow life debts do not work like that, my dear mermaid,” a strange merman says from the sea. He watches me from the shallows, his bronze hair like flames atop the cerulean sea. I’ve never seen him before, but right now I cannot care who he is or why he is here. The merman tilts his head and adds, “One cannot give life once it has already been claimed. One can only save a life before. Of course,Icould bring him back if you’d like—for a price.”
The memory pummels me in a cruel, relentless assault, wrenching tears from my eyes as I remember the worst day of my life with near-perfect clarity. Merrow life debts. Bargains.
A sorcerer who broke every promise he ever made.
Shit.
I have no reason to believe that rotten bastard now. Except I’m drowning. I’m drowning, and so is the fucking warlock who just cut me free from my noose. He saved my life. He saved amerrow’slife seconds before Mortem could claim it. Which means—
If Arion dies, I die too.
My tail thrashes through the water with an exhausting amount of effort. I chase after the warlock—after his sinking body and sagging wings—while salt water floods my mouth, burning my ears and nose as my heartbeat slows to a lethal rhythm.Beat.I stretch out my hand.Beat.My fingers barely graze his.Beat.I leverage my nails, wrapping them around his index finger before pulling myself closer, closer, even as I cut his skin and blood trickles between us. And suddenly—both confirmation and damnation—my own index finger sizzles. Sharp pain slices a thin line across the top. My blood spills the same as his.
Just as it did when I carved up his chest.
I wrap a hand around his and yank him upward.Stupid warlock.IfI can just get us out of here, if I can just tow us to the surface, I can undo this. I can repay his life debt and kill himthen. But his wings are too heavy, his body is too muscular, and I am not exactly at my strongest right now. My vision blackens one time too many today, and my heart rate slows further.
Fuck the consequences.
With my right hand wrapped firmly around Arion’s wrist, I use my left hand to bend the water.Bendit, not move through it. Merrow are made up of a million particles of water—a million particles of the goddess herself. And though time and war have eroded our seas and split our powers into four, I can still use what remains inside me of my home, of the Syl. I am not a siren. I am not a fervor or opacus either. I am anaecorian. I can manipulate the water to do my bidding.
My skin crackles with tantalizing electricity, and my bones submit to the magic building within. I swirl my wrist, and water ribbons tangle with my fingers as the Sel begins to churn.
I smile in spite of myself. In spite of, unfortunately, still dying.
Arion’s body crests toward the surface with newborn waves, dragging his massive, feathery wings behind him. If we make it out of this—andI can break the life debt—maybe I’ll strangle him with them.
Faster, I command the waters,faster.
My magic lifts him higher still, a platform of water pushing his body up, up,up. I follow quickly, my tail propelling me after him with brutal force. But before I can break us through the surface, before I can save us, kelp lashes out from somewhere below and ropes around my wrists.
Clams leap from the sandy depths and snap at my tail. A fin skims the surface, a mere mile away. Sharp, gray, nefarious—and headed straight for me.
My heart falls through my stomach. Darkness does more than claim my vision.
The sorcerer has found me.
Tears prick my eyes, and that hideous fear returns as the shark darts closer. This cannot be happening. A faraway part of my mindrefuses to accept it, the same part that agreed to the warlock’s wretched deal. A mistake. Always the same mistake, and I—I was supposed to have more time. I was supposed to get away, make a home for myself, behappy. Just for once. Just for one year, one month, even one day. I only ever wanted to be free. The kelp tightens like shackles, and I retch as it drags me deeper below.
I hope Arion and I drown first.
Death is preferable to what is coming for me now.
“Zephyra,” a strong, shuddering voice pulses through the Sel.“Zephyra, my dear, it is time to come home.”An icy phantom touch caresses my face, and I open my mouth on a silent scream.
His voice. His touch.
“I love you, Zephyra.”
No, no,no.
The shark plunges ahead. The clams nip and snap, and sharp pain slices me to my core with each bite. The kelp holds me prisoner. I can’t use my magic. I can’tfocus. I can’t… I can’t…
Arion awakens with a roar, as sudden as a thunderstorm, and he shoots a hand downward—towardme—and latches on to my kelp-wrapped wrists. His wings don’t sag anymore; they have begun to undulate while his magic electrifies the current around us. With a rough tug, he hauls me upward, into his arms.
“Time to come home,” that menacing voice echoes through the waters.
But Arion either doesn’t hear it or he doesn’t care about the looming threat. The greatest threat. He doesn’t care about the clams and kelp and shark either. Something dangerous builds inside him, beats hard against my side. His gaze flashes murder as he tears the kelp away, as he boils the clams from the inside out, incinerating them, shell and all.
