I blink at that, startled over again. Mostly because no one has ever asked my opinion before. I’ve given it, sure, but never because anyone particularly wanted it. Rather than admit as much, I say, “I can’t swim, Arion.”
Nowhestartles, blinking too. “You’re amermaid.”
“I mean, I can swim. It’s just not very smart for me to do so. Maybe you didn’t notice the vengeful clams and kelp”—I wave a hand toward the sea—“but I have my fair share of enemies. One in particular is… someone we need to avoid. Unless we want to be tortured within an inch of our lives.”
He rolls his eyes, unconcerned. “I am the world’s most powerful warlock—”
“Yes, and humble too. We’ve been over that.” My gaze drifts to the black whorls on his chest, and with another start, I realize they aren’t whorls at all. His veins have somehow blackened beneath his flesh.Weird.I shake my head. “Trust me, warlock. This is one person even you don’t want to dance with.”
He gazes at me in staunch refusal. “I need that heart.”
“And I’d love to sever our debt, but we shouldn’t linger in the ocean without any real direction…” My voice trails off, and I bite my lip, another memory hovering at the edge of my subconscious, waiting for me to look at it. Not a memory of him, this time. Not the sorcerer. Someone else. Someone I’ve tried very hard to forget.
Arion’s eyes narrow. “What is it? What are you thinking?”
“No one,” I say quickly, too quickly, before stumbling back a step. “I mean, nothing. I’m not thinking about anything.” As if I’ve cracked open storm doors, the memory rips through me with all the wicked intensity of a cyclone. I stumble another step. Trip and fall against the banister. The scars on my body scream with renewedagony, and Arion must feel it, because he advances after me, eyes still searching my face.
“What is it?” he demands.
“If we can find proof, we could take it to the Merrow Council,” Jacin says, hope burning bright in his emerald gaze. “We could stop sneaking around. We could be together.”
“How are we going to dig up proof of an ancient romantic union? That’s impossible.” I stroke a hand over his cheek, pressing kisses to his neck, his abdomen, his hand. He reaches up and runs a thumb over my lips. He is more certain than I’ve ever seen him, and, goddess—it makes him beautiful. I nip his finger, and he smirks, then rolls us over so he’s suddenly on top of me. His legs pin me to his bed. He smells like leather and wine, and he feels like heaven.
“Have you ever heard of the Illuminated Library, Zephyra?”
I force myself from the repressed memory, hands clenched tight around the banister. The stone cracks in my palm. Breaks. I almost lose my balance again, but Arion catches me with a strong hand around my waist. I throw myself out of his reach before his touch can brand me.
I’ve had enough of beautiful men.
“The Illuminated Library.” I stare at the sun’s reflection dancing on the ocean’s surface, trying to burn the mistakes from my mind. “They have records there. Ancient records.”
“In Lucia, yes.” Arion tilts his head, not quite understanding. “Lucius, God of Earth, employed record keepers before Mortem’s Fall. When war between land and sea waged, the record keepers locked themselves inside the library and perished with the key rather than allow enemies to abscond with our history.” He pauses his textbook explanation. “It’s basically a tomb now. Impenetrable and guarded by Lucia’s dryads.”
A tomb.I smile around the bitter emotions roiling through me, the cruel memories. Each feels like a slap to the face. “Abysses thrived before the Fall. If there are any true records of its location, they will be there.”
He ponders this for a moment, still seeming more suspicious than not. “How can we be sure?”
“Do you have any better ideas?”
“No,” he says reluctantly, scowling at his own turn of phrase. “However, you’re forgetting the part where the record keepers died, and no one has penetrated their library since—not with dryads at the door. We can’t just stroll up and ask them to let a mermaid and a warlock inside.”
“We’re not going toask,” I scoff, despite the familiar clamp of panic on my lungs, despite Jacin’s voice wrapping around my chest and squeezing. Because the warlock is wrong again; the library isn’t impenetrable. Though I force myself to breathe through the memories, to breathe and breathe andbreathe, it doesn’t matter. Some doors, once opened, cannot be closed again.
“Oh?” Arion asks coldly. “What do you suggest?”
He already knows the answer. I’m a liar and a thief, and I’m going to dowhateverit takes to rid myself of this warlock, this bond, this cage. “We’re going to break in, of course.”
“Impossible.”
“It’s not,” I admit softly. “I’ve done it before.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
ARION
What do you mean, you’ve done it before? No mortal has entered the Illuminated Library in five hundred years. The world would have heard about it.Iwould have heard about it.”
“I didn’t say it was a successful robbery.” Zephyra’s gaze fixes on the horizon, and she crosses her arms as if holding herself together through sheer force of will. The silvered cord burns between us, knotted around my wrists now. I don’t understand the implication.
