Zephyra is dying.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
ZEPHYRA
Zephyra,” a silver-haired mermaid spits with utter contempt, “you’re looking rather atrocious.”
“Don’t lie, Vesper. You and I both know I always look fantastic.”
I meet the other mermaid’s frown with a beaming smile, pushing unruly waves from my face with a calm hand—though my heart beats furiously in my chest. Bile stings my tongue.Why is she here? How did she find me?My gaze flicks to her wrist, to the puckering scar that marks where she fell on her dagger. Because I pushed her. Because I needed to flee.
I don’t want to be the person I am. I don’t want people to die because of me.
That single scar is the only one that maims her otherwise smooth skin.
Vesper presses a bronzed trident to Gavriall’s slender throat. Her dark brown skin slick with water, her thick tail sparkling the same iridescence as her hair, she perches on the ground near the cavern’s entrance. She dragged Gavriall down to her by the silky tendrils of his hair, but she holds him there with the sharp tips of her trident. Blood wells from his flesh and trickles onto stone. I rub the sleep from my eyes—just to be sure this isn’t a nightmare—before standing.
Vesper’s navy gaze flicks to my shirt, to my legs, with a snarl of disgust. “Come here, or I’ll split open his throat.”
I blink, hoping it’s not as obvious when I glance around the chamber in search of another exit. Of course, there isn’t one. I swallow my rising fear, pushing it down as deep as I can send it. Fear won’t buy me time with Vesper. “What makes you think I care what you do to him?”
Her furious expression could be carved straight from stone. She tightens her grip on the trident, even though Gavriall grasps her wrist with panicked hands. He’s not stronger than a mermaid. Especially not a mermaid who is surrounded by the sea.
“What?But I—I just saved you,” Gavriall hastens to say with wild eyes. Unrestrained terror strangles his voice. “Let’s not encourage the mermaid; I’d rather keep my larynx right where it is. I’ve been told I have a very lovely throat,” he adds to Vesper, as if in hopes of this crucial achievement saving his life. She ignores him though; she’s here for me. That much is clear. I just don’t understand why.
“You think I don’t understand your traitorous nature? I know better thananyone else, Zephyra.”
I glance at the cavern’s entrance. Right beside her. Inches away. The current moves lazily, lapping at the rocks, and the silvered cord—the bond—shoots from my heart into the waters, so far away I can’t begin to guess where it ends. Arion is gone. Gavriall is about to be gutted. And Vesper—
Vesper is going to kill me.
I can’t reach the entrance without first reaching her. Vesper is agile. I’ve seen her shimmy up drainpipes, sprint across rooftops, sneak through a guard-infested city without anyone noticing. She is graceful and deadly, and I won’t have seconds before she hurtles that trident my way. Threatening Gavriall is a trap. She doesn’t expect me to save him. She expects me to run. And that is precisely when she’ll deal my killing blow.
“Why are you here?” I slide an inch away from her, toward the other side of the jagged hole. She anticipates the movement, matching me inch for inch with Gavriall gripped alongside her. “How did you even find me?”
She laughs at that. A dangerous cackle as venomous as an underwater serpent. “How do youthink? You’ve left a trail of bodies in your wake from Mortia to the isles to here. I followed the blood, and, lo and behold, there you were. Here youare.” And the way she says this—it’s as if she’s not talking about the isle imploding at all. It’s as if she’s talking about—
Mortem’s Temple.
Stavros.
The name cuts deep, and I shudder.You deserve everything coming to you, he said, and then he died.
“I’m sorry,” I tell her. “About Stavros. I didn’t know what they were going to do. He turned on me, Vesper, and they still—”
“Shut up!” Her scream rattles the stalactites. One breaks off and shatters at my feet. “Shut the fuck up!”
Her gaze darkens, deepens, while wrath sizzles on her skin. As though a storm has cracked open above her and lightning engulfs her. Engulfs us all. Gavriall pleads with silent eyes for me to do something, to save him, even as he claws at Vesper’s wrists. She ignores him. She probably doesn’t even feel it. I glance at her fresh scar again.
She’s had worse.
“I don’t want your fucking apologies. They mean nothing.Youmean nothing. I always knew you were bad news. I never liked you, and I never wanted you with us—you know that, don’t you?” Her trident slips in her anger, and the wound at Gavriall’s throat bleeds faster. He gags, undoubtedly feeling the sticky warmth pooling along his skin, and scrambles to kick her away. Vesper does not budge. “Eos…Eosbegged me to let you stay. She said you were lost. She said you were alone. She said we should be kind to you because there were ghosts in your eyes.” Tears trickle down Vesper’s cheeks as her tail lashes the ground. “I should have killed you then. I should have killed you the second I spotted that lock of pink hair slipping out of your goddess-damned wig. I thought you were a liability we could overcome, but you…” She shakes her head. “You’re worse than that. Youaredeath. It follows you around and does your bidding, and—and I’m not letting this happen again.”
Youaredeath.
I swallow hard, unable to speak. Tears clog my own throat, but she’s right; I don’t deserve them. Stavros is dead, and it is my fault. I shoved Vesper to the floor so I could get away, and I abandoned them to whatever cruel fate awaited. Jacin, Stavros, that entire isle—
I am death.
