The name alone was sedition. It implied parity between bloodlines. Unity between the Shallows and the Deep.
Everything his ancestors had fought a wretched, bloody war to exterminate. The legacy his father had died to preserve.
It was a trap more elegant than any he’d ever devised.
For if he acknowledged it, allowed such insanity to stand, and granted an exception, every ambitious, radical prick circling the edges of his authority would sense frailty. Weakness.
A chance to move against him.
But rejecting it?
It was to abhor the legitimacy of his own venom, marking the child.
Exhaling through his gills in a measured stream, Thalos looked upon Nyxarion with a new light. The Abyssari exile had summoned him to the mid-ground, where no other might see how the foundations of his authority had shivered and cracked. And for that, he supposed he owed the other a measure of gratitude.
A moment to explain what he’d come to say.
“Go on, then,” Thalos drawled, arms crossed over his chest.
Nyxarion laughed. A rich sound that rolled through the current. Unhurried. Thick with genuine amusement. Ever his opposite, Nyx spread his hands. Claws glinting, fins unfurled in a lethal display that made him appear twice his already monstrous breadth.
Posturing.
"I confess," Nyxarion said at length, his silver gaze alight with wicked mirth, "I'm not entirely certain you'll be willing to entertain this offer."
Lifting one brow, Thalos' jaw tightened.
"Pride can be… how did you word it? A cumbersome thing, yes?" The words dripped with exaggerated courtesy, each syllable a barb of his own condescending speech lobbed back in his face. “But, then…”
Rolling his shoulders, tail flicking in the depths, Nyx paused to savor his moment.
But it was only an instant. "She has quite the appetite for things she just shouldn't crave, doesn't she?"
For the space of three breaths, Thalos held that molten silver stare and did not blink.
And then… his lips twitched. Just a little. At the corner.
“You insufferable prick,” he drawled, huffing a quiet laugh through his nose. But he flicked his wrist, granting Nyx the point. “She does indeed,” he admitted, and moved to hook the pouch of sun clams at his hip. Heavy with irridescent shells, he pitched it through the water. Lobbed in a clean arc.
Catching it, nostrils flared, Nyx didn’t comment as he secured it to his belt.
An offer fit for aVireliiof the Hollow Court, gathered by his own hand. Mostly. For a Siren. A girl who wasn’t his, but belonged to neither and both at once.
He was tired.
Tongue clicking, Thalos said, “Get on with it. Make your offer, Korrides." Eyes slitted and narrow, Thalos’ lips twitched. Amused despite himself. "Convince me to dismantle my own seat of power for a Siren that isn’t mine.”
The current shifted.
Nyxarion's mirth grew sharp. Hardening into something cutting and wicked. "You swore a blood oath to survive the Crucible of Bone."
Thalos touched the scars glittering beneath his ribs.
"Nerissa's venom was given to repair mortal injury," Nyxarion continued, watching the path Thalos’ fingers took. “Her final song sung to lure you back from death’s tide. And in return, you swore to return Sirens to the sea.”
Flinching, scales rippling with an involuntary shimmer of silver, Thalos’ lip curled. “I am more aware of my oath than you are, Nyxarion. Make your point.”
"Kore's Covenant," the Abyssari king said, "this… Covenant of Twin Venoms. It has a certain kind of… merit."
