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The suction cups along my tentacles peel from the bedrock. I drive myself downward into the current and follow Lotan into the fissure before he can disappear into the dark. Water compresses around my bulk as I descend. His armored head turns back when my shadow spreads across the ravine wall.

“The coastline doesn’t belong to my mother,” I project into the freezing current.

The soundwaves strike the stone walls and return as a deep vibration. I spread my tentacles through the narrow space, blocking part of Lotan’s path without pinning him against the rock.

The markings along my hide flare brighter as my temper breaks through the last of my restraint. Blue light spills across the ravine, catching on the serrated edges of his scales and the pale debris swirling between us.

I descend until only a short stretch of dark water separates us.

“It wasn’t my mother’s job to broker deals for the surface. I control the port. You will take the heated basin, Lotan.”

Lotan goes still, but he doesn’t retreat. For the first time since he emerged from the ravine, he stops behaving as though this negotiation is already his.

He shifts deeper into the fissure, putting more distance between us without surrendering his position.

“I will consider it once I feel the heat.” Lotan’s jagged voice rasps through the water. “But tread lightly, kraken. You are not the only ancient power who commands the deep.”

It isn’t agreement, but it is the first concession he has made.

Lotan melts away into the dark, and I emerge from the ravine. As I prepare myself for the journey home, a glowing flower draws my eye at the edge of the fissure. Its fleshy petals emit a steady neon-blue glow against the dark rock.

I pull it carefully from the stone. I can’t give Valerie the truth she deserves, not yet. The vow to my mother might no longer bind me now that Valerie is my claimed mate, but the fear of losing her keeps me silent. If I tell her that her home is still in danger, she might leave me before the bond can truly take root.

I tuck the stem safely into a pouch on my belt and turn back toward the fortress.

After the confrontation with Lotan, returning to the fortress should have been easy. Instead, it takes more out of me than I expected. I shed the bulk of my true form in the airlock. I change into a fresh suit and retrieve the waterproof canister I took to Saltweather.

My tentacles refuse to settle completely, and tension remains locked across my shoulders. The silence of the fortress does little to help.

I reach the residential wing, and I’ve yet to calm down.

I turn the corner and nearly collide with Valerie. She stops short, sliding slightly against the stone.

The warm scent of her shampoo reaches me before I can put any distance between us. Every instinct sharpened by the confrontation below immediately fixes on her. I want to close the gap, pull her against my chest, and bury my face in her neck until the aggression still riding through me finally quiets.

Instead, I keep my hands at my sides. I am still withholding the truth about Saltweather. I have no intention of using this bond to draw her closer until I can be completely truthful.

“Pardon me,” I state, taking a deliberate step backward.

Valerie blinks, caught off guard by the sterile formality. She doesn’t reach out. Instead, she pulls her shoulders back and settles into the same polite, composed posture she used when she first marched into my office. “Sigurd. Hello.”

“Valerie. I trust you are finding the accommodations adequate?” I ask. “How have you been?”

The question sounds absurd the moment it leaves my mouth. I’m speaking to my claimed mate as though she were a visiting shareholder.

Valerie hesitates at the sudden distance between us, then offers me a small, diplomatic smile.

“I’ve been fine,” she replies, her tone polite. “Your mother has actually been very welcoming.”

The lie is so blatant I almost laugh aloud. Solveig doesn’t welcome humans. She interrogates them until they either prove useful or leave.

“I doubt that very much,” I reply, my voice softening, “but I’m glad you’re comfortable.”

She looks tired and a little pale. The treatments in the medical bay have stabilized her lungs, but keeping her trapped here is still wrong. She belongs in the sun, surrounded by the coastal air of her town, not buried at the bottom of the ocean because of me.

I force my attention toward something I can actually fix.

“I spoke with your friends at the fish market,” I state, keeping my tone level. “The environment there remains undisturbed. However, Mrs. Ferreira threatened to gut me if I harmed you.”