Fire (The Mermaid Legacy - Book 2) (27 page)

It took Pelagius only a few seconds to wake Dad, and when he woke it was as if he was still in mid-fight as he swirled away from us ending up crouched against a wall.

“It’s OK,Dad, it’s over.”

“What do you mean?”

I explained about the children and how they had put our enemies into somnus.

“Who is that?” I asked, pointing to the woman whose hair floated around her as she turned and drifted in the current.

Dad sighed. “That is Nasrin.”

“Your second in command from all those years ago?”

“Yes. She joined forces with Neith, that’s why he had such a huge army. If I’d known what she’d been plotting all these years, I would have hunted her down and tried to stop her ages ago.”

“I think all of us would have done something if we’d been more aware,” Merrick agreed.

“How long is the somnus going to last?”

“I chose to go into my somnus and that lasted a long time,” Pelagius answered. “I’m not sure how long their forced somnus will last.”

“Let’s put them in jail,” I suggested but Merrick shook his head.

“We don’t have things like jail underwater, it takes too many resources and too much energy to maintain, and anyway so few Oceanids ever need to be put in one.”

“Well, we can’t leave them all together like this, at the very least we need to separate them and get them as far away from each other as possible.”

“I also think we should find a holding place for Nasrin,” Dad chipped in. “I have a particular cave I’d like to reacquaint Nasrin with.” He left the group to go and tow her to the cave he had in mind.

We were organising the Oceanids so that those of the enemy that had belonged to their communities were taken home and kept there, and those we didn’t recognise would be taken to the far corners of the globe and placed in communities the Oceanids trusted.

We were still discussing the logistics of moving hundreds of sleeping Oceanids across open and dangerous waters when Dad reappeared, his face pale.

“She’s gone,” he told us.

“What!”

“That’s impossible,” Pelagius informed Dad “If she was in somnus she’ll not move for months.”

“Well, she’s not in the hall.”

We sent search parties all over Ferengren looking for Nasrin but there wasn’t a trace of her.

“How is this possible?” I asked Pelagius.

“It isn’t,” he replied, “unless…”

“Unless what?”

“Unless she had help from another Oceanid.”

“But the only Oceanids who are not in somnus are our Oceanids…” My heart skipped a beat as my mind skimmed the battle. Neith’s information about us had been pinpoint accurate, nothing like the rubbish we’d been feeding Cyan. He had lured us to Ferengren and very nearly succeeded in annihilating us, and he’d done it with insider information.

“There’s another spy,” I breathed.

Dad nodded. “There must be. Alexandra, I’ll take a contingent and hunt Nasrin down. She cannot be left unfound.”

I nodded “OK, good idea, she can’t have gotten far,” I replied, not realising that I wouldn’t see him for months as his search took him across the oceans and back again without a trace of her.

By the time the sun was at its fullest, almost all of Ferengren was deserted.

I said goodbye to the last of the pods who had come to The Haven’s aid and fought with us so bravely before drifting to the depths of Ferengren, tears melting into the water around me as I said goodbye to Mitra.

Merrick swam to me and took my hand.

“She was incredibly brave, a true queen.” He pulled me into his arms and kissed me gently. “Just like her rider.”

I rested my head on his chest as I took one last look at the yawning depths that held the best friend and greatest mentor I’d ever had.

Goodbye, Mitra. Thank you for all you’ve given me
.

I knew not to expect it but the absence of the mental nudge I’d grown so used to tore at my heart as I turned with Merrick and left Ferengren for good.

The days following the victory at Ferengren were a confusion of administration as on our return to The Haven we discovered that Aoi had taken Azura’s body and left.

As soon as we got back it seemed to naturally fall to me to organise teams of the Oceanids that chose to stay at The Haven to begin the clean-up, starting with food, supplies and sleeping arrangements.

The whole operation had taken several days, and in that time Merrick and I worked tirelessly, comforting those who had lost loved ones, finding willing parents for children whose families had been lost and dealing with the myriad of tiny but important issues that comes with housing and feeding hundreds of people.

The children worried me the most. Gone was their enthusiastic, joyful play and in the place of former laughter and smiles, their little faces seemed constantly creased in frowns and they spoke seriously of the problems we all faced.

“I don’t know how to get things back to the way they were.,” I told Merrick one evening after dinner. We were floating on the reed mats at the surface, gazing at the star-encrusted sky.

He flipped onto his stomach, slinging an arm across my midriff and pulling me to his side before kissing me.

I wriggled onto my side so that I could look him in the eye.

“Merrick, this is serious.”

He sighed. “I know, Alex, and that is half the problem, we’re all so serious. The truth is the battle changed all of us. We are different now and trying to get back to what we were is a wasted effort. We need to move forward to what we will be.”

“And what is that?”

“Well, that’s up to all of us to define isn’t it?”

I shrugged, thinking about what I wanted to be, where I wanted to be.

“What are you thinking?” he asked, propping his head up on one hand and running his hand from my shoulder down the length of my arm until it rested on my waist.

I smiled at him, relishing his touch.

“I was thinking about your question, and where I want to be.”

“And what is the answer?”

“ I want to be with you.” I gazed into his eyes, no longer afraid to let him see how much I adored him.

He beamed, pulling me closer to him.

“Well, that’s good news,” he replied huskily, his eyes lit with a hungry fire as he kissed me, “because otherwise I’d have to stalk you for the rest of your life.”

I laughed before sobering a little. “I just don’t know where I want to be with you.” His eyebrows shot up in surprise as I rushed to explain.

“I am so torn. I love the ocean, it feels like home, but every time I think about staying here I wonder how my mom is doing, how she’s coping without me. I think about how sad she must be…I came to the ocean to rescue you, and now that that is done I feel kind of…spare.”

He pulled me off the reed mat, holding me tight against his body as we slowly sank into the beautiful blue, spiralling gently as we went.

“Well, the world, including the ocean, is our oyster as the humans say. We can go back to your human life. I would have to enrol at school and stay in the bedroom next to yours…which would be kind of weird, but we could do it.” He grinned as I wrinkled my nose at the idea of going back to ordinary life…I’d changed so much I didn’t know how I would cope with ‘fitting in’ again.

“Or we could stay here and finish helping The Haven, and then explore the ocean…and maybe make this…” he kissed me, his tongue tracing the outline of my lips, “more official.” He grinned. “It’s up to you really.”

The murmured voices of the entire pod below us as they spilled over the edges of the arena interrupted our delicious discussion.

Pelagius waved us over.

“What’s going on?” I whispered to Merrick as we swam into the centre of the arena.

He looked as bewildered as I was. “No idea.”

“Merrick and Alexandra,” Pelagius began, floating slightly above the crowd. “Words cannot express how grateful we are for your bravery, courage and sacrifice. You led our people, Merrick through enduring great pain and overcoming massive obstacles, and Alexandra through leading our people so bravely through the fires of battle into victory.”

I blushed at the extravagant description of me.

“You have shown yourselves, despite your age, to hold the true qualities of leadership and it is for this reason that we humbly request you to be the King and Queen of The Haven.”

I had chosen a deep sapphire-blue gown, shot through with turquoise and emerald.. It swirled around me in the warm lazy water, imitating my hair as it drifted in the current, which was held out of my eyes by a few intricate plaits woven through with crystals and pearls.

As was the tradition, I waited in the centre of the arena, turning in a three hundred and sixty degree circle slowly as I waited for him.

The audience murmured around me as their eyes skimmed the breathtaking gown and otherworldly emerald green paste that had turned my whole body into a work of art.

I had no patience for their admiration today. There was only one person whose opinion mattered and he seemed to be taking a long time to arrive.

We’d had to wait out the full month until the next Full Moon Festival before this event and in that time we’d restored The Haven to its former glory and even added some additional elements that made life a little more practical.

It had taken me all of a few seconds to decide whether I would stay in The Haven with Merrick and help the Oceanids. My life on land had grown dreamily insubstantial and the need at The Haven was so great that it felt only natural to stay. Merrick was my breath, my sun, and the Oceanids my family.

I still missed mom, but for the most part Merrick and I were so busy sorting through the seemingly neverending tasks of restoring and running The Haven, that the little time we did have we spent alone ensconced in each other’s company.

He had officially asked me to be his life partner two weeks ago. We had been floating on the surface again, our arms wrapped around each other, gazing into each other’s eyes, when he’d whispered his dreams of our life together. Intimate whispers that still made my skin tingle with anticipation.

“Be mine, Alexandra?” he’d whispered, kissing me between each word.

The announcement of our coming union had been the catalyst that lifted the pall that still lingered over the inhabitants of The Haven. The children and adults alike had gone to great lengths to decorate The Haven in glittering sheaths of pearls, the brightest and most beautiful coral, and shoals of exquisite fish that flitted around like great flocks of butterflies.

Merrick swept from the sidelines of the arena up to me, his face alight with excitement and anticipation. As he wrapped his arms around me and pressed his forehead against mine, we swirled together, our clothing and hair melting into each other’s creating a private cocoon.

He smiled at me in the turquoise sun-dappled water, before dipping his head and kissing me until I was dizzy.

Terms