The Vast and Brutal Sea: A Vicious Deep novel (The Vicious Deep) (22 page)

Maybe it’s watching myself die.

Maybe it’s the chill of the room or the painful pulse that runs through my body. But I can feel a change. I roll over on my side, sure that I’m not going to make it out of this room alive. Maybe I’m already dead.

I taste copper in my mouth and I spit it out. My tongue is dry and my lips are swollen.

In my hand is the Scepter of the Earth. I’m afraid to look at the end of it, but I force my eyes to open. The nautilus maid is gone. In her place is a tall coral the same shade of pink as her eyes. A lone fish is swimming in the shallows.

I hold my side where I saw myself get stabbed and replay the vision in my head. It couldn’t have been a vision because that’s not how my life is supposed to be. And then I think really hard about what another oracle—Lucine—showed me the time I watched her give Kurt the Trident of the Skies. She showed me the same thing. Me, dead, with a crown on my head.

Thalia’s words ring like a bell: killing an oracle is a curse.

And then I feel it. The ground is shaking, trembling like an earthquake. The quartz in my scepter lights up, and I know I’ve done it. I’ve released the Sleeping Giants.

The sensation is thrilling, pushing every thought of death out of my head. It is the lightning and current that flows through the earth. I hold my scepter horizontally, and the energy that flows through it is like ten shots of adrenaline in the chest. I could swim for miles, for days. I hold out my scepter, and a blast of light crashes into the wall, breaking it down.

I concentrate on pushing the lightning straight through the rock of the ceiling until it’s a single beam into the sky. The room is flooded white and the walls are crumbling around me, but I don’t care. I hold the beam as long as I can.

The island trembles all the way through. Pieces of stone break away from the ceiling. I have to get out of the chambers and find Nieve and Kurt. But I’m high on adrenaline and the power of the scepter. The ground is shaking so hard that it knocks me off balance and I fall forward, right on top of the pink coral.

That sobers me up.

Focus, Amada said. Focus.

I dive back into the main artery that leads to the tunnels and swim down. The shark guard is all gone. Instead three prongs wait for me, pointed right at my throat.

Kurt’s violet eyes glow fiercely; his mouth is an angry snarl.

My mind flashes to us fighting in the vision Chrysilla gave me. I shake it away because that can’t be how we end. Not after all we’ve been through.

Chunks of the island break off from the tunnels, and the hungry chatter of merrows echoes through them.

“You can’t go that way,” Kurt says, lowering his trident. “They’re coming for us.”

He swims along the base of the shaking island. The ground beneath us is also trembling, splitting like a hairline fracture across glass. First a nick, then with every shake, it keeps going and going.

When I don’t follow, Kurt turns around. “Please.”

This could be the worst idea I’ve had in a while, and I have a lot of bad ideas. But when Kurt gives me his back, I know he’s not worried that I’m going to skewer him. So I follow him where he leads, back to surface that is overgrown with vines and trees. It’s a part of Toliss where I’ve never been before. A waterfall breaks the landscape and rushes into a narrow stream full of multicolored fish. We trip over broken branches and scratch our legs on jagged rocks until we’re under then behind the waterfall. It’s relatively dry, and a hole in the ceiling of the cave provides some light.

“Why are you doing this?”

“I have to!”

I shield my eyes as birds take flight around us. “That’s a non-answer!”

But we keep running through the Toliss jungle, and I fluctuate between wanting to bash him in the face and hug it out like bros because he came back to me.

“Where are we going?” I shout as branches and boulders fall all around us. I duck out of the way as lightning strikes the ground near us and three trunks fall sideways, narrowly missing me. A few hours ago, I couldn’t get the quartz scepter to conjure any power, and now it’s made us target practice for the angry sky gods. Kurt’s screams get drowned out in the rumble of thunder, the ripping apart of solid rock.

“Kurt?”

He falls forward, flat on his face.

“What’s wrong?”

“She’s calling to me—” He grits his teeth and screams through it, clutching the Trident of the Skies. His unfiltered power blows through it in sparks of lightning. His breath is labored, like someone’s got their hands on his lungs.

“What do I do?”

He shakes his head and pushes himself up, like he’s wading through cement. “I have to go to her.”

“No!” I pull on his arm.

He wavers on his knees, gasping for air. He gulps it down and it sounds easier. He grabs my shoulder for support. “It’s like she’s squeezing my lungs.”

“She can do that?” I hope I’ve never seen Kurt complain about pain before. “As your friend, I’d like to point out that this is what we call an abusive relationship.”

“Lucine wants what’s best for me.” He leans on a tree trunk for support, pressing his hand to his chest like he’s making sure his heart is still beating.

“We have to get back to the others,” I say. “Shelly’ll know how to make it stop.”

“No. We have to finish this. Nieve has weaknesses just like everyone else.” He breathes normally again.

The sky is dark and so are our paths. We follow the light of our weapons and the animals that scatter away. I scream as I feel the ground fall beneath me. Kurt grabs on to me by the back of my harness and pulls me back. With one foot out to sea, I’m a step away from free falling off a cliff and into the crashing waves.

“Only way out is down,” I say.

And he goes, “Together.”

“On three,” I say, retracing our steps and getting ready to jump.

“Tristan, I’m sorry,” Kurt says.

The wind is screeching in a fury, bringing the sea over the cliff.

“One—” I say, but neither of us waits. We run, run, run, and then jump.

It feels so long since I’ve taken a dive. I’ve come a long way from Karel pushing me in the Vale of Tears. I tuck my head between my shoulders and straighten my legs.

But I don’t reach the sea.

Searing pain digs into my shoulders. Something warm runs down my chest and back. In the dark, I see a slick body and massive wings flying beside me. A sea dragon. It wasn’t the wind screeching; it was the sea dragons. Thick black talons grab Kurt by the shoulder and fly away. Talons, cutting me and dragging me away.

I scream, and as I feel my body being lifted into the sky, I know no one can hear me.

My body is cold. There’s a void that is getting bigger and bigger. It’s like losing a part of myself. I can feel a piece of me missing. Gone. The scepter is gone.

I try to lift my arms. Feel my chest. Move my legs.

Except I can’t move my legs.

I hold my breath and brace myself to look down. My vision is doubled and my temples pound. I lift my torso up and even that’s a challenge. The ground has stopped shaking, but I feel a wave of nausea hit me and I turn my face to the side and puke last night’s pizza.

When I see my tail, I could cry tears of joy that it’s there and I’m in one piece. I search the room and I must be dreaming because I see Adaro. His face is right in front of mine.

I shut my eyes to make his face go away and it does. When I open them again, I see Gwen. She presses something warm and smelly on my shoulders. I blink and she’s gone.

Off to the side, Kurt’s hands are chained against a wall. His blood is smeared all over his torso so that with my fuzzy vision, it looks like he’s wearing a shirt.

“Don’t say it,” Kurt says. He shuts his eyes and I picture him trying to retrace his steps to see what he could have done differently.

“Say what?” It hurts to talk.

“I told you so.”

“I didn’t say it, you did.”

He closes his eyes and leans his head back. “They’ve been coming in and out. Gwen healed you. She loves you. She won’t let Nieve kill you.”

The combinations of being without my scepter and the beatings I’ve taken have left me quiet. I did it. I killed the nautilus maid. I can feel the sleeping giants stirring awake. I signaled my army.

But I messed up badly. “How did we get here?”

“My father told me that if we follow our hearts to the very end, we’ll find what we’re looking for.”

I laugh and it hurts. “If what you’re looking for is death.”

“You don’t believe that.”

He’s right, I don’t.

“What made you change your mind?” I ask. “What made you come back?”

“Lucine herself.” Kurt lifts his legs and swallows the pain. “She told me to give the Trident of the Skies to the sea witch so we could be together in peace, away from all this. All I had to do was kill you myself. Now she has it anyway.”

I sit up like I’ve been set on fire. In the back of my head, I can see Kurt and me as mortal enemies. We can’t end up that way. Perhaps this is how it starts. Perhaps this is how it ends.

“Where was this when I was warning you, huh?” I could kick him. “We were together, Kurt. We were together from the beginning, through all of this. We watched your father die. And then you still went back to her.”

“Do you think I wanted this?” He leans forward, pulling on his chains. “I’ve spent my entire life doing what the king asked of me. Then I find that he’s—was—my father, and despite that, he chose you. Forgive me, Tristan, but that hurt me more than I’ll ever want to say. You have been in a land where time is unmoving, but it has only been a day of mine.”

Look at us, the mighty champions.

“Nieve promised me that my loved ones would be alive at the end of this,” he says. “And Lucine—I’ve loved her since I met her. When I was searching for vengeance for my parents’ deaths, she gave me a path. She gave me a reason to live for that was all consuming and wrong, but I wanted it. If she had told me to chop off my limbs and give them to her, I would have without question. Then she cast me aside because her mind isn’t right. I know that. When I saw her again, it was like she had never left me in the first place.”

“To be fair, you seemed to enjoy it,” I say, laughing.

He squints and gives me his cheek.

“The king was right,” he says, “in the end. You and I are not very different.”

I agree.

“Though now I have better hair.”

I point to my head. “This is your fault.”

“Tristan, why did you go to get the nautilus maid again?”

How do you change a future that seems to be laid out for you? Here I am, looking at my friend turned family turned enemy turned ally once again. He’s asking me to trust him. I’ve had too many misses with the trust thing recently. I never knew how much it would hurt to have someone betray me.

“Because I had to kill her.”

The fog lifts from my head when I say that.

“No one can do that.” He’s startled. “There’s a curse. If you kill an oracle, you’ll die a young king.”

“Well…I did. With the scepter.” I reach for a weapon that isn’t there and the emptiness grows tenfold. “She was in bad shape when I got to her. After you and Gwen came to get her—”

“That’s not why I went.” He looks away, ashamed. “Lucine told me to go to my father because he was dying. She told me to help Gwenivere rescue her sister oracle.” A bitter laugh leaves his lips and he looks to the hole in the ceiling. “Because you wanted her, that’s why. I’m such a fool.”

“Layla says it’s part of being a guy,” I say. “The fool thing. I don’t think she means that.”

Kurt nods. “I’m sure she does.”

“Thank you,” I tell him.

His brow creases. “What for?”

“For protecting her. From the sharks.”

The earth rumbles harder.

I shake my head. “You warned me that the people I love would get hurt.”

“It’s the best kind of way to hurt your enemy,” he says. “By taking away the things they love.”

“What does Nieve love?” I wonder aloud. “Besides her power.”

We say it together. “Her children.”

Steps echo outside our chamber prison. Kurt and I remain silent as Gwen comes back in. She ignores Kurt and touches the bloody gashes where the sea dragon grabbed me, and I scream bloody murder.

She flinches and looks me dead in the eyes. “You’re awake.”

“Gwen.” I take on a lighter tone. “Enjoying the weather?”

“You don’t have to put on a brave face,” she says.

“Is that what you’re doing?” I will her to look at me. “Because you don’t have to heal me. You can let me bleed out. I’ve been wondering lately what will happen to me when I die. You know, since I’m half human. Humans leave behind their bones, no matter how old they are. It’s the one thing that we have in common at the very end. But then there’s the fishy part of me. What if the bottom half of me washes away in little bubbles and from my waist up I’m all human bone? What if it’s the other way around?” I cough and laugh, making a terrible choking sound.

“Say something,” I whisper.

The white stone walls bounce my words back at me.
Say
something.

She squeezes the towel soaked with a green liquid. Then she throws it on the floor. The green ooze trickles from the broken shell bowl and spreads out like the Finger Lakes on a map.

“What would you have me say?” Gwen lowers her face to mine. “That I love you. That I love you so much I’d betray my family for you?”

She laughs a bitter laugh and turns away so I can’t see her. “We have worked too hard and too long to stop now. Don’t you see? Mother will bring our people together when we take over the land that once belonged to us.”

“That world doesn’t belong to you,” I say. I pull at my bindings, my joints screaming in pain. “Is that what you really want, or your mother?”

She traces her fingers on my face, down my neck and along where the cuts on my shoulder have started to scab. Her magic leaves a dirty trail on me, and I think I’d rather feel the pain.

“I don’t know what I want anymore,” she says softly. Then she turns around and leaves me, walking out into the dark corridors of the Toliss chambers.

“Gwen, don’t go,” I say. “Don’t go.”

“Leave her,” Kurt tells me.

She stops at the door, but she isn’t talking to me. She’s talking to someone out there, waiting in the hallway. “He’s ready.”

Leomaris walks in. It wasn’t Adaro I thought I saw; it was his father. His long hair is pulled back, and the thick golden band frames his forehead. He’s joined by a slender merman with a face that looks like a jigsaw puzzle of skins.

Leomaris raises his hand and the binding ropes loosen. My muscles are cramped and I fall hard on my face. They’re on me at once.

“Gwen!” I shout her name but she’s gone.

Leomaris and the merman pick me up and drag me out into the hallway.

“You’re making a mistake,” I tell the herald. “You can’t trust her.”

“I don’t have to trust her,” he tells me. “I can’t defeat her. No one can. Someone has to pay for my son’s death. That someone is you.”

They throw me in front of the great white throne where I first met my grandfather. Kurt falls beside me on his knees, his head bent forward. Wet strands of hair cover his face.

Then there’s Nieve flanked by Archer and Gwen. She smiles wide as a shark, her teeth a waiting trap. Her legs are covered with bright silver scales that look thick as armor, right down to the ankles where her slender feet touch the ground. Her crown is gilded gold with woven pearls as if they’re floating on her white hair.

The pool was once bright and laughing with mermaids singing and swimming. The paradise welcomed me to my life as a merman. Now there is only the smell of death. Merrows in clusters adding to the destruction. It’s gone, broken in half. The gash down the lake has created a connecting rush of water from the shore. It’s like a wrecking crew ripped out the lake and went straight for the sea, crushing the valley wall that used to block the surrounding trees. Now, that’s all demolished. From here, there’s a direct path where trees were crushed to mulch. The sea is dark and I squint my eyes for some sign that my army got my signal, that I wasn’t too late—

No, it wasn’t a wrecking crew that did this. Not even Nieve. Not the merrows. It was the Sleeping Giants. Well, wide awake now.

With a shove, I’m on my knees beside Kurt, facing the Silver Queen. The pieces of the trident are suspended in the air for her to take. Hands push our heads to the ground. My cheek presses against the top of her foot. She lifts my chin with her toes. Kicks me in the face.

First, she holds the Staff of Eternity. She twirls it between her hands like a baton. Her merrows holler and shout in a discordant chorus. Then she takes the Scepter of the Earth. My scepter. I tug on my ropes, summoning the energy that ran inside me moments ago, but it’s gone. She slides the handle into one of the openings of the staff. The core of the quartz lights up like a headlight shining in my face. I have to look away.

Then she takes the Trident of the Skies. She holds it alone first, raising it to the sky, pulling on the power of the heavens until it circles her in a shower of sparks. Kurt can’t look, but I force myself. I force myself to get angry. I force myself to hate.

Finally, she connects the missing piece. The lake of the Sea Court is full of stomping feet and shouts of victory.

Then she walks forward to face her merrows. She raises the trident into the sky and blocks out the sun.