This was unreal. The halls, the ceiling, the critters. Mari had the hardest time believing that she was alive and not dead, sent to fishy heaven. The city was washed with a blue, aquatic glow, like their hidden sun was casting the most unique array of colors.
Ambrose had tried keeping her tied to his side, but had given up after only a couple of minutes—which was perfectly fine with her. She couldn’t see enough, fast enough. There was so many things that made her jaw drop, so many things that made her squirm, and so many things that made her want to run away.
The housing was probably one of the coolest things she had ever seen. Every house they passed looked exactly alike. Black marble pillars held up large estates. One house equaled a whole entire block. You could see everything that was going on inside, from the outside.
Most of the houses, though created with black marble, had a red inner glow. The light spilled onto the sandy ground a couple feet away from the edge of the house. Mari had never seen anything like it in her life. The first couple miles into the city were full of houses—which could actually be described as temples.
The farther they got into the city, the more active it became. The temples were replaced with sweeping structures that scraped the skies, towers taller than anything she had ever seen in her life. Mermaids—or Atlanteans, as Ambrose was urging her to call them—were everywhere. And they all looked different, which shocked her to no end.
Some were blonde, some were brunette. Some were redheaded and teal-head, purple-head, and blue-head. By the time they reached their actual destination, which was a huge-ass castle centered in the middle of the city, she could rightfully say that she had met the face of diversity.
The tails were all different, too. Not a single person had the same colored tail. They were like walking rainbows, she thought, staring at an Atlantean with a pink tail and purple spiked hair. Her eyes were just as unique—but as they met hers, offense entered them, then shock as they took in her figure.
She pressed tighter against Ambrose, quickly looking away from them.
Mari was completely, totally, utterly lost. She didn’t know their customs, their language. Sure, some spoke English, but she’d heard a few of them speaking a completely different language. It had been so beautiful, it brought tears to her eyes.
This set them apart even more. They weren’t cultured, she thought, eyeing them.
She had only seen three or four women on the streets the whole entire swim to the palace. Everyone else was either male or child. Did they keep their women locked up? She passed a quick glance at Ambrose and frowned.
She didn’t even know anything about Ambrose.
What had she learned from him on their journey? she asked herself. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. She had been too excited to see Atlantis that she hadn’t bothered to learn about it while they had the time.
She vaguely remembered that their government was a patriarchy, and that was it. Hell, she didn’t even know why Ambrose had been exiled in the first place.
“Hey,” she whispered, clutching him tightly. “I’m not going to be fed to sharks, am I?”
“No,” he whispered back, a gleam entering his eyes. “You’re getting fed to eels. They like the extra spice with the females. It makes the zap all that more powerful.”
She gasped, then slapped at his arm. “Ambrose, I’m serious here! I don’t even know why you were exiled—how do I know you aren’t going to the castle just to turn yourself in? What will happen to—me?” she asked, catching herself. Her heart stopped in her chest. For a second, she had almost said us.
Ambrose looked at her solemnly. “Nothing will happen to you. I’ll make Kai swear that if anything happens to me, you’ll be taken care of. Don’t worry, Mari. All will be well.”
Her face turned pink and she bit her lip worriedly. “What will happen to you?”
The man named Kai cast a dark look over his shoulder, looking her straight in the eye as if to tell her to shut up. She could understand why, but nonetheless she gave him a nasty look back. Guards were surrounding them like a mermaid-shield, and most likely listening to their conversation.
Ambrose gave her a silent look before twining his fingers through hers. A thrill rushed up her arm, stabbing her right in the heart. A fear unlike anything she had felt shot through her.
Was he preparing for something? Was there something he wasn’t telling her? What had he done, in the first place, to get him exiled? Mari had never really thought about it—she’d been to focused on all the adventure, on Ambrose himself.
What if he had killed someone? Was he a murderer, a rapist? A thief?
None of those felt right. He was too kind, too quiet. Ambrose was one of the nicest people she had ever met—besides beating the tuna out of his brother, Ambrose had made it his point to be nothing but considerate. Hell, she knew how he felt—like he wasn’t good enough, like he never would be.
What had happened to him?
She desperately wanted to ask him, but knew it would have to wait. It wasn’t safe to ask in front of the very people that had exiled him. The second they got some time alone, she was getting answers…and finishing what they had started at F-Inn. If he only had limited time, she was going to make the rest of his days the best she could.
Or…
An idea popped into her head, probably the dumbest she had ever had.
She had killed those Octopians with a flick of her finger, scared the ever loving shit out of them. What if she turned all possessed again? Would that scare his executioners into letting them go? The thought did not appeal to her at all.
She had had no control over her body or mind during those few minutes of possession. Killing something again? That also didn’t sound like the most appealing thing on the menu. But she couldn’t let Ambrose, a man that she desperately cared for, be killed because he wanted the best for her—and because he had come back for a dick brother.
Mari didn’t know what the fight had been about, but she had felt the fury wafting off of Ambrose. Whatever had happened between them, Erikos had done something to piss off her gentle merman so badly that he was willing to beat up blood—and Ambrose was incredibly loyal.
“We’re here.”
Kai’s voice brought her out of her thoughts and she was almost thankful for the distraction.
He turned around, facing her. God, but the man was huge. Not as tall as Deimos or Ambrose, but almost there. His hair was long and wavy, so blonde it almost matched hers. His eyes were stern, hard—completely black. It was unsettling, having straight black eyes stare at you as if you were nothing but an ant on the ground, but she managed to hold his gaze.
Ambrose tightened his fingers around hers and she drew comfort from it.
“Do not speak. Do not meet their eyes. Look indifferent. I’m not sure what you are, but you aren’t a god.” He drew a long, skeptical gaze down her tail, and she forced herself not to shift uncomfortably. “You might look like one, but you aren’t. It’s best the king not know this.”
Mari nodded, giving a sigh of relief when he turned back around.
“You’ll do fine,” Ambrose assured her, smiling.
Too bad she couldn’t smile back. Her nerves were running on a high that was making her jittery to the point of shaking. Even Ambrose, who was trying his best to calm her down, wasn’t doing a very good job.
“I’m going to find some way to stumble over my tail. Or, you know, blow something up with my godly powers,” she muttered as the sweeping door to the palace swung open. Air bubbles sprung from every direction, blocking her vision for a moment.
When they cleared, she forgot all about her worries.
Holy shit.
The place was the gothic version of The Little Mermaid. The room in front of her expanded about one hundred yards ahead. The marble was shining, imprinted, and black. Like the rest of the city. Except, laced through this black marble, there were gold streams that ran along the floor, all centering around a crimson symbol that was structured in the middle of the room.
Surrounding the rectangular room were marble pillars that were the same style as the floor she floated above. On each pillar, the same symbol that was imprinted on the ground was on the higher part of the marble, gold instead of red.
At the end of the spacious room was a throne so large it took her breath. The top of the chair, adorned with golden and crimson coloring, were two stone serpents. Their mouths were open, long tongues lashing out, with diamond fangs gleaming into the room. Their eyes were made of the reddest stone she had ever seen, and they glared at her from their dais. Long, detailed bodies were intertwined, both starting at opposite sides of the chair, and then meeting in the middle. Their necks, besides their feet, were the only body parts that were not bound together.
So fish worshipped serpents? Didn’t those things eat fish?
Mari concluded, right there, that Atlanteans were sadistic sons of bitches. She bet they held sacrifices to the Lochness Monster and came to the shore every eve to dance naked around a chicken with its head cut off.
She looked at Ambrose quickly, then stifled a laugh. She could see Ambrose doing that.
Definitely.
“The queen and I are retiring for tonight,” a deep voice called from the throne.
Deimos placed himself in front of her, blocking her vision. Ambrose was on one side of her, and a guard was on the other. All in all, she was caged in.
And she really didn’t like it.
She shoved at Deimos’s back, who growled at her warningly. “Move,” she hissed when he didn’t. “I want to see!”
“Mari,” Ambrose growled, squeezing her hand painfully. She was about to snap at him when she caught look on his face. “More than likely, you’ll get your chance. Stop drawing attention to yourself.”
He turned his gaze away from her dismissively, effectively silencing her.
Okay. Well. That was that, then, wasn’t it?
Kai’s voice echoed through the throne room. “We have a pressing issue, my lord.”
She heard the faint sigh, and then the king spoke. “I doubt it can be much more pressing than my bed.”
Mari held in a snort. Some king he was. Her chest puffed with pride. At least with Ambrose, she knew he would take care of every problem until the city was at peace, even if it meant no sleep and no “precious bed.”
Stupid old men, stupid fake kings, stupid Deimos who wouldn’t move.
“Actually, this concerns you more than the city.”
As if they had planned it, Deimos, Kai, and the surrounding guards all stepped back from Mari and Ambrose.
Finally, she could see the king!
And what a sad disappointment.
She had expected some large, hulking guy with a grey beard, pointed crown, and a trident, like Ariel’s dad or something. Instead, sitting on that elegant throne, was a thin old crone who didn’t even have a crown!
Unlike the rest of the citizens, they had on black robes that folded their way down to the floor. Only the tips of their tails peeked through the robes. The woman at his side was frail, smaller than he was. Her robes were charcoal, barely decipherable from the black that matched the man standing next to her. The tips of her violet fin peaked from underneath the silken looking robes, a darker shade of purple than the man beside her.
“Damn it,” she muttered, before slapping a hand over her mouth.
Kai shot her the most dangerous, life threatening glare she had ever gotten in her life.
Before she could apologize, though, the gasps from the throne drew her attention.
“What?” he demanded, his shout ringing throughout the room.
With surprising speed for an old man, the king shot to his feet, the little old lady at his side following suit.
“Guards!” the king shouted, stabbing a finger at Ambrose. “Take him! The Exiled One is not welcome here!”
None of them moved.
“You bastards, kill him!” Mari watched with alarm as the man’s face bulged with purple veins. The lady beside him also cast a worried glance, matching Mari’s concern.
Again, none of them made a move. She looked around her covertly, taking in the crossed arms and hard faces.
“If one of you don’t take this man into custody, you will all be labeled as traitors!” he roared, surging off of the dais. His finger shook with his fury, and the purple became more pronounced the closer he got.
Mari backed up a little. She didn’t know much about fish, but she imaged they got strokes just the same as humans did—and she really didn’t feel like having a waif of a man fall on her dead. She’d had enough death for one day, thank you very much.
Still, though, the man came even closer until he was standing right in front of Ambrose, and she had the feeling that Ambrose didn’t really give a crap that the man was spitting mad—literally.
He confirmed her thoughts when his thick hand wrapped around the frail wrist that was right in his face. Shivers went down Mari’s back when he spoke.
“How’s being king treating you, H’Sai? Taking a toll at all?”
“You’re a conspirator and a bastard!” the king said furiously, despite being locked in what she thought looked like a painful grip.
Ambrose sneered. “And you’re a lazy piece of work. You would rather sleep than take care of your people.”
“You would rather kill than let thrive!” H’Sai shot back, wrenching his hand away. She suspected that Ambrose let him—the man was so old and withered he looked like a waif in the large room. Hardly the powerful king that he should be, Mari thought, watching the interaction between the two.
Mari was lost. Ambrose didn’t seem like a conspirator at all—he was the most loyal and trustworthy man she had ever had the pleasure of knowing. She might not know about him, but she did know him. Just the way he had taken care of her and protected her was enough to assure her that he would never betray anyone.
“Men,” Kai cut it, placing himself between the two of them. “There is a woman in our presence—two, in fact,” he amended, bowing his head respectfully at the woman who had stayed back. She smiled gently in acknowledgment.
“As king, and former king, you should know how to take care of your affairs. Fighting it out like children is not how it is done. D’Mari,” Kai said, gesturing to her. “The guards will escort you to your quarters, which I have already had prepared for you.”
She frowned, barely noticing the way he had altered her name. “If you wouldn’t mind, I’d like to stay—“ He cut off her by waving a guard at her, who took her arm.
These people had a really bad touching problem, she thought as she tried to take her arm back. “You don’t have to do that—“
Deimos growled, baring his teeth at the guard. He swallowed, slowly loosening his hold. Mari patted Deimos's arm proudly while smiling smugly at the guard. She turned around, determined to stay and witness what would happen between Ambrose and H’Sai. She knew close to nothing about Ambrose, and this was the perfect time to learn.
“Mari, please,” Ambrose said quietly. “I’ll come to you when this is over.”
She almost denied him, but the look in his eyes made her stop. They were solemn, like he had accepted some terrible weight on his shoulders. And maybe, by engaging the king, he had.
Mari nodded slowly. “Fine,” she said, putting up a resigned façade.
She bid Deimos to follow her as the guards led her out.
Ambrose was silly if he actually thought she would listen to him.
As the doors began to close, she looked over her shoulder to see the three remaining men, Kai, Ambrose, and H’Sai, exit under one of the pillars that was two away from the throne on the right side. She quickly memorized which one it was, right as the doors closed fully behind them.