Chapter 4

ChapterFour

“Thank the goddess I got here in time,” Emerson growls. I can tell he is panicked, and I just want to tell him I’m okay. The pain is gone but everything is foggy as I try to wake up. “She was close to fucking dying.” Emerson’s voice echoes with his anger and worry, and I try to pull myself awake to calm him down. To tell him I’m okay.

“That siren bastard pulled me deep into the water to attempt to drown me, as he knew he couldn’t beat me in combat,” Lorenzo explains, protective anger marking his words too. He shouldn’t feel bad; he kept me alive when it was three against one and impressively so too. “He pulled me too deep to get back up after I killed him. I let you down by not keeping her safe.”

“No, brother,” Emerson replies, his voice a little calmer now as he must know I’m getting better, or he can sense I’m waking up. “You kept her alive, and I owe you. It’s my fault she is here at all. I should have never taken my eyes off her, even a second, and the fucking Siren King would never have had a chance to take her.”

I open my heavy eyelids and murmur to Emerson, “It’s not your fault.”

Emerson drops his forehead onto mine and takes a deep breath. I do too. “You scared me, Doe. I thought you were going to die on me there.”

“No, never,” I whisper back. “Death needs to work harder if it wants to take me.”

Emerson cups the back of my neck, his dark purple eyes staring deep into my soul. “Are you okay?”

I take a second to assess myself, and I notice that my shoulder still hurts, but it doesn’t feel anything like it did before. I still feel Emerson’s magic pressing into my skin, healing my infected blood and the cut. My arm is completely healed and doesn’t hurt at all. “Thank you for healing me. How do you still have magic? I can’t even get sparks out of my fingers.”

“Luck, but I only have about a quarter of my power here. I feel it being drained. But fuck, I need this,” Emerson answers, cupping my cheek and lifting my head so he can kiss me. I let myself fall into that kiss, needing him, needing this moment to just be in Emerson’s arms, where I feel the safest in the world, and feeling everything from him. My soul seems to sing with every kiss, and my skin burns for an entirely different reason as he groans, deepening the kiss, his hand tightening on my waist as I dig my hands into his soft hair.

Lorenzo clears his throat. “I hate to be the third wheel here, but we really don’t have time for this, and it’s too open in this place. We could be attacked any moment now. If you’re healed enough to be kissing, you can walk. We need to get out of here.”

Emerson growls playfully at his brother. “When you find your mate, I am going to enjoy interrupting you both at every chance I get.”

I pause.

“Mate?”

Emerson pauses too, realizing what he just said and admitted to. I’ve always suspected it since I heard and understood about fated mates. I think I’ve known since I was turned into a fae, because of how drawn I was to him, and my senses became so much more. I felt this connection between us, something laced into our souls, but I couldn’t accept it. I’m not sure I have accepted what it means. He was an enemy when we met, someone I thought could be nothing but an evil king sitting on a throne in the mountains, out of touch with the lives of a mortal like me. Now… I trust him more than anyone else in this world. Our souls are destined, we are destined. But knowing it and hearing it confirmed are two different things. Emerson strokes my arm with the back of his hand. “Yes, Calliophe Maryann Sprite. You’re my fated mate, and I’ve waited a long time to find you.”

I climb out of his lap, needing some space and a moment. “I can’t… not right now.”

Emerson doesn’t push me, and I’m thankful for it. Lorenzo looks like he wants to jump into the water to avoid us both right now.

Emerson changes the subject. “What did this to you? And how did you find each other?”

I quickly give him a brief explanation of everything that’s happened since I woke up as Lorenzo searches the bodies of the sirens, finding a small dagger and some more of the seaweed he used to heal me.

Lorenzo offers me the small dagger and gives Emerson the other long one he found, which he clips to his side. “We will need all the help we can get,” he says, carefully wrapping the seaweed in some cloth he found on one of the sirens.

I only just notice that Emerson is in the same clothing as Lorenzo and me, but goddess damn, he makes it look incredible. The leather is particularly tight, showing off his muscular shoulders and arms, his flat stomach, and muscular thighs. He has a cloak, and the scales on his chest are different, brushed with gold, which make mine seem plain in comparison. Emerson’s dark hair is brushed to the side in his mortal form, and some part of me misses seeing his monster form. He doesn’t have his wings, and I wonder if he can even call them here without the magic.

Emerson notices my wandering eyes, and his amused smile makes me frown and look away. Emerson walks to my side. “I don’t think there is anywhere safe, but I’m not being separated from you again.” He takes my hand, and things might be strange between us at the moment, with the new information we have never spoken about before, but I don’t let go. I need him close, too.

Lorenzo sighs at us both as we leave the siren bodies for the monsters and head back along the rocks to search for the others. “I heard that you took in Nerelyth as part of your court. Thank you.”

Emerson nods. “I didn’t do it just for you. She’s a strong ally to have in my court and at my side. She’ll make our court stronger. She is powerful and has many strengths of her own. The fact she is close to you only makes me certain that she can be trusted.”

“She can,” I agree. I take note of what he just said. “Our court?”

Emerson looks down at me, making sure I see how firm he is. “Yes, our court, if you want a place at my side. I would understand if you don’t. We can talk about this another time when you’re ready.”

“Technically, it can’t be her court until she makes the vow,” Lorenzo adds in from ahead of us, looking over his shoulder at me, his voice nothing but teasing.

I roll my eyes at him. “No one’s actually told me how to make the vow. How would I know it? I was mortal until recently.”

“I will tell you the words anytime you wish,” Emerson murmurs into my ear, sending shivers down my skin. I look up at him, my breath hitching.

Lorenzo dramatically, and loudly, sighs. “The third wheel here can scent these changes, and for the record, I’m uncomfortable.”

Emerson whacks his arm, and Lorenzo yelps, jumping out of the way. I laugh. “Technically, there’s four of us here.”

“Thank you. At least someone didn’t forget me. Bat asshole over here almost drowned me,” Posy chirps from Lorenzo’s pocket. “And I’m hungry.”

“I said I was sorry about that, but I got pulled in the water. I didn’t just go for a swim, Posy,” Lorenzo groans. “And I’ll find food soon. In case you haven’t noticed, we have other things to do. You’re unbelievably selfish!”

“I don’t care about a bat’s opinion of me,” Posy answers. The pair of them keep arguing like we aren’t in a cavern full of monsters. Honestly, they might scare the monsters off.

“Now I’m uncomfortable, for the record,” Emerson deadpans.

I chuckle, mostly as Lorenzo and Posy barely notice us as they bicker about the water. To me, it sounds like Lorenzo saved her life, but I’m not going to interrupt their argument to get abuse hurled my way. I lean my head on Emerson’s shoulder just for a moment, and he kisses the top of my head. “I’m so sorry about Louie. When we get out of here, we’ll save him and go into the Rift together and face anything we find there. We’ll get him back.”

“We could die here,” I sadly muse, “and Louie will never know I was trying to save him. That I never gave up. We don’t even know what is in the Rift.”

I quickly tell Emerson all about my dream. “So, there is more than just the thrones there now?”

I nod. “I think so. The kids… they are changing. Louie is changing and I feel like I have to get there soon, or he won’t be able to come back.”

Lorenzo and Posy have apparently stopped arguing as Lorenzo looks back. “When we go into the Rift, we’ll save what is left of him and deal with him back in our city.”

“No, you’re not coming with us,” Emerson firmly replies. “If I don’t come back, you’re the next in line for the throne. We both know Solandis wouldn’t be a good queen because of her temper.”

Lorenzo shakes his head. “It is my job to protect you, brother. You can’t demand I stay behind.”

“Sometimes I wonder if I’m your king at all, as we both know you won’t do as I ask either way,” Emerson says with a sigh.

“You love—”

Lorenzo is cut off by a loud, non-mortal wail. The wail echoes around the cavern, and it’s so high pitched it burns my ears. “What’s that noise?”

That doesn’t even sound like a normal monster. It sounds like a wail filled with water, like it’s drowning. With my sensitive hearing, I hear a female cry of pain, and all three of us start running at the same time towards the sound. After a few minutes of running, we find the wailing sound coming from a tunnel that’s big enough for us all to run through, even if Emerson has to duck his head. When we come out the other side, all of us pause as Zurine, Nerelyth, and Felix are on top of what looks like a giant jellyfish. But instead of smooth legs, this thing has legs with sharp tips leaking some kind of purple liquid on the ground, burning where it touches.

Lorenzo and Emerson look at each other, stepping closer to help, but the creature slams a leg right in front of us, blocking us off. Lorenzo and Emerson start chopping at the leg with their swords to get through, but it’s tough, and the leg doesn’t move. I step back so I can see the others, and I have to admire how they are all still standing on its back when the monster is throwing itself around like it’s insane. Zurine’s silver blonde hair reflects the light as she lifts a gold arrow from a quiver on her back, sliding it into a gold bow. Both Zurine and Nerelyth are in dark blue leathers matching my own, and they look badass.

“I need to hit its brain. Keep it still somehow!” Zurine demands.

Nerelyth and Felix nod, both of them moving to try different things. Nerelyth slams her hands down on the monster’s head, water flowing to her from every direction and wrapping around the creature, trying to hold it still. The creature is too strong and Nerelyth’s magic is too weak, and within moments she has to let the water fall as the creature breaks free.

“Fuck it, plan B,” Felix shouts, jumping off the monster and rolling to a stop on the ground. Felix roars, attracting the attention of the monster, which has a massive mouth full of sharp teeth, which it opens as it turns on Felix. As the monster goes to eat Felix, it goes still long enough for Zurine to fire an arrow straight down into its head. It wails in pain for a minute before collapsing in a puddle of goo and bones at their feet. Emerson and Lorenzo finally manage to cut through the leg, and we all slide through into the mess.

I rush over to Zurine and Nerelyth, both of them smiling brightly as they see me and open their arms. We slam into each other, and I sigh in relief. Nerelyth shakes slightly. “I’m so sorry my father did this to you.”

I lean back, letting go of Zurine for a moment. “No, it wasn’t your fault. But I think you’re both completely insane coming in here for me, knowing what this place is.”

Zurine raises an eyebrow. “Would you leave us in here, if the roles were reversed?”

I sigh. “No, not in a million years.” I look over at Felix, who seems to sense my gaze and looks back at me. I nod in thanks, and he bows his head to me. Emerson follows the gaze to meet my eyes for a second before I turn back to my friends.

“I’m glad to see you well, but why do you have so much dried blood on you?” Zurine questions, and Nerelyth waits for the answer, too.

“I got attacked. Lorenzo found me and helped. Emerson healed me,” I say, rounding up an answer quickly. “We all need to get out of here alive, and I’m glad we are together. That’s the best way we can survive this.”

Nerry still has a guilty look in her eyes, and I take her hand, linking our fingers to comfort her.

“Why is Lorenzo arguing with the bat—” Zurine pauses as the ground beneath us starts to shake right before it just fades away. A scream rips out of my throat as I free-fall through the air, losing sight of everyone quickly. In the shock, my hand slipped from Nerelyth. My stomach feels like it’s in my chest as I continue to fall, what is left of the creature slamming into me every few seconds. “EMERSON!”

Suddenly someone crashes into me, pulling me against his hard body, and I wrap my arms around Emerson, burying my head into his neck. He shouts something to me, but I can’t hear him as we are pulled around, and instantaneously, we are plunged into freezing cold water. Emerson’s arm never moves from around my waist as I close my eyes and hold my breath. He holds me to his chest, and I open my stinging eyes after a while to look up at him. He stares down at me, a million emotions in his eyes. We both could die here, and I’ve never told him I love him. I’ve never told him I would search this world for him and destroy anyone in my way. That I want to be at his side, proudly, and face everything the world has to throw at us.

Mostly, I haven’t told Emerson that he was never a monster to me.

I don’t take my eyes off Emerson’s as we are getting pulled down and down, the water glowing around us. Even as my lungs begin to burn and even as darkness flickers into my vision, I tighten my grip on Emerson. We are not being parted. Not ever again. As everything starts to fade into blackness, we fall out of the water, and Emerson turns us so he lands first, slamming hard onto the ground with me on his chest, coughing out water.

“Breathe. I’m here,” Emerson commands, coughing himself. I suck in lungfuls of air for a few moments. “I believe that’s the second time I’ve saved you underwater.”

“True,” I reply around a cough, leaning against his warm chest, rubbing the salt water out of my eyes. “Why did it have to be a test in water? I can’t swim and my power is fire. I’m useless here.”

“You’re never useless, Doe,” Emerson murmurs. “But we are alone. The others have been separated from us.”

I look around the small soundless room we are in. The ceiling is made of still water where we fell out of, but as I look up, a wall of rock slams across it, cutting us off and pitching the room into darkness. Immediately, glowing blue water falls down three of the walls of the room. We both stand up as we look at the only wall without water. It’s smooth with square pieces of rock making a pattern. Each square has a word, but it’s a language I’ve never seen before.

Emerson lets me go to stare at the wall. “It’s a puzzle.”

“Can you read that?” I ask, hoping he can because otherwise we will be in the dark. We both stare at the puzzle, and I slide one of the squares to the side. They easily move around the wall.

“I’ve never seen this language before, and I’ve studied most of the languages of our world,” Emerson tightly replies, knowing what it means for us both.

I purse my lips. “Maybe it’s the language the god of here speaks. How do we get out of here without being able to read this or fix the puzzle?”

“I don’t know,” he replies, gritting his teeth. “We—”

He stops mid-sentence as the surrounding walls rumble and move in closer. Walking closer to the wall, I look through the water to see sharp spikes smothering the wall. “There are spikes on the walls under the water. The longer we take to complete the puzzle… I think the walls are going to close in and rip us apart.”

Emerson growls, shadows darkening in the room. “I won’t let that happen to you.”

I go back, placing my hand on his arm. “We should try to do this the easy way first by figuring out the puzzle rather than pissing off the god that owns this place. It’s his test, and we have to pass it.”

Emerson’s eyes swirl as he looks down at me, but he lets his magic relax before we both go back to the puzzle and begin moving the pieces around. After sliding them around for a while, as the walls keep moving inwards, both of us get more frustrated. “This isn’t going to work. There has to be a way to read this.”

I push down the panic and fear in my chest, knowing I need to think. I look around the room. We’re missing something. There has to be a solution, or it would be pointless. I look around the room once more, and there’s still nothing, but the water falls down. “The water!”

“What?” Emerson questions as I rush to the nearest moving wall, which is far too close, before stepping under the falling water close to the wall. I flinch as I turn around, the spikes grazing my back over my clothes.

The water is warm, and it feels like pure magic, making me want to relax and forget that I’m in any danger, that Emerson is too. “Calliophe, focus!”

Hearing Emerson makes me snap out of it, wondering what in the goddess is wrong with me. I open my eyes and look at the puzzle, but I don’t see a strange language anymore. I can read the words, and they make a sentence. I step out of the water, but the puzzle pieces go back to the strange language. I frown and step back into the water, and they change back into words I can read.

“They make a sentence. I can read it when I’m under the water,” I shout at Emerson. “Move them how I tell you!”

Emerson listens as I show him where to move the blocks, and I try to ignore the spikes as they push into my skin, cutting through my clothes. Emerson tenses, no doubt sensing my pain. “Swap with me now!” he yells.

“No, just move the last two, and I can get out. You can heal me then; it’s not that bad,” I command, and surprisingly, he listens, even with every inch of him tense. As he moves the last block, the walls stop moving, and I fall out of the water. Emerson catches me, using his magic to heal my back as he kisses me softly. “Next time, I get hurt, not you.”

“I’m not agreeing to that,” I chuckle.

He shakes his head at me. “So stubborn, Doe.”

“Emerson, listen, I want to tell y—”

Suddenly, the door with the puzzle flips open, and we both stand and walk out into a tunnel, where I can see the main cavern room at the other side. I just hope the others have survived. They have to. I have a sinking feeling that first test was the easiest one, and it’s only going to get harder from here on out. I glance down at my wrist where the mark is, and the water within the necklace locket has gone down, leaving two thirds left.

Emerson wraps his arm around my waist as we head forward. “What did the puzzle say?”

I look into Emerson’s purple eyes. “All true love dies in the sea.”