Prologue

Scythe

Twenty Years Ago

E ven the nose of a shark pup can sense blood has been spilled in this mansion.

A lot of it.

It's a warm summer's day, the week before I start primary school, when my dad takes me to see the beast he calls ‘the new king of the district'. He says there might be some sea snakes. He says there might be a room of gold like in the fairytales I like to read.

But there are neither of these things in this huge, cold place.

I have to crane my neck to see all of it as Dad and I walk up the circular drive, and I've surely never seen a house so big before, made of black stone, pillars as tall as trees, and snakes of different types carved in sharp relief around them. Dangerous guardians of a dangerous house.

"Keep your back straight," Dad says, smoothing a possessive hand down my long hair. "And remember to bow properly, like we practised."

"Will there be other kids inside?" I ask carefully. At this age, I've figured out that he doesn't tolerate certain questions.

He frowns as one of the tall front doors opens and a black-haired serpent comes out with a stern face. "Sure, son."

"Mr Fengari," the serpent says in a high, superior tone that tells me he's better than us. "His Majesty welcomes you to Serpent Court."

We go inside and sit on chairs made of a soft red material I've never seen before. The serpent returns with iced fizzy drinks and I gulp mine down greedily. The bubbles zip up my nose and I shake my head like my wolf mum sometimes does. Dad cuts me a dark look.

As I carefully put down my empty glass on the shiny wooden side table, a man and a woman enter the room.

Dad jumps to his feet, and I copy him, bowing low at the waist like we both practised at least twenty times in our living room at home.

"Your Majesty," Dad says in a slow, deliberate voice I've never heard him use. I instantly know he'll never cuss or threaten these people.

I straighten to look with interest upon the new King of the Serpents.

He's even taller than my dad, but where Dad is bulky, Mace Naga is built with lean muscle. He has black as night hair that brushes his shoulders, and dark, watchful eyes that see everything. My instincts tell me this is a beast who does not blink when he kills.

The woman next to him can only be his mate, because of how close he keeps her, except she doesn't look like a queen. She's milky pale, with watery blue eyes, and thin like a reed that could break easily. She also has a big, round belly with a hatchling inside.

It brings a smile to my face because that reminds me of my own baby brother.

"Mr Fengari," the king says, his voice deep and precise. "So, this is your precious, precious son." I stare at him and his thin lips curve into a smile, looking me up and down. He sees my silver hair, my blue eyes, my pale skin and, to my surprise, he finds it funny. "Well, he certainly has the look. Can he shift at this age?"

"Not yet, Your Majesty, but he doesn't drown neither."

I flinch at the memory of Dad's experiments with a bucket full of water in the garage.

"Do you see his beauty?" Dad continues, stepping close to me and stroking my hair. "The pretty silver?"

The pregnant woman smiles at me and says so softly it's like a whisper, "I see kindness in his eyes."

The serpent king glances at her the same way Dad looks at my mum when she says something silly.

"I wasn't expecting to see you, Your Majesty." Dad bows again to the woman, and I know he's nervous.

The pregnant lady smiles faintly. "When I heard?—"

"You will address her as Mrs Naga," the king interrupts regally.

Dad's neck flushes with a bit of pink. "Of course, Your Highness."

So she isn't the queen then. The Serpent King has to be like my dad, rex of his den. One of his other wives must be the queen.

"Come," the king says, gesturing to my dad. "Let us talk business."

They start to take their seats, but the woman steps forward. "May I take the little one for a stroll? Show him the flowering lotuses by the garden?"

This lady is different, I know that now. Her eyes are soft and playful, like a child's. Not heated and searching like the other women I've met.

"I want to go," I say earnestly. I've never seen ‘flowering lotuses'.

"Yes, yes," Dad says excitedly. "Take him for a spin."

I eagerly fall in step with the lady, and she leads me across the fancy tiled floor to an arched back door. It's beautiful outside, with a cool breeze that tickles the bright green ferns on either side of us. A neat path of stones leads through a garden bursting with green plants and flowers of white, purple, and yellow.

"Your eyes are like the sea," I say shyly.

She beams at me, making her look very young. "And your eyes are free."

It makes my heart pound for some reason, and I don't know why. We walk silently for a moment and absently she strokes her round belly. After a moment, she stops by a little pond, where pink flowers bloom like little princesses sunbaking. She points them out to me and I bend down to dip my fingers in the still water.

"I'm going to tell you a story," she says. "If you would like to hear it."

I nod eagerly, enamoured by this gentle woman who is so different from her rex. She belongs in quiet spaces surrounded by beauty and sunlight. Something to bring colour to her cheeks and joy into her eyes.

She smiles indulgently, before looking back out across the pond. Her voice takes on a much quieter, hushed melody. "There was a young princess, the last of her kind, who lived in a palace by the sea. And there was an ancient prince, the last of his kind, who had lived in his kingdom under the sea for a hundred years."

I can hardly breathe. "What was his name?" I whisper.

She swallows and says so quietly I have to lean in to hear it. "Eko. And he was a Greenland shark. They can live that long, you know, down in the cold, cold depths of the dark ocean. But they're often blind--little fishes eat away at their eyes. Eko was ancient and wise and he had his own type of magic that let him see. This magic allowed him to feel the moment his mate was ready for him. He travelled all the way from the cold waters into the southern warmer waters. The night he arrived upon those foreign, distant shores, the princess sensed something in the air."

Her voice takes on a new rhythm and her eyes are keen, like we're talking about a great secret.

"She wandered down to the beach near her home and saw, through the night, something lit up amongst the sand dunes. She followed that light—a pure, celestial thing that spoke to her very soul. Standing, with his feet kissed by the lapping ocean, was the prince of the sea, with her mating mark upon his neck. He took her hand, and together they sat upon the beach and spoke of their lives until the dawn sun appeared at the horizon.

"He returned to the sea, with a promise to return that night. They both returned as promised, and the next night, and the next. And so it went on, until the ancient prince started to become unwell. He began to see things that were not there, hear things that were not to be heard. The princess begged him to return to the water so he could be well again. He refused, saying that he would rather be mad and have her, than sane without her.

"But the princess couldn't stand the pain she saw in him, and with the power fate gave her, she forced Eko back to his home, with the promise that in one year, she would return to the same place on the sand. But the next year, the princess did not come to her appointed place. Prince Eko sat on the beach and waited and waited. But still she did not come. He sought her out as only an animus can seek out his regina and found her in her home. But she was not as happy to see him as he had hoped.

"‘You will always be of the sea,' she said. ‘And I will always be of the land. We can never be together, not in this life.' Though his heart protested, he knew it in his cold, Greenland bones that it was true. He would have stayed if she'd asked it of him. Would've stayed until the madness took him. But because she loved him, she let him go. And because he loved her, he accepted her wish. So, with a heavy heart, he left.

"But still that ancient prince returns to that same beach on the first full moon of every year in the hopes that he will catch a glimpse of his regina. And every year, that princess looks upon that same full moon and knows, just for that night, she and her mate gaze upon the same moon, and it is the one thing they can share."

I stare at her as she finishes the story. This woman knows things others do not. Things my dad can never understand. Things that in my heart, I feel deeply.

"Fate smiles at you," she whispers to me, placing a hand on her belly. "But she is also crying."