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She tapped her chin as she considered the building. How had the Methians built such a thing underwater? And most importantly, why?

Tilting her head back, she squinted up toward the surface of the water. There were secrets here, and she wanted to discover them.

Mer explored the entire structure and continued on. She startled a little eel, who blinked at her with large eyes and a mouth gaping from its crevice.

“Sorry, my friend,” she whispered before moving on.

To her knowledge, eels didn’t live in freshwater. Then what was that one doing here? Perhaps there were freshwater eels as well? Mer hadn’t spent enough time in fresh water to know.

The water warmed, and large pink flowers grew from the rocky bottom, the lime-and-pale-pink leaves swaying lightly in the current.

Her nose wrinkled. A current... there wasn’t supposed to be a current in lakes, was there? She’d have to do research when she returned to the palace.

She followed the source of it, the ground tilting slightly upward. A blast of cold water hit her, causing her scales to rise and then it dissipated. She blinked and smacked her lips, tasting the water. That had been pure saltwater.

Chasing the source, she swam faster and halted as a massive stone wall rose from the lake bottom. It was black, porous, and pockmarked. Some holes were large enough that she could have stood inside. Movement caught her eye to the left. Mer squinted at the hole and drifted closer. The water grew hotter until Mer stopped, watching as the sand roiled in front of the wall, glistening iridescent water rising upward. Carefully, she reached toward the water and paused when she could get no closer. Mer snatched her hand back, gaping at her reddened palm.

The water had burned her.

She blinked at the bubbling sand once more.

A natural hot spring.

Another blast of frigid saltwater made its way through the wave of hot acrid water, and she froze as a pair of gleaming eyes met hers from one of the holes in the porous rocks. She stiffened when a pair of black-and-blue striped lips turned up into a smile.

Mer blinked and it was gone. She rubbed her eyes and squinted harder. Mer drifted as close as she could to the boiling water, searching the rock face for any sign of life.

Nothing.

She pushed back, feeling a little queasy from the heat, and shook her head.

Perhaps she’d imagined it all. Her attention moved to her arm, which still throbbed in pain. Perhaps her injury was causing her to hallucinate. She couldn’t ignore her dislocated shoulder anymore.

Mer turned her back to the wall and swam back toward the pavilion.

Her skin crawled, and a chill ran down her spine. She whipped around and scanned the wall once more. Someone was watching her, and it felt... sinister.

Chapter Thirty

MER

No monstersof the lake had revealed themselves to Mer.

Her uneasiness drifted away as her right arm had made itself known again. She couldn’t put off dealing with it any longer.

Taking a deep breath, she eyeballed her contraption. Mer had managed to tie a length of seaweed around her wrist one-handed. She dug her heels into the sand and leaned back, putting tension on her wounded shoulder. The seaweed stretched but held. If she pulled hard enough, her dislocated shoulder would go back into place. Pain sizzled up her arm, and her teeth gnashed together. It still wasn’t enough to put her shoulder back in.

More pressure.

Mer pulled harder, and much to her frustration, the seaweed popped from the soil, and she tumbled backward. She scowled at the spiderweb-like roots of the seaweed that floated through the water.

Well, that didn’t work very well.

She eyed the amphitheater over her shoulder with narrowed eyes. The columns were sturdy enough. If she rammed her shoulder into the stone, perhaps she could fix the dislocation.

Or make it significantly worse.

Mer sighed. It was time to return to the surface.