Page 8 of A Sea of Vows and Silence (The Naiads of Juile #3)

Cebrinne

M y sister spent the minutes of our coach ride unnaturally quiet.

Selena was generally chatty, even with those she didn’t know well.

But she’d brought a book instead, curling into the wall of the carriage and leaving me to deal with the unknown Naiad.

The man leaned arrogantly against the backrest with his ridiculous cloak pulled low as he played with his knife, the flicker of a smile twitching his mouth.

Usually, Selena was the one forced to endure the plight of a broody sister.

The air between them hovered, calm yet charged, and though I’d never been in the position, I felt like a child whose parents had suffered a fight and refused to speak.

So, I watched the forest and farmlands roll by instead, my fists curled on my lap, my head lulled by the crunch of the sanded road under the coach wheels outside.

When a male voice shattered the peaceful sound, I nearly jumped, then angled a narrow gaze at him.

“Do you always do what he expects you to?” Pheolix asked.

I rolled my eyes. Sent a glowering stare his way, ready to snap a retort that fell along the lines of, I have to, you simpleton. But he wasn’t facing me.

Selena blinked at the silence, realizing in the same moment that his words were aimed at her. She glanced up from her page. “Pardon?” she asked. “You’re referring to me?”

He didn’t answer, though his attention remained on Selena. Or, more appropriately, remained on the inside stitching of his hood, pointed in her direction .

Selena must have had the same thought. She scoffed. “Are you horribly disfigured or something?”

His mouth twitched again. “The opposite.”

“Well, I’ve seen your face before.” She flipped a page loudly. “I remember you. You may as well remove the hood.”

She knew him? I glanced at her, eyebrows raised.

Pheolix sighed loudly. “Most women buy me a drink before asking me to take off my clothes.” Selena’s jaw tightened, and even though he couldn't see her, his smirk grew. “The hood isn’t for you, though I’m flattered you think it is.”

“Who are you?” I cut in. “Thaan’s never mentioned a Pheolix.”

He ignored me, still trained on my sister. “So. Which part of me do you remember most?” The coach hit a small bump, and we all leaned slightly to the right to brace against it. Pheolix propped his arm along the backrest of his seat. When Selena didn't respond, he cleared his throat. “Can’t decide?”

She snorted, returning to her pages. “The words, jealous over being played at your own game, ring fairly clearly in my memory. The rest isn’t very memorable. You have a plain face, if I recall.”

I tried to place the sentence, but it was as foreign to me as he was.

I waited for Selena to catch my bewildered expression.

That’s what we usually did—toss covert glances back and forth, filling in gaps with questions and answers spoken by the subtle meeting of our eyes.

But her mouth hardened, her brows tightened, and she kept her gaze firmly rooted to the book she wasn’t even reading.

Pheolix clicked his tongue. “Upset that I called your transition a game? You should know that it’s all a game to him. A method of seeing who plays and who doesn’t. Who listens and who disobeys.”

She turned a page. “I think I made it clear in his office an hour ago that I don’t obey.”

The coach hit another bump. I thumped her thigh with the back of my hand, demanding she look at me, and she gave a small shake of her head .

Pheolix exhaled a breathy chuckle. “He expected you not to.” His eyes dropped to the book in Selena’s lap. “They fall in love in the end.”

Selena’s brows tightened, though she didn’t glance up. “Have you read it before?”

“No,” he sighed, leaning back. “That’s just what always happens.

She’s some plucky princess locked in a tower, and he’s a prince disguised as a peasant from an enemy kingdom that rescues her with nothing but his cleft chin and bulging biceps.

Cue a training subplot and traumatic backstories.

The world tries to keep them apart, but against all odds, their adorable love perseveres.

He ascends the throne, and they live happily ever after. Am I wrong?”

Eyes locked on her page, Selena’s scowl deepened.

My own lip curled as the Venus Sea carved into view.

The red cliffs hung lower here than they did at Laurier Palace.

Squat enough to find trails to climb down to the sand and sunbathe.

Pheolix tilted his head back, no doubt so he could see the water under his hood.

Mid-day in the month of Piscaa, the sun reflected brightly against the distant sea, and even the gray of the ocean sparkled.

I shifted in my seat, a sudden barrage of nervous bubbles in my belly, though I let the shell of my exterior harden, promising myself that however Selena had met the stupid Naiad, she’d tell me later when we were alone.

If we didn’t die.

“We’ll cast off here,” Pheolix said as though he were in charge, lighting a wick of agitation within me. “Then swim north, directly through the center of their territory. If you see one of them, do whatever you can to escape. Don’t try to fight.”

Selena didn’t even look at him. “Are you planning to swim while wearing that thing?”

He ignored her, standing before the coach completely came to a bumpy halt and swinging out the door in a smooth drop.

Selena finally met my eyes, and I widened mine at her, inviting an explanation.

But she just rolled her own in a look that clearly stated, I’ll tell you later.

Then unfolded herself from the bench, leaving her book on the cushion.

Alone in the coach, I pulled a crimson pill from the pouch of my skirt.

As small as a seed, coated in soft beeswax, it sat opaque in my palm, rolling down the track of my lifeline.

I tossed it into my mouth, then slid my fingers along my hip, ensuring the rest remained secure to my skin.

All thirteen of them, caught under the scalloped edges of scales I’d summoned to the surface.

My stomach heaved.

I thrust myself out before I could think about what I’d just swallowed.

Pheolix had already stalked to the water’s edge. We waited for our coach to turn a wide arc, leaving us on the beach, a soft cloud of dust unfurling behind its wheels.

Selena yanked the ties of her stays, letting her corset flap to the damp sand, once more eyeing Pheolix’s cloak. “What is it, wool? Be a shame if it drowned you.”

I gave an involuntary chuckle. My sister, well-read and brainy, rarely took that tone with anyone but me.

Whoever he was, he’d done something to offend her.

She generally didn’t hoard grudges either, but judging by how well I knew him, I was left to imagine he’d done something truly vexing. Long ago.

Pheolix flicked his neck-clasp open with a lazy thumb.

It dropped from his shoulders, leaving tanned skin and tattooed lines that spanned the length of his back in broad strokes, trailing his sides below his ribcage.

The pattern reminded me of something, though I couldn’t place what.

I couldn’t place his face, either, but I’d never been skilled at remembering faces. Or perhaps I’d never cared to.

His hair was a shade that straddled autumn leaves and fire, almost changing as his long strands caught the sunlight, his half-bun tugged loose from the breeze. Gray eyes glinted at us, cunning humor cutting through them. As though he saw more than he let on .

He loosened the top button of his pants, letting them hang open at his hips, and crossed his arms as we undressed.

Though nudity was a daily occurrence among Naiads, those who lived amid humans tended to avert their eyes in the moments between the shield of clothes and the one of water.

Pheolix appraised us both as he waited for our skirts to fall.

“It’s rude to stare,” Selena snapped.

“I know,” he said, his smile a fleeting thing. Half mystery, half taunt. Impish and wily, as though he’d tucked tricks and riddles away to use at his leisure. “I’m rude.”

I shed myself down to my underthings, leaving Selena to glare at him across the sand as I waded into the water first. Salt licked my skin, stroking my ire away.

Concealed under the waves, I pulled the rest off, molting skin until the deep bronze scales of my tail surfaced, muscles lengthening and firming down to my flukes, the tips of which burned orange.

“She’s touched,” Pheolix said. As though we were too stupid to understand what happened once our bodies connected to the water. “Let’s go.”

Selena’s feet splashed in behind me, ducking to loosen the delicate lace garment that stretched across her hips. “Get undressed, then. You’re the one still in pants.”

“Did you hear that?” Pheolix asked, turning to me. “Another fervid demand that I remove my clothes.” I shot him with a testy glance. He tsked, stepping into the water. “If you’re both so impatient to see me naked, you could have offered to help.”

We dove in, abandoning him in the surf.

He caught up quickly. Below the surface, we sliced through the water, the current rolling under us as waves crashed above.

The Venusian Sea was dark this time of year.

The rocky floor deep below held only hues of jagged black.

Strands of eerie light filtered down, disappearing before they touched the bottom.

As though the dark sea stole secrets from the wind and sun above .

In the dim water, Pheolix’s lean frame cut to the lead.

Something in the transition from human to Naiad always made males seem twice as long.

Scales and fins embellished a male’s arms and back, adding vibrance and bulk the way a male bird’s plumage decorates its body.

Selena would spout something about establishing dominance through color display and signaling strength and vigor to females if I mentioned it.

I wasn’t interested in discussing Naiad mating theories, so I left such topics alone.

Her eyes shifted over him. Mine did as well.

I’m not sure what it was like for ocean-born sirens who grew up in a saltwater Domus .

Like us, most of Thaan’s palace servants were human-born.

And though social Naiad laws determined it rude to comment on the shade of a tail, it was impossible not to be curious the first time you observed another Naiad enter the water.

Though the shine of his arm and back scales caught the eye, Pheolix’s tail was the bright color of cooled steel, a flash of blue along his flukes.

Not a Prizivac Vode.

Selena’s gaze flicked away, pretending she hadn’t looked. Her own tail stroked ahead, the iron-gray of it so stark it might have been black if not for the way it shone violet as she turned. Naiads often stared at her tail, though not as much as mine.

Other than my sister’s, I’d never seen another Prizivac’s tail. And though her coloring was rare, it was close enough to the average Naiad blue that most assumed she was simply unique until they caught sight of my own and learned we were twins.

Rumors from the south had drifted across Thaan’s servants that a coppertail lived in Sidra’s Domus .

A young female close to my age. But rumor also told her powers were limited.

That she was perhaps strong but unfit as future Videre .

Someone from a broken line of heirs. Skilled at incantation , maybe, like Selena was.

Or fluid-mapping. Healing, possibly. The Juile colony was known for their healers.

Whatever the coppertail’s failings were, Sidra hadn’t named her an heir. Videres would prefer a water-caller to safeguard their colony’s future. I knew because that’s what I was. A trap wrapped in bronze scales and water-calling blood, laid for a Videre I’d never met.

A pair of eyes cut through dark water in the distance then flitted away.

Not before a cold chill laced down my spiculae.

Nerves fired down my vertebrae, announcing that I’d just spotted a Naiad.

I slowed, searching for eyes in the shadows.

Pheolix flashed ahead. Selena sent me a glance that said hurry up , and we thrust forward.

I caught more eyes, there one moment, blinking out of sight the next. Slinking away into the dark to report to their monarch. We sped ahead. And then the flashes of eyes grew bolder, evolving into glints of tail and fin as we breached the innermost circle of their water.

A male chopped through our path, forcing us right. We ducked under him, racing to escape. Two more met us below, faces hard and unfriendly. Pheolix shoved the nearest one aside, granting us room to flee.

Sudden adrenaline hammered my heart against my chest. Selena hesitated, but I snatched her wrist, yanking her along with me. I glanced back for him, but Pheolix was already returning to take the lead.

The three males floated behind us, faces dazed.

It didn’t matter. We swam into a sudden wall of them, a wave of Naiads waiting ahead. Pheolix breached the surface to leap over them. Selena and I followed.

And then we landed back under. Right in the middle of a circle of sirens.

The Naiads we’d just leapt over closed in on our backs. The ones ahead pressed in. More came up from under us, pushing us to the feral waves above.

They had us surrounded.

Right where we wanted them.