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18

Archernar

“ H ey, it’s you!” Darias’s idiot son stumbled to a stop on his way toward me, looking visibly stunned.

My eardrums spasmed. He was as noisy as ever.

So, it was as I’d thought. He really had recognized me from my time disguised as a hotel employee in the Atlantic.

All I’d wanted was to keep an eye on the curse-resistant mermaid and take the trident she found before anyone else could. Neither Darias’s son nor his supposed ‘daughter’ should have spared me a second thought while I pretended to be human, but I didn’t have time to dwell on their apparent fixation with me.

Pure rage coursed through me as I turned, locking eyes with the one who had gotten between me and the Pacific’s trident.

Laverne .

As a sea lion, she should have been nothing more than prey to me, but never in all my days had anyone ever burrowed underneath my skin like she did. And I’d seen many days.

Every bit of my instincts urged me to lunge forward and devour her whole.

If it weren’t for my body’s resilience, her carelessness would have been the death of me. Because of her, I’d been dragged through hell, chewed up, and spit back out.

That testosterone-crazed sea lion’s bite had been bad enough, but turning into a cursed fish and struggling my way back to shore was enough to end any normal mer.

But not me.

As soon as her gaze landed on me, those round eyes widened. Her fur, which I recently discovered she could be forced to shed, bristled as though she thought she was staring down a corpse.

I was destined to be many things, but a corpse would never be one of them.

“You put me through quite the hassle back there, whiskers,” I heaved out, swiping the spit from my mouth from my sprint to intercept her. My other hand clutched onto the only scrap of clothing that managed to make it back to shore with me.

This confrontation was long overdue, and I couldn’t wait to show her the full extent of my wrath.

With the trident teetering on the edge of her mouth’s grasp, it seemed fortune was about to favor me. Soon, it would be mine.

She gasped. “Bradley?!”

Bradley, Bradley, Bradley. I could feel the blood pulsing in my temples every time she addressed me by that name.

It shouldn’t have mattered what she called me, yet something about her insistence on using that human alias set my teeth on edge.

Narrowly suppressing my anger, I kept my voice controlled, motioning to what she carried in her mouth. “Here, let me get that for you,” I said with a cheerful smile, momentarily leaning into my Bradley persona.

The trident was my sole objective here—not her, regardless of her persistent insistence otherwise. And now that it was within my reach, I could practically feel my youth being restored.

“You! You were dead.” Her fear was unmistakable as she shuffled back in the sand, her gaze focusing on where my false smile lingered. “I saw you die!”

Her other pursuers were still behind her, an entire herd of sea lions that had been temporarily knocked out and tossed across the shoreline by magic, and she was right to fear me over all of them.

My chest rose and fell with rapid breaths, my fake smile turning into a sneer that spread across my lips. Now that I’d been forced out in the open, there was no need to pretend to be anything other than who I truly was, was there?

“You sure about that?” I taunted, letting my voice drop to its usual, gravelly pitch.

“YES, I’m sure!” she shot back, her overconfidence rattling through my mind.

Feisty thing. I licked my lips, anticipating the taste of my victory over her as I took a step closer.

“Stay away from my Laverne!” Another voice pushed into my mind, a second sea lion asserting her presence.

“Mama?” Laverne seemed to take immediate notice, her eyes going even wider. I turned to see a larger sea lion on the beach behind me.

This new sea lion looked me up and down, her whiskers going flat as Darias’s son stepped in, positioning himself as a barrier between us. “Don’t worry, Charlene,” he quietly insisted. “I’ll handle this.”

“You’ll handle it.” My words dripped with sarcasm. “Of course you will,” I added with a laugh, turning my attention back to Laverne. The trident looked incredibly out of place in her mouth. Did she really think I’d let her claim it for her so-called brother?

Speaking of her brother, now that he’d spoken up, Darias’s idiot son finally seemed ready to react. He took off in a sprint, his footsteps thundering toward me to intervene, but I was quicker.

With a swift motion, I raised my free hand, showing him a preview of what I held in my possession. Just a glimpse.

“I’d reconsider getting any closer, Kai-Kai, ” I called over my shoulder. And although I’d casually used the nickname his sister affectionately called him, I was through pretending to be nice.

When he realized what I held, he skidded to a halt.

“D-don’t hurt her!” His eyebrows furrowed in panic, but then something changed. The muscles in his forearms tensed, and he lifted his hands. They balled into fists, his knuckles turning white from the pressure of his grip.

“Oh, Kai-Kai…” I shook my head, tsk ing in disapproval. He really thought his feeble fists could hurt me when nothing less than a god could ever take me down?

“Archernar!” The unexpected sound of my name being growled across the beach was like a symphony to my ears.

“What a rare treat,” I called back, my grin turning manic. When was the last time someone had addressed me by my given name? It must have been ages ago and before the curse was placed upon us. Well before I was stripped of my trident and began my search for its temporary replacement.

Though, technically, he hadn’t said it quite right.

“It’s King Archernar,” I corrected, momentarily turning my attention to the Atlantic’s current prince.

As of late, I’d had to keep myself hidden from him and all others who might have recognized me—though, admittedly, there weren’t many still alive who would. The other kingdoms weren’t stupid enough to venture into Southern territories without reason. And although Southern mers were highly sociable, we kept to our pods. It was unusual for us to venture outside of our clan’s home range.

Eamon’s son met my gaze with flared nostrils and a wild, unpredictable energy no different from any other Atlantic royalty of recent memory. His physical features had changed significantly since our last meeting, unlike my own.

How long had it been? Maybe five… maybe fifteen years? Either way, it hardly mattered. I wasn’t one to care about the passing of time.

“Me, address you as a king? Yeah, okay.” He scoffed, mirroring the same air of superiority as his father, a trait inherited from generations of Atlantic arrogance. “Is there anyone alive who still considers you their ruler, old man?”

Old… man?

Although his features were strained from the pain of using magic, it didn’t take away much of his insult’s sting.

I gritted my teeth, muttering under my breath. “Calm, Archer. Calm .” After centuries of living with my trident beside me, I had yet to exhibit the first signs of aging since having it taken from me. I still had time—there was nothing I had more of than time.

I was not and never would be old .

As the magic the Atlantic prince had summoned dissipated, his pained grimace relaxed into a smirk. “I suppose it’s not too hard to call yourself a king when you’re the only one left in your clan, is it?” he said, taunting me as I’d taunted his whiskered companion.

My teeth gnashed harder, and my muscles bulged as I fought to hold back my rage. It was true that many of the old clans had disappeared over time, replaced by new ones that preferred to govern themselves independently rather than having one central ruler. But that had been inevitable. A consequence of the passing of time.

The oceans were always changing, but not me. Never me .

It had been nearly twelve or maybe thirteen centuries since my clan had crowned me, and no one had ever been strong enough to overthrow me—no one. Of course, many of the old clans had attempted to do so and had inevitably lost their lives trying.

Their names and faces had long faded from memory, and now, none remained in my home range, but that didn’t matter.

Even if the waters that I kept to were lonelier now than they once were, I was still the undisputed king of the Southern Ocean. Yet, out of the four other kingdoms, only the Pacific still consistently afforded me the respect that I deserved as the Southern Ocean’s ruler.

“I see you hold the same beliefs as the Atlantic’s current ruler,” I said lightly, biting back my rage.

Now, it was Eamon’s son gnashing his teeth.

It was a shame I hadn’t been able to steal the Atlantic’s trident from him before he’d impaled himself with it. Given the display he’d just put on, the magic it held could have been useful to me. But there was no use dwelling on it.

Once he was dead, there would be nothing stopping me from claiming that power for myself.

But that would have to wait. Now, I had more pressing matters. And thanks to his companion’s noisy chattering, my venture into the Atlantic’s territory hadn’t been for nothing. If they’d hoped to keep their plans and the trident’s location a secret, they shouldn’t have spoken of them so close to a Southern mer.

My hearing was exceptional, and there was no sound within miles that my ears couldn’t pick up on if I kept my focus.

When, during a late night heart-to-heart at the hotel, I’d discovered through Darias’s son’s shocked exclamations that the sea lions had taken the Pacific’s trident, it had only made sense for me to pursue it next.

Locating the sea lions in possession of the trident, however, had proven to be more challenging than expected. Thankfully, right when I’d been about to give up the search and move on to the Arctic, this noisy trio arrived at the scene and led me right to it.

“You’re King Archernar?” Darias’s son looked from me to his companions, his eyes filling with astonishment. “If that’s true… Lee, he is a king. There’s an entire section of the ruins dedicated to him!”

A swell of pride filled my chest. Maybe he wasn’t as dim-witted as I’d thought, although listening in on countless hours of him and his companion’s mindless conversations both here and in the Atlantic had me thinking otherwise.

“Yes, exactly,” I agreed. My legacy was carved into stone. I was, and forever would be, a king.

At my agreement, Darias’s son drew in a deep breath, his face flushing pink. His fists clenched into tight balls, poised for defense. “But even if you are the same king I’ve read about, I still won’t let you lay a hand on my sister.”

The larger sea lion’s eyes widened with interest. “Oh? He’s a king?”

“Hold on,” the current source of all my frustrations snapped, bringing my attention back to her. “You’re a KING? Bradley, is that true?”

She looked like she was trying to decide whether to faint at the news or to slap me because of it. For all I knew, she would end up doing both the moment I tried to pry the trident out of her mouth.

A grin twisted my lips. “Don’t be difficult, whiskers,” I coaxed. I was looking forward to seeing what other surprises she might throw at me.

Her whiskers immediately spread, a growl building deep in her throat.

“Be a good girl and give me the trident,” I continued, raising my hand once more to threaten her with what I held inside it. “Unless you want to see the surprise I’ve brought with me.”

She snorted, not letting her curiosity get the better of her. “As if I would ever give YOU the trident!”

The boldness of her refusal almost made me laugh. Almost. She was ferocious for prey, but one way or another, I’d get what I wanted from her.

My grin built into a smirk as I flexed my fingers. “If that’s your final decision?—”

“U-use the trident, Laverne!” The panicked command interrupted me as soon as Darias’s son realized what I was about to do. “Just think of something! Anything you could use against him!”

“ME?” My brain throbbed from the crack of Laverne’s voice stabbing into it.

Despite her ferocity, she was just a small and feeble sea lion. She couldn’t possibly?—

I ducked, my keen ears catching the whoosh of a plummeting object as soon as it started falling from the sky. I grinned as I dodged it, feeling the wind from its near-miss whipping through my hair.

However, my smile stalled when I peered down at the sand and realized what it was—a gray fish that had fallen from above.

It didn’t have a face.

“A fish? Is that the best you’ve got?” I taunted, straightening back to my full height. “I could hear it coming before it even?—”

Another one fell, then another, and another. An entire platoon of fish descended from the sky, each one bigger than the last, slapping into each other as they rained down on top of me.

Heat blossomed over my back as the first one struck me with a heavy thud that nearly knocked out all my breath. After a few more fish had hit me with stinging force, it was obvious my ears couldn’t keep up with where they were coming from next.

“Fucking fish? ” Eamon’s son called from a distance, and I couldn’t agree more.

She was mocking me, and I wasn’t about to let her get away with it.

The fish continued to pour down, their slippery bodies smacking against my exposed skin as I sprinted, tripping over them to reach Laverne and my next trident. When I finally made it, I didn’t think twice before opening my hand, revealing what I had been keeping concealed from her.

The downpour of fish ceased the moment her gaze focused onto it. Her eyes grew more prominent than I’d ever seen them, absorbing every ounce of her shock and fear. “But how?” she whispered.

I smirked as I stumbled a step closer, waving the flower I held in my hand. And what an interesting flower it was.

A moonflower , the sea lions called it.

“How did I get it?” My excitement surged, my voice rising in a feverish pitch as I watched her fur begin to shudder. “You must be dying to know, aren’t you? How this little flower could still be pulsing with life and magic, fully in bloom, while the others are long gone, decayed and withered under the sunlight.”

She didn’t bother answering—or perhaps she couldn’t. Her body contorted, and the fur that she wore sloughed off her shoulders to unveil a glimpse of the smooth skin underneath. I had to admit, the first time seeing her turn into a woman had thrown me, but now I was far more prepared.

“It’s all because of me,” I continued, momentarily drawn to the smooth dip of her collarbone that her newly separated fur didn’t quite cover. My hand holding the flower twitched as I traced the curve of it in my mind. “Because of my power and my vitality.” As I spoke, her legs came into view, the ones that had gripped my waist so tightly as she held me down. I stumbled. “My... body.”

My lips remained parted at that thought when I realized—I’d already missed it. The opportune moment I’d been waiting for, while she was still taken aback by her transformation, to seize the trident from her.

By the time I made my move for it, she’d already relinquished it from her mouth and thrown herself on top of it, wounding her arms around it as tightly as one could. “This is for Big Brother,” she yelled out, nearly burying her face in the sand. “Get back, scoundrel! I won’t let you have it!”

I clenched my teeth, not wanting to relive the scuffle we had in the grass the previous evening. Especially in my current condition. Neither of us were properly clothed, and we were in front of an audience.

Her thick fur slipped off her shoulders, sliding down her back where it piled over the sand. Without hesitation, I saw my chance and snatched it up.

Yes . It may not have been the trident, but it was exactly what I needed to get it from her. From what I’d seen last night, her fur was precious to her. I should have dug it up then to use against her, but I’d never thought she would have gotten the trident before I could.

When she looked up, those enormous eyes were now lined with silver and even more striking. Their depths glistened with fear and maybe something else as she realized I now had possession of her fur.

“Laverne!” Behind me, Darias’s son was back to sprinting, scrambling over fish to get to us, but he was too late. I had his sister’s fur, and I already planned to use it to get what I wanted from her.

A trade sounded simple enough. Surely, it was worth more to her than a trident.

But then her expression changed, and a flush spread across her cheeks, reaching all the way to where her silver hair began.

“You—you picked up my coat,” she whispered far too softly. Too shakily. She made no move to take her fur back or offer me the trident in return. Instead, she simply stared at my hand holding it, her eyes somehow growing wider with each passing moment.

Was this... adoration in her gaze? That didn’t make sense unless she was now taking on a persona of her own—like the one she’d used to trick the other sea lions.

Somewhere behind me, Darias’s son cried out his disappointment while the second sea lion let out a surprised gasp.

“Oh my goodness, I can’t believe it!” I heard the sea lion’s body flop over the sand in rapid bounces of excitement. “ My baby is married!”

I stared down at Laverne, my gaze shifting between her and the fur coat in my hand.

“... Excuse me?”

Did she just say her baby was married?