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T here was nothing in the darkest, deepest part of the sea but pressure. The kind that morphs a living thing into a grotesque, slanted version of itself.

And that was where my body lay. Under all that water. Moldering. Changing.

An unbankable heat hollowed out my stomach. It was not a heat like Theodore’s, gentle and warm as daylight. It was hellfire. It boiled my blood, scalded my veins. My sight was gone, my hearing muffled, and I was being emptied. Theodore was leaving me, one drop of glistening Gods’ blood at a time.

I’d never known the sea without his power stitched through me. I’d never known the sea with only my bond to Eusia lingering in my gut.

Theodore’s absence would bring me more than heartache. For awful things filled empty spaces. And it was in the darkest, deepest part of the sea that monsters were made.