Page 27
He slanted a glare at Raggon, who suddenly felt every speck of sand and salt clinging to his filthy body. “Shadow of the Tide! For the love of the deeps, strive to be worthy as my girl’s consort!”
Raggon was quick to discover his meaning as luxurious fabric materialized over his skin—a black shirt appearing as if woven from the night itself, followed by an elegant brocade coat with gleaming satin trim and decorative silver clasps. Since the wild days of his banishment, he’d never looked—or smelled—so much like a prince. What was that smell? Sea lavender? Yeah… that was reserved only for Thessa.
Glancing up from these unusual duds, he stiffened under Poseidon’s glare. The Ruler of the Seas had grown into a formidable giant, his white hair gleaming under the moon. “I deem you man and wife! Now put on your crown and reclaim your castle for my daughter or I’ll make the seas so rough you’ll heave your guts over the gunwale every time you dare set your vessel upon my domain.”
Raggon couldn’t help his own answering laugh this time, even if it was tinged with wariness and astonishment. Man and wife? He’d promise anything if it meant taking Thessa home with him. “Aye, aye, sire.”
Poseidon let out an aggravated sigh and turned back to his daughter. His massive hand gently passed over her bedraggled appearance. The ripped, oversized shirt and damp robe transformed in a shimmer of seafoam, replaced by a flowing gown the color of the waters at sunset. Raggon’s breath caught in his throat. She was stunning—stunning like the first rays of dawn breaking over wild, uncharted isles. The golden fabric caught every stir of the breeze and danced with the same natural grace that had followed her from the waves.
Her father patted her smooth cheek affectionately, just as the deafening boom of cannon fire split the air, the sound rolling across the water like the wrath of ancient gods.
The earth erupted in a violent spray of sand and coral only twenty paces away. Raggon moved instinctively for Thessa to shield her from stinging sand.
Poseidon whipped around in the water, fixing his glare on the sleek warship with blood red sails that prowled along the horizon, black smoke curling from its cannons like malevolent fingers.
“Circe,” he growled low under his voice. “I’ll banish her to the Isles of Shadows, the farthest parts of the abyss. She won’t dare travel my waters again.” His stern countenance broke into a grin when he turned back to them. “My illness has rendered me useless for far too long—I’m ready for some fun…”
Thessa’s answering smile showed their family resemblance. Now Raggon could see why she adored her father. With a gesture of his trident, the sea rose up around him in a spiraling column, his ancient luminance fracturing through the water into a thousand rainbow prisms before collapsing back with a thunderous crash.
Poseidon had returned to the seas to take care of unfinished business.
“Thessa!” A willowy arm waved from the water, followed by the face of an ethereal beauty. Moonlight caught the scattered pearls woven through the mermaid’s raven tresses. “Sister! You’ve caught yourself a dashing human prince, have you?”
“Nephele!” Thessa cried out, rushing for the waves. “He was the one to catch me… in his ship’s net!”
“Hmmph!” Her sister arced backward with a playful splash. “That’s what we all say!”
Behind them, the sea around Circe’s ship suddenly darkened to an inky black. A massive whirlpool formed, dragging the vessel downward while Poseidon’s voice thundered across the waters in a sound that screeched through Raggon’s ears.
The ship spun faster and faster until it was swallowed completely by the churning darkness—banished to the Isles of Shadows in the deepest abyss.
The mermaids barely glanced at the spectacle, their expressions unchanged as the horizon cleared, all while his heart beat an uneven staccato. No wonder Circe and Scylla had waited for Poseidon’s illness to make their move. Such displays of their father’s power were as commonplace to his daughters as changing tides. He swallowed to ease the dryness in his throat.
“Well…” Nephele drifted languidly in the gentle swells, twirling a strand of her dark hair with a shrug. “I expect an invite to the castle… and a tiara to match!” Not waiting for an answer, Nephele’s tail flicked jeweled droplets into the air as she disappeared. Around her, half a dozen other mermaid sisters appeared just long enough to wave their farewell before slipping beneath the waves, leaving only ripples and echoing laughter behind.
“Shiver me bones! Fish folk gone!” Sterling squawked, flapping frantically past Raggon’s head in a blur of scattered feathers.
He twisted on his heel, his stomach clenching. Where was Tobias? Raggon practically tripped over his brother in his search. Tobias sat cross-legged on the sand, the copper wind whistler disassembled around him in a precise array of parts, his skilled fingers making minute adjustments to the intricate mechanism.
Raggon stared in shock, hands half-raised, since he was almost too afraid to believe this was real. His brother was no longer a dragon!
“You’ve got to admit,” Tobias said, tilting his head, “Your birthday gift came in handy… but there are a few things wrong with the resonance chamber.”
Raggon’s heart leaped about in a confused dance in his chest. “Tobias!”
His brother grinned and stood in one fluid motion, taller than Raggon by half a head, his lanky frame outlined against the shining sea. His face, usually animated with boyish amusement, now carried the shadow of his ordeal, but his warm brown eyes still crinkled at the corners. Unable to contain himself any longer, Raggon crashed into Tobias, his arms finding him in a bone-crushing embrace to assure himself that his brother was truly himself again.
“I thought I’d… lost you,” Raggon managed, his rough voice wouldn’t stop choking him.
Tobias thumped his back. “What? You didn’t want a dragon for a brother?”
For once, Raggon didn’t have it in him to joke. “How—how are you back?”
His brother’s face turned serious. “You should know better than anyone—the witch can’t contain our sylph magic! I could shift as soon the sea steel from the collar dropped off.” Tobias pulled back from their embrace, taking a deep breath that strangely reminded Raggon of the dragon getting ready to blow fire. “I became the monster she wanted to make me, but… our bloodline made me more powerful than she could possibly imagine. Everything I did after that became instinct.”
Raggon had guessed that, but… “How are you human again? We only have the power to shift to seafoam.”
“And collect our form when we land elsewhere.” His brother shrugged, the amusement dancing back in his eyes. “It’s easier to collect my human form after a shift.”
And so Tobias was back to normal? What else was their family capable of doing when put to the test? “I—I half expected you to roast me like a pig the next time I teased you about one of your inventions!”
“Ha! I’ll leave that to your new father-in-law,” Tobias’s voice took on a teasing edge. “Of course, I imagine his lectures will be nothing to what Morris can give you. He’s ready to hound you with sermons on impropriety and royal duty!”
“Morris?” Joy surged through Raggon at the confirmation that the old advisor had survived. “Where did the old duke wander off to?”
“The last I saw of him he was at the waterfall, setting up a ‘serviceable tea service’ fashioned from coconut shells.”
Raggon snickered at the far-fetched tale, energized by one thought—the man was alive! “I’d wager he’s attempting to civilize the wilderness one properly folded napkin at a time.”
His brother burst into full-throated laughter, the sound sweeping away the last of the draconic darkness that had clung to him.
Smiley was back!
Raggon turned, his breath catching at the sight of Thessa’s elegant profile in the moonlight—the curve of her cheek, the delicate shoulders and the rhythmic waves sweeping aside the coral gown to reveal enticing glimpses of her graceful legs.
After all this, his mermaid had legs! His mermaid—he could say that now. Poseidon had declared them man and wife! What did she say? She gazed back at him, her eyes reflecting the countless stars above, a softness in them reserved only for him. He waded after her. The foam still glittered over the waves with the lingering magical glimmer of her father’s visit. Each cool surge lapped against his ankles as he reached her.
“Clam?” he whispered, smiling at her. She returned the smile with a radiance of her own, causing his healed heart to perform backflips. “We can return to our homeland.”
“Yes! I suppose you need to learn how to be a prince again… well, a king.”
“I can’t do it without you,” he said. His hands entwined with hers. She was the one responsible for all this—everything bright in his life, including the racing of his heart… one that had no right to be beating. “Your father gave me his blessing, but… what do you say on the matter?”
“I didn’t bring you back to life to give you to anyone else.”
That was exactly what he wanted to hear!
“So… we’re stranded here together…” His thumb followed where his eyes had gone, caressing first her cheek before trailing down to the elegant curve of her neck, where he marveled at the softness of her skin. His fingers somehow got tangled up in all the silkiness of her hair. He pulled her closer, his voice dropping to a whisper against her ear, “on an island paradise, with nothing but time and moonlight and… each other… presently our ship’s laying on its side like a beached whale on the other side of the island unless your healing voice extends to fixing up our ride home?”
“No!” She let out a husky giggle. He’d never heard a better sound and unable to resist her a moment longer, he captured her lips with his own. The heat of her skin beneath his sent his senses reeling.
“Morris can perform the official nuptials,” he said after a breathless minute of never wanting to release her. “I’m not waiting until we reach the shores of Sylphoria…” Not a chance! “I’m bringing home my queen!” He scooped her up and spun her, relishing the feel of her against him, so alive, so free from the witch’s curses, so completely his. Her golden gown swirled like a sea-born spell around them, the fabric shimmering between two worlds—not fully of land nor ocean—but just as they were now, their delighted cry mingling with the crash of the waves and their joyous laughter.
They were interrupted by a pointed clearing of Tobias’s throat. “Hey, bilge-rat, on the matter of a ride… I think I can arrange a way home.”
Raggon set her down, still holding Thessa close. He turned in time to see his brother walking toward the water’s edge. Moonlight rippled across Tobias’s form, stretching and expanding. Glossy scales erupted across his skin, gleaming like polished obsidian, his silhouette distorting and growing until where his brother had stood now crouched a magnificent black dragon, powerful wings unfurled against the star-strewn sky.
Raggon’s mouth fell open in shock, a tangle of emotions warring within him—distrust, amazement, and pride all colliding at once. He stumbled back a half-step and glanced down at Thessa. “Did you know about this…?”
Thessa nodded, rising on tiptoe to press a gentle kiss to his cheek, her touch instantly steadying him. Her fingers traced a soothing path along his jaw, quickly coaxing a smile back to his shocked mouth. “Welcome back to the land of the living—life is about to get… extraordinary.”
“What are you waiting for?” a voice rumbled through the air like distant thunder, multi-toned and resonating with depth that no human throat could produce. Tobias’s new form carried both the dragon’s power and his brother’s good humor, laced heavily with mischief. “This is the best part of Circe’s curse!”
Loud squawking clashed with the sound of waves as Sterling swooped between them with a dramatic dive and barrel roll. “All aboard, ye landlubbers!”
Raggon’s hand squeezed Thessa’s, their fingers interlocking—their grip forged in fire and sea magic, their bond unbreakable.
The dragon lowered itself to the sand, wings partially extended in invitation. They were in for another adventure—but then again, with his mermaid at his side, the world of humans begged to be explored together.
His legs itched to walk with her beneath the ancient oak trees planted by his ancestors, to race with her along the sandy beach, and to surreptitiously tangle those lovely ankles with his beneath the royal dinner table… to get them through a long evening of Morris’ dry lectures on the sixteen sacred knots of maritime diplomacy, each more tedious than the last.
Raggon couldn’t believe his luck that he’d caught a mermaid with the power to heal more than his heart, his kingdom would thrive under her rule. He drank in her smiles and the dark eyes alive with the fire of her spirit. “Thessa, I’m craving the soothing tones of your sea-charmed lips—what lullabies can you sing to me?”
Her laugh rippled across the water with the silver moonlight. “Why, Shadow of the Tide, are you having trouble sleeping?” she whispered. “What would you have me sing? Songs of adventure, of worlds beyond the horizon?”
“As long as they’re sung by you,” he said, drawing her close, “I’ll follow your siren’s call anywhere.”
The End
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