Page 5 of Storm and Sea (Storm and Sea Saga #1)

A treus was thirteen . His father left exactly sixty-seven days ago. Summer was in full swing, and the seafloor was full of crustaceans that kept his stomach full. He wouldn’t taste the bitter tang of starvation for months to come, but he was already starved for something else. For company. For someone to talk to.

Atreus swam back and forth on the outskirts of the village, too nervous to go any closer and too lonely to go back to his tower. For the past two weeks, he’d been hiding behind stones near the villagers’ homes, picking up bits and pieces of their conversations. To hear the voices of other living creatures. The inflection of a laugh or the hum of a mother’s lullaby. Soon, it wasn’t enough. And now he swam circles on the outskirts of a family sand-hut home, reciting his opening lines.

“Hi, I’m Atreus, and I live on the island…” Too informal.

“Hello. I’m Atreus…” That made him about as interesting as a sea slug.

It needed to be perfect. If what his father said about the villagers was true, he only had one chance to change their minds. His father’s words rang in his head like a warning bell.

“Stay away from those Mer. They’ll likely stone you the moment they see you.”

“Why? Did I do something wrong?”

His father scoffed. “You exist. That’s reason enough.”

He never expanded more than that.

But sixty-seven and a half days of isolation broke through that barrier of fear. Now, he drifted outside the family home he’d watched for weeks—a mother, a father, and a boy. The boy was around Atreus’s age, maybe a little younger, and much smaller. Most of the Mer in this village were small, with Atreus already nearly the size of the adults at thirteen.

“You can do this,” he chanted, forcing himself closer to the home. “Just be polite.”

Atreus was behind the house when his nerves got the best of him, and he stopped.

I can’t do it.

He turned around, defeated, when he collided with a scaly body.

“Ouch!” a small voice yelped as Atreus’s bulk pushed him through the water.

“Sorry!” he said, helping the boy from the sand. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to. ”

It was the boy who lived in the house. Atreus recognized him right away. He didn’t look like the others.

“It’s okay,” he said, straightening his seaflax pants and picking up the long stick he used to herd the goatfish. When his eyes locked on Atreus, they widened. “You’re not Sireni ,” he said with a mix of awe and fear. “What are you?”

“I don’t know,” Atreus said honestly and bit his tongue.

He felt like an idiot. The lines he rehearsed died in his brain. He should introduce himself. How did that go again?

“Wanna help me gather the goatfish?” the boy asked, snapping him from internal panic.

Atreus nodded stupidly, his out-of-practice words uselessly trapped in his throat.

“Here, hold this. They listen better when I wave it around.” The boy handed Atreus a long, smooth staff made of seawood.

Before they reached the school of meandering goatfish, a figure dashed between them, shoving Atreus with unexpected force and yanking the staff from his grip.

The woman, her scales the same color as the boy—likely his mother—yanked her son close as if rescuing him from the jaws of a Great White. She was so alarmed that Atreus spun to see what was attacking them. It took him a moment to realize she was looking at him .

“What are you doing here?” she screeched, pushing her son away. “Get out of here! GO!” she shouted hysterically. Atreus backed away, arms raised in surrender. Her mouth set in a manic snarl, and he worried she would strike him with the staff.

“I—I wasn’t doing anything wrong.”

“You stay away from my son, away from this village, halfling mutt! Keep your Skraith away from us.”

As the unfamiliar words tumbled from her mouth, Atreus watched the boy’s slitted pupils constrict in alarm. He stared at Atreus as though seeing him for the first time. As though seeing a monster.

Atreus’s heart beat heavy in his chest, a sting of guilt eating away at his insides. Guilt for… he didn’t know what. He didn’t know what he did wrong, but he’d violated some rule, some law.

His crime?

He existed.

Atreus swam straight to his island, ran to the house, and buried himself under patchy blankets. He didn’t stop trembling for hours.

It was the first and last time he spoke to the Mer of the village.

Now, likely a decade later, Atreus stared into the fire, sleep impossible as the story of his isolation played over and over in his mind. The look of fear and disgust on the sirena’s face was palpable. And even worse, it reflected in the eyes of her son.

Halfling. Skraith.

To this day, Atreus didn’t know what those words meant. He’d never had another Mer to ask. But it was reason enough for him never to approach the Mer village again, even when he was only days away from starvation. He was quicker to approach the bloodthirsty humans than the Sireni . Luckily for him, the humans hadn’t seen him as an abomination.

“Only because you’re hiding

in a shell of their skin.”

Atreus flinched at the whispering voice in his head. He poked at the fire more insistently, letting the floating embers distract him. He wished the sun would hurry and rise already. There was no chance of him sleeping, not with another person so close.

Too close .

Nyel hadn’t so much as rolled over since falling asleep on the mattress. He slept soundly. Obviously, whatever issues he was dealing with wouldn’t stop him from getting a good night’s sleep.

Would he be so comfortable if he knew what I was?

Atreus had made a point not to dip his hands in the bucket Nyel used to clean his wound. It was better to let Nyel believe he was ‘normal’ and not well… whatever he was.

Does he even remember me?

No matter how many times Atreus wished he could forget, the precious minutes he spent with the jade boy remained permanently etched in his brain.

During the nights when his stomach was empty and his heart even more so, Atreus comforted himself by imagining what it would have been like if the boy’s mother had never appeared. Would they have herded the goatfish together? Talked? What would they have talked about?

Since that day, Atreus held dozens—no hundreds—of conversations with the boy. His imagination supplied him with stories that would never be. And now, the subject of his daydreams slept only feet from him. Older, bigger, and with no memory of Atreus.

The sun wasn’t up yet, but Atreus couldn’t stand it any longer. He doused the fire (assuming Nyel wouldn’t think to do so), grabbed his leather pack filled with extra clothes and food, and moved to leave the lighthouse. He paused with his hand on the door.

Nyel slept. Not a snore. Not so much as a heavy breath. Quiet. Peaceful.

Atreus approached, using the sireno’s moment of vulnerability to get a good look. Nyel’s human body was as strange as his Mer. It was so unblemished that he almost appeared fake, like the marble statue in the center of town. But the wavy dark hair that fluttered with each breath was proof enough of his mortality. Atreus was tempted to stroke a finger across his pale cheek, just to know what it felt like.

Then he’d leave, and they would never see each other again .

“If he knew the truth about you,

he’d run and never look back.”

Atreus retracted his hand and, without a sound, left Nyel alone in the tower.

He didn’t belong with his kind. He belonged with the humans. He belonged in Baia Vita.

That green-eyed jerk killed the fire, and Nyel couldn’t make another one. He woke up shivering only to see he was alone in the circular tower room.

Atreus was gone.

Nyel’s shoulders drooped. He shouldn’t have been so disappointed; Atreus told him he was leaving. Still, part of Nyel hoped he would have stayed long enough to say bye.

“It’s only polite,” Nyel muttered to himself, rubbing his fleshy hands together. His human hands were more flexible than his webbed ones.

However, the more he pondered it, the more it bothered him. He got the distinct feeling that Atreus didn’t like him very much.

Another shiver tore through him.

“Sharks!” he cursed, rubbing his arms up and down vigorously. He hated this part of the human body. Why did he have to fight against the air he breathed? This body was so frustrating. When he woke, it took him a moment to remember he wasn’t underwater. The weight of himself was suffocating. With no water to support him, he was a sack of sand. He lay there, gasping for an embarrassing amount of time before he had the strength to lift his head.

Nyel observed his spindly fingers as he wiggled them. In less than a day, he’d learned more about himself than he had his entire life in Corallina. He’d learned that fire was hot, dangerously so. That humans had air ballons instead of gills. That his body needed heat to stay warm.

And now that he’d gotten a taste, Nyel wanted more. He didn’t know it before, but now it was so painfully obvious. The missing piece in his mundane life. He was starving for something new—something his mind could latch onto—something to digest and learn.

Something different.

Nyel cautiously touched the metal bowl that once held the roaring fire. Though the flames were gone, the bowl was still warm. He sighed, letting his hands fall flush to the metal. One jump into the waves, and his body would no longer be so sensitive to the difference between hot and cold. He could return, apologize to his mother, and prepare to go on the Tideway with Chel. He scoffed.

No way.

From this height, Nyel could see the shores of the human land. Their settlement sat right beside the curve of the bay before climbing the hill.

Atreus is there.

Nyel squirmed as jealousy took root like a coral in stone.

What is he doing? Who is he seeing?

How could he have spent years in the company of humans without being gutted? Nyel wanted to know more. More about humans. How they worked, what they ate, and the way they socialized. For the first time in his life, Nyel dared to want more .

Nephi gritted his teeth as he lost the trail for the third time. He’d have to double back to find it again. At this rate, he wouldn’t have any fucking fangs left for how hard he was grinding them. Nyel’s scent was faint in the water, but with a general idea of where he was going, Nephi found it. Yet the trail continued to go blank as his damaged scent receptors failed him again and again.

“Fucking damn it!” he cursed, kicking a fire coral where a piece snapped off and fell to the sand. He hadn’t always been so useless. He didn’t used to lose fresh trails. Back then, he was a predator. Back then, he was unstoppable. Back then…

Back then… It might as well have been only hours ago, with how vividly the images now flashed through his mind.

Opalescent fins. Moonlight reflecting off sky blue scales. Then… orange. So much orange .

The color alone was enough to send him into a rage. Overcome with the need to tear, to cripple, to kill—he tore apart his corallite victim. One branch at a time. He only wished the creature had vocal chords. He wanted to hear it scream, to cry out. Maybe its cries could drown out the ones that replayed in his brain.

Every.

Single .

Night.

If I had been faster. Stronger. Smarter. We could have escaped. I could have saved him.

The sudden memories made Nephi lose focus. His vision blurred, the edges turning red. He roared in frustration, tearing into the innocent animal piece by piece.

When his vision cleared, only the stump remained, and scavenger fish picked at the newly exposed flesh. Nephi panted, gills heaving, missing the taste of copper in his mouth as what remained of the bloodless animal floated around him. If anyone saw, they’d think he lost his mind.

Didn’t matter. As a halfling, people made that assumption about him anyway. But now, after everything. Well… Nephi was beginning to think they were right. These days, he was like a torpedo hurling through the water. He was a mortar of repressed fire and wrath - ready to blow with the slightest spark.

He needed to get ahold of himself. Getting lost in memories wouldn’t help anyone, least of all Nyel. A quick visit to the Veritani home told him that Nyel hadn’t returned. Bianca was inconsolable while her sister and his father, Donato, tried to calm her. Donato noticed him peeking into the home but turned away and continued consoling his wife.

Just as well.

Nephi had no intention of talking to his father. Besides the green scales covering his torso, they had nothing in common. And Nephi was more than happy to keep it that way. He had no attachments to these people. Not Bianca, who hated him. Nor his father, who pretended he didn’t exist. And not his half-brother, with whom he shared blood.

They never treated him like family, and why should they? He was a stranger. A living, breathing mockery of the Spirits. Cursed. When he returned to Corallina, fresh burns covering his body and barely clinging to life, they didn’t even offer him a place in the home. Nephi slept beneath the sand hut —where the sandwinder slept. Only occasionally did they remember he was down there, wounded and too weak to move, and they’d set out a bowl of food as if he were a stray leatherback turtle.

Didn’t matter.

Nephi didn’t come here to be babied. He just needed a place to rest. To lie low and take care of his damn self. He was no good to the Pod wounded, and they moved too often for him to keep up in this state. Tariq ordered him to find a place to rest until he was ready to return—and like a fucking idiot, he went home.

Not my home.

But it was where his half-brother lived. And thoughts of Nyel continued to nag Nephi for hours. Since leaving Nyel at that sandbank, the idea of that dumb kid getting close to a human encampment made his skin crawl.

The idiot doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing. He has no idea what those land dwellers are capable of.

Nephi found the spot where they’d last spoken and followed the scent. In his prime, following a scent, even one a day old, would have been child’s play. Despite resenting that side of himself, the Sireni were excellent trackers. Their enhanced sense of smell allowed them to detect even the smallest change in their crop. But with his sense of smell damaged and his right eye nearly blind, he struggled. Still, he followed the scent and, late in the afternoon, found that it led to a small island with a human tower perched at the top.

Of course he came here, even after I told him not to.

Nephi stepped from the waves, unflinching as Marvassa tickled his skin. He walked with confidence, upright with perfect posture. He’d spent many weeks in this form, hiding amongst the humans. Learning their secrets. Listening to their conversations. Watching. Waiting for the right opportunity to strike .

A spy amongst wolves.

But now he was marked by the human’s sadism. Nephi cringed as Marvassa changed scale to skin, including the parts disfigured with burns. He examined his new body, seeing for the first time how these scars fared under the sunlight. They were just as distorted and disgusting as they were in his Mer form. He touched the side of his head; his dark brown hair burned off one side, and his ear crinkled to almost nothing.

“You’re an ugly bastard in both bodies,” he told himself as he smirked.

At least he wouldn’t have to worry about the human females throwing themselves at him anymore. That was the part he hated most about his missions into human territory. The dance between male and female. The ritual of courting and mating. Humans were mad for it. It was their greatest weakness, an easy one for him to exploit. And when he learned that he was particularly attractive to the human females, it was almost too easy to infiltrate their defenses.

He got close enough to steal the needed information, then returned to the sea. He’d never actually bed any of them. Even the idea of lying with a human made him want to gag. They were filthy, oily, and smelled of the earth they lived on. It took years for him to master enough self-control to hide his repulsion. To smile instead of snarl.

They ate it up every time.

Now, with scars marring his once handsome features, Nephi would have to figure out a different way to infiltrate their ranks. It didn’t matter. His job right now was to heal. That’s what his commander said. He’d be back in the thick of the fighting soon enough.

Nephi shook off the remaining water droplets, letting the air fill his nose. His shoulders relaxed some. There were no humans here; by the looks of it, there hadn’t been for a long time. He followed Nyel’s trail to the lighthouse, pushed inside, and halted. The scent was strong now, mixed with the tang of iron.

Nyel was hurt.

Nephi raced up the tower steps.

The humans have him. Damn it, why didn’t I stop him? The stubborn brat should have listened when I ? —

He charged into the lighthouse room, only to find it empty. Nyel’s scent was strong. Fresh. He’d been here only an hour or two ago. Nephi was about to go down to find the fresh scent when another one made him pause. Another Mer. Male. There was something off about this one—something different. A scent Nephi hadn’t encountered in a long time.

Another halfling.

Even more on edge, Nephi didn’t bother with the stairs and shoved open a window. The tower stood resolute on the rocky cliff, the waves crashing against the stone. He jumped on the railing with ease, his balance perfect. He may be an ugly bastard, but he was still strong. Poised. A weapon itching for its next fight.

He jumped.

There was no hesitation. The wind howled past him, but he didn’t brace—didn’t tense. The height didn’t scare him. He had done this a thousand times, and he would do it a thousand more.

The ocean rushed up to meet him. At the last moment, he curved his body, angling just right—barely disturbing the surface as he slipped into the depths.

Marvassa took him, and he was a monster once more.

The swim to the human settlement would take him less than half an hour. That meant it would take Nyel twice that. And in this weather, the choppy current may have slowed his brother even more.

In typical early spring fashion, the sky remained in a perpetual state of indecision. Rain. No rain. Wind. Lightning. A constant whiplash of weather currents, shifting on the whim of Pygon’s mood.

In the minutes he spent in the tower, the weather turned once again to an angry gray whirl of nature’s forces. It was the perfect storm and a prime opportunity for an inexperienced Mer to get caught unaware.

Nephi shook his head, cursing the foolishness of youth. He’d never been so careless at that age. If he pushed himself, he might catch the dumb kid before he did anything even more stupid. Nephi kept close to the surface, where Nyel’s scent was the strongest.

Moron. If a boat came by, he could have been spotted ? —

No sooner had the thought occurred to him than the sound of an approaching engine sputtered in the water. Nephi dove straight down, letting the depth hide his presence from the vessel’s captain.

The boat listed harshly to its port side. Something was off.

Easy pickings.

He could sink this boat. Overpower it like a shark picking off the weakest swimmers in a school. But Nephi was alone. Here, he had no Pod to help him sink the human machine. To help erase the land-dwelling creatures that dared intrude upon their ocean home. The thought sent Nephi’s blood to boil. And even now, knowing it was stupid— he was tempted to take the vessel on his own.

If nothing else, he wanted action. He wanted adrenaline, claws, and teeth. He wanted those land rats to recognize what they took from him. To feel it. The way he’d felt it every fucking second since.

The ghost of a hand rested on his shoulder.

“Patience, my love. The right opportunity will come.”

Ludomir’s voice rang in his head. Even in the confines of his memory, that voice calmed Nephi. It put his angry heart at ease, reminding him to take calming breaths and control his rage. To push it deep. Hide it away. Stay in control .

“You are the master of your mind. Not the wrath that haunts you. Breathe, my love.”

The ghostly presence slid from his shoulder down his arm, reaching for his hand.

His breaths came easier now. Nephi unclenched his talons, but as he reached for the phantom hand, he only found empty water.

The momentary calm was sullied as agony took its place.

His chest spasmed, unable to decide if the pain was rooted in longing, loss, or regret.

Or all three.

If only I’d been faster, if only I’d seen the signs. I wouldn’t be burned, and Ludo would still be at my side.”

Nephi clenched his jaw until it hurt.

It didn’t matter.

None of it did.

Ludo was gone, Nephi was brutally scarred, and his Pod was waiting for him. Once healed, he’d return and offer himself for the most dangerous mission he could.

At least then, his death would mean something.

Nephi turned tail to follow Nyel’s scent and ignored the distressed vessel when a powerful wave crashed above him. The screech of tearing metal pierced the water, only to be swallowed by the ocean’s roar. The boat’s engine gave a final high-pitched whine before it sputtered and died. When the next wave hit, the vessel capsized. Metal and debris fell into the water, littering the sea floor with more human waste. Among the life vests and fishing nets thrown into the sea was a shape Nephi was all too familiar with.

A human fell from the boat and landed with a dull ‘whoosh’ as it sank below the waves. Even from a distance, Nephi could tell this was a man, a young one at that. Yet his body remained motionless as it sank lower and lower. Likely knocked unconscious when the boat flipped. He would drown.

Serves him right.

Nephi was a second from abandoning the dying figure when he caught a flash of blond hair. He whipped around, heart in his throat.

Blond hair twisted in tight ringlets—high cheekbones. Sun-kissed skin and a full lower lip, now turned blue with cyanosis as he sank.

He was dying.

Drowning.

My Ludo.

Instinct propelled Nephi into action, shooting through the water like a missile. He grabbed the young man under his arms, dragging him to the surface. A bell rang its death tolls as the boat took on water. Nephi avoided the floating debris, careful not to let his fins get tangled in the human’s nets. Even now, with his head above water, the young man remained motionless in Nephi’s arms.

“Breathe, damn it!” Nephi yelled.

Swimming with half his body above the waves was hard enough, and the raging storm made it almost impossible. He only had minutes before the boy in his arms would be lost forever. Precious seconds while his blood retained some oxygen to send to his brain.

“Fragile fucking creatures.” Nephi cursed as he swam the young man to the capsized boat. It was completely upside down now; its hull pointed to the sky. It would take another quarter of an hour to sink. It was enough.

Using his talons to dig into the wood, Nephi dragged them onto the hull, laying the young man on his back. The rain pelted his head as he crouched over….

Ludo. My Ludo.

But that was impossible. Ludo was dead. Killed in the explosion, his lifeless body burned beyond recognition in the fire.

Yet here he was, lips blue, chest still and lifeless.

“Damn you, Ludo!” Nephi roared and tilted the boy’s chin up .

With expert precision, Nephi placed his mouth over the boy’s and blew, inflating the lungs in his chest. In rapid succession, Nephi began chest compressions, pumping five times before returning for another breath. Over and over, Nephi repeated the process, his compressions cracking the boy’s ribs. If that is what it took to manually force his heart to beat, it was a small price to pay.

On the fourth round of breaths and compressions, the boy sputtered. Nephi rolled him to the side so he could expel the seawater from his mouth. The boy coughed and choked, white foam coming out in bubbly spurts. Color rapidly returned to his lips and cheeks.

Despite himself, Nephi relaxed.

Ludo continued to spit out water and— no, not Ludo. Not Ludo!

But even as he berated himself, Nephi couldn’t look away. Even knowing what this person was, he couldn’t bring himself to drag the boy back to the water and watch him drown. Even as the human’s eyes opened and focused on him, Nephi wasn’t even remotely tempted to slit his throat as he should have done.

As he’d done countless times before.

The young man’s eyes fluttered, focusing on him. He didn’t cry out. Didn’t attack or show any alarm at the sight of a sea monster at his side.

He just…stared.

And that is when Nephi’s illusions fell away. The human’s eyes were yellow—the merciless eyes of a predator.

Ludo’s eyes had been silver, like the calm before a winter storm.

Whether it was the sight of such a creature or the stress of nearly drowning, Nephi didn’t know. Only that the next second, the human slumped to his side. Unconscious.

Pathetic.

Yet Nephi didn’t leave him to perish. He’d already crossed that line the moment his scales made contact with skin. Instead, he positioned the boy against his chest so his head lolled on Nephi’s shoulder. And with painstaking slowness, Nephi paddled them to shore. It took three times as long as it should have, but it was all he could manage with the relentless waves and swimming with only his lower half. He dragged the boy’s unconscious body along the beach before letting him flop (harsher than necessary) to the sand.

“There,” he bit out, lip curling. But in the same breath, his expression softened.

With his eyes closed, the boy could have been Ludo. Asleep on the beach. Peaceful. Ready to wake and offer Nephi a smile like he’d done a thousand times before.

He’d never see that smile again. All because of their kind. The humans. And now, he’d saved one. Because of his broken heart, weakness seeped into the cracks, and now he had saved the very thing he’d dedicated his life to destroy.

Nephi leaped into the water before his weakness could compel him to do more. As he halfheartedly searched for Nyel’s trail, Nephi’s mind was lost. He couldn’t focus on the scent, his thoughts elsewhere. They were back on the beach, fixated on blond curls and amber skin. He clutched his head.

What have I done?