Page 1 of The Merman’s Betrothal (Outcast Hearts #2)

D eep beneath the black and rolling waves of the Minch, Prince Fionn patrolled the territory of his kinsmen. He swam deftly in darkness, guided by the flow of current and the tidal pull of the moon.

His blue skin blended well with the underwater murk, natural camouflage from predators. Swirling tattoos over his right shoulder and left hip enhanced the illusion of invisibility. If Fionn were to be hunted, it was his fine silver hair that would give him away: a mark of his royal blood.

For this patrol, the prince had tied his hair into a braid and masked its colour in the traditional way the warriors used, by weaving in strands of seaweed and shells like Iomhar had taught him.

It would do to be cautious, the old Minchman had advised him.

There were greater dangers than sharks in these waters.

Fionn spotted a line hanging from the surface and kicked off toward it. It was a rope extending to the seabed. Fionn glanced up first, checking for the shadow of a boat. There was none. He made out the shape of a lonely orange buoy bobbing on the waves above.

The rope from the buoy led to a string of small, domed cages settled on the seabed. Five of them were spaced out along the line.

Fionn’s lip curled as he inspected the traps.

They were loathsome objects: left by trespassers.

He found three lobsters caught in the cages and a handful of spider crabs, all clawing uselessly at the the mesh that confined them.

They would be waiting here for hours until the human who set the trap returned to haul them from the water.

Today, that human would return disappointed.

Fionn felt along the belt he wore across his torso, slung from shoulder to hip. Like the kilt that preserved his modesty, the belt was made from tightly woven kelp. Fionn unstrung the clam knife attached to it and then carefully sawed at the mesh on the occupied traps.

The crustaceans scuttled slowly to freedom. Fionn put away his knife with satisfaction.

He cast a final glance to the orange buoy on the surface, then whipped away into the current.

* * *

One mile from the same orange buoy, Rory Douglas was struggling to keep his fishing boat afloat.

Not because there was anything wrong with the boat. And not because the sea was rough. In fact, it was an uncharacteristically calm day on the Minch, the strait that separated the Scottish mainland from the islands of the Outer Hebrides.

No, the reason Rory was struggling not to purposefully capsize his own vessel was because of the company he was suffering aboard it.

Presently, as Rory angled the Wandering Star toward the next orange buoy, his companion, Ol’ Doaty, was shouting in his ear between taking swigs from a can of stout.

‘You kids t’day dun know yers alive,’ was the current train of slurred condemnation. ‘All soft. Dunno what a real day’s work is. Look at yer!’

He made a shaky gesture with his hand that loosely pointed to Rory’s appearance, from the scruffy dark hair poking out under his hood to the work-worn patches on the toes of his boots.

But Rory knew it wasn’t his scruffiness that Doaty took offense to.

More the fact that Rory was still somewhat young and fresh-faced, despite the weariness in his eyes.

By comparison, Ol’ Doaty was a broad, grey-faced man with a straggly beard he never combed.

His pocked skin was a scar of some childhood infection overlaid with decades of battering weather, and he had a habit of letting spittle fly when he talked—or yelled, as he seemed incapable of speaking at a reasonable volume.

He was a vastly experienced, seasoned fisherman.

The trouble was, in Rory’s opinion, the seasoning stank.

‘How many hours y’worked this week boy, eh? Eh?’

Rory grit his teeth. ‘Forty.’

‘Pah!’ White specks of saliva peppered Ol’ Doaty’s beard. ‘Forty. S’barely part-time. Seventy! Tha’s how many me and yer pa put in, every day! Hard workers, us.’

‘Seventy hours a day?’ Rory repeated flatly. ‘You’re right, I couldn’t do that.’

The sarcasm must have cut through Ol’ Doaty’s alcohol haze because he responded with a hard smack to the back of Rory’s head.

‘Jesus, Doaty! I’m on the wheel.’ Rory fought to steady the Star . She rocked briefly, but wasn’t in any real danger. He knew Doaty wouldn’t give a shit, anyway.

‘Fuckin’ kids,’ Ol’ Doaty grumbled. He rattled his beer can and, finding it empty, spat into it. ‘The cheek on you. I oughta tell yer pa.’

Rory huffed through his nose. This would be good. ‘Tell him what?’

‘That yer a useless prick, Rory. The likes o’ you ain’t fit to run his business, whatever he thinks.’

‘Is that right? Too bad I’ve been doing it so long, then.’

‘Aye, rightest thing I know. Yer lazy, too. S’like you dun even want t’be on the water. Always rushin’ home. Taking weekends. Pah! Pathetic. No wonder yer failin’.’

Rory swallowed hard. None of it was new. Ol’ Doaty’s verbal diarrhoea was an unchangeable cornerstone of their mutually despised relationship. If there was such a thing as true love, then he and Ol’ Doaty were in true hate with each other.

The only reason Rory allowed him onboard was because he’d promised his dad that he’d look after the old bastard. It was only once a week, at least.

Ol’ Doaty and Rory’s father had been friends for a lifetime; creel fishing together since their teens. But Doaty had been a thorn in Rory’s side ever since he was old enough to start collecting creels—the baited pots used to catch prawns, crabs, and lobsters.

Character building, Hamish Douglas had called it when he palmed Rory off to the old sod to learn the trade. Really, Rory knew it was just another way for his dad to put him out of sight for a while.

And now Rory was twenty-nine and ran his dad’s creel fishing business, but in Ol’ Doaty’s eyes he was still the same skinny, spotty little wet handkerchief from all those years ago.

‘I’m going to get the next lot in.’ Rory pulled the boat alongside the orange buoy rocking on the waves. ‘Or you could do it, if you fancy doing some actual work.’

Ol’ Doaty snorted, a disgusting nasal peal of displeasure. ‘Lazy little prick. Said so, din’t I?’

Rory’s fist curled. It’s nothing new, he told himself. It’s just how Doaty is. Let it go.

Rory scratched over his own beard of short stubble, just to give his hand something else to do. Besides, being around Doaty always made him itch.

Rory hooked the rope from the buoy and began to haul it into the boat.

No one except Doaty would dare to call him little these days.

A decade of this kind of work had given Rory solid arms and a sturdy build.

He wasn’t particularly tall at only five-foot-five, but he’d worked hard to make sure anyone would be hard-pressed to call him ‘small’, either.

The first creel emerged from the sea, empty. So did the next five.

‘Jesus Christ,’ Rory muttered, inspecting the torn mesh of one of the pots. He’d pulled up another line afflicted by the same damage earlier in the day. ‘What the fuck is destroying these?’

He cast an eye over the holding containers partially filled with live crustaceans stored in separate boxes. The day’s catch was abysmal. Just as it had been yesterday, and the day before. Rory’s yields had been diminishing all year—and now he had a ton of broken equipment to replace as well.

He had no explanation for all the freak damage he’d encountered in the last week alone.

There had been cut ropes, smashed creels, and even one of the buoys looked as though it had been hacked with a knife.

Rory was beginning to suspect a person was behind it.

But who would hate him enough to give him this level of grief? Who would even have the time?

He stowed the rope and broken creels in disgust. ‘We’re heading back in,’ he told Doaty on his way to the cabin. The old man had fallen asleep in his chair.

Rory turned the Star toward the mainland.

The wind was picking up and a bank of dark cloud was rolling in.

Rory foresaw the rest of his evening: drenched, cold, sorting lobsters from crabs on the Ullapool harbour wall while Ol’ Doaty toddled off for a pint in a warm pub.

Some days it felt like Rory’s entire existence consisted only of rain, waves, and more rain.

He shrugged deeper into his thick oilskin coat. The neck fastening chafed at his chin and the hood sat uncomfortably around his face, but it was the only thing that truly protected him from the elements and kept him sane.

He turned into the long channel of Loch Broom, shoulders relaxing as the land began to rise on both banks.

Ullapool’s seafront jutted out into the loch on a pointed tip of land.

Rows of white caravans formed a low wall there before the even whiter houses of Ullapool came into view, capped by their grey tiled roofs.

Rory navigated around this headland to meet the harbour wall on the other side.

He spotted the vessels of other local fishermen, already moored and emptied.

Their owners were doubtless already in the pub across the road.

Rory would tip Ol’ Doaty out there, roll him through the doors if necessary, and leave him to the other grizzled fishermen.

And Rory would keep his head down, work as hard as he could, for as long as it took, and pretend that he wasn’t wishing for a different kind of future.