Page 47 of The Merman’s Betrothal (Outcast Hearts #2)

The young red merman continued in earnest. ‘ Because I am the second Redfolk that your prince would have seen, the magic would not have ignited a bond between us anyway? ’

The Blue King raised his stare to meet the Red King’s. It held brazen defiance. ‘ We must assume so. ’

Hope swirled in Rory’s chest and in Fionn’s. It sounded like they were on a course to victory.

The Red King shot forward, surprising his own guards. Suddenly, he loomed over Rory. Even Fionn startled, readying his stance for an attack as the crimson giant leered down at them. ‘ If you are truly Redfolk then you bow to me, now. ’

Rory’s gills flared at the challenge. ‘ Like fuck, mate. ’

There was the barest, subtlest of pauses that told Rory the Red King needed a moment to parse his meaning in the DeepSong. Rory felt immense satisfaction when the king’s scowl deepened.

‘ Your insolence invites a death sentence in my realm, ’ the king growled.

‘ This is not your realm, ’ the Blue King cut in sharply. ‘ And the bargain does not stipulate that he must leave it. ’

Fionn seemed to light up. In the sweetest voice Rory had ever heard him use, he sang, ‘ I shall go wherever my bonded mate chooses. ’

Out of here, Rory thought, swallowing back a wave of dread. The mood in the room had only darkened. He was caught by a wash of vertigo, a sense of tiptoeing over a deadly chasm.

Fionn’s hand on his shoulder steadied him.

The Red King’s mouth twisted into a mockery of a grin as he looked at Rory again. ‘ Then perhaps we shall not leave, either. If it pleases my kin to stay, then so shall we. ’

He made a complicated hand signal to his red envoy.

Two of them began to rattle some instruments made of shells.

The sound seemed to command the water, making it gather in a spot high up in the chamber.

It churned and frothed, a strange underwater whirlpool, until the water itself parted like a window opening onto another world.

The room froze. Rory felt his pulse stutter.

The vision beyond the whirlpool showed an ocean like nothing he had ever seen.

The water was like… translucent mercury.

The world seemed silvery and viscous. Sparkling seaweed dangled in the current like vines made of crystal.

The seabed was covered in bone-white coral. Bleached? Rory wondered, horrified.

And the warmth pouring out of this whirling portal was something else. Did the Redfolk live in a tropical climate? The Minchmen shuddered as the heat reached them.

‘ You must forgive us for making ourselves comfortable, ’ the Red King declared. ‘ Do not fear, we will soon make your ocean as beautiful as ours. ’

‘ Close it at once, ’ the Blue King demanded.

‘ No. ’ The Red king smirked, leaning into the Blue King’s face. ‘ We will pour storms into these waters. We shall heat them with our wrath. Your seas shall run cold no more. Such is the fate chosen by your little prince. ’

What. The. Fuck.

Rory couldn’t tell if he was most furious about the threat to his oceans or about the Red King lumping all of this on Fionn’s head. Something snapped inside him, accompanied by a cracking of his spines…

Fionn pushed his way between the two monarchs.

‘ You are the real traitor to both our peoples, ’ he told the Red King.

‘ I know my own heart. I never deserved to be a pawn in your games! And I know that you did not come here seeking peace. These are not the words or the actions of any king I would allow myself to be ruled by. ’

Rory watched him through a mental fog. He was so fucking proud of Fionn for not taking this shit any more.

And he wasn’t about to let Fionn face down the Red King on his own.

The seething portal still churned overhead. Spilling its toxic water into the chamber. Rory tasted its foulness. It curled around the Blue King’s throne, causing the corals to shudder and shrink.

I’m all in. This is my ocean.

Rory lurched forward, suddenly ungainly in the water.

A few choked exclamations followed him from the crowd.

He glimpsed a patch of blood-red flesh on his arm.

His fins seemed longer. His fingernails had turned to dark claws.

He didn’t so much swim through the water as cut through it.

And when he reached the Red King, his jaws were open and fanged.

The Red King jolted in shock as Rory made contact. He hadn’t been expecting a charged assault. Rory’s clawed hands closed around his throat.

The Red King’s silver crown teetered on his head as he fought back. He scored deep gouges down Rory’s arms, spilling his blood into the water like mist. Then he drew a pearlescent dagger and struck for Rory’s abdomen.

Rory acted on instincts he didn’t know he had. He released his grip, ducked his head and rolled forward and under his own legs. There was a soft swish as his wickedly sharp spines made contact with the Red King’s face, followed by a scream of agony.

So that’s what those are for, Rory thought dimly.

All this happened in seconds, so fast that no one else had time to react—except for Fionn, who it seemed was being bodily held back from the fight by Iomhar.

Rory darted backwards to get some distance from the Red King. They sized each other up, both panting and in pain. The king’s face was scored by several fine, bloody lacerations from Rory’s spines.

The Red King’s gaze landed on something over Rory’s shoulder. His savage scowl morphed into a look of horror.

Rory felt a strange weight hanging on his spines. He reached back and plucked the Red King’s crown off them.

‘ This yours? ’ Rory couldn’t keep the shit-eating grin from his voice.

Singing through clenched teeth, the Red King demanded, ‘ Kill me, then. ’

Reason flooded back into Rory’s brain. The Redfolk all seemed to be craning their necks. Their eyes were fixed on the crown. Rory held it up and their gazes followed. ‘ I’m not going to kill you. ’

‘ You have taken the crown from my head. ’ The Red King’s lip curled. Rory tasted his hatred: bitter and peppery. ‘ Our laws dictate that you end my life. Take my throne. Rule my ocean. ’

Still snarling, the Red King exposed his throat as though expecting a lethal blow.

Fucking hell.

Rory heard Fionn utter a similar expletive behind him. These fae mermen were completely off their nut.

‘ I don’t want anyone’s throne. Or to rule an ocean. I just want to protect it. ’ Rory held out the crown. ‘ But if you come back here, I might kill you. ’

Rhiath glowered at the peace offering. ‘ What do you want? ’

‘ I want you to get out of my ocean. ’ Rory felt ten times the size of himself. ‘ You won’t ever threaten it again, you understand? Or the blue mermen here. You go away in peace. Get it? ’

The king snatched back the silver crown. He thrust it onto his head so ruthlessly that little trickles of blood ran down his face from the thorns scraping into his flesh. The Red King snapped at his party. ‘ We return to the citadel. ’

All at once the Redfolk hurried toward the shining whirlpool portal, spurred on by the wrath of their ruler.

The Red King held out an arm to block the young Redfolk who had spoken earlier.

‘ You will stay here, Liath, ’ the king snarled at him. ‘ You have failed in your purpose. ’

Liath jerked back as though struck. ‘ But Uncle, I had no say in— ’

The fins along the Red King’s arm stiffened into nasty points under Liath’s chin. ‘ I have no further use for you. I will not have your presence reminding me of this black day. Be gone. ’

Liath fell back as he was released, gasping. The Red King didn’t even deign to give the Blue King a cursory salute before he, too, disappeared through the portal. The whirlpool closed with a sucking whoosh that robbed the chamber of its heat.

For a total of about five seconds, the throne room shared a collective stunned silence.

And then it erupted, once again, into a different kind of uproar.