Page 36 of The Princesses of Ruin (The Princesses of Ruin #5)
Chapter thirty-four
Reina
J asper is tense. The flick of his tail through the dark water is rigid and swift, like he’s preparing to bolt at any second.
His grip on my hand is similarly rigid. I want to tell him that it’s okay, we’re safe, but the water is so crushingly dense it’s difficult for me to form words while we’re moving, even selkie ones.
Our escorts keep their distance. Their watery shadows are thick and tentacled.
It reminds me of Jasper in his octopus form.
Their very presence protects us from other predators as we make our way into the Deep.
Ga’hanoi are feared by many creatures, even ones that are much bigger than them, like the sha’kara.
I bring my other hand to my lips and press my tongue to the ring on my thumb. The pin pierces my flesh and I wince as the iron tang spreads in my water-filled mouth. My blood is soaked into the ring, renewing its energy. Warmth washes over my body as the ring’s power flares.
Alastair isn’t a high-blood magus, and so many of his runes depend on bloodshed. It’s clever, but not the most useful tool in the water. Jasper says the creatures down here can scent even a drop of blood for miles .
We’ve slowed, I realize, and I turn to see Jasper’s selkie eyes fully dilated, his gaze pinned on something over my shoulder. I twist to see one of the ga’hanoi escorts has moved closer.
“Injured?” it rasps in a waterlogged whisper.
“No,” I reply. “Sorry—”
The creature is moving away quickly, returning to its post.
Jasper cups my cheeks and presses his thumbs over my lips. “Swallow.”
I do, shivering as the seawater sloshes into my stomach.
Kazimir provided me with a magic-infused filter to create drinking water, but Adrik knew there would be no avoiding swallowing seawater when eating—or just by accident.
He prepared several potions for consuming seawater, and they taste like frog balls, but they prevent me from spilling my guts or getting sick in cases like this.
Jasper slides his thumbs away and kisses me, caressing the corners of my lips as he pulls away. “Remember, these things eat my people. Don’t let them smell your blood.”
“Ate,” I clarify, hoping I’m using the right word for the tense shift.
We swim on, increasing our speed.
Halting clicks and chest-shaking rumbles move through the blackness, spiking my fear. I check our escorts, but I can’t see them anymore. I take the slowest gasp in history, my gills shocked from the icy water.
“They’re still beside us. Your eyes are too weak to see them,” Jasper says.
Am I to spend the entire trip in darkness? Jasper said using my light on our journey there wouldn’t be allowed since I’d attract attention the escorts couldn’t hope to defeat, but will I be blind every moment I’m there, too ?
My heart pounds as I drop into the abyss on faith.
Faith that the ga’hanoi will help us instead of eat us.
What a silly thought. Of course they won’t eat us.
If they were going to, they would’ve knocked us out long ago by strangulation and towed our limp bodies down to the depths.
Jasper says their tentacles are as strong or even stronger than his own in his giant form, and that they could easily crush my neck in a second.
We slow our descent, and I pull closer to Jasper. His body is cold against mine, but I need the comfort of his skin, his heartbeat.
“Narrow passage,” an escort murmurs so close to my ear I yelp.
“One by one,” another says, and I feel the water displaced by its passing.
My chest is heavy and tight. There’s not enough oxygen in the water. I clench my jaw and pray for Nol’Ther’s calm so that I don’t fling any more yelps or curses.
Jasper presses his head against mine. “I’ll carry you.”
“Too narrow,” another ga’hanoi says behind us. “One.”
Jasper’s body contorts, shifting until he’s a massive octopus. He can’t speak, but I know what to do. I make myself into a tight ball and he curls his limbs around me. I lean my face into his rubbery skin and squeeze my eyes shut.
Then we’re moving.
I wrap my fingers around Jasper’s limb and hold on. If he drops me, or something happens, I need to have a grip. I need to have something to keep me anchored, from floating away in this void of darkness and ill-intentioned creatures.
We bump something, then bounce on the other side even more violently. I can’t stop the whimper that ripples from my throat. Jasper slows and we settle, then he begins again .
The darkness stretches on. Jasper’s suckers pop against my arms and neck, giving me something to focus on so that madness doesn’t take me.
For so— so long —we move this way. Bumping and slowing. Adjusting and resuming. The regularity of it should be calming. Nothing is wrong, nothing bad is happening. It’s just a narrow passage.
But it feels like we’re crawling into the first realm of hell.
Maybe we are.
At least we’re going together.
The sound of the water changes outside the folds of Jasper’s limbs, and we move a little faster for a moment. Then he’s unfurling.
Colors in every shade I’ve ever dreamed glitter before me. The immense city of the ga’hanoi is made of magus crystals, and each tower is a surging aurora of all the magic of its inhabitants. Pinks, purples, blues, and greens shimmer and flash.
The structure of the area is a crater, as if something immense smashed the rock here and left its mark.
At the center of the bowl, at the deepest point, are the tallest towers.
They stretch all the way to the top of the bowl and bloom like mushroom caps, creating a ceiling of magus glass that blocks out the darkness of the Deep.
Stretching out from the center are larger structures composed of stone and crystal, creating a mosaic of dark and light. The other structures’ shapes vary greatly, not one building looking the same as another. There are so many it’s impossible to count.
I suck down a breath of warm water. “Beautiful…”
“I’m pleased the princess finds our city to her liking.” A familiar ga’hanoi rasp comes from below, not in the selkie tongue, but Fynish.
I look down to see what might be the representative from a month ago waiting with an escort of their own.
The ga’hanoi are all so featureless, they’re hard to tell apart, but he has a scar on his body below the ropy layers of his additional limbs that I recognize from the first meeting. It’s not just any mark. It’s a rune.
He glides on the water, twisting his tentacles until he’s face to face with me. The large eyes atop his bulbous body bore into mine, their dark depths seeking. Hunting. He reaches out with an amorphous hand, something not quite human but certainly not ga’hanoi.
Jasper yanks me into his grasp, covering me in all his limbs like a shield.
The representative’s tentacles rise in a posture that appears startled, or defensive. “I only meant to greet her as her people do.”
“Jasper,” I murmur, my voice much more natural in this space. The warmer water and lower density make me feel more like myself.
His large octopus eyes stare into my soul, pleading.
I skim my palm under his eye and up the side of his body. He releases me and returns to his selkie form. With Jasper subdued, I turn back to the representative and extend my hand.
“I’m Reina Hilden, the fourth and youngest princess of Fynren.”
He takes my hand and then does something unexpected. The upper half of his body shapes into something man-like, and he presses his featureless face with oversized eyes to my knuckles.
“An honor to receive the princess. You may address me as Vek’ihr.” He speaks the word with a deep click between the syllables I know I’ll never be able to replicate with my throat. “Last hatched of the royal clutch, and the Subordinate Son.”
I look at Jasper for help, but he shakes his head subtly.
“What does that title mean?” I ask.
“Please, swim with us and I will answer. We have prepared a meal,” Vek’ihr says.
I can see a fiery retort on Jasper’s tongue and so I silence it with a quick, “Thank you. We would be delighted.”
Vek’ihr doesn’t turn away, keeping his eyes and man-like body pointed toward us as he swims ahead on many thin limbs.
“Last hatched is a literal meaning. I emerged last from my egg. Subordinate Son—I was the last male hatched. I am a servant to the throne, as is my lineage, forever.”
I’m doing my best to capture the political structure here, but another burning question pops out first. “How do you speak Fynish?”
“I absorb information quickly,” he says with an air of finality that raises the hair on my arms.
“Is it my understanding then, Vek’ihr, that you will help us through this meeting with your king?”
“Yes, that is my purpose,” he says.
We drift past the first buildings. They’re unlike anything I’ve ever seen. The rooms and doorways are constructed in ways that allow the natural current to flow through, or to halt. Some spaces are tunnels to move between, while others are blocked off and I’m unable to see inside.
I want to ask more questions about their culture, but I know I need to prepare for the coming meeting.
“What must we know about decorum for dinner? What is the seating arrangement? Am I allowed to speak out of turn, or should I wait for the king to address me?”
“Many questions,” Vek’ihr says, then makes a noise that might be a laugh. “You will be free to speak. There is no king. We do not sit when eating. There is no decorum. Meals are not regarded the same here. We do not do what you do.”
“No king? Who will we address?”
“We do not follow the same rigid structure as your people. Our history, our very nature, is counter to this kind of leadership. You will address the Conclave of Currents, our fluid leadership. The strongest, firstborn of clutches, and those with the most knowledge lead.”
“Why the meal?” I ask.
He makes three sharp clicking noises and his body comes alight with color. He points his limbs in several different directions at once and our escort breaks off.