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I knew only darkness and pain. Nothing else existed. Nothing else could slip within the edges of the two. My body raged with fever one moment before trembling against an icy cold the next. I drowned in nightmares that were so vivid, I couldn’t help but scream as though they were real.
Shadows flickered and slithered against the scales of my flesh, threatening to drag me under, to hold me down.
And to never let me resurface.
Agony pulled me awake. I rolled over in the darkness, knowing nothing about where or even who I was. All I knew was the pain that held me in a tight fist and had me heaving. My stomach roiled painfully, and I clutched at it, but there was no easing whatever was inside.
The light brush of something against my face had me swatting against the darkness in fear. My head was too muddled to think clearly. But I breathed in and out. In. Out. Until finally, my brain cleared for a mere moment, just enough for me to remember who I was. Maisie Fauna. And where I was. The palace.
I sat up, gently easing my tail from the side of the bed. A mistake, because pain shot straight through my skull, nearly blinding me. I heaved a breath and fell forward, hitting the wall beside the bed. My limbs ached and screamed in protest as I tried getting up, fingernails clawing against the wall. They came in touch with something soft. I struggled to remember what it was. Oh, right. A tapestry. I hauled myself up, shoulder sliding up against the wall.
I tugged...
And the tapestry came falling down.
I groaned in pain. Poison. Someone had poisoned me. Why? Did it matter? My hands slid up the wall to keep myself upright. I put pressure on my palm and heard the sliding of stone against stone. And suddenly, the wall that was keeping me upright was gone and I was falling through empty space.
I reeled back before I could hit the floor, causing a pain I’d never known to electrify me all the way down to my tailfin. Wiping a hand across my vision to clear it, I looked up at where the wall had been and stared into a hallway of sorts. Inside, nothing but blackness greeted me.
This can’t be real.
I pushed through it, my fins screaming at every movement. The darkness was too thick to see anything through, anyway. I pressed my hands against the outer edges of the doorway, pushing my fingers against stone. A piece of it caved in and then the wall seemed to materialize once again.
My stomach heaved as I bent down, fingers fumbling for the tapestry on the floor. When I finally gripped it, I tried for what felt like an eternity to hang it back up where it had been. That miniscule task had worn me out, had my body on the edge of collapsing.
Trembling, I took a stroke, then two, but it was all I managed before I let the darkness drag me under once more.
Small rays of light beams shone down against my eyes. I blinked several times, though my lids felt heavy with the weight of sleep. I managed to open them and glance around at my surroundings. My body was shaking from the cold, and I soon saw why. I was sprawled on the floor by the bed and still wearing the dress I’d worn to the anniversary dinner.
I lifted myself up on shaking arms and looked around the room. Small rays of phytoplankton pierced past the sea glass to cast a rainbow of illuminative colors against the floors and walls.
My whole body ached and my mind raced, struggling to remember events from the day before. There had been the anniversary dinner. Arguing with diplomats about the selects. And then... I’d toasted with Prince Kai. After that there was nothing but darkness.
Poison.
I’d been poisoned.
But the question was, were they trying to poison me or the princess? Not me. No one here knew who I was aside from Captain Saber, the queen, king, a few guards. No. I couldn’t have been the target. That much was clear even through my poison-addled mind. So, an even bigger question still, was who wanted Princess Odele dead?
I swam jerkily over to the bed and sat on the edge. Every muscle in me ached. The pain reminding me of the gator attack that had destroyed my fin. Except this was much, much worse. I hunched over my tail and breathed in and out as an attempt to control it.
When I looked up again, my gaze fell on the wall beside the bed. The tapestry that had hung there was crooked, hanging on by a single hook. I narrowed my eyes at it when the memories suddenly came back to me in an instant.
Last night, the panel on the wall, the doorway...
Had it been real? Or had it been a dream?
I got up slowly and swam over. My shaking fingers moved the tapestry aside to reveal the wall behind. Polished quartz, like the rest of the palace. Maybe it had been a dream. I was about to turn away when something caught my eye.
I pressed my face closer to the wall, squinting my eyes to see the thin outline against it, like a crack in the stone. Taking a breath, I pressed my hand against it and there was the familiar sound of stone scraping against stone as that small piece of quartz was pushed inwards.
A dull scraping sound filled the room, and I jolted back as the wall suddenly parted to reveal the dark entrance of a doorway. My heart thundered wildly, my breath hitching as it struggled to catch up with my racing mind. It hadn’t been a dream. I hadn’t imagined it in a delirious fever.
The princess had a secret passage in her bedroom.
Fear tried to slide doubt into my mind, but my curiosity got the best of me, and I swam slowly into the entrance. But it was dark, too dark to see anything in front of me. I made it five swim strokes in when the sudden touch of something slimy against my fin had me shuddering and racing back to the entrance.
Something was in there, something more mysterious than the creature that had slithered over me. It could be the answer to the mystery of her disappearance. How had she disappeared straight under the noses of guards and palace courtiers? Could this be a passage that had led her out? And if so, did no one else know about it?
I’d have to explore it, to find answers at the end of it.
A knocking at the door pulled me out of those thoughts. Quickly, I pressed the panel again and the wall slid back into place, then I straightened the tapestry until it looked as though it hadn’t been bothered in the first place and swam as quickly as I could manage into the bed.
The doors opened a second later, and mer I didn’t recognize shuffled in wearing white medical robes. Following behind them was Captain Saber. His eyes locked on mine, and I swore I saw relief slash through his blue depths.
The medics rushed to my bedside and bowed respectfully. “Your Majesty, it is such a relief to see you awake.”
I managed to give them a weak smile, though my own gaze remained on the captain. He was at the fin of the bed, his posture rigid straight, hand on the hilt of his sword. Maybe he meant to cut the medics down, if they even touched me wrong. Funny, it almost seemed like he truly cared.
“Yeah.” I sat up again the cushiony mound at my back. Speaking hurt my throat, made it burn. “What a crazy night.”
The medics looked to each other. “Your Majesty... you’ve been unconscious for seven days.”
My breath froze as soon as it climbed up my throat. “Seven days?” I choked out.
They nodded. “The poison left you unconscious. You are lucky to be alive.”
“Right.” I fought back the panic. Seven days. I’d been knocked out for seven days because someone had poisoned me.
I kept my gaze focused straight ahead if only to avoid looking at the tapestry by the side of the bed.
The medics got to work, checking my temperature and looking me over. “Are you in pain?” the medic asked.
I turned to look at him. He was an old merman with kind eyes and gentle, firm fingers. “My body hurts,” I confessed.
He nodded. “That’s normal. The poison is flushing from your system. Sea wasp poison is quite deadly, indeed.”
Which meant that the culprit had meant to kill, not maim. I shuddered at the idea. When I’d agreed to being the princess, I hadn’t known the dangers it would entail. After all, why would anyone want to kill someone so daft and selfish? Unless... unless she hadn’t been as daft as she seemed.
“Where is she?”
I looked up with a startled expression to the entrance of the room. Prince Kai was pushing past the captain’s trusted soldiers to get through. My heart fell to the pit of my stomach.
“Let him through,” the captain ordered tightly, though his eyes never once left the prince as his mermen moved aside and let him into the room.
Prince Kai didn’t seem to notice the distrust circulating through the room. He swam right over to the bed, nearly pushing the medic away as he perched himself on the edge and reached for my hands. I felt my face flush as he lowered his head and pressed kisses to the backs of my knuckles.
When he looked up, his dark eyes were distraught. “Princess...” The word came out strangled. “Thank the Great Dragon...” He lowered his lids as if praying before searching my face, looking for any sign of the sickness.
I was suddenly self-conscious, all too aware of the heavy, leaden texture of my tongue, the parched lips, and my more than likely pale parlor. I was still in the dress from the dinner, for tides’ sakes. I probably smelled.
He didn’t seem to care as he pulled me gently into his arms, pressing his hand against the back of my head to hold me in place briefly before leaning me back against the bed. “Prince Kai...” My head spun quickly, and my breath came out in small pants.
His hand came to rest against my cheek, pushing away a stray lock of hair with the pad of his thumb. “They refused me entry for days. They refused to give me any news of you.” I reached for his hand, the movement subconscious. The tips of my fingers grazed against his knuckles, feeling the split, scabbing skin there. My brows furrowed but he pulled his hands away, hiding them within the long sleeves of his kimono. Almost as if he didn’t want me to see.
“Her Majesty’s condition was critical,” Captain Saber said from his position at the end of the bed. He was glaring at the prince, his posture rigid, distrustful. “She was not well enough to receive visitors.”
Prince Kai slashed the captain with a glare that startled me. His otherwise gentle demeanor was gone. “I am her betrothed,” he ground out tightly. “I have a right to see her. To inquire about her well-being. To worry.”
The captain’s lip twitched. “Yes. Though I have to wonder, and forgive me, Prince, but were you actually worried for the princess’ well-being or for your own position should she die?”
Prince Kai’s face went red at the declaration, and I couldn’t help the pain that squeezed at my heart. I wasn’t the princess. I knew that if and when she was found, I would leave and never see the Prince of Draconi again. But the cold cruelty in the captain’s voice, the flushing of the prince’s face was all the confirmation I needed.
He cared about himself. About his kingdom. The expression in his eyes suddenly made much more sense. The relief hadn’t been for me at all.
“Princess...”
I wasn’t the princess. But already I was falling into the illusion that I was. That Prince Kai somehow belonged to me. Otherwise, why did the truth hurt so much?
I clasped my hands in my lap, and before the prince could open his mouth to argue, I spoke, “Please leave.” My voice was as cold as the captain’s words and as quiet as a whisper. When I looked up, Prince Kai’s face was shocked; hurt, even.
“You cannot think that’s true...” He reached for me and froze when I cringed back. The stiff posture was back in an instant. Gone was the caring expression and in its place a mask of indifference that he seemed to have perfected so well. “As you wish, Your Majesty.” He gave me a stiff bow. When he rose, those dark eyes of his flashed like a bolt of lightning. It somehow filled me with both fear and anticipation. Like I was prey and he was predator. But then it was gone.
And so was he.
“If you could all please leave. Everyone but Captain Saber.”
The medics gathered their supplies, bowed awkwardly and left, closing the doors behind them. Even with them gone, his posture, his expression didn’t change. I looked up at him through my purple lashes. Everything in me ached. Somehow, the emotional hurt worse than the physical.
“Did you find the culprit?” I asked.
The captain stiffened and then slowly shook his head. “We are actively looking. Even the prince has been—” He broke off with an irate shake of his head. “It does not matter. We have not found them.”
The prince has been what? I didn’t ask that, but I thought back to Prince Kai’s bruised knuckles and couldn’t help but wonder... But that was ridiculous. I swallowed and met the captain’s gaze. “I want my blade back.”
“No.”
I glared. “Captain, someone is trying to murder me—the princess, you know what I mean—and I do not want to go around without protection.” The blade would offer some sort of comfort, even if I didn’t know how to wield it. But he didn’t need to know that last bit.
“You have protection,” he said tightly.
I snorted. “Sorry, but how well has that worked out? I don’t want to be rude, but you and your soldiers couldn’t keep the real princess safe, and you certainly couldn’t stop me from getting poisoned. I need more.”
“Then we will double the soldiers—”
“No,” I interrupted. “What happens when one of your soldiers turns out to be the culprit? I cannot rely on guards at every second. I need my blade.”
“A princess cannot swim around—”
“I am not the princess!” I shouted then, hands fisting the blankets. Sensing my distress, the anemones flowed over to me and caressed my arms in the slight sting of their embrace. I pushed them aside, calmed my breathing. “I am not the princess,” I repeated. “And I will never be the princess. No amount of pretending will turn me into her. I am not a helpless royal, and I want my weapon to defend myself should I ever need it.”
The captain was quiet a long moment after that. From where I sat, I could make out the slow workings of his square jaw as he contemplated my words. The side of his mouth twitched, and he sighed. “I will think it over.”
I scowled at him. What else had to happen to me for him to agree to give me my blade back? Did I have to get attacked on Eramaea’s streets for him to finally see reason?
“Get some rest.” That was his goodbye as he turned and swam from the room.