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I’d slipped inside the training room for but a moment. I hadn’t meant for Maisie to see me, not after she’d made it abundantly clear just how little she wanted to do with me.
I’d conceded to her wishes, if only because I thought the space would help quench my own anger. I furiously spent the past few days looking for any sign of Princess Odele and of the Black Blade. I swam to the mouth of that alley, the one where that criminal had dropped her off, near the rear of the palace. I had been searching for a clue as to how she disappeared out of thin water.
All my efforts had been fruitless attempts.
So much investigating left me with little answers, too many questions, and a bout of cold fury.
There’d been nothing to do but monitor Maisie from afar. And that’s how I found myself here, watching, raging.
It had been like a perfect dance between the two, yet entirely unplanned. Even I was fascinated by the choreography of the push and pull between them. Of the Dragon Prince challenging Maisie to go faster, push harder. She’d done it, making it a feat I had not been able to accomplish. Gone was the prominent sign of her limp. There’d been a confidence in her that, with a start, had reminded me of Odele.
That resemblance was the only explanation I had for the jealousy searing in my chest.
Every movement, every swipe of the blade against her clothing pushed her further away from me and into another’s arms.
But she wasn’t Odele.
Even if she was, she didn’t belong to me any more than Maisie belonged to Kai. They were wishes that were about as impossible and far away as the stars in a two-legger sky.
I bowed briefly to the Draconian Prince before excusing myself to go after Maisie. I left behind the other guards with a gesture of my hand. Not even Percival followed.
I knew she did not want to see me. I didn’t care, because I wanted to see her. Her, or the princess she represented? It didn’t matter.
She was swimming slowly, if a little distractedly. I wondered if she even noticed me beside her.
“Are you here to lecture me about how I ruined the princess’ image?” she asked quietly, sadly.
I startled at the tone. Something in it seemed... broken, defeated. Her hands were red, blisters marring the backs of her knuckles. She kept rubbing her fingers across them. Seeing that hurt skin made my blood suddenly boil, rage raining high.
I was familiar with the sight of welts and bruises. I’d seen them before, had sustained them myself on behalf of Odele. At the time, I’d wanted to protect her from such a fate, as it was my duty to protect her from all harm.
Percival had whacked her once across the backs of her hands. I could still hear the gasp of pain ripped from her throat. Offering my hands in her stead had been easy. Watching her suffer was not.
What I’d done had been selfless. All I’d wanted was to spare her such cruelty. I had, but I still remembered the words she’d said to me right after.
“I didn’t ask you to save me. You aren’t a hero. You’re nothing to me, so stop pretending otherwise.”
Her words had cut through me like a knife just before she slammed the door to her room in my face. I’d leaned against it. I should have turned away, but I couldn’t bring myself to leave. Especially not when the sounds from inside suddenly drifted towards me. The sound of Odele weeping.
“No,” I replied. Contrary to her belief, I did not enjoy lecturing and yelling. And this time, I didn’t plan on doing it. “You look like you’ve suffered enough.”
If I expected her to chuckle, she did not. She still ran fingers across her bruised skin in anxious movements. Instinct made me place a hand over hers. All I wanted was to ease that pain. She stopped. A weary sigh pushed past her lips, and she pulled her hands away from mine, putting space between us.
“You know,” she began as we turned in the hallway, “the longer I’m here, involved in all of this...” She gestured her arms around, at the walls, and ceiling. “The murder attempts, the suffocating lack of privacy, the lessons...” Her fingers fluttered absently, flexing. Finally, she turned to look at me. It was then I realized we had stopped swimming to face each other. “I am starting to understand why she swam away.”
Those words were a dagger to my heart. To think that she’d left of her own accord, that there had been nothing to make her stay.
Not even me.
An impossible wish. To think she even noticed me. She scarcely did. I was just another servant to her. Just another mer she could yell at and misuse. Still, I loved her. I was starting to think that loving her had been a far greater mistake than losing her.
I almost hated the mer in front of me for making me realize that but couldn’t bring myself to feel such a sentiment.
“Then, are you thinking of swimming away too?” I knew my words had come out colder than I’d intended, frigid like the cold freeze floating through water.
Her attention snapped away from me and resumed forward, leaving me to follow.
“I’d hoped you’d understand me better by now, Captain,” she chastised, annoyed. “I am not one to just swim away from duties and leave behind the mer who need me. I said I’d help, and I will.”
Determined as she was, I knew it wasn’t to help Thalassar but to shake the royal foundations of the palace and challenge the laws of war.
“Then I hope to see you do your duty to Thalassar and help,” I commented as we turned down the hallway to Odele’s rooms, “rather than cause more chaos by freeing the criminals of their cells.”
She stopped, just in front of Princess Odele’s room, and turned sharply to me, her glare in place. “I’ll kindly thank you to stop insulting me every time we meet, Captain. If I recall correctly, I gave you an order to stay away.”
Her chin was tilted up, her hands clasped delicately at her stomach. Though her clothes were in tatters and wisps of hair floated out of her chignon, in this moment she looked and sounded every bit as regal and demanding as Odele.
“Well? You are dismissed, Captain.”
She exuded power. Command. Both which were staggering. I blinked, for I could not find the will to do much else. A choked laugh escaped me. “Oh, Maisie.” I shook my head back and forth. “You’re more like Princess Odele than you know.”
Her spine steeled. To her, there could be no greater insult than to be compared to the mermaid she despised the most.
“Goodbye, Captain.” She whirled around, opened the door to her temporary lodgings, and slammed it in my face.
I stared at it long after she’d done it, willing my heart to cease its infernal rapid beating. Deny it as she might, there were some similarities they shared, similarities that ran deeper than just an outwards appearance. Odele used to slam that door in my face as well.
Odele. Odele. Maisie. Odele. Maisie. Odele.
Maisie.
Maisie.
Maisie. Maisie. Maisie.
Was this mermaid from Lagoona pushing the princess from my mind, or were they starting to blur together, becoming one single entity that made my heart pound with affection for the both of them?
No.
It couldn’t be true.
Or rather, I didn’t want it to be true. My head knew which mer was which. And it was time for my heart to learn who it belonged to.