Oceanborn

“But I didn’t feel anything those other times,” I say. “Via the bond, I mean.”

“That’s what happened this morning?”

“Yes. It was bad, Speio, like I was being gutted from nose to tail. It was so strong I could barely handle it. It felt...wrong.”

Speio leans his body into mine in a comforting gesture. “He’ll be okay, Riss,” he says slowly with an uncertain look at me. “Look, I know things between us haven’t been great, and I know that’s my fault. I know you don’t trust me. But I care about you, and I care about Lo.”

“You hate Lo.”

“I don’t hate Lo,” Speio says as we swim past a row of unfamiliar underwater mountains. I must have drifted farther than I’d expected. “I thought that he was hiding something, and he was. But now, well, he’s a part of you...so that means he’s a part of us.” Speio stops, considering his words. “And if something happens to him, that’s going to be bad for everyone here, right?”

“Nothing bad’s going to happen to Lo,” I say swiftly, just as I feel the pull of home. We’re nearly back.

“No, you’re right,” he says. “Riss?”

“What?”

“I want you know that I’m here no matter what. I mean, I know you don’t trust me and you have every right not to, but if we have to go back for Lo, then I’ll go back with you, okay?”

“What about finding your mate here in Waterfell?” I ask. “It’s what you’ve always wanted.”

Speio shrugs, another humanlike gesture that almost makes me smile. “It’s what I thought I wanted because I couldn’t have it when we lived on the mainland. But turns out, just because we’re home doesn’t mean that I’m going to bond with someone. Plus, I miss skateboarding. And surfing. And our friends. And believe it or not, a part of me wishes that I could finish my senior year at Dover.” He stares at me, his eyes vulnerable. “Too human?”

“Not at all,” I admit, floored by his candid admissions. “I feel like that, too. I miss Jenna and Sawyer. I even miss Cara sometimes.” Cara...said archnemesis who’d had her eye on Lo and had been determined to banish me to hell when she realized that we were a couple. She even hooked up with Speio to get back at me. I grin. “But only on very special occasions.”

Speio eyes Nova and Nell, who don’t know whether to be annoyed at my disappearing act or relieved that I’ve returned before they got flayed alive by Echlios for letting me out of their sight in the first place. “You looked really good up there today, Riss,” he says so softly that I can hardly hear him. “Like a real queen. Your father would have been proud.”

“Thanks,” I say, startled.

But Speio is already swimming away. It’s more words than we’ve spoken in months, and I realize that I’ve missed him. I think back to what he said about Lo and frown. Dehydration is a common affliction for our species, particularly because of the combination of water and salt in our bodies. But Lo is a hybrid, which means that he should be able to tolerate it better than we can. Or maybe it’s the reverse.

The way Echlios explained it, Lo is the best of both worlds—an Aquarathi with transmuted human DNA that allows him to live comfortably on land or in the sea. He is the product of accelerated evolution based on the laws of natural selection...accelerated because his mother and her cronies induced those genetic characteristics. We faced and fought others that looked like hideous mutations, hybrids that Ehmora, my mother and the brilliant genetic-scientist ex-headmaster of Dover Prep had concocted. As far as we know, Lo is the only perfect hybrid in existence. But maybe he isn’t perfect. Maybe he’s flawed in some terminal, human way.

The furious outward rush of breath leaves me weak. Lo can’t be sick. He can’t be. He’s meant to be with me. All of a sudden, those countless arguments I had with myself about leaving him behind become meaningless. The only thing I can think about is Lo and figuring out what’s wrong with him...figuring out how I can save him. Because I did this. It’s my fault. The guilt is nearly suffocating. Maybe if I hadn’t been so selfish about keeping us apart, things would be different. He would be happy and healthy, here with me where he belongs. Instead I’m going to lose him.

“Soren,” I pulse, entering the core of the High Court. The Aquarathi in the chamber clear out, their heads bowed. I can sense the underlying tension, and a certainty that something isn’t quite right floods my body. I try not to let the fear invade my head, but it does, like insidious ink. “Any news?” I ask her. “Is Echlios back?”

“Yes, there’s news, and no, Echlios is not back,” she says slowly. I can feel her sadness in the water rushing around in her body. I can see it in the shimmer of her melting green eyes.

“What is it? Is Lo okay?”

“Nerissa...”

Heaven help me, I already know what she’s going to say. I want to shake her, to smash my head into her side. I want to scream my fear and shed it from the inside of my skin. Instead I pull on a composed mask and deaden the emotion running rampant within me. “Just say it, Soren. Tell me. I can handle it, I promise.”

But I can’t handle it at all, not when her lips shape the words that make my bones thin to air and my heart crumble into unrecognizable fragments. “It’s not good. He’s dying.”

2 Impossible Choices

The faces of the six members of the Aquarathi High Council could be hewn from calcified rock. The lower-court kings and queens have already been briefed on the situation—I can see their varying reactions in the tilt of their heads and the rigid stance of their bodies. Their royal guards, including mine, the ever-present Nova and Nell, line the rear of the hall in a silent, ominous row.

Soren calls the meeting to order—she’s acting in Echlios’s stead since he’s still landside. I swallow hard and bury my grief deep. I greet each of the High Council in turn, all of them baring their necks to me in respectful deference—Queen Miral and her consort, Hevan, from the Gold Court, Queen Castia from Emerald, King Verren and Queen Aylis from Sapphire, and lastly, Keil, the new king of the Ruby Court.

I watch him surreptitiously as he takes his place in the circle. Keil, Ehmora’s cousin, is young but ambitious. He’s probably the only other Aquarathi on this council who’s around the same age as me. As if reading my thoughts, he winks at me and I blink, startled at the familiarity. I remember training with him when we were young, and have several memories of him being rebellious and funny, but it’s not like we’ve seen each other a lot since then, nor is he someone I would consider an ally. The other royals are all far older—and likely more worldly in the ways of ruling—than either of us.

I clear my throat—my job is to reassure and to calm, to keep my internal fears compartmentalized. And the last thing I want to do now is to appear weak. “Before we start, what is the update on the oil spill off Hawaii? Has it been mitigated?”

Hevan, Gold Court consort, nods. “Yes, my queen. Most of it has been isolated with booms and removed with skimmer equipment. We have done what we can to assist with more rapid biodegradation from below the surface.”

“Any more information on what caused it?”

Hevan hesitates, looking to his queen for guidance. Miral nods. “Someone hacked the ship’s computer, forcing it to capsize. We’re still working on it.”

I have my guesses as to who could forcibly cause an ocean tanker to capsize and have the means to do so—Cano, it seems, will do anything to prove that he’s still around. If we trace it back to him, maybe we can finally hunt him down and learn where he’s been hiding. “Keep me informed the minute you hear anything. Any news from our friends at NOAA on the proposed initiatives to mark up the bills on marine debris at the recent House Committee meeting?”

“Yes, the bill was successfully amended, and funding allocated.”

“Excellent. And the senate hearing on the offshore-industrial-waste issue?”

“Still on track for next month.”

“Good.”

I inhale deeply to counter my sudden inability to breathe, forcing the simmering dread out of my mind. Time to address the real reason the High Council had been convened. “As you’ve been recently informed, my...the regent has fallen ill. Echlios has been dispatched to further assess the situation. There’s no cause for alarm.”

“No cause for alarm,” Castia from the Emerald Court huffs. “You are bonded to the creature. We saw you collapse from whatever it was you felt during the coronation! You cannot underestimate the bond, even one as...unique as yours.” It’s clear from her tone that unique was far from her intended word choice. “If he is in fatal danger, then you are in danger. And we are in danger.”

“The prince regent is safe for the moment,” Soren interjects in a firm, respectful tone. “As is your queen.”

“Safe?” Castia hisses. “Look at her. She can barely focus despite the pretense.”

“If the regent is dying, then you should go to him,” King Verren says with a disgusted look at Castia.

“I cannot leave Waterfell,” I say despite the lurch in my stomach at his words. I eye the Sapphire Court king, who has always been a strong ally.

“You invite destruction,” Castia says under her breath.

Soren bristles beside me, but I shoot her a warning glance. Tensions are skyrocketing already, it seems. “Explain what you mean, Castia,” I say carefully.

“What about these hybrid abominations that Ehmora created?” She spits out the name in distaste.

“Most of them have been eliminated, Castia. You know that. Echlios made sure of it. We haven’t had any sightings of them in weeks.”

“And the human, Cano? What of him?”

I sigh. “We’re still looking for him.”

“So he’s still at large?”

“What is your point, Castia?”

Her eyes glitter like jade stones. “My point, my queen, is this—how do we know that this human isn’t working with your...prince regent? How do we know that this half-human hybrid son of Ehmora’s won’t lead him right to us? That this isn’t all some intricate ploy to infiltrate Waterfell...to expose us?”

I lift my chin and hold her challenging stare. “Lo is bonded to me. His loyalty is to me, and to Waterfell. He would never betray us to Cano.”

“Your duty is to your people, not a hybrid.”

King Verren and Queen Aylis share an anxious glance at Castia’s provocative words. He moves forward. “I think what Castia is trying to say and failing to do so is that even if he does not intend to be disloyal, the prince regent is vulnerable.” He looks at me with an almost apologetic expression, as if supporting Castia’s claims is the last thing he wants to do. “Which means that you, too, are vulnerable. What if Cano attacked him to get to you?”

“Attacked him? How?” I ask.

“The bond is enduring, and if yours is anything like ours,” Aylis murmurs, “you will feel every bit of his suffering as if it is your own, my queen. If the prince is dying, then you, too, are compromised.”

“You are the only one who can give him the strength to survive the journey back here, and bring him back safely,” Verren says. “You must go.”

“But how can I?” I whisper, my heart aching as if it’s being torn into two—love and duty clashing like titans—even as Verren’s soft words make a fragile, if unrealistic, hope bloom in my chest. As much as every cell inside me wants to go to Lo, how can I abandon Waterfell and expose my people with the threat of Cano still looming? But how can I forsake Lo, either? I swallow hard. “You suggest the impossible, Verren,” I say softly. “If I go, our people are at risk. If I don’t go, he dies. How can I possibly choose?”

“Your place is here,” Castia snarls. “That creature is not oceanborn.”

“Mind your words, Castia,” Verren snarls back.

A wave of nausea makes my vision swim for a second. I steady myself and ignore the concerned glance that Soren sends in my direction. Following the attack during the coronation, I’ve been experiencing ongoing tremors—nothing like the first, but painful just the same. My claws curl into fists to quell their sudden shaking.

“We need you to continue to be a strong queen,” Verren continues with a knowing glance, and then adds quickly, “As you have been. And you can be that only with the regent at your side. Alive and well.”

I glance at Miral, queen of the Gold Court, who until now has been silent. She, too, has been one of my stronger supporters over the last few weeks. “Miral? What is your say on this?”

“I agree that this Cano is a threat. My reports have been unreliable, but he still poses a risk to us. If our existence is to remain a secret, then we must find and deal with the threat. While I agree that your prince is loyal and he has more than proven himself, he is still exposed, especially to this man. As are you.” She exchanges a look with the Sapphire Court royals. “And Aylis is right. We cannot know how his illness will affect you.”

“Keil?” I turn to the Ruby Court king.

“I think you should stay. Let Echlios handle the boy. If you leave now, the Aquarathi will view your absence once more as a conscious decision to choose this hybrid over them.” He flicks his tail indolently. “It is, after all, reminiscent of your past behavior.” As much as his blunt words sting, I know he’s right. My duty as queen is to the Aquarathi people. I open my mouth to say as much, but Keil isn’t finished. “That said, Cano is a threat, the prince is dying, you will be weakened and we will be defenseless if we don’t do anything, so I propose four months.”

“Four months for what?” I say, surprised.

“Four months to finish what you started landside,” he says coolly. “Lure Cano out of hiding, remove the threat, save your prince, return to Waterfell. Uphold your oaths to defend our people.”

The suggestive note in his tone makes me bristle, but I ignore it. “Just like that? And what if four months isn’t enough?”

Keil’s answer is as diplomatic as the conciliatory smile he sends my way. “Let’s cross that bridge should we come to it, shall we? For now, you may choose a proxy to act in your stead.”

“And the Aquarathi?”

“We will make sure our courts understand what is at stake,” he says, his gaze sweeping the chamber. “Are we in agreement?”

* * *

The High Council had argued for hours after Keil’s bombshell suggestion. While the Gold and Sapphire Courts were in agreement to protect the prince regent, Castia was of the mind that the laws of the wild should apply—meaning Lo would live out his days and die like any other sick Aquarathi, regardless of the effect it had on me or my ability to lead. In the end, after impassioned debate on all sides, they had all reluctantly agreed to Keil’s proposal. To his dismay, I left Miral in charge, and we had four months to join Echlios and “fix” the problem. If we didn’t return to Waterfell in that time frame, I’d likely be forced to abdicate despite Keil’s generous—and calculated—words about crossing that bridge if we came to it.

After I got over the initial shock of the High Council’s decision, it was a foregone conclusion that we would return to La Jolla in short order. Hybrid or not, Lo was one of us and we couldn’t abandon him. Especially not if an attack on him made me—and Waterfell—vulnerable to exposure.

And so, in much the same way as we left La Jolla, we arrive in the dead of night to join Echlios in our old house on the beach with a plan to get ourselves back into the routine of being human...not an easy task given the new weight sitting on our shoulders. We aren’t here to learn or to acclimatize to humans. We’re here to save one of us.

San Diego is the same as when we left it a few months ago...warm, sunny and clear blue skies stretching for miles. I didn’t realize how much I’d miss the sky—the unending canvas of it, stretching out from the arms of the horizon, or the white tendrils of clouds drifting past and tinged in sunlight. Waterfell is beautiful in a different way, but nothing there can mimic the simple beauty of daylight.

Soren extends a glimmer outward and confirms that the beach is deserted. Shifting into human form feels strange, as if my body has forgotten how to do it, but of course it’s just muscle memory. My bones crack and dissolve inside me, condensing and reshaping into the form of delicate human bones. Oddly, it hurts a little this time and I’m enveloped by a suffocating sensation as if I’m being stretched infinitely and then reformed into something far too tight. I try to relax into it and not force the shift—forcing means broken or excruciatingly misshaped bones. Breathing deeply, I focus on the ridged planes of my face softening and reshaping into smooth contours of cheek and brow. Human skin stretches over the shimmering gold-green tissue as I wave a slender forearm in front of me. My eyes are the last things to change, the protective coating slipping over the large, brilliant irises of my species. The hazel-hued shield mimics the appearance of human eyes.

Soren is already halfway up the beach, her nude form camouflaged by a glimmer. Even though the beach is deserted, anyone watching would see only sand. I glance at Speio, who is just completing his transformation. I catch him right at the moment when his face is halfway between beast and human. I’m shocked by how grotesque he appears as the fangs in his gaping mouth shift into human teeth and the puckered scaly hide of his face burns a mottled green. For a second he reminds me of the hybrid we killed, and a sour feeling fills my stomach. Lo is a hybrid, too.

“What’s wrong?” Speio asks, shift complete, looking every inch like a tall, boyish seventeen-year-old with a shock of white-blond messy hair falling over one eye. His chest is lean and muscled, much the same as his Aquarathi one, but that’s where my scrutiny stops. As much as I love Speio and have seen him naked countless times, I have to draw the line somewhere.

“Nothing,” I say averting my eyes. “You just looked...weird.”

He shoots me a confused look. “You’ve seen me change a gazillion times.”

I shrug and wrap my arms around myself, the slick fuzzy feeling of my new skin slightly off-putting. “Seriously, it was nothing. I’m worked up about Lo and whether he’s getting ill because of his, you know, hybrid genes.”

“Could be,” Speio says with a forced grin. “Or could be anything. Maybe it’s a royal bonding thing we don’t know about. It’s going to be fine, Riss. Echlios will figure it out.”

But I can see in Speio’s eyes that he, too, thinks it’s because Lo is a hybrid. It’s the only explanation. Aquarathi don’t get sick—it’s the reason we were able to come to another planet and survive, thrive even—our immune systems are incredibly strong. So it stands to reason that Lo is sick because of his integrated human DNA...which means we have no idea in hell of how to help him.

Fighting my defeatist attitude, I enter my old room from the patio entrance off the pool deck and grab the robe hanging on the hook near the door. Echlios had the housekeepers come in to ready everything for our arrival, and the room looks exactly as I left it—my little mini pieces of Waterfell and home away from home. Glittering sea-glass ceiling, stained glass windows, walls painted in shimmering shades of blue...and one solemn auburn-haired best friend.

“Jenna,” I gasp, and throw myself into her arms. “What are you doing here? Did you talk to Echlios? Have you seen Lo? What happened?”

Jenna nods, hugging me even more tightly to her after my rapid-fire questions. She doesn’t answer immediately but pulls me over to the side of the bed and pats the spot next to her. I sit.

“Guess you didn’t think you’d be back to visit me so soon,” she says, her mouth twisting in a half smile. “Wish it was under better circumstances.”

“Soren says Echlios is with him at his house,” I blurt out. “She wants me to wait to talk to Echlios, but it feels like I’m going burst out of my skin.” I gesture at my human body. “Something doesn’t feel the same. Like I’m going to explode into nothing.”

“That’s just panic, Riss. It’s okay. Lo is fine,” she says gently. “At least he seems fine on the surface, except for the passing out. That started in the last few weeks. I mean...he was fine. Surfing, working, hanging out. Then all of a sudden, he wasn’t around. Sawyer tried calling him, and he was just holed up in his house. We thought he had the flu or something.” She pauses, her eyes shifting and becoming shadowed. “But then we found out about the memory loss.”

“The what?” I say in a shocked whisper. This is beyond bad. There’s no awful human-brain condition I’ve learned about that doesn’t start with some kind of degenerative memory loss—Alzheimer’s. Huntington’s. Dementia.

“After he collapsed on the beach a week ago, he had no memory of how he’d gotten there. I thought it was just a concussion from surfing or something, you know, so I didn’t think much of it.” She stops, watching me carefully. “We can talk tomorrow if that’s better.”

“No,” I say. “Please, Jenna. I want to talk now.”

Jenna takes my slack-fingered hand into hers and squeezes reassuringly. The light touch makes me want to snatch my hand away, because I know whatever she’s on the verge of saying is going to be bad. I take a deep breath. “Lo asked Sawyer about his mother. About Ehmora.”

“What do you mean? As in what exactly?”

“He asked him whether he’s seen her around lately.”

I can’t help it. My jaw drops open. Ehmora is dead. Lo killed her three months ago. “What did Sawyer say?”

“He asked him why, and then Lo told him that she’d gone on some business trip and he hadn’t seen her since. It was weird, Sawyer said, like totally out of the blue. Then he dropped the subject and they started talking about surfing as if he’d never even brought it up in the first place.”

“Sawyer doesn’t know about Ehmora, does he, Jenna?” I ask. Jenna would never give away what we are, not even to her boyfriend of three years, but I have to ask, anyway.

“Of course not. He just told me about it, and that’s when things started to click into place. I did some research on his symptoms—dehydration, disorientation, unconsciousness and memory loss—but none of the existing diseases seem to match them. And it’s not like we can take him to a hospital. They’d drag him to an underground, classified bunker in the blink of an eye.”

“That was quick thinking, by the way,” I say, remembering that she somehow convinced the paramedics that Lo didn’t need to be admitted. “The thing with the diabetic stuff.”

“It’s amazing they even believed me,” Jenna says. “It sounded so outlandish when I said it, but Lo was awake and nodding, so maybe they believed him.”

“It was a glimmer,” I murmur softly, nodding. It’s something small, but Lo using a glimmer gives me hope, because at least he still knows what he is. And because he’s a hybrid, holding on to his human form is far easier for him than it is us, so there’s no immediate risk of exposure. I suppress a small sigh of relief.

“A what?”

“Something that we can do,” I say. “Remember when you asked me about mind control last spring?” Jenna’s blue eyes almost bug out of her head, but she’s known my secret long enough to know that I’d never use it to hurt her. “We can...suggest things to people. Not Speio or Soren so much, but me. And now Lo.”

“Because he’s with you, a queen?”

“Yes, and because he’s the son of a queen.”

“Oh.”

I study Jenna, surprised by how much I missed her in three months. She’s become far more than just a best friend. She’s family. And because I trusted her with our secret, she’s now a part of us.

“You cut your hair,” I say, only just noticing the layered strands resting on her shoulders and the new sheared fringe across her brow.

“The bangs were a bad idea.” She brushes them back with one hand. “But at least it’ll grow. It was way shorter than this at first. I looked like one of those weird dolls with the button eyes. I must have been having separation issues when you left, because I literally chopped it off one afternoon.”

“It looks good.”

“It looks like crap, but thanks for the vote of support,” she says with a smile. “You look the same.”