The Kiss That Saved Me (The Tidal Kiss Trilogy Book 2) (27 page)

“You can’t tell me what to do, Saturnus. Now assemble the goddamn squad!” I shout at him, letting my anger loose.

“I don’t answer to you. I answer to a force more sacred and more powerful than you can possibly comprehend, boy. Now sit down and go back to playing with your human women, or whatever it is you used to do before you got involved with that harlot you call a soulmate!” He shouts back and I’ve had enough, I feel rage climb within me like a wave, cresting and powering outward from my body in a burst of air that knocks Saturnus back, but only slightly.

“How dare you raise your hands to me!?” He comes at me, powering forward using his gaudy, jewel encrusted tailfin. I predict his assault and raise my fist, smacking him straight between the eyes with a large crack of my knuckles on his skull. He moves backward, disoriented from the blow.
 

“You forget yourself, Saturnus. I have more battle experience than anyone in this city. If you want to pick a fight, I suggest you choose a more meagre opponent,” I sound calm but I’m not. I’m in internal tumult. He gets up off the floor and moves, quicker than I have ever seen him move before, so fast he’s almost a blur and then he’s behind me.

“No. You forgot yourself. You are nothing. You hear me. Nothing. I will have that throne, I’ll have the crown off your head, even if I have to slit your throat and watch your blood run cold to do it.” His words shock me.
 

What the hell is his problem? Does he really want the throne that badly? Hell, if he’d have asked I probably would have given it to him a couple of months ago. I’m not going to do that now. Is it that the power of the Goddess has gone to his head? Or that he knows I’m really not the right fit for this job? Maybe he knows what the Goddess wants, maybe that’s not me.

 
Either way, something within him is snapping.

“Get out of my city,” I choke out the words as his fingers close over my gills. I gasp, like a fish out of water. He laughs, whispering perversely in the shell of my ear. Delighting in my struggle against him.

“Stupid, stupid boy. You know what’s funny? You overestimate your power. You may be Crowned Ruler, but I’m the one upholding the glimmer over this city. You can’t get rid of me. Unless you want everyone slaughtered by sunrise that is. Or… maybe that is what you want? After all, why else would you be sending away our only defence?” His grip vanishes as quickly as it had clutched my throat and I sink to the floor. He’s gone, moving out of the room in a flurry of bubbles.
 

I debate going after him, leaving him bloody, but I remember Callie’s words to me. He’s our link with Atargatis. Right now that’s something I have to live with. He was right about one thing; we do need him.
 

I’m moving up off the stained glass of the throne room floor when Cole enters. He sees me looking breathless but doesn’t ask why I look shaken. He knows when to pry; it’s one of the things I like most about him.

“Sir, she’s been seen off the coast, Sir… or at least we think it’s her.” Cole looks concerned.

“What do you mean you think it’s her? She’s not exactly subtle with that aqua tail!” I bark at him, irritated at the incompetence my men are showing.

“She doesn’t look the same Sir. She’s changed… her hair, her tail is different too. She’s with a Psiren. I just got word,” he says it, gasping almost with the speed at which he delivers the message.

“Right, let’s go,” I don’t even think about anything else. Hearing Callie is out in the open ocean gives me a little relief, but she’s with a Psiren, is he torturing her, leading her to her death? Am I too late?
 

“Sir, don’t you want to let your right hand know we’re leaving?” Cole asks me, looking troubled.

“No, Cole. I think Saturnus and I are perfectly clear on protocol for this kind of eventuality,” I exit the room with Cole, toward the armoury to collect my weapons. Whatever Callie’s business is with the Psiren, whether he be torturing her, killing her, or using her as bait, tonight will be his last night on earth.

CALLIE

The water at this depth isn’t like I remember, it’s lighter, fresher, and gives a clarity not unlike high definition as I zoom through it seamlessly. My time in the depths of the Cryptopolis has changed me, and it feels like I’m experiencing these coastal waters for the first time. They leave a fizzle of zest on my tongue and a refreshing tang in my nostrils. The low pressure means I move faster than I ever did before I journeyed to the deep, because my muscles are used to working so much harder at high pressures.

“Where are we?” I ask Vex as we reach a sloping incline of dust-like sand.
 

“Close to SDSU,” he replies, the expression on his face is absentminded, something that somehow doesn’t look right on him because he’s usually so intense.

“How do you know?” I query him and he shrugs, mumbling in reply.

“One never forgets the place they breathed their last breath, Pet.” I inhale sharply, I know he is right about that, despite the miles of ocean, the endless azure hue that seems to never end, I know I’ll always be able to find my way back to that beach. The one where I succumbed to the kiss that killed me.
 

Then, I’m curious, I want to ask him how exactly it was he did die, but I don’t have the courage, so instead I redirect the conversation, focusing on the task at hand.
 

My head breaks the surface of the cool shallow water and I blow liquid out of my nose, rejecting it as the dryness of the night air hits me.

“So how do I do this?” I look to him as his head moves above the surface slowly, seamlessly. He doesn’t make any sound as he breaks the surface, not even a drop, he just slides like a ghost into the night.

“Well, seeing as how you’re channelling whatever darkness is inside of you properly, it shouldn’t be too much of a problem. It’s all about visualisation. You just have to cleave yourself from the ocean, imagine yourself being independent from it.”

“How do you know all this?” I ask him and he laughs.

“Mother taught me. She teaches all of us. She learned from Solustus I think.” I shudder at the word ‘mother’. I haven’t even met this creature and yet I already can’t stand the thought of her. She will always be a killer of innocents in my eyes, and that is wrong.

“Oh… okay… so I just picture myself being able to leave the ocean?” I cock my head in disbelief; surely it can’t be that simple.

“What were you expecting? Sacrifice of an innocent virgin?” He chuckles to himself, a sound deep and hollow stemming from his throat.

“Have you seen the world we live in? You laugh, but I was sacrificed, remember?” I wonder if he realises the magnitude of what’s going on around him, the world of Gods and Goddesses he’s been brought into. He smirks and I roll my eyes,
no, of course he doesn’t understand. He’s a jackass.

“Was there chanting? Did they sing Baa Baa black sheep?” He looks like he may laugh and so I slap him on the arm.

“Yes… it was very official. Officially shit scary.”

“Well, as much as I’m sure it was terrifying, can we get on with it. I don’t really plan on pruning up out here, that was supposed to be one of the perks of having to deal with tentacles, you know, not dying of old age.”
 

“Fine,” I snap and close my eyes. I focus, not needing to feel the rays of the moon on me, imagining my tailfin splitting in half and my scales vanishing. I feel a shiver run through me, not the normal tickling sensation, and when I look down at myself my modesty has vanished along with the black of my scales.
 

I move forward out of the water and Vex follows me, totally stark nude, droplets clinging onto him and trickling oh so slowly down the defined lines of his musculature.

“Try not to stare, Love. You’ll make me blush.” Then I do blush, unable to stop myself and his eyes roll over me, scorching. I scowl at him but despite myself can’t stop staring at him either. He’s shorter than Orion, around five foot eight, but he is tightly packed with sinew. He’s stocky and pale, his hair gleaming white in the moonlight and his lilac irises spectral.

“I wasn’t staring,” I say, standing naked on the beach. I remind myself as I shiver, never to curse Georgia again as I wonder what I’m expected to do next. “What now?” I ask him urgently.

“Well, I was thinking we could not freeze to death for a start.”

“You have clothes?” I ask him and he shakes his head.

“No, but I know where some bikers stash their stuff just up the beach, fancy breaking and entering?” I don’t have much of a choice so say nothing as he breaks into a full out stride along the sand, totally unashamed of himself as I scurry after him, covering my boobs with one arm and my private parts with the other.
 

We reach our destination, a large wooden shed on the sand. It looks like it could be used to store jet-skis. There’s a light on inside and the door is cracked ajar. Vex smiles and doesn’t break his stride.

“Hey! What the hell are you doing! I’m not walking in on some biker’s club like this!” I gesture down at my nudity. He looks down at me and then back at my face with a smirk.
 

“Calm your arse down. They’re with us,” he moves away, pulling my naked and completely not calm ‘arse’ into the lamplight of the oversized shed. Then he pushes me behind his body, covering me.

“Darius! Clothes, mate. Grab some chick stuff too.”
 

“Please don’t tell you me you brought her?!” I hear the exclamation and pop my head around Vex’s shoulder.

“You bet your ass he did,” I say, cheery just to piss him off. Daryl blushes in embarrassment, clearly still wounded from my take down, and a man next to him with dreadlocks throws a bundle of black clothing at Vex, who catches it and turns to me, shielding me from the rest of the room.

“Go change outside,” he pushes me back through the door and into the chill night, I curse him under my breath. The San Diego weather never seemed cold to me before, but I stand, shivering and dripping wet on the sand, holding black garments to me. I hold them at arms-length, untangling them and looking at them with a cocked eyebrow.

“Oh you’ve got to be kidding…” I mutter getting dressed. Pulling on leather when you’re dripping wet should never be attempted alone, I realise this as I fall on my ass, trying to pull up the black, skin tight leather pants that have been provided. There is no underwear, so I guess I’ll be going commando. I pull the black corset around my chest, still sitting in the sand. It fits well despite being a little loose around the hips. I clip the silver buckles that line the front of the corset in place, pushing my breasts up upward. The attire reminds me of the night I snuck out to meet Orion, but I push this memory back as I flip my long black hair over one shoulder. I’m not that girl anymore. Not a chance.

“Got any shoes?” I walk into the bike shed, finally dry, and the boys are getting dressed behind large bikes. There are three of them, Daryl, Vex, and another Psiren I haven’t yet met. He has dreadlocks and bloody red eyes. His dark skin glistens with sea water, forming in droplets over his abnormally large and faintly tattooed biceps.

“Over there, Love,” Vex jerks his chin over to the pile of leathers and bike helmets that are hung along the wall. Boots are messily shoved against the wall, and to no surprise are all black.

“Aren’t the bikers gonna be pissed we’re stealing their stuff?” I ask.

“I don’t think they’ll need leathers where they are, Pet. No roads in hell.” I shudder. I’m wearing a dead woman’s clothes. That is wrong on so many levels. I pick up the smallest pair of boots in the pile, they’re knee high, flat and made of soft leather, they had definitely belonged to a woman. I slip them on my bare feet, not thinking about the previous owner. I stare up from the floor as Vex pulls a black round neck t-shirt over his abs.

“The leather, it suits you,” he compliments me and I catch Daryl glaring at me over Vex’s shoulder, his buddy wolf whistles. I glare back at them and Vex turns around to stare at him.

“Bugger off, mate,” he rolls his eyes and turns back to me. “Ignore him, and Tiberius,” he gestures to the Psiren with dreadlocks and skin the colour of dark chocolate. “Ever ridden before?” He asks me and I shake my head, black hair surrounding my face in a shadowy mass that I’m not used to. “Great, you can ride with me.” A glint passes behind the lilacs of his eyes and I recognise the mischief of his intent. My heartbeat quickens slightly in my chest as he walks me over to the largest black and silver bike.