To Kill a Kingdom(67)

He doesn’t wake.

His breathing is hitched, but I’m surprised he’s even breathing at all. I heard the crunch as the bat connected with the back of his head. A coward’s blow. Elian was winning, and in just a few more minutes – even without that knife he loves so damn much – he would have killed Tallis Rycroft. With his bare hands if he had to. And I would have helped.

If I had my song, I wouldn’t have even wasted it on a man like Tallis. Let him drown knowing the horror of death, without the comfort of beauty or love. Elian has an army and we should have used that to attack Rycroft, but the prince prefers trickery to war.

Get away clean, he said. Before anyone can notice what we’ve taken.

I look to my hands, smeared with Elian’s blood. This is not getting away clean.

In the sea, mermaids sing songs about humans. There’s one they hum like a child’s lullaby, which weaves the story of Keto’s slaughter. In it, the mermaids speak of human bravery and how they claimed victory against all odds, but until I was dragged onto Elian’s ship, I’d never seen courage from a human. Even the strongest men fell under my spell, and those I didn’t lure were too scared to challenge me. Elian is different. He has courage, or recklessness masked as something like it. And he also has mercy. Mercy even for creatures like Maeve, whose life he took as a last option. He didn’t want to savor it; he just wanted it over with. Like I had with the Kalokaírin prince. With Crestell.

I wonder if I’d be that sort of a killer if I had been raised human. Merciful and hesitant to shed blood. Or, perhaps, if I wouldn’t have been a killer at all. If I would have just been a girl, like any other who walked the world. Keto created our race in war and savagery, but it was the sea queens who took her hate and made it our legacy. Queens like my mother, who taught their children to be empty warriors.

Elian’s family taught him to be something else. The kind of man willing to throw a strange girl out of harm’s way and battle a tyrannical pirate in her place. The chivalry I used to scoff at has saved my life twice now. Is that what it means to be human? Pushing someone else out of danger and throwing yourself in? Every time I protected Kahlia, the Sea Queen chided me for my weakness and punished us both as though she could beat the bond out of us. I spent my life rethinking every look and action to be sure there wasn’t any visible affection in either. She told me it made me inferior. That human emotions were a curse. But Elian’s human emotions are what led him to save me. To help me. To trust that I’ll do the same when the time comes.

Elian stirs and lets out a low groan. His head lolls and his eyes flicker open. He blinks in his surroundings, and it only takes a few moments before he notices the restraints binding his hands. He tugs, a halfhearted attempt at escape, and then cranes his head toward me. From across the room, I see his elegant jaw sharpen.

“Lira?” His voice is as coarse as sand. He must see blood somewhere – it seems to be everywhere – because the next thing he asks is, “Where are you hurt?”

Again, I lick the crack in my lip where Tallis struck me.

The blood is warm and bitter.

“I’m not.” I angle my face away so he doesn’t see otherwise. “You bled all over me.”

Elian’s laugh is more of a scoff. “Charming as ever,” he says.

He takes in a long breath and closes his eyes for a moment. The pain in his head must be getting the best of him, but he tries to swallow it and appear the brave warrior. As though it would be an offense for me to see him as anything else.

“I’ll kill him for this,” Elian says.

“You should make sure he doesn’t kill us first.”

Elian tugs at the rope again, twisting his arm in the most bizarre angles in an attempt to slip the restraints. He moves like an eel, slippery and too quick for me to see what he’s doing from where I’m sitting.

“Enough,” I say, when I see the rope begin to redden his skin. “You’re not helping.”

“I’m trying,” Elian tells me. “Feel free to yank your own thumb out of its socket anytime now. Or better yet, how about you use that Psáriin to call some sirens here and let them kill us before Rycroft has a chance?”

I flick my chin up. “We wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t insisted on such a ridiculous plan.”

“I think getting my head smashed in may have affected my hearing.” Elian’s voice loses its usual musicality. “What did you just say?”

“You didn’t even realize he was tricking you,” I say. “And you walked right into his hands.”

Elian’s shoulders twitch. “He has the necklace, so whether I knew about his ambush or not, I still would have come. I’ve sacrificed too much to fall at the last hurdle.”

“As though you’ve ever had to sacrifice anything,” I shoot back, thinking of the kingdom I have hanging on the line. “You’re the prince of a kingdom that’s full of brightness and warmth.”

“And that kingdom is exactly what I’ve sacrificed!”

“What does that mean?”

Elian sighs. “It means that my deal with the princess was about more than just a map and a necklace.” His voice is rueful. “I promised she could rule alongside me if she gave me her help.”

My lips part as the weight of his words sink through the air. While I’m trying everything I can to steal my throne from my mother, Elian is busy bargaining his away for treasure.