Aristocrats always carried the same stench.
They reeked of stolen lands, stale pride and a nauseating smell of entitlement that mixed perfectly well with their sickenly sweet perfume that clung onto their skins. They filled every inch of the ballroom like rot clothed in silk, laughing too loudly, leaning too close, speaking as if they owned the world.
He stood among them with a glass of red wine in his hand.
A Marquis—he couldn’t remember the name, and didn’t care to—was speaking at him. Something about his daughter coming of age and some arrangements. Darian wasn’t really listening.
His attention had long drifted to the center of the hall where something large had been placed and covered in dark velvet cloth.
A display he was sure he wasn’t going to like.
The Emperor of Astravia had developed a habit of collecting live things and calling it art.
"Marquis," Darian said flatly, interrupting the man mid-sentence. "Excuse me, I have... better things to do"
He didn’t wait for permission. He simply moved, stepping past the nobleman playing matchmaker as though he didn’t exist, ignoring the offended silence that followed.
The crowd moved instinctively as he passed, creating space the way people did around a force they didn’t want to deal with.
He had fought an eight-year war on the frontier.
This was worse.
At least in war, people were honest about wanting you dead. Here, they smiled and laughed with you whiles secretly plotting your doom.
Darian stopped near a corner of the hall and finally raised his glass to his lips.
He would rather return to the front lines and fight another eight year war than spend another second pretending to care about these people. After all If he had learnt anything from fighting wars his entire adolescence, it was that driving spear through an enemy was always the best solution.
He would have loved to prove that theory here, he wanted to drive a spear through the emperor’s chest but he knew better.
It wasn’t the right time to kill his uncle.
The doors at the far end of the hall opened. The Emperor entered like a man who believed the world was build for him.
Erik Emberfall.
Darian’s uncle.
He walked with effortless confidence, stopping at the center of the hall as though the entire room had been arranged for his pleasure. Nobles bowed. Some deeper than others.
The Emperor smiled as if he were a fucking saint receiving worship instead of a usurper sitting on a stolen throne.
"Now," Erik said, spreading his arms slightly, "I know you’ve all been wondering what I’ve brought for you today."
His gaze drifted across the room, landing briefly on Darian. "There you are," he said warmly. "My favourite nephew."
Darian inclined his head once. "Uncle."
Erik’s smile widened. "I have something for you."
That was never a good sentence in this palace.
The servants moved and somewhere not so far he heard chains move. Then, slowly, the dark cloth in the center of the room was pulled away.
Silence filled the hall for a second then came the sound of a collective inhale.
Inside the glass tank was a girl.
A mermaid.
Her tail shimmered in shades of deep sapphire, pressed tightly against the curved surface of the enclosure as she recoiled backward. Her eyes were wide, not just with fear, but something close to shock and confusion.
Darian did not move.
His amber eyes fixed in the creature.
Chains wrapped around her tail and wrists, glowing faintly with enchantment. A collar around her neck pulsed with light every time she struggled, forcing her body into painful obedience. She jerked again, trying to push herself away from the glass, but there was nowhere to go
The Emperor stepped closer and tapped the tank as if inspecting a piece of livestock. "A beauty, isn’t she?" he said proudly.
A few nobles laughed.
"She’s for your collection," someone added. "Imagine the rarity."
Darian’s fingers curled slightly around his glass.
The mermaid flinched at the sound of their laughter. Her gaze darted across the room, sharp and panicked, like an animal searching for a way out that did not exist.
Erik turned slightly toward him. "And she’s all yours."
There was a pause.
Darian stepped forward and the crowd parted again.
He stopped only a few feet from the glass. Up close, he could see it more clearly. The way her hands trembled despite how tightly she tried to control them. The way her breathing had turned uneven. The way her eyes kept locking onto exits that weren’t there.
She was trapped and he could see her slowly realizing that.
Darian’s jaw tightened.
"Mine?" he repeated slowly.
Erik laughed softly, as if amused by the question. "She’ll behave, once she learns where she belongs."
The mermaid’s eyes snapped toward him at the sound of his voice. For a moment, everything in the hall faded.
Darian’s fist clenched at his side. "She’s a living creature," he said quietly.
The laughter in the hall didn’t stop immediately, as if the nobles didn’t understand what had been said at first. Then it rippled through them anyway, amusement, disbelief, curiosity.
Erik’s smile didn’t change. "That’s not what I asked," he replied.
Darian turned to face his uncle, the man looked smug as if he had purchased the most precious piece of art that was to ever exist and not a living person he forced into submission.
It disgusted him, but he fought the urge to grab a sword and kill him.
Darian forced himself to bow, "Thank you, your majesty" he said through gritted teeth.
Despite his own believes he had to accept this cruel gift, Erik had made refusing a gift from the emperor a treasonous crime. And the last thing Darian needed was to give his uncle the upper hand in this fight.
Erik’s satisfied laugh grated against every nerve Darian had left. He didn’t allow himself to react to it. He’d learned that trick a long time ago, the same year his eight-year-old self had watched this man drive a sword through his father’s chest, and had gone on worshipping him anyway, he never really had a choice.
He slowly straightened and his gaze went to the tank that had now been surrounded by nobles who were openly gawking and mocking. They tapped on the glass just to scare her even more.
The mermaid had quiet down, she sat on the tank floor with her tail to her chest and her face buried within them, her shoulders shook as sobs wracked her body.
"Look she’s crying, I wonder what coloured pearls they would be" Darian’s gaze snapped to a woman who stood too close to the glass.
Another ignorant fool.
Calypsos didn’t cry pearls. Just another myth they told to justify hunting them.
Darian grabbed a passing waiter, "Pull the covers up now" the order was cold but clear.
Whether he like it or not she was his now. And he refused to let anyone else see her break.