It had been five days since the mermaid had grown legs.
She had adjusted to them, if only slightly. At the very least, she no longer stumbled down the mansion’s corridors the way she had during the first few days. Watching her learn to walk had been like watching a newborn fawn take its first steps. Awkward, stubborn, and determined not to accept help.
Darian had moved her into one of the guest chambers overlooking the gardens. It was a far cry from the glass tank his uncle had imprisoned her in. He had also assigned her a caretaker, a young maid scarcely older than the Calypso herself. Fiona possessed enough energy to exhaust an entire household, and he had hoped some of it might chip away at the girl’s silence.
He hadn’t been so fortunate.
To the rest of the empire, she was an exotic pet.
To Darian, she was simply another victim of Erik’s cruelty.
Resting against the trunk of an old apple tree, he watched the pair wander through the gardens. Neither of them had noticed him.
Fiona’s laughter carried easily through the afternoon air. Brown curls bounced around her freckled face as she reached for Neria’s hand, trying to tug her farther along the stone path.
"You need some sun, Nerry!"
Neria allowed herself to be pulled for all of three steps before wrenching her hand free.
Her expression alone was enough to send most soldiers retreating. She spun on her heel and started back toward the manor without a word.
Fiona sighed dramatically. "Nerry!"
Neria didn’t even slow down.
"You’ve been glaring at the walls for five days!"
Still nothing.
"If you’re going to glare at least do it with some fresh air in your lungs!"
That, apparently, was enough to make Neria stop. She turned just enough to shoot Fiona a sharp look. "Are you going to tell me what I can and cannot do."
Fiona’s fingers wriggled with each other nervously at her sharp tone. "I wasn’t trying to."
From beneath the apple tree, Darian sighed.
He pushed himself away from the apple tree and made his way towards them, his hands tucked into the pockets of his trousers. Fiona was the first to notice him, the maid immediately dipped into a curtsy, her cheerful smile faltering into something more respectful.
"Your Grace."
Neria didn’t even bother looking at him. She stood with her arms folded tightly across her chest, her gaze fixed on the flower beds as though he didn’t exist. The hostility radiating off her was almost tangible.
Another sigh escaped him.
Fiona looked between the two of them before taking a few awkward steps backwards, deciding it was best to leave whatever conversation was about to happen to them.
Darian stopped a respectable distance away. "You seem to be adjusting."
That got her attention.
Neria slowly turned her head, her sapphire eyes narrowing the moment they landed on him. "I wasn’t given much of a choice, was I?" she replied, the bitterness in her voice impossible to miss. "What do you want?"
It was a rather bold question to ask the owner of the estate, but Darian had long accepted that Neria was unlike anyone else he’d ever met.
"I simply wanted to know whether you were adjusting. It can’t be easy after everything you’ve—"
"Don’t."
The single word was sharp enough to cut through whatever he had intended to say.
"Don’t stand there pretending to sympathize with me." She took a small step back, putting even more distance between them. "You landwalkers are all the same. You kill us, chain us, call us pets, then suddenly decide to play kind when it eases your conscience."
Darian remained silent.
There was very little he could say that wouldn’t sound like an excuse.
From where Neria stood, she wasn’t entirely wrong. His uncle had slaughtered her people, but it was Darian’s estate she was imprisoned in. His name was the one attached to her captivity. Whether he wanted her there or not made little difference to the girl who had lost everything.
He had only just opened his mouth to try again when Hartley’s familiar figure appeared from the pathway leading into the gardens. Beside the old steward walked a man dressed in the crimson and gold uniform of the Imperial Household, a rolled parchment held carefully beneath one arm.
A royal messenger.
Both men stopped before him. Hartley bowed his head while the messenger dropped to one knee.
"Your Grace."
Darian’s expression cooled instantly.
"What does the Emperor want now?"
The messenger rose just enough to present the sealed scroll. "His Imperial Majesty requests your attendance at tonight’s imperial banquet."
Another banquet.
Another evening spent watching Erik squander the empire’s wealth while soldiers froze and bled defending borders he rarely thought about.
The messenger’s gaze shifted toward Neria, lingering a second too long before returning to Darian.
"His Majesty also insists that you bring your... pet."
The word made Neria’s jaw tighten.
Before either of them could respond, another servant stepped forward carrying a polished wooden box. He placed it carefully upon the messenger’s hands before opening the lid.
Inside rested a gown of rich vermilion silk.
Darian’s eyes settled on it for only a moment before his jaw tightened.
He knew that design.
Erik had commissioned dresses like these for the whores he kept around him. The neckline plunged scandalously low, the skirts were slit high along the thigh, and the thin golden chains stitched into the silk drew attention to every curve they rested against.
They weren’t made to clothe women, they were made to display them.
A slow wave of anger settled in Darian’s chest.
His uncle wasn’t inviting Neria to dinner. He was planning to parade her before the entire imperial court.
__
Fiona had called the dress scandalous.
Neria still didn’t entirely understand why.
She agreed that it revealed far too much. The fabric clung to her body in ways she found uncomfortable, leaving her shoulders bare and exposing more of her unfamiliar legs than she thought necessary. It felt less like clothing and more like something meant to be stared at.
Landwalkers truly were strange.
The maids had adorned her with necklaces, bracelets and rings fashioned from pearls and precious stones. She recognized some of them immediately. They were the same sort of treasures she used to collect from sunken ships, trinkets forgotten beneath the sea and claimed as her own. She had once thought them beautiful.
Now they felt unbearably heavy.
Neria stood before the mirror in silence, her fingers drifting to the shell pendant resting against her chest. It was the only thing she had refused to let the maids remove. They had tried, insisting it didn’t match the gown, but the moment their hands touched it she had nearly bitten one of them.
So they left it.
Her thumb brushed over its smooth surface, and for a brief moment she closed her eyes.
Nerissa.
The image of her sister surfaced once again. The harpoon. The blood staining the sea. The lifeless body sinking deeper and deeper into the darkness while Neria screamed helplessly inside a hunter’s net.
Her chest tightened.
Every night it was the same. Every time she closed her eyes she watched her pod die all over again.
Slowly, she opened them.
Her reflection stared back.
She hardly recognized the girl in the mirror. She was just another landwalker dressed for a banquet she never wished to attend.
A faint, bitter smile tugged at her lips.
Tonight...
Tonight those monsters would finally understand what it meant to lose everything.
Her fingers curled tightly around the shell necklace.
She would sing.
Not one of the songs her pod used to teach their young. Not the melodies carried through coral reefs during migrations or beneath moonlit tides.
No.
She would sing the Mad Ballad.
A song so forbidden, Calypsos swore to never utter a word of it in their lifetimes. Only a few could sing it.
Very very few.
And Neria was part of the few.
A song that turned reason into madness. Those who heard it no longer recognized friend from foe. Love became hatred. Fear became violence. Families will spill the blood of their own kin.
It was the darkest secret her people possessed.
One never meant to be used.
The price was hefty. To sing that dark horrid melody to the shadow gods one must sacrifice something of their own.
Their soul.
A price she was willing to take.