Page 67 of Brine and Bone
That had been the intention.
But then he'd seen her, and his throwaway gambit had found an anchor in something real.
Thalos closed his eyes. The image surfaced unbidden. Vivid. Painted in brilliant shades and stark relief. Kore caught on Nyxarion's knot, curled into his chest. That beautiful skin pulsing in waves of enticing, erratic color. Hypnotic patterns threaded in a braid of shifting waves that rippled through her scales.
Light dancing across a reef.
Moonlight and malice.
Asterion braided through with Korrides.
Lips twitching, Thalos shook his head, bewildered, for it was a potential he hadn't foreseen. A Siren marked by two kings.
Rolling, letting the current carry him in a slow drift, his smile became something wicked.
Because Nyxarion had allowed it.
Threnakar’s exiled prince. Who’d built a kingdom from forbidden coral, won legal breeding rights over a Siren, and beaten Thalos at his own game through brute savagery. He had delivered his precious bride to Thalos, despite all of it, and demanded service.
Grinning, Thalos flicked his tail and caught a warm current. Plotting what came next.
The second trimester was only a few tides away. And with it, a time of peace. Where Thalassari females began to hunt for asuitable nest. Where they could seclude themselves for the third trimester. Force their environment to suit their needs.
He felt the vibration before the ancients reacted, startled from his thoughts, for it was a particular harmonic.
A frequency meant forhim.Sung in a tune that matched his own Resonance with deadly precision.
As one, the scholars stopped plotting and griping. Recoiling, Pelagius and Vorthane surged toward the surface. Alarmed.
Syrathis alone remained still—but those trembling barbles went rigid, reaching down. Straining into the black.
It was a summons between kings.
Nyxarion.
Concentric waves of sound thrumming in the abyss. Subaudible. Insistent. Laced with urgent demand.
Grinning, Thalos stared into the gloom. Pulled from his lazy basking, he rolled. Tail sweeping through the shallows in a single, sleek stroke. The pouch of sun clams settled against his hip, in the spot where the Waveblade was meant to hang.
"Sovereign," Pelagius hissed, fins in full, bristling flare. "You must not answer such a summons! It is a trap. A clear ambush.”
Vorthane lunged forward. Crooked and listing. "Take Cymareth," he said, steel-blue scales bristling with the state of his alarm. "At minimum. You should be attended by a delegation. Armed by the Hollow Court at your flank.”
But Thalos was already moving.
Camouflage rippling across opalescent scales, silver blended with dark waters. A cloak of invisibility that absorbed the dreary tones that matched the abyss.
Ignoring their delicate sensibilities, grin cutting and eager, he dove. Descending without so much as bothering with the riptide, he slid through the layers. Driving toward the mid-ground.
A beacon in the dark, Nyxarion made absolutely no effort to hide.
Scales pulsing the hypnotic blue of the trench-born, spines and fins spread to their limit as he filled the mid-ground in a rigid coil. Scales lifted, venting heat from that massive body, it was an impressive sight. One Thalos took a moment to simply observe, while he remained unseen. Watching the shimmering thermal eddies distorting the water around him.
His Resonance was a wall of sound that vibrated deep in Thalos's bones.
But he was alone.
Absent sentries or guards. No Trident.
