Page 139 of In Violent Waves

Lyra glimpsed the turtles on the banks and the bubbles that popped at the surface. Again, she didn’t have the heart to tell him he was wrong.

The turtles might have decimated a good portion of the fish, and the lack of birds didn’t bode well either.

The reeds waved in the breeze as Wilder cast their line. Lyra sat on the ground beside him. The grass on the bank was soft, and there were colorful wildflowers blooming throughout. Such charming peace exuded from this place.

“So you’ve seen what most of the Wilds have to offer. Will you tell me about Atlantis?” Wilder prompted, taking a seat beside her and keeping an eye on his line.

“There’s not much to tell.”

“Friends? Siblings?”

Lyra sighed through her nose. “The closest things to friends I have are Marina and Seraphina. The two women who were with me the night you kidnapped me.”

“Oh, right,” Wilder bit back a smile.

“I guess you could call them friends. But they’re not friends in the same way that you have Maelys, Ridge, and Otto. And as far as siblings go, I have six older sisters.”

“All females,” Wilder said in surprise.

“It’s ironic King Auris only sired daughters when they have no place in our kingdom except as bargaining chips or pawns,” she mused.

Wilder furrowed his brow and recast his line.

“What do you mean?”

“All of my older sisters were married off to bordering territories when I was still quite young. My engagement was even planned from infancy. But there was a large age gap between me and my next oldest sister.”

“How big?”

“Eight years. When I was ten, she was married off.”

“That’s so young.”

“Mhm.” Lyra sighed through her nose. “I’m not exactly sure why I wasn’t married off as soon as I turned eighteen, as well. Except maybe it was because I was my father’s favorite—or that I needed to become stronger to survive my fiancé.”

Wilder turned to her then. “Is he that bad?”

Lyra gestured to the scars on the inside of her arms. “He’s the worst sort. More muscle than brains, he is cruel, and the only thing he truly loves is himself. He turned his mother over for reading ‘illicit material’.”

“I just can’t imagine why they would want their females to suffer,” Wilder murmured.

Lyra shrugged. “Control, maybe? I don’t know. There’s no mention of the three sisters, either. They stripped that tidbit from all our books, paintings, and rites. But then again, we can’t partake in that, anyway.”

Wilder shook his head, and Lyra sighed.

It fell silent before he asked, “How are Seraphina and Marina different from my friends?”

Lyra frowned, thinking back over her bond with the two of them.

“I would say I’m closer to Marina than Seraphina. But we were raised much differently. Her father was kind despite her being a female, and therefore, she’s always been a bit different.”

“How so?”

“Well, she—she asks a lot of pointed questions.”

Wilder snorted, and Lyra glared.

“It’s not like that. She has this way of riling me up and getting me into trouble.” She didn’t know how to explain it to him other than to give examples. “When I was fifteen, I found a book on elves that a library guard hadn’t put back in the right place. Well, actually, Marina is the one who found it and showed me, and the one who caused a distraction so that I could slip out unnoticed. I devoured that book.”