Page 40 of A Magic Deep & Drowning

The uneasiness only grew as he swam up to the green doors that led to the throne room. They should have been posted with his mother’s guards, but there was no one there, and they stood slightly ajar. Pushing them the rest of the way open, he felt his heart sink.

Every space in the Water Kingdom made allowances for the creatures and folk that could not breathe underwater indefinitely. Ledges and pockets of air were carved into every space so that there was no need to surface. Maurits could breathe underwater for hours, a day perhaps if he really needed to. But there were those who required air more frequently.

Maurits stared into the throne room. Those ledges should have been full of courtiers and advisors, but they stood empty. The only creature in the cavernous room was his brother.

“Brother, you have come at last. I know that you dislike attending to your duties here, but I didn’t think you would be quitesotardy.”

Thade sat on the coral throne, a simple pedestal with a seat that had been worn smooth and shimmering from centuries of use. His voice echoed through the hall, sending a few stray mackerel scattering.

“Where is Mother?” Maurits asked warily.

Flicking a disinterested look at Maurits, Thade returned to running his hands along the arms of the throne. “Indisposed.”

“Thade, what—”

“King Thade,” his brother corrected him in an icy tone.

If Thade was looking to elicit a reaction out of his brother, he would be disappointed. Maurits wasn’t moved to anger, or even confusion. Thade had taken the throne, or rather, was playing at taking the throne. There was not a creature that would willingly submit to the rule of an untried youngest son. Maurits’s only real concern was where their mother was, and if this had been the plan between her and Thade all along.

“Thade, I am not calling you that,” Maurits returned in what he thought was a commendably calm tone.

His brother’s gills flared. “If you do not address me properly, you’re not only disrespecting me, but the throne and very office of king itself.”

“And what would make you think that I would ever care anything about that?”

Thade shot up from the throne, his patience gone. “Where is she?” he growled. “The girl.”

“Really? That is your first order of business?” Maurits gave a littletskthat sent red crawling up his brother’s face. “You stole the throne, and your biggest concern is one of Mother’slost pets?” He might have delivered the words calmly, but inside his heart had started beating hard and fast at his brother’s sudden interest in Clara. Thade had seen her himself, had all but protected her from their mother, and now he was suddenly interested in her whereabouts? No, he did not like this at all.

One moment Maurits was floating peacefully before the throne, and the next, he was on his back, icy manacles around his wrists and tail.

Thade hovered above him, his face so close that Maurits could see the tiny scar under his right eye where Thade had run afoul of a ray as a child. “Watch your tongue, brother.”

When had Thade gotten sostrong? Not just physically, but his powers, they were... sharp. Their mother had always been able to take the water in hand, to bend it to her will. She could bestow forms, shift her own shape, and those were just the powers of which Maurits was aware. As her sons, Maurits and Thade had inherited some of her abilities, but never to such a degree.

As if sensing the question, Thade gave an infuriating little smirk. “While you’ve been busy on land, playing man and falling in love, I’ve been training, honing my power. I told you I lifted your silly dog curse, didn’t I?”

Maurits didn’t bother asking him why. Whatever plans Thade had, there was little chance that Maurits would understand his brother’s motivations. “It seems you are quite content then,” he said evenly, watching the slight tic in Thade’s eye. “You have your throne, and I am spared having to undertake a duty which never appealed to me. I suppose I should thank you.”

Thade’s flint eyes flashed murder, but then he was smiling, pushing away and swimming back to the throne. “Oh, Maurits, the golden child. You didn’t even ask how I managed it. Aren’t you curious how I took the crown?”

“Not particularly, no.”

Scowling, Thade lowered himself back onto his seat.

“Now that you’ve shown me just how clever you are, will you release these damn manacles?”

Taking up the old brass trident that rested beside the throne, Thade began to idly pass it between his hands, studying the patinaed points. It was a largely symbolic object, a relic of the water kings and queens of long ago, when sparring and feats of strength were expected of rulers. His mother had always kept it mounted above the throne, a reminder of the power that she wielded. “Did you know that you possess something of a following? No, don’t scoff. It’s true. The basilisks seem to think that you will give them representation on the council, and there are those among the nix and the merfolk who see you as a vital continuation of the way of order. Whatever your transgressions, Mother has made sure that your image never suffered. I might be the younger son, untested and unproven, but I have plans, ones so grand that you could not even begin to conceive of their breadth. My tenure on the throne must be legitimate. There can be no alternative, no other prince waiting in the wings.”

Maurits closed his eyes as he began to follow Thade’s stream of thoughts. “So you see, I cannot allow you to go, not when there are those who would see you on the throne.”

There it was. His brother was going to kill him. It didn’t matter that they had been bonded through the grief of losing Evi all those years ago. It didn’t matter that Maurits would have happily given Thade the crown and all that went with it.

Suddenly the invisible manacle bonding Maurits’s tail fell away. A moment later, Maurits realized it was because Thade wanted him upright for whatever he was about to do next.

With a snap of his fingers, Thade summoned a contingent of guards. Some of them he recognized from his mother’s court, while others came from some of the deeper crevices and plateaus. Forgotten creatures that all had an angry, desperatelook about them. He wondered about the kind of company Thade had been keeping these past years.

Two of the burlier merfolk flanked Maurits, taking him by his arms. “I should probably kill you,” mused Thade as he watched, “but whatever our differences, we are still brothers. I would not pain Mother by taking away another of her children. And I may have use for you yet.”

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