Page 26 of Queen Takes More
Moving on, I swept over my heart tree that cast sparks up into the night sky of the tapestry. Drops of diamonds and moonlight mixed with crystal rose petals, shining like stars. The still surface of the water at its base reflected the tree and the sparks, endlessly deep as if an ocean stretched beneath it. Cold and deep and blue.
Okeanos dove through that darkness, tentacles sweeping his kraken body effortlessly through the water.
For a moment, my heart stopped.
He’s leaving me.
:Never, my queen,:he replied instantly. Contrite, he paused mid-dive, turning back toward the surface of the water.:I will gladly stay as long as you allow it. I’ll submit to the cage when it’s time. Or if you’d rather kill me, I’ll go to my knees for your knight’s blade without hesitation.:
His whole life had been nothing but misery. Chained in a cage at the bottom of Marne Ceresa’s pond for a hundred years. Even his mother, a Skolos Triune queen, hadn’t trusted him.
I couldn’t blame him for wanting to explore. To taste freedom for the first time in his life.:Nobody’s putting you in a cage or killing you. You’re free. If that means you want to leave…:
:I don’t,:he said immediately.
Though I felt the siren call in his bond. The sea beckoned at the bottom of my grotto. I didn’t know how it was possible, but I could taste the salt of the ocean. The heated steam of my grotto had cooled.
Maybe that was his power as a king kraken—to open the portal to the sea.
:It’syourpower,:Rik whispered in my mind.:Our Triskeles queen has gained the power to access any body of water she wishes from her grotto. Is it any surprise after calling such a Blood as him?:
A kraken. A mythical creature of the sea. Of course, he would want, noneed, access to the ocean. I didn’t want him withering away, pining for dark salty waters of the deep, resigned to my little steamy grotto in Arkansas.
:Go, my kraken.:I stroked my power through his bond gently, like Daire’s tail swishing through me. :Taste the salt of the sea. Explore the depths that call you. Return to me when you wish.:
:Then I wish to stay, my queen, by your side for all time.:
Tears burned my eyes. I felt again his hesitant caress on my wrist. Unsure of his place. Afraid to overstep and be sent to the bottom of the lake in chains once more.:I am with you always. I am with you now. Show me what it’s like to dive into the darkness of the deepest oceans. Take me with you.:
He hesitated, tentacles slowly unfurling in the water like a purple and black flower. I sank deeper into his bond, letting him feel me moving inside him. I tasted the water on his skin, cool and salty and mysterious. He hadn’t swum in ocean water in so long that almost didn’t remember what it felt like.
Sinking silently deeper, he curled his tentacles tightly to his body. He glided effortlessly through the endless water, gaining speed as the temperature cooled to icy blackness. His bond burned with the fierce joy of a creature doing exactly what he’d been made to do and doing it extremely well. The mighty kraken was a terror of the sea, large enough to bring down any ship, breaking its masts like fragile sticks. For all his immense size and strength, he was also extremely fast. He plummeted past giant sharks like they were statues.
I pulled my mind back slightly, giving him a kiss in the bond.:Swim free, my kraken. I’ll wait for you at the grotto when you’re ready.:
He was too deeply into his beast to send words back to me, but he sent me an image of a full moon, and the waves rising to its call.
I was his moon, pulling his tide back to the shore.
OKEANOS
Freedom was as foreign to me as dry air on my skin and land beneath my feet. I couldn’t remember exactly how old I’d been when I first shifted to the uncontrollable beast inside me. Five or six, I thought. Old enough to finally be taken to the sacred beach outside of Mother’s nest.
It’d been a stormy night of fierce winds and growling waves that crashed onto the rocks. Wind tore at my hair and whipped my clothes. The smell of salt and ozone in the air made chills race down my spine. Lightning tore the sky and waves sprayed up onto my face. I’d thrown my head back and lifted my arms, waiting for the storm to sweep me away.
Instead, the kraken had boiled up out of me.
I didn’t know how many days I’d been gone to the sea. I dreaded the resignation on Mother’s face. But it was fear tightening her lips as I stood before her, bare toes dug down into the sand, kelp tangled in my hair, and streaks of dried salt on my skin.
Goddess below. It’d been so wondrous. I couldn’t regret my adventure.
Until Mother banished me back to the sea that had called me. She’d cried and hugged me and told me she loved me…
But then she sent me away.
I was still a child, not a kraken. I didn’t know how to call the monster back out. I’d almost starved to death before some of her sibs took pity on me and started bringing me food. I lived on the beach for months, maybe years. I had no way of counting the passing of time other than the number of storms that drove me to burrow beneath one of the palm trees that had been torn up partially from the ground, leaving a snug cave behind.
I learned to catch my own crab and small fish. I cracked open clams and mussels. I climbed for coconuts and bananas. I survived.
