Page 162 of Cruel Tides

“Royalblood?” I scoffed, my fingers curling around the vial. What was she implying?

As if sensing my skepticism, she plucked the vial from my fingers and uncorked it with a sly grin. My gaze remained fixed on the vial as the dark liquid spilled into the water. Then, in one fluid motion, she tossed her crown at it. The instant the dark tarnished metal met the blood, the crown’s surface sizzled, releasing a pulse of magic into the water.

“Good. Very good.” Seeming satisfied with this reaction, she let the crown drift down to the rocky floor. “Careful, child,” she warned as I leaned in closer, inspecting the dark streams of magic. “The crown is thirsty for more of your blood. It will sear all that it touches until its magic falls dormant once more.”

“How do I know that was my blood?” I whispered, still fixated on the smoldering crown. “Everything down here so far has been a deception.”

“Child,” she said, cupping my cheek. I looked up at her and was taken aback by the kindness in her eyes. “Or should I say, my precious grandchild? Doubt is only natural, my dear. But you would do well to heed my words. I never wavered in my hope of finding you. When your mother, my beloved daughter, met her untimely end, and that loathsome merman stole you away from us… I always knew the day would come when we’d be reunited.”

Her smile took on a tender warmth as her fingers caressed my hair. “You bear a striking resemblance to her. My beloved daughter,” she said with a gentle sigh. “May her soul find solace in the depths of the great abyss.”

Although she claimed that we were related and that I was of royal blood, one part of her story struck me the most.

“My mother is… dead?” I turned down to look at my hands. I didn’t know how to feel or if I’d even choose to believe it. I’d always thought she was alive, swimming away somewhere, disregarding the fact that she had a daughter. I wasn’t sure which reality was worse, or if I should let myself care, either way.

I could sense the cecaelia’s eyes on me, their whispers growing as more men emerged from their crevices.

It was foolish to believe them, wasn’t it? They’d done nothing but lie to me. Yet the same thought kept resurfacing…

I was never like the other merfolk, was I?

“You say a mermanstoleme?”

“Ohhh,” she wailed, making a show of snatching up her crown. It must have been done searching for more blood, because the surface hadn’t burned her when she wrapped around it. “It pains me to even remember that day.”

She snapped her fingers, and the sea wizard materialized with a box in his hands. It was a peculiar box, adorned with a latch and gilded filigree that seemed to dance along its edges.

While I was still assessing it, one of the sea wizard’s tentacles snaked under the latch to retrieve what was inside. When a crown with eight sharpened points emerged, the queen squealed, enraptured.

It was a beautiful crown, truly. But when he held it up, I felt a sinking feeling in my stomach as I realized where this was headed.

“I haven’t been this excited since the day we discovered the merfolk were cursed.” With a turn toward the sea wizard, the queen clapped her hands. “Puppet,” she commanded, “I’ll give you one moon cycle from now to break the curse concealing her true nature. Do whatever it takes. Use any means, as long as you don’t hurt ourdear princess.”

Um… what?

Even if I was cursed, did I want it to be broken?

Numbness settled over me as I stared at the crown cradled in the sea wizard’s grasp. The queen spun away, her laughter filled with unbridled glee. “We shall celebrate with a grand ball!” she exclaimed. “The depths of the sea shall rejoice at the return of the princess!”

My head shook with the sea wizard’s approach. “I—I’m not…” I stuttered, my eyes pleading for his understanding, but it did nothing to stop him.

He held his mouth in a tight grimace as he leaned closer, gingerly placing the crown atop my head. But before he pulled away, his cheek grazed mine as he whispered, “Welcome home, princess.”

Princess.

No—no. I was a captive, a mouse. Anything to him butthat.

Already, the crown weighed heavily on my head. Yet, instead of feeling like I was gaining something, a startling clarity washed through me of all the things I’d just lost.

The vision in the mirror had not been that of a princess but of a demoness with white eyes.

There was a reason the sea wizard had wanted me to see my eyes first and why he hadn’t wanted his queen to know about them.

‘Are you a sea witch?’ Barren’s voice echoed in my memory, and my hands lifted, grappling with the base of my neck.

“Careful with that crown, child. You must never remove it,” the queen advised, gliding over to straighten it back on top of my head. “How else will your pawns be able to recognize you while you’re under this wretched curse? Wave to them, dearest. Let them know their princess has returned.”

But as I looked out at the bodies closing in around me, I could only shudder. Their eyes were filled with a mix of lust and curiosity, but all I felt was revulsion.

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