one, he is in a heavy masculine one. Both crowns are symbols of power, but somehow it feels like only he is the king here, and she is an impostor, wanting to wrest it from a highborn or even a magical lady.
Moran stood at the arched window, unafraid of falling out of it and crashing through the rocks. She knew by now that the octopus-like limbs braiding the window frame were not the tentacles of the monster beside him, but parts of his own body. But she didn’t care.
“I love you!” Desdemona hugged him from behind, running her bare feet over the slimy tails snaking beneath the royal robe.
Should she tell him how beautiful he is, or does he know it himself? He’s a monster, but she thinks he’s beautiful! Everything in the world turned upside down when a king from the sea came to rule the earthlings.
“Do you think I see you as a victim?” Moran felt her heart fluttering like a caged bird.
“I don’t know! Everyone has seen me as a sacrifice since I was chosen to serve the sea god. I heard that if the sacrifice with the chosen girl doesn’t take place, the sea will flood the whole country.”
“Let it drown!”
“You say that about your country?”
“I will flood it myself if you are chosen as the sacrifice.”
“But I thought you chose me to take me personally to the temple for sacrifice.”
She imagined the terrible celebration when a king personally gives his young wife to the sea god for a ritual to ensure the coastal kingdom’s peace and prosperity for many more years. Will she be beheaded with a sickle or cut open alive? Or drowned? Sometimes water is scarier than poison. Dodger had said it right. At the thought of drowning, the shimmering edge of the sea below sent a shiver of fear through her. Eerie images of the ritual came to mind. Desdemona clutched her eyes in horror.
“Tell me, the sea god’s victims become mermaids after he kills them.”
“Where did you get that idea?”
“I dreamed it,” she admitted honestly. No need to be hypocritical. It was as if Moran could see through her mind and was nervous, too.
“Dreams are as fine a line as water. A whole kingdom can hide beneath it.”
“How do you know?”
“So claims a lady who is no stranger to the realm of dreams and its rulers. She says that dreams are a witch’s labyrinth in which one can get lost and never return.”
“I imagine the temple of the sea god to be such a labyrinth.”
“Do not fear him. A queen shouldn’t be afraid of anything.”
But she didn’t feel like a queen.
Flowers and jewels alone were not enough to inspire her with regal majesty.
The chirping of the birds sounded almost musical. It was definitely not the cries of seagulls. In addition, the croaking instantly changed to an almost nightingale-like trill. Desdemona looked around.
Morillas were sitting on the parapets of the towers again. It was a whole flock of them now.
“I’d give you one,” Moran intercepted her gaze, “but they’re too free-spirited. They’d wither in a cage. And if you capture them, there’ll be a great flood. That’s why they’re feared. If sailors see a morilla near a ship, it means the ship will sink within 24 hours.”
“It is cruel!”
“The sea is cruel.”
“But it is beautiful too!” Desdemona cast a glance at Moran from under half-lowered lashes. He can only be compared to the harsh beauty of the sea. He is beautiful and dangerous.
“Let’s play a game!” She found an old ivory chess set.
“It is all right! Strip chess is a popular game in the mortal world. If I win something you take it off, if you win something I take it off.”
She flared up, but agreed. Winning from him wasn’t hard. The undressing game took her by surprise when she realized he had nothing on under his robe. He undressed first, showing off his tentacles and some shiny growths on his forearms that looked like scarlet bracelets.
“Next time we’ll play sea chess. I’m better at it!” Moran pushed the board into one of the newly dug pools. The chessboard sank. But Desdemona wasn’t upset. What caught her eye was the sun pendant with unusual milling around the edges on it around Moran’s neck.
“I feel like I’ve seen this symbol somewhere before.”
“It’s the mark of my goddess!” Moran put his robe back on and carefully hid the pendant. “We are all slaves to Alais. But I want to be your slave.”
It seemed to her that it was the other way around – She is his captive. But he reached for her and all sense of inequality vanished.
“Moran! If I start drowning again…” she remembered the night he had rescued her.
“You think you can drown yourself in my kingdom without my permission? Water is my element! I rule it, not you. No one is allowed to drown themselves in my domain without my permission. Besides, you won’t get rid of me that easily!”
Is he joking or is he serious? Probably it is both.
“You are mine. That’s all!” The corners of his lips parted in a happy smile, and his face was no longer cold.
For fun, he made the mirror show her the lily nymphs.
“They live on the lakes,” he explained. “Their clothes are lily petals that grow from their skin and give off a marvelous fragrance. They are called lilies. The boys dream of them, and I dream of you.”
“And what is about your brothers?”
“For them, to love a girl is to drag her down. In the beginning they were still choosing, but then they split up. Now they drown anyone they think is pretty.”
Some sounds suddenly alerted her. The clinking of metal and quick footsteps! Desdemona didn’t even realize they were suddenly aware, because Moran instantly blew the heads off two people. The corpses fell into the pool, staining it with blood. And some fish-like creatures devoured the dead flesh.
“They are conspirators! They’re like bedbugs! No matter how many of them you take out, they keep coming back,” Moran grumbled. Their axes had wounded him.
“Shall I call for the king’s physician?” Desdemona was worried.
Moran shook his head negatively. It appeared that all he had to do was sink into the water and all his wounds would heal themselves.
“Water heals all our injuries,” Moran braided his tentacles around the edge of the pool
“You were better off in the water. You’re vulnerable on land,” she concluded. That’s probably why there are so many new pools. While he was targeting his
