The Sea Witch (The Era of Villains Book 1) (4 page)

Serena
laid herself out on a stone outcropping overlooking the drop and
finally allowed herself to weep. Her back shook up and down with the
force of her sobs as she let herself feel the worst of the pain. One
image kept forming in her head, renewing her tears and her sobs each
time. Triton’s genuine amusement. The easy smile. The brisk
laugh that meant everything she had dreamed of was just a joke to
him.

Over and
over, behind her lids, she rose and said, “Me! You should take
me.” Over and over his beautiful face split in a smile. Over
and over that “Ha!” crashed against her eardrums and
dashed her dreams to pieces. She had been a fool to think one flirty
smile could change everything. Of course he hadn’t meant
anything by it. He was charming. He was raised to be. He was polite.
That was all he had been doing yesterday, living up to his
upbringing. He didn’t remember her name. She was sure of it
now.

The jeers
of the mermaids were just unpleasant background noise in her head.
Queen Amphitrite’s words stung, all the more so because there
was truth in them. Yet again, her mother’s reputation marred
Serena no matter how hard she tried to escape it. Moira was also the
main reason why Serena was a maid, and thus so far below Triton’s
station. Moira had wealth (though nothing like that of the
bubbleheads, since half the time she asked for potion ingredients as
payment instead of money), but she did not share it with her
daughters, especially not with a daughter who did not follow in her
fin strokes. Serena would not have cared—she didn’t want
her mother’s ill-gotten money—but Moira’s
reputation had followed her into the job market as well. Even
merpeople who did not know about the darker deals made in Moira’s
cave were hesitant to hire the daughter of a sea witch. All merfolk
knew that sea witches’ powers were inherited, and sea witch
magic was mistrusted. It was seen as dark, unsavory, an evil
opposite to the magic of the Trident. No one ever really outgrew
that childish tendency to mistrust things they did not understand,
things that were different, like merpeople with inherent magical
power.

But it
wasn’t Queen Amphitrite’s words or her cruel sneer that
caused Serena the most pain; she had heard such things before,
though not from someone so loved and respected as the queen. What
hurt the most was that laugh and all it represented.

She was
weeping too loudly to hear the movement in the water. It was a slow,
steady sound. A pumping of strong limbs with a few seconds pause
between each pump.

“
Pardon
my intrusion,” said a smooth, deep voice that made Serena suck
in a startled gasp that choked off her sobs, “but I could not
help but notice your distress.”

The
speaker was a giant octopus, one of the largest Serena had ever
seen. When he pumped his tentacles as one behind him in a fluid
motion to propel himself closer to her, he was as long as a merman.
When he stopped in front of her and splayed out his tentacles, he
looked massive and a little bit frightening. Serena’s unease
showed on her face.

“
Please
don’t be afraid, miss,” said the octopus. He spoke
slowly, taking his time on each word. His voice was calm and
dignified. He spoke like royalty. “I heard you crying, and it
was such a heartbreaking sound that I had to see if I could offer
any help. My name is Casius. What’s yours?”

Serena
stared as Casius for a moment, trying to let the shaky little
hiccups brought on by such heavy crying pass before she responded.
He was a bright orange-red color, rather beautiful. His body was
covered in textured folds of skin. Serena knew these folds would
help him blend in to textured surfaces, like rocks or coral, when he
camouflaged himself. She had a strange urge to run her hand along
his oblong head to see what the wrinkles felt like.

“
Serena.”

“
A
lovely name. It’s old Atlantian, you know. Very regal. It
suits you.”

“
Thank
you. It’s very nice to meet you, Casius.”

She held
out her hand out of habit and then started to pull it back with an
embarrassed smile, but he wrapped a tentacle gently around her
half-outstretched hand and shook it. The white suckers on the
underside of his tentacle pulled ever so gently against her skin as
he withdrew it.

“
Very
nice to meet you too, Serena. It’s not every day you meet one
so beautiful as you.”

“
You’re
very kind,” said Serena with a weak smile, casting down her
eyes.

“
You
don’t look as if you believe me. I didn’t say it to be
kind. I said it because it’s true.”

Serena
raised her head and looked into Casius’ eyes. They were a
milky, glassy white, like a pearl encased in one of her mother’s
floating light orbs. A long, black slit served as his pupil. His
pearly eyes looked back into her brown ones, and she could see no
mockery there. His look was direct, calm, and serious. His eyes did
not wander off her face absentmindedly. He was not going through the
motions of politeness. She could detect no false flattery, and that
made her feel better than the compliment itself. A genuine smile lit
her face this time, despite the still-present pain in her chest.

“
That’s
much better,” said Casius. His mouth was a beak hidden under
his body at the very center of his tentacles, so he could not truly
smile, but his smile dwelt in his voice nonetheless. “Now
please tell me what’s wrong, dear. Perhaps I can be of help.”

“
Thank
you, but you cannot,” said Serena. She hung her head, and her
hair whipped around in a sudden strong current and obscured her
face. Serena was grateful, for tears were burning in her eyes again.
There was a tremor in her voice as she said, “No one can. I
cannot change who I am.”

“
And
why should you?”

Casius
wrapped one tentacle around Serena’s shoulders, and with a
swift movement of his other seven tentacles, he was at her side
instead of in front of her. Serena welcomed the comforting gesture,
though she felt a little embarrassed at accepting it from a
stranger. Suddenly, she was furious with Moira.

I should
be able to go to my own mother for comfort, she thought, but instead
of running home when I’m upset, I flee the city and accept a
comforting tentacle from a stranger.

But
already Casius didn’t really feel like a stranger to her. With
just a simple gesture, he had shown her more affection than her
mother ever had. When Moira put an arm around you, she was trying to
get something from you. The comforting arm always pushed you
steadily towards whatever it was she wanted from you. With Serena,
it was the cauldron in the living room. She would hold Serena to her
with an inked arm, crooning nice things in her ear, and eventually
Serena would feel the stone cauldron bump against her tail.

“
Because
I’m not good enough for him,” she said. It was something
she never would have told her mother or Hazel. Both would have
mocked her: Moira with a cruel look of disgust in her eyes, and
Hazel with absolute glee.

“
Nonsense,”
said Casius, and his dignified voice suggested the idea could be
nothing but. “I’m sure it’s quite the opposite.”

“
You
don’t understand.”

“
Well
perhaps you could help me.”

“
Prince
Triton,” she said, staring at her hands, her cheeks burning
with an embarrassed blush. Casius gave a soft “ah” of
understanding. “I…I love him. I love him so much I can
hardly stand it, and he doesn’t even notice me. I thought he
finally did, just yesterday, but I was wrong. I was a fool for
thinking he could actually want me. Why should he? I’m his
maid. I’m a piece of palace furniture that he’s been
trained to overlook.”

“
Just
because you are a maid doesn’t mean the two of you could never
be,” said Casius. “There is no law in Adamar that says
the prince must marry a mermaid of station. If you truly love him,
fight for him.”

“
But
I’m not just a maid,” said Serena, fiddling with her
fingernails. The shame she’d kept bottled up for so long was
leaking out into her voice. Amphitrite’s words had jostled it
loose, and Casius’ kindness had set it free. “I’m
the daughter of Moira the Sea Witch. I’m a witch too. I have
powers.”

“
I’ve
heard of your mother.”

“
Yes,
well so has Queen Amphitrite. Her decree has made my mother a
criminal, and I can’t say I disagree. The prince can’t
marry the daughter of a criminal.”

“
Why
not? Your mother’s name should not mar yours. From what I know
of your mother, she is a very powerful mermaid, very gifted.”
Serena felt a jolt of surprise. No one had ever referred to her
mother as gifted. Moira’s name was usually whispered like a
dark secret, her powers just as feared as they were sought after.
“You say you have powers too. If yours are anything like your
mother’s, that makes you a very special mermaid. Yes, your
mother has a reputation of dabbling in the blacker side of magic,
it’s true, but you can use your powers however you like. You
could build up your own brighter reputation.”

Casius
looked sidelong at Serena with something like awe growing inside
him. Just underneath his tentacle, draped across the young mermaid’s
shoulder, thrummed incredible power.

“
Yes,
but then I’d be a criminal too,” said Serena with a
small, dry laugh. “Amphitrite’s decree didn’t
specify between good sea witches and bad ones.”

“
I’m
sure if she knew you were a good witch providing good services to
Adamar she would make an exception.”

“
Not
after today, she wouldn’t.”

“
Oh?
Why is that?”

Serena
hesitated. She had told him so much already, and she hardly knew
him. She looked away, out over the drop into Deep Ocean, out into
the endless blue.

“
You
don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” said
Casius. “I didn’t mean to pry. I’m sorry.”

He began
to pull his tentacle away from her shoulders, the suction cups
tugging gently. The water felt cold where his tentacle had once
been, and her stomach twisted at the loss of his comforting touch.
She realized his tentacle had seemed to take away some of the ache
in her chest—her heart hadn’t felt so completely
shattered—and she wanted it back.

“
Please,
don’t apologize. Don’t go,” she said, hearing the
desperation in her voice and not caring. She reached behind her head
and grasped his tentacle as it pulled away from her back and
replaced it gently.

“
I’ll
stay as long as you like, Serena. But still, you don’t have to
tell me.”

“
Thank
you,” she said, trying to convey her gratitude in her voice
and her eyes as she looked over at him and smiled.

They sat
on the outcropping side by side in silence, looking out into the
blue. After a few minutes had passed, Serena took a big breathe.

“
I
told Prince Triton that he should take me to tomorrow night’s
dinner party. In front of a bunch of other mermaids—thin,
wealthy, gorgeous ones that he lets hang on his arms all the time.
He…he laughed.” Her heart throbbed when she said it,
but it didn’t hurt quite as much as before. “It wasn’t
a mean laugh. He wasn’t making fun of me. He honestly thought
it was a joke—that I was being funny. It was terrible. I can’t
stop hearing it.” Casius squeezed her a little tighter, but he
did not interrupt. He seemed to know that if he interrupted her, she
wouldn’t be able to continue. “The other mermaids
started making fun of me, of course, but that didn’t really
bother me. They’ve got brains the size of a krill.”
Casius couldn’t hold in a deep, rumbling laugh, and Serena
smiled a little. “Then Queen Amphitrite swam down. She had
seen the whole thing. She basically told me never to look at her son
again. That just my looking at him would taint him because I’m
no good and my family’s no good, and if I didn’t get
back to my rightful place scrubbing floors I would never set fins in
the palace again.”

Casius
was quiet for a moment. Serena nursed her wounded heart and pride.

“
You
know, Serena,” he finally said, “the royal family has a
reputation of responding cruelly to things that threaten their sense
of superiority. The queen is well aware that sea witches’
powers are hereditary, passed from mother to daughter. She knows you
have magic in your veins. The power your family has is rare. With
spells and potions and raw magic, your family can do almost anything
the Trident can do—except undo the magic of the Trident, of
course.

“
The
Trident is what makes the royal family unique, and the power your
family has rivals it. The queen didn’t say all of those things
because she truly believes you are inferior. Your power is inside
you. You carry it with you always, and it cannot be stolen from you.
Queen Amphitrite treated you so cruelly because she is threatened by
you.”

Serena
didn’t say anything. It sounded so logical, and it was a
somewhat comforting thought because it meant that she could still be
worthy of Triton’s love, but it couldn’t be true. The
queen was not jealous of her like Hazel was. The queen hated her
mother. She was disgusted by the idea of her only child marrying a
lowly maid and the daughter of a criminal she personally hated.