Fathoms of Forgiveness (Sacred Breath, Book 2) (9 page)

“Naclana!” Aazuria shouted. The man slightly recoiled from the tone of her voice, and was unable to respond.

“If you please, Princess,” said the young guard behind Naclana, a dark-skinned woman clad in heavy armor. She stepped forward and bowed before speaking. “Throughout the last few hours we found several more cases containing all the parts of your sister's body. Among them were her limbs, head, and torso.”

The only sound in the room was Alcyone’s muffled sob.

“The message was written directly into her skin,” the young guard continued hesitantly. “A different word is engraved in every body part.”

Aazuria stared down at the arm she held, rotating it to see the word carved into the tiny wrist. Her awareness of anything happening around her dwindled as she stared down blankly at the symbol. She did not notice that a few steps away, Elandria was clutching her chest and fighting a massive bout of nausea and pain. Her heart was beating erratically and quickly, and she was unable to catch her breath. The pain in her chest was spreading and there was a pounding in her head. She felt faint, and although she knew that if she focused she could probably fight her body's inclination to shut itself down, she could not conceive of any good reason to even bother trying to do this.

“Thank you for telling me, Naclana,”
Elandria signed, closing her eyes. Her knees buckled beneath her, and she began to collapse.

Trevain gathered his senses just quickly enough to catch the falling woman. He held Elandria against him and stared up at Naclana with rage on his face. “Did you have to make a fucking PowerPoint presentation about it, man? Jesus. I despise you.”

“Power...” Naclana’s brow furrowed in confusion, but Trevain was already leaving the room with Elandria in his arms, depriving him of an explanation. He looked at the Captain’s broad retreating back in confusion, as two of the guards in the room left to escort him. He knew that the words were meant to be insulting, regardless of the details of what they meant.

“Mama,” Alcyone said brokenly, reaching out toward Visola for support.

“It’s okay, baby,” Visola said, quickly moving to embrace her elderly daughter. Alcyone’s frail body shook with sobs, and Visola held her, realizing that her daughter weighed barely ninety pounds. She was greatly weakened from her time spent on land, and even more weakened by the loneliness of the psychiatric facility she had lived in.

“I can’t… I just can’t,” Alcyone was whispering. “I need to lie down.”

“Sure, sweetie, let’s get you to bed,” Visola said, kissing her daughter’s wrinkled forehead, which was covered with wisps of thin grey hair. “I’ll be right back, Zuri.” She looked pointedly at the guards. “Watch over the princess.”

When Visola had taken Alcyone out of the room, carefully supporting her mother around the shoulders, only Aazuria remained with Naclana and the other guards. She had not moved from the spot where she had stood as rigid as a statue since she had learned that her sister had been killed. Murdered and mutilated. Her hands holding Corallyn’s small arm were stiff—it was as though she herself were being infected with empathetic rigor mortis.

“Princess Aazuria,” Naclana said softly. “I’m so sorry about your sister.”

Her cousin’s voice drew her out of her trance, and she stared at him, disbelieving. She was suddenly startled by the fact that everyone had left the room. Where was Trevain? Where was Elandria? It seemed like the whole world was tinted in dark purple. Was she still standing? She was not aware of her feet. How had her body remained upright? Why were her cheeks dry? Had she not been crying? She vaguely remembered Elandria collapsing. She remembered Alcyone crying. None of the emotions had been hers. None of the reactions had been hers.

She felt nothing. She squeezed on Corallyn’s ashen flesh, trying to convince herself that it was real. This was really happening. She tried to feel pain or hurt—that would be the normal thing.

“Princess Aazuria?” Naclana asked, with worry in his voice. He was disturbed by her silent stillness. His voice pierced into her consciousness again.

“Damn you!” Aazuria whispered sharply to her cousin, lifting her eyes to meet his. She tried to force fake emotion into her voice. “Are you out of your mind? Elandria just had heart surgery!” She reached out and carefully returned Corallyn’s severed arm to the case. Aazuria wondered why she was not even sad; she was just hollow. She could not blame the messenger for this. “I am sorry, Naclana. I just wish you had not allowed Elandria to know!”

“With all due respect and more, Princess,” Naclana said, bowing deeply in apology. “News like this would have made Elandria swoon whether or not she was at full health.” It was no secret in Adlivun that the bond between Corallyn and Elandria had been as deep as between the closest of mother and daughter. From the time that Corallyn had been brought to them by their father, King Kyrosed Vellamo, Elandria had taken care of the young girl as though she was her own child.

“Are you calling my sister weak?” Aazuria asked harshly. “I know she is not your blood relation, but that gives you no right to…”

“That isn’t fair!” Naclana said with a frown. “She demanded to be present, and you permitted it.”

“I did not know you wished to show me body parts!” Aazuria said. “You can be firm when it suits you, Naclana. You should have been firm here. If I lose my other sister too, I will consider it your fault.”

He bowed deeply in respect, apology, and acceptance of this judgment. “Do you want to know all the words which were carved into Corallyn’s skin?”

“Of course,” Aazuria said. “Let us wait for the others to return.” Her eyes fell onto the female guard who had been the one to actually break the news of Corallyn’s death. She had the appearance of a fourteen-year-old, and she had probably reached her full height. It was impossible to gauge her true age. From her armor, she was evidently a moderate-ranking military official. “What is your name?” Aazuria asked her.

“Lieutenant Namaka,” she answered, with a bow.

Aazuria studied the woman’s dark eyes and strong features, and tried to remember where she knew her from. She had likely been a migrant from some distant settlement, probably Bimini. “Lieutenant Namaka,” Aazuria said with authority. “I will need you to maintain a close watch on Visola from now on. It was her husband who did this to my sister, and I have a hunch that she is about to do something senseless to retaliate. She is the hot-blooded type. Are you capable of guarding her closely?”

Namaka saluted across her chest with enthusiasm. “Yes, Princess Aazuria. I always have and always will.”

Aazuria might have wondered about the girl’s unusual gusto, and considered how teenagers were always so thrilled to be given an important task. She might have grieved that Corallyn would never get a chance to reach even Namaka’s stage of bodily development, and she might have heard Corallyn’s voice in her head wishing, like she frequently had, that she would grow breasts sooner rather than later. All these thoughts were interrupted when she was distracted by Trevain reentering the room. She immediately turned to him, with concern about Elandria at the tip of her tongue, but he was already answering her unspoken question.

“She’s in a healing pod and the doctors are looking after her,” he said, as he approached her. “She should be fine.”

“Thank you,” Aazuria told him with relief. “Thank you for seeing to her, Trevain.”

“Nonsense,” he said. “Elandria took care of me when I was ill.”

“She always takes care of everyone,” Aazuria said. She turned back to gaze at the limb in the box.

“Rocket launchers,” Visola said as she entered the room. The echoing of her heavy footsteps made it sound like a giantess was approaching. She gritted her teeth together, as a growl was emitted from deep in her throat. “I am going to kill them all. With rocket launchers.”

“We do not possess rocket launchers,” Aazuria said.

“O, ye of little faith!” Visola responded. She placed her hands on her hips, and turned to Trevain with a raised red eyebrow. Although her voice carried a somewhat light tone, there was a new, predatory and almost reptilian hue glinting in her green eyes. “After all this time, she still doubts me and my capacity for vengeance.”

“What are we going to do, Grandma?” Trevain asked quietly.

“We’re going to give Vachlan exactly what he wants,” Visola answered. “He must have known somehow that we had decided to attack him instead of exchanging me for Corallyn. That means he has eyes and ears on the inside. A mole. It’s either someone extremely new to Adlivun who is masquerading as one of us, or an old ally of his from back when he lived here. I need to find this person.”

“Before you decide what you plan on doing, you need to know the message…”

“Probably more threats and bravado,” Visola said angrily.

“What language is that written in?” Trevain asked, pointing at the symbol on Corallyn’s arm. “What does it mean?”

“Much like our sign language, we have a universal undersea writing system,” Aazuria explained. “It is extremely old—it dates back thousands of years to the first undersea civilization. I believe I am babbling this history lesson to avoid facing the matter at hand, and I will just get to the point. The symbol means ‘Surrender’ and the little arrow at the bottom right corner indicates that it is a command.”

“I see,” Trevain said, nodding to pretend he understood. In some part of his mind the information was registering, and he was forming a favorable opinion of the concise writing system, but in all the parts he could currently access, all he could think about was what Corallyn had suffered.

Naclana sighed. “The rest of the message on the other body parts demands that we ‘Surrender Visola ASAP or Adlivun will be razed.’”

“Then it’s decided,” Visola said. “I’m going.”

“No. Without you we will lose for certain. We do not have anyone else who can lead the army. No one has the knowledge and experience…”

“Sure, there are tons of folks who can lead. Plus Queen Amabie is here.”

“Our troops need you, Viso. I need you. Name one other person who could take your place.”

“Trevain will do it,” Visola said with a shrug.

“Me?” Trevain asked. “No way. I’m the least qualified out of everyone…”

“True, little grandson.” She reached out and pinched his cheek. “For now you are unqualified, but it won’t be that way for long.”

Aazuria was glaring at both of them. “I will not sacrifice your life, Visola. That is not how bargaining with me works. I am not going to make it so easy—if he thinks that sending me my murdered sister is going to grant him permission to murder my friend, he is mistaken.”

“Do you think I don’t know this man?”

“Obviously you did not know him well enough before you swam down the aisle with him.”

“You gave me your blessing,” Visola said angrily. “I know one thing: he won’t stop until he gets what he wants.”

“We do not have enough evidence to judge his level of determination,” Aazuria said. “What he usually wants is you, and you are pitifully easy to get.”

Visola’s mouth sputtered as she tried to yell five words at once. “Wha— ”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Trevain said, raising his hands and stepping between the two women. “Ladies, calm down.”

“She started it,” Visola mumbled.

“Yeah, she did,” Trevain said, turning to his fiancée. “Zuri, maybe this isn’t my place… but don’t you always say that have you implicit trust in my grandma’s opinion? I hardly know her, but I have seen enough to trust her. Everyone in Adlivun speaks highly of General Ramaris. Maybe you should consider her words, and let her go.”

“Thanks, Trevain,” Visola said with surprise. “Wow, you actually stood up for me. I’m blown away.”

“If I can help in any way,” he offered, “if you need a fast boat…”

“No,” Aazuria said, holding up her hand. “We will go before a carefully chosen council and decide this together. This conversation is closed and no action will be taken without a consensus.”

Visola put both of her hands in her hair with exasperation. “You and Queen Amabie will control the consensus!”

“A council sounds like a good idea,” Trevain said.

Naclana cleared his throat, reminding them that he was still in the room. Their heads snapped to look at him. “I hate to have to ask this: would you like to see the other symbols?” Naclana asked.

“Is that really necessary?” Trevain asked.

“It’s necessary,” Visola said.

Aazuria imagined Corallyn’s head severed from her body with a symbol carved into her forehead. She still felt nothing. She supposed that she would not feel anything again until Vachlan had paid for this. “I will look at them,” she said.