‘You won’t like this idea.’
‘I’ll hear it anyway.’
Iomhar swept an arm to the surface, stretching for the light. ‘A group of young warriors and foragers are taking reprieve in a human town tonight. There will be drinking and music and merrymaking. You should join them.’
Fionn immediately recoiled. ‘You’re right, I don’t like it.’
‘You’ve hardly spent any time on land at all. Why not take a chance on it tonight?Broaden your horizons a little.’ Iomhar gave him a sidelong glance. ‘I will not tell your father. After all, it is only a harmless social activity and you will be safe among friends.’
Oh, friends. That’s what Iomhar was really getting at, and it was the part that deterred Fionn almost as much as the prospect of mixing with humans. He’d never had a great deal of luck befriending other Minchmen, despite his desire to serve them well as First Prince. Perhaps it was because his efforts were always coloured by the knowledge that his value to them as a prince, and as a person, was as an object to be eventually traded for continued peace with the Redfolk.
‘I hear Neacel will be attending this evening,’ Iomhar added with a hopeful inflection. ‘He would welcome your company.’
‘Which one’s Neacel, again?’ Fionn’s brow creased while Iomhar’s whole expression fell.
‘You were assigned to forage for oysters with him last week.’
‘Oh. No. I spent the day on spear drill instead.’
Iomhar exploded. ‘You did what? You ask me for more freedom and different duties yet you snub the opportunities I give you!’
‘It was not a snub,’ Fionn said, a little hurt. From his point of view, he’d been presented with the opportunity to make a choice for himself, and had done so. ‘Are my skills really put to best use by foraging?’
‘That is not the point, sprat.’ Iomhar massaged his temples. ‘Do you realise you avoid forging connections with others at all costs? Please, I am begging you. Before you are sent away with the Redfolk, spend some time among your own kin. This is your last chance, Fionn. Please do not waste the time you have leftwith pointless patrols and practice for combat that you will not face.’
The dawning of realisation on Fionn was an empty one, leaving his heart feeling hollow. Iomhar wanted him to make a friend. That was all. Fionn was facing a lifetime of banishment by arranged marriage, and Iomhar was merely worried about his minuscule social circle.
‘I’ll do as I please,’ Fionn sang back sulkily, then dipped into the current. This time, Iomhar did not follow.
Fionn closed his eyes, allowing the current to propel him like flotsam down an underwater river. He wished to scream, but doing so would upset the ocean. Already it thrashed a little too harshly, reacting to his barely-contained fury.
Fury—or was it despair?
A creature had sensed his suffering. Its dark shape caught up with him in the current: the sleek body of a female grey seal. She nudged Fionn’s elbow, tickling his torso with her whiskers.
Fionn rolled to greet her. ‘Hello Acha,’ he sang, stroking her head through the streaming bubbles. ‘My most loyal friend.’
Acha was a wonderful companion. She didn’t talk back, for one thing.
Together, they ducked out of the current a few yards away from the palace boundary.
The area around the palace was marked by a perimeter of large standing stones protruding from the seabed. Each stone was scored with fae markings: together, they generated an invisible magical barrier. Looking in from the outside, a stranger might believe the space beyond the stones was empty. Any fish that drew too close were swept backwards by a powerful vortex in the water.
Fionn hovered just outside the boundary line. Within, a faint vision of the palace was clear to him. The stones recognised his Bluefolk blood and would allow him to pass.
Still, Fionn didn’t move.
He pictured his father inside, holding court from his throne of coral. The Blue King would bend his ear to the advice and requests of other Minchmen, nod respect to the warriors and gratitude to the foragers, and speak warmly to his two other sons. But Fionn, his eldest, he would greet with little more than a blank stare.
Fionn had known his purpose from a young age. It was the duty of every firstborn prince: his Redfolk betrothal had been sealed in blood by magic centuries ago, before he was even born. The palace records described it as a fae bargain, an unbreakable pact.
The Redfolk lived in the fae realm—an alien place Fionn could barely conceive of, existing on a separate plane adjacent to the world he called home. The magic there was supposedly older and stronger than the weak streams of it that floated haphazardly over the earth.
Magic was at the heart of the marriage bargain between their kingdoms. It was, after all, an exchange of goods. A prince in exchange for fae enchantments, like the one carved into the boundary stones around the palace.
Soon, Fionn would meet the creature that he was destined to spend the rest of his life with. And he’d be spending it in the fae realm, a literal world away from his home waters.
The thought made him sick.
