Page 6 of Welcome to Seaman’s Cove: Part Two

“You will.” I reassure him, smoothing a hand through his hair.

“Maybe,” he hedges.

The uncertainty in his voice makes that edginess crawl along my skin, the burn in my muscles intensifying. I reposition, no longer comfortable.

“How can I help?” Phoenix asks.

“Just… stay here with me.” Always, I want to add, but I bite my tongue. Phoenix has other commitments, and I don’t know how Sebastian will fit into this newly forming pack. The two of them will have to make their own choices.

Tomorrow, I’ll finally meet the fabled beta, and then, we’ll see what happens.

Fresh nerves join the jittery electricity in my gut. This is all new for me. I’m usually the one in control, the one with the answers, the one who shapes the world around me into what I want. I’m the fucking dean of anthropology. People look up to me.

But right now, I feel more uncertain than ever before. The ground beneath me is shaky and uneven. I don’t know how we’re gonna all come out of this. I’ve no clue where to look for her first.

“Hey, breathe.” Phoenix splays his hand on my chest. “We’ll find her.”

But it’s not just her I’m worried about. There’s Phoenix and Sebastian, the Ocearus dig site and Madi’s claim on it, my position at the school now that I’ve bonded a student. And then there’s Caspian. My omega’s merman mate. A man I’m nearly as attracted to as Madi. What kind of life can we live with a merman in our pack? How can we join our worlds?

The questions swirl and rise, tugging me under.

“Breathe,” Phoenix demands sharply.

I suck in a breath.

“That’s it, baby.” He kisses my naked chest, and a shiver breaks out on my skin. “Just breathe with me.” He repositions, draping his body over mine. His weight blankets my restlessness, snuffing out some of it.

He holds my gaze as he takes slow intentional breaths. I follow suit. My heart rate returns to normal, exhaustion creeping at the edges of my vision.

“Thank you,” I whisper, pulling him closer.

He doesn’t resist, but he doesn’t initiate anything more, despite the way our bodies press into each other. This isn’t about sex. It’s deeper than that. Phoenix has always been my best friend, my safe place, my home.

And I need that home more than ever.

5

The guards left me on what seems to be a pile of rock more than an island. The outcropping is in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by ocean. It’s well after sunset now, the darkness stretching as far as I can see.

The first thing I do once the mermen guards are out of sight is pull my phone from my dry bag. I didn’t use it today, so I’ve got a decent amount of battery life, but no signal. Of fucking course. I turn it off and shove it back in the pack, then pull out my little flashlight and examine my open cage.

It’s barely twenty feet in diameter at its widest point, if I had to guess. Would something like this even show up on radar or satellite imaging?

I’m kind of surprised the big mermen with spears didn’t stick around, but I guess they figure I can’t go anywhere from here. It’s not like I can breathe underwater on my own. There’s nothing but ocean as far as I can see. Or maybe they’re still down there, somewhere, circling the depths.

The bit of rock doesn’t have any vegetation, but there’s an overhang that spans part of the plateau as well as the water, offering a little shade. I’m sure I’ll need that come tomorrow. My skin wasn’t made to fry in the sun for hours.

For now, I sit in the driest spot I can find and dump out the contents of my bag. Apart from my phone and flashlight, I’ve got a pocket knife, which could definitely come in handy. It won’t be much good in a fight, but it might help me skin a fish for breakfast come morning, if I can manage to catch one. I also have my Aunt April’s journal, a few sorry-looking snacks, some of those weird devices we found in Ocearus—the harmonica-like things. And, what’s this at the bottom? I dig around, then pull out five round discs. I forgot I grabbed these from the library.

I shouldn’t have taken them. It’s against every protocol to remove an artifact from what will soon be an active site. I’m not even sure what possessed me to do it. But they’re all branded with the royal sigil Caspian has tattooed on his palms, and some protective, curious instinct had me grabbing them off the shelves at the last second.

Holding the flashlight between my teeth, I aim it so it’ll shine on the little metal discs. I turn one over trying to figure out what it is and how it works. There were tons of these in the library.

They look like CDs, flat with some kind of etching on one side, concentric circles stacked like rings on a tree. All I can guess is that they somehow store information. I pick up the next disc, examining it closer. The engravings are the same shape, but with a different pattern of spacing. The third disc only has rings that fill half the surface. Are they like the merfolk version of a record?

With my luck, they’re nothing but decorative pieces and I’ve stolen artifacts for no reason. But there were so many of them, and they were hidden. No, these have to be important somehow. Maybe they even hold information that could help me in my current predicament. I have to hope so.

I tuck them back in my bag, knowing there’s not much more I can do tonight without draining all my flashlight battery. This will have to wait until tomorrow.