Sea Star - Orm Marius

Devil's Deep Beach - 2022

"How can I help?" Claudia asked as Atlanna attended to Orm's wounds.

"We need to drape the burns in seaweed, that will help sooth them."

"Got it." She took up a piece of seaweed from the pile Atlanna had gathered and lay it gently across Orm's pecs. 

Orm was conscious now, and clearly in a lot of discomfort. "Um, this okay?" she asked, coughing awkwardly as her fingertips grazed his skin. 

He just nodded stiffly, gritting his teeth. Atlanna touched his cheek lovingly. 

"I'm sorry to drag you all into this," Arthur apologized.

He, Mera, Claudia, Atlanna, Orm, Topo and some other important Atlanteans had gathered on a beach away from the doomed island. 

"Something happened to me when I touched that Black Trident," Orm said, gritting out the words.

"Why is he even still here?" demanded a red-haired man, who turned out to be Mera's father. "He should have been on his way back to prison long ago. And the Surface Dweller?"

Oh, right, he was talking about her now. 

"Claudia's like family and well, he is family," Arthur explained. 

"We should hear what he has to say," Atlanna said on behalf of her son.

"I made that mistake once. That's how I know he can't be trusted."

"And he cut off my claw - this thing took a whole year to grow back, " said the giant crustacean - yup, giant, talking crustacean - who was apparently the Brine King. Claudia had heard Arthur talk about him before: "I get so bored sometimes I don't even know which end of the Brine king I'm supposed to be looking at." This had made her laugh pretty damn hard. 

"He's actually been really helpful," she admitted. Unlike she was being right now - she had said she would help with the seaweed bandage thing but felt too awkward doing something so intimate for a man she barely knew. 

"Yeah, he wants to stop Manta same as we do," Arthur agreed. "And just for the record, the only reason we made it this far is because of him."

"It's true." She wasn't sure these Atlantean Kings were even listening to her, but she wasn't going to let that stop her from voicing her opinions.

"I saw the Lost Kingdom," Orm said. 

There was silence, so this must have been a big deal.

"Mom, I don't know enough about this - is that even possible?" Arthur asked. 

"All anyone knows for sure is that there once was a seventh kingdom, and then, one day, just before the Fall, every record of it was stricken from the chronicles," Atlanna explained.

"How do you even know what you saw was the Lost Kingdom?" Mera's dad again. "No one even knows what it's called anymore."

"Hey, will you shut up and let him speak," Claudia demanded. Silence again, and everyone stared at her. Arthur was smirking. "Sorry."

"Thank you, Claudia." Did Orm smile a little? It was hard to tell. He continued. "It's called Necrus. And I didn't just see it, I knew it. It was almost like I was remembering it, flashes of someone else's memories. During King Atlan's time, there were seven united kingdoms of Atlantis, and the Black City was a curse upon them all. By exploiting orichalcum, Necrus rapidly became a superpower unlike any other. But it came at a terrible price: poisoning the land and the sea, even the mind of the tyrant who ruled it: Atlan's own brother, Kordax."

"No way," breathed Claudia. "Well that's poetic..."

"Atlan pleaded with him to stop using it, before the world was irrevocably damaged, however, Kordax resented Atlan, thinking his own brother was trying to steal his power. So he resorted to dark magic and crafted an instrument of evil: the Black Trident. He used it to transform himself and his people into monsters to fight Atlantis, and so, the two brothers went to war. But Atlan defeated Kordax and imprisoned him and all of Necrus with a spell cast with his own blood to ensure that Kordax's dark power would never be found. And that is why Necrus is stricken from the chronicles. This evil was supposed to remain frozen for all eternity. But David Kane has found it, and it's slowly possessing him."

Claudia broke the heavy silence that once again fell upon the group.  "Well shit..."

"But even with the ice caps melting, Kordax still can't be freed," Mera spoke up. "Atlan used blood magic to seal Kordax in his prison. Only Atlan himself could release him."

"Manta doesn't need Atlan himself: he just need's Atlan's blood," cried Atlanna in realization. "Blood magic isn't really magic, it's DNA. The key to his prison is the royal bloodline itself."

"Wait, since you're all royals, does that mean you're direct descendants of Atlan?" Claudia asked.

"Yes.  That means in order to reach Kordax he needs blood from either you Mother, me or Arthur," Orm reasoned. "We're the end of the bloodline."

"No, we're not," Arthur cried, sharing a stricken look with his wife. "Not anymore."

(Duh duh duh!!!!!!! And we're going to end there for now! 

Thank you so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed as always! :))