The dark waters| ✓

28. EVEN LOVERS DROWN

"I'm his fiancé." Noelani says. "He proposed to me two days ago. And of course, I said yes. Who can say no to him." She says with a  smile. My mind seems to be a haze of confusion.

So this is why.

"Congratulations." I say with a lot of efforts. My voice cracks and breaks off. I really didn't want to give Noelani the satisfaction of  hurting me. But the hurt was evident. It was written all over my face. It was in my voice.

"I'm just gonna leave... I've got things to do." She says giving me one last smile before leaving . Once she leaves, silence hangs in the air. I use this silence to prepare what I'm gonna say, how I'm gonna respond, how everything will be all right and sorted out.

"Leah..." Dylan says.

"Leave right away. Before I lose it completely, leave. And don't call me Leah again. That name is only for my friends. For you, Cordelia. Get out Evian." I say trying to hide my hurt. My voice trembles slightly, full of all the emotions inside of me fighting to get out.

Dylan looks at me with an apologetic expression. He looks miserable and that oddly makes me happy. I look out of the window. He gets up from the bed and leaves the room. I don't look back until I'm sure there's no one left in the room. I feel odd. I know nothing happened between us. I shouldn't be sad I didn't lose anything.
Still I cry.

But no one will know, because here the ocean will carry the tears away.

No one will know.

________________________________

I'm in a rectangular room which looks like a meeting room.The only source of light is  a chandelier having green vines holding it to the roof. The vines end in a bulb shaped translucent pouch that has a thick luminous golden liquid flowing around it slowly which pours its golden light around the room with a mixture of other colours coming from the flouroscent flowers between the vines.
Almost everything in the room is made of stone, except for the chairs that seem to have a covering on it, that kind of looks like jellyfish skin.

"I see you are strong enough to move around. And explore the headquarters." I hear someone say from behind.

I turn around to face the person. The first thing I notice about him is his hair. Bright red auburn hair that move around slightly in the water. He has grey eyes that shine as they land on me. He has a friendly smile plastered on his face.

"Headquarters?" I ask.

"You are in the fidelist's headquarters."He says raising his eyebrows.

"Oh.... I say looking around again and paying more attention to the details.

"Isn't fancy. But it's comfortable." He says looking around. "We have a huge one inside the city, but it got captured and raided, so we had to shift to the suburbs."

"So we aren't exactly in Marinus?" I say.

"Nope. This place is hardly its shadow.The main city is surely the most beautiful place you'll ever see." His says. His eyes glimmer as he talks about it.

"You must be missing Marinus." I say. "You are?"

"Alun." He says smiling. "And you are Cordelia Lynn."

"Yeah. So... what are the plans?"

"Well first of all we need to go free Llyr."

"Why? What happened?"

"The last attack didn't go so well. Turns out Llyr already knew we were going to come. He had his full army waiting. Most of us managed to escape. Llyr didn't. He was the only one they were actually interested in."

"Can I come as well? I want to fight." I say.

"No I don't think you are ready to." Alun says looking down.

"Then what's the point of me staying here? Just send me back to Lucerne already." I say.

"I don't think you quite understand." Alun says looking up. "Why do you think you can breathe underwater Leah?"

"Because I'm half mer?" I answer.
"Why do you think you're half mer?" Alun asks. I squint my eyes at him and shrug.

"What are you trying to say?"

"To be straightforward with you, what I'm trying to say is that Llyr is your father. That makes you mermaid royalty."