Trinket (Reverse Harem)

Tentacles

That sounded so stupid. So, so stupid. If she smacked me, I deserved it.

Her face doesn't move, but her brows twitch. "I see. Well, if Ormiss has left you to your own devices, I can't fault you if you find your way into trouble."

"Is there trouble this way?" I asked.

A compressed smile. "It's a palace."

Right. Stupid me. I should have just smacked myself.

"I am Lady Piama. Why don't I show you the way out of the palace? I was just going to go down to the market."

She added that last sentence a bit quickly, before I could take offense at the second sentence. I tried to figure out if I should trust her—Tynne's mother had taught me to never trust a high-bred in their own home. My maids back in haven had spotted me for a low-bred right away. Piama didn't offer me any clues, not that high-breds usually did, and I resisted the urge to fidget. I'd never been very good at reading people, and making a mistake now could be deadly.

I'd been screwing up (and around...) a lot lately. And when I haven't been screwing up, I'd been generally dead weight on everything.

But what was I going to tell her? No, I'd rather just randomly wander this infernal palace until I die of starvation?

"I'd enjoy seeing the market," I said, trying to smile. My lips just stretched over my teeth. I probably looked ghoulish.

"This way," she gestured with one finger and went back the opposite way.

Riiight. I'd been going the completely wrong direction.

She glanced at me as I made an effort to remember to walk beside her, and not behind her. Her eyes trailed over my face and down my arms, to the exposed scars over my back. She didn't ask about them. Instead, she said, "So I was one of Ormiss' teachers."

"For magery, you mean?" I asked.

"Mostly magery."

"Do all hippocamp have magic?"

She laughed like I had said something hilarious. "Do all wolf-shifters have magic?"

"They all have magic, but none are mages," I said dryly. Wolf-shifters weren't mages. Their magic was in their third form that was excellent for ripping things in two, their keen sense of smell and hearing, their physical endurance, and their ability to heal. But not a single one was a mage. They didn't even bother to have their own clergy or oracles for the Churn. Even humans had those.

A scowl flits across her face. "Point taken. No, not all hippocamp have magic. It is a rather rare ability. Tends to run in bloodlines."

"So are you related to Ormiss?"

"Quite distantly. He and I can both trace our bloodlines back to founding sea serpents and unicorns."

Well, every hippocamp could do that, because that's where hippocamp came from: sea serpents mated with unicorns. Maybe not every hippocamp was a purebred, but every hippocamp somewhere wayyyy far back had a sea serpent and a unicorn progenitor. I didn't say so, though, because she preened a bit. Maybe she just meant they actually knew their lineage all the way back.

"How long have the unicorns and sea serpents been gone?" I asked.

"A long time," she said. "The sea serpents disappeared into the deep... a long time ago. And unicorns were around longer but... they've been gone hundreds of years as well. No one knows what happened to them. The sea-serpents wanted to explore the depth. There weren't many of them, you see, never were, and they liked treasure and secrets and when there was no more treasure nor secrets they got bored and..."