“Can’t you just whip up a giant statue of me?” I say to him. “I
think I’m pretty statue-worthy.”
He’s using the trident to rebuild the wall the Sleeping Giants
crushed. Instead of a huge structure that needed to be climbed, it’s
now a line of pillars that give a view of the thick forest. Beyond the
forest is the white beach.
“I wouldn’t want to scare anyone away,” he says.
“Funny.”
It goes on like that for a few days in preparation for the
official coronation. Part of me is all jitters, thinking about the
visions I’ve seen-me dying, Kurt and I mortal enemies. Even if I’ve
avoided that version of the future, who’s to say something equally
violent isn’t going to happen?
Slender hands wrap around me. “Worrying again?”
I sling an arm around Layla’s shoulder. “Me? Never.”
She tilts her head up for a kiss and I take it eagerly.
“Thalia says she needs you in the nursery,” she says.
This is when my heart tightens. I walk into the Toliss chambers
where one room hasn’t changed. During the aftermath, I told Kurt about
Nieve’s nursery. We decided it was best to raise the baby merrows.
“This has never been done,” he said.
I picked up the one with skin the color of sunset. “The creatures
we were fighting didn’t stand a chance. They were literally fed hatred
and dark magic three times a day.”
It didn’t go over well with some of the elder mermen, but those
who didn’t want to be ruled by the throne had the option of leaving.
Our numbers now are small, which I guess makes us an endangered
species.
Now in the nursery, Thalia feeds one of the children. “You wanted
to see me.”
She nods, her long, greenish hair loose around her body. She wears
a tulle skirt. Her scales cover her breasts like a bra. I wonder if I
can do that. So I close my eyes and try to make the scales rise, but
they don’t. Must be a chick thing.
“Thalia-” I know what she wants to ask me.
“Why didn’t you change me?” she asks, trying to keep her voice
down so as not to wake the kids. “You kept your word to everyone else.
To the landlocked, to the river people. Everyone except for me.”
“The reason I did that…” I say.
“Is because I asked him to,” Kurt finishes for me. He walks into
the chamber. His cheeks are sunburned from a week of pure,
unadulterated sun. “I owe this to you.”
Thalia puts the baby down and stands in front of her brother.
He takes her chin and tilts her face so she can look at him. “I
wish I hadn’t left you. I wish I’d been a better brother to you. But
know that I love you, and if this is what makes you happy, this is
what I will do.”
He takes his trident and points it at Thalia. A pulsing blue light
hits her chest. Her eyes and mouth open wide as if something inside
her is breaking. Her gills disappear, leaving the faint pearly scar.
It has to hurt. I know it does. My mom said it did when it happened to
her. But when it’s done and Thalia wobbles to take her first step as a
human girl, Kurt holds out his arms and catches her.
•••
The coronation is an all-day thing.
With all the elders turned to surf and coral beneath the Glass
Castle, Kai is the only one left to fill their shoes. She takes in
every detail, from a specific leaf that has to be wreathed around
Kurt’s hair to the direction he holds the trident to the sun. It’s
like she’s posing a model for a photo shoot. She guides the new
members of the Sea Guard, lead by Arion, to flank the new king.
She nicks his finger and holds it over the great lake. Kurt
repeats after her, “As blood of the sea, I swear to serve thee.”
Then she pops a crown over his head, the same one my grandfather
wore the day I met him.
“Jealous?” Shelly asks beside me.
“Like the new ’do,” I tell her.
She touches her hair self-consciously. It’s long and black, no
longer a handful of thin wisps. Now that she’s one of the two
remaining oracles, she’s been trying to “get out there” so her line
doesn’t die with her.
Shelly struts to the throne where Kurt takes her hand and kisses
the back of it. Her fairy handmaidens flit about her, fixing strays
from her hair and wrinkles from her dress.
Kai calls my name and the lake gets quiet.
I look around as if there is another Tristan Hart.
Layla gives me a push and I walk to them. When I try to bow, Kurt
stops me. Shelly holds a golden box and opens it for me. Nestled on a
lining of red velvet is a strange weapon. Seventeen inches or so of
glistening platinum with HART etched in a fine cursive, and a sharp
piercing white crystal at the end.
“For defeating the sea witch,” Kurt says, “and never forgetting
where you come from. Tristan Hart, I declare you Protector of Land and
Sea.”
“I forged it myself,” Shelly says with a wink.
I take it and feel the instant connection to the core of the
crystal. I turn to the cheering crowd and hold up my weapon to the
sky.
I stand at the Coney Island pier. In the distance, a storm moves
toward the horizon and I know that’s where Toliss is moving on to its
next destination.
The boardwalk is reopened, and with a little help from the Sea
King, the beach is patched from the holes we put in it. The sky
directly above me is silky dark blue without a single threat of a
cloud. The Wonder Wheel and other rides are up and the beach is open
for the public once again. Frederik lies on the beach, a line that
could pass for a smile brightening his face. He’s surrounded by giddy
vampire girls and demigods. They look up at the moon and soak up its
light-moonbathing.
Marty and Layla run up on either side of me. We lean on the new
wooden railing. The old one was blasted to bits. I grab for Layla
without thinking twice, taking her hand in mine and trying not to
think that this is the same pier she got taken from.
“Your parents are wondering where you are,” Layla says. “Everyone
is celebrating.”
“I know,” I say. “I’m just taking it all in.”
“Marty misses Dylan already,” she snorts. “Now that Dylan is the
King’s advisor guy.”
Marty pulls down the beak of his cap. He’s got a new one, though
he’s still pissed at me for throwing the other one out.
“Not my first heartbreak, ladybird,” the shapeshifter says. “There
are plenty of fish in the sea. Isn’t that right, T?”
I shake my head, bringing Layla closer to me and biting down on
her neck just to feel her shiver. Then she pulls away and says, “I’m
not a chew toy.”
“More for me,” Marty says.
“I don’t know, guys,” I say. “I know it’s been a hell of a couple
of weeks, but I’m feeling kind of antsy, you know?”
Marty picks up a newspaper that blows against his legs. The
Brooklyn Star . The headline reads: Local Swim Team Captain Saves the
Day. There’s a picture of Angelo saving a homeless guy from a fuzzy
shot of a merrow. Then a smaller article that reads: Kraken Attacks
Local Celebrities. Well, it’s not wrong. Marty crumples the paper and
dunks it in the garbage.
“You’re just saying that because you have a new toy,” Marty
reminds me. “You’re like Aquaman. No wait, that’s taken. Mighty
Merman? How about-”
“How about, you all shut your clams and come with me for a bit of
fun.” Brendan is standing on the pier.
“How the hell did you get up here?” Layla says, hugging him.
Brendan smirks, and we follow his eyes to where a ship bobs in the