“The Sun started making changes to the kingdom as soon as he reached the throne. He called back the men who were away at war far to the west on Ollen Island and put an end to the conflict immediately. He simply let the northerners have the land.

  Yriaa spans the full territory of a rather isolated island. As such, we used to struggle to connect with the wider world for trade and opportunities of expansion. We’re too far from our closest neighbors to make it worth their while to trade with us, particularly because we don't grow or mine any goods that they consider valuable. Precious stones, metals, spices, we have none of that. The strength of our kingdom is agricultural, good for self-sustenance and bad for proliferation. The bigger players wanted nothing to do with it. It’s not profitable to trade with a territory months away with no salt of its own to preserve its goods. Our leathers and rough fabrics were no novelty to them, either, so they left us alone, in our peace and food aplenty.

  Yriaa used to belong to the larger lands in the southwest long ago, but when we fought and at last achieved our independence from the Carmeem empire, we became mostly self-sufficient. Aside from the occasional independent tradings here and there with our former, ancestral empire, we remained an entirely secluded realm.

  The only piece of land Yriaa ever conquered was a small island in the far northwest, a good distance away from the motherland but not so far as to make it inaccessible. It was a key to the development we sought, and the whole kingdom was in an uproar at its initial discovery. I hear King Artlan was able to mine Ollen Island for all sorts of metals and precious materials for a few years, and that he’d been in the process of establishing a large Yriaan settlement out there, before the war started.

  This was overwhelmingly positive progress for our people, you see, for it would have provided us with a path to the larger world. Yriaa’s ships and technology were not advanced enough to allow us access to the lands in the far north or even the south, our closest neighbor, to be able to form any sort of allegiance. Ollen was to become our kingdom’s only outpost and treasure trove.

  When we extended a hand to the north to initiate trading agreements, however, we were encountered with hostility. Ollen was theirs, they claimed, won in a sweeping conquest in an earlier war amongst their people. So, when we came to their doorstep to announce we’d taken it, they deployed forces to fight us away.

  Our king at the time, Artlan, had his mind fixed on it, however. He saw a potential in the land the northerners had not, and he was convinced that they wouldn’t try so hard to hold a land they hadn’t even cared to inhabit until then. He fought them back intelligently, conservatively, trying to wear them out. He was making good progress, I think, when the Sun came and surrendered Ollen to the north.

  The Sun God chose to focus all his attentions on the mainland, and his first order of business, strangely, was to recognize the pirates who roamed the eastern islands and our busier coasts as privateers for the Sun reign. He put out a widespread call to all the experienced criminals of the Seas to make them an advantageous offer. They did not need to swear to him to serve him, he insisted, when they refused to give up their freedom and said they preferred a quick death over a life of slavery. To this day the Sun’s privateers remain a band of free outlaws, pirates in spirit but much better dressed. They guard the coasts of Yriaa in their fancy uniforms, along with the Sea’s sirens. They’ve been allies from the beginning, those two snakes.

  But, what I was saying was, I never understood the sense in the Sun’s actions. But that was what he decided to do with his newfound power, and hastily, too.

  The Sun reign taxed the free folk mercilessly in those initial years, even worse than in current days, in an attempt to lure more followers to his side. My parents didn’t budge, though, and that was where it all went wrong for me.

  That is the real beginning of my story.

  We had led a somewhat comfortable life, until then. We ate well, and trade was good, facilitated by the throne. My family sold crops directly to the crown, and in exchange we were allowed to inhabit and farm the land, rightfully owned by the king, and received modest payments in the form of coin and other goods.

  The Sun dismantled all those systems that had allowed our previous rulers to build peace within the kingdom. He left us all to either fend for ourselves, battling his crippling taxes and the constant danger of the more hostile Gods, or to surrender to his new order in exchange for protection and financial advantage.

  My parents struggled during those days to keep us fed and clothed, so it was only logical that, when an opportunity arose to rid themselves of a daughter, they’d take it. They chose to discard their most useless mouth to feed.

  And so I was given as a bride to the worst man I’d ever met shortly after I turned thirteen.”

  Teela sat with her shoulders hunched forward and caressed Homely in her tightly clasped hands. Her small friend was asleep, his beady little eyes closed and his head hanging loosely onto her fingertips. She could feel the beat of his tiny heart faintly pumping within his chest and his talons gripping the skin of her palms.

  She felt slightly anxious to return to her larger friend, Clover. They’d left him, along with Mantis’s black mount, at the nice Sea people’s stables, and she was sure he was being treated well, for the strangers had shown Teela and her companions nothing but kindness, despite Mantis’s warning that they had ulterior motives. Regardless, she felt impatient to see to her beloved horse herself, as she wasn’t used to being apart from him for long or leaving him in the care of strangers.

  The fishing vessel’s return to the pier from where they’d departed was quick and tense. The sailors continued to glower at Mantis, Leroh, and her, even as they performed their duties on the ship. Teela feared that they might attempt some sort of foolish retribution for their fallen man, but Mantis’s threat kept. The remaining Seamen did not speak to them, or interact with them beyond the poisonous glares they threw their way.

  Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.

  Leroh sat by her side with his hands covering his eyes and his head bent over his crossed legs. His brown curls hung forward over his face, still damp from when the God’s drenched hand had reached over to him, and his rough tunic of soft brown linen was crumpled and wet. Teela shuddered at the thought that the God of the Sea himself had put her brother in such a state.

  She did not dare to speak to him, or Mantis. What they had experienced, what had almost become of Leroh because of Teela, it all lay too heavy among them.

  He had almost been devoured.

  As a consequence to her actions and decisions, her brother had nearly become food for the Sea God.

  It was an odd feeling, the guilt. Teela did not often consider the consequences that her behavior might bring upon Leroh, because she’d always believed it his own fault that he found himself suffering on her behalf.

  When Teela got herself yelled at by the townsfolk of Pirn or the traveling strangers she approached at the tavern with her inappropriate talk, or when she was threatened with violence and vague hints at danger in an attempt to repel her, she knew it as her own adversity to face. She decided being screamed at or worse was a fair price to pay, if it resulted in her attaining bits of information previously denied to her. The repercussions were her own, and she’d always been ready to face the results of her decisions when she went poking at the unknown.

  But Leroh believed, had told her countless times, that whatever trouble she brought upon herself was his to deal with, that he was responsible for cleaning after her messes. It was not true. It was a self-imposed burden, she knew. But he wholeheartedly believed it, and hated her for it.

  This time, however, Teela had finally come to face the unpleasant truth in his words. He was committed to “protecting” her no matter what, even if only for their mother’s sake, even if just to avoid being seen as a coward or a failure. Nothing Teela could say or do would ever change his mind about what he believed to be his life’s duty as the man of the family. So he would follow her, as that was the only thing he could think to do.

  And so, whatever trouble she got herself in, he’d get himself in. He wouldn’t help, or truly protect her in any significant way; he didn’t know how. But he would follow in her step toward whatever risk she chose to bargain for in a petty attempt to dissuade her from doing with her own life what she wanted. It was stupid, irrational, but it was so.

  And Teela did not even need him! If anything, Leroh was a hindrance and an unwanted presence in her journey toward discovery, but he was too set in his ways to understand that, having believed for most of his life that his duty was to raise her. He would come along wherever she went and take the brunt of any ramifications come her way, mindlessly, stubbornly refusing to even consider leaving her alone and returning to his own, happy life.

  That day, Teela saw with daunting clarity that she truly was more likely to get him killed than herself. She had not thought it possible, considering their different dispositions and reactions to the magical perils of their world, but it was, unfortunately, the reality of it. He would die for her, and not even by his own volition. It would not be an act of brotherly love and honor, when he inevitably sacrificed himself for Teela; he thought it his responsibility to forfeit his life before he failed in his task to look after her. Leroh feared death, but, ultimately, he feared Mother’s judgment of him more.

  It was not fair.

  Teela had to return to Pirn.

  Perhaps, she told herself in a rogue string of thought, she could escape him. If he didn’t see her go, if he had no opportunity to follow, he’d have to give her up, wouldn’t he?

  Unless he went out looking for her anyway when she was already gone, searching aimlessly in a world very hungry for their kind.

  She frowned at that upsetting conclusion and decided to push the whole topic away, later to be dealt with. Teela transferred her attention to the auburn-haired woman beside her.

  Mantis had killed that innocent man for her.

  It was somehow extremely important to Teela that it had been done as punishment for a transgression to her. She could not shake the feeling that she’d decided the sailor’s fate when she’d foolishly strayed from their tight group and wandered away, if only by a few paces. If Teela had stayed sitting with her companions like her instincts had suggested, would that man still be dead? Probably not, she decided,

  Teela had not been happy with the sailors' approach, and she’d known an unpleasant sense of uncertainty and shame when she’d understood the group of men were laughing at her behind her back. She still didn’t fully comprehend what had occurred then, but she was able to imagine the sort of mockery that might have taken place to provoke such a response from Mantis.

  Nevertheless, it had not been an infraction punishable by death, nor close to it. Teela was certain of it. If she’d been given a chance to mete out punishment for the offense against herself, she would have considered a reprimand from the captain a more than reasonable retribution. But Mantis had simply murdered him. Right there and then, behind Teela’s back and within the blink of an eye, she’d put an end to the young man’s life.

  It was wrong, Teela knew, immoral.

  Since she’d met the fascinating woman, Teela had been internally building an image of Mantis that painted her as a tormented, reluctant servant to a ruthless God. She killed, yes, but her victims were always bad people. Rapists, she’d said, those among us who deserved it. Mantis had also killed the other two men at the tavern, but Teela knew they had intended to attack her, and that made the act much less reproachable in her mind.

  The idea of serving a God and acting on their great command, however removed from human values, didn’t seem so bad to Teela. Gods had the power and authority to make decisions beyond her comprehension, and she had no right to question their will.

  This, however, had been Mantis’s will. It was clear that her Goddess had not ordered her to kill the sailor. She’d made that decision alone, and that did not seem right or just to Teela.

  Inexplicably, the last thing on her mind as they neared the pier and the fishermen eagerly raced to their tasks, was the Sea God. Certainly, he had been beyond her wildest imaginings, more overwhelmingly powerful and permeated with magical strength than she could have ever envisioned. But, despite being larger than anything Teela had ever laid eyes on and as majestic and foreign to her as the ocean itself, he’d still not made an impression on her as lasting and insidious as Mantis’s revelation of her true character.