Three Rings (The Fairytail Saga) (24 page)

The sound of her laughter pissed Tristan off. Before he knew what he was doing, he slammed the bedroom door shut, stepping up to her as he did so, fixing his features in the deadliest expression he had.

‘Should have known that becoming mer would have made you twice as conceited as you were before,’ he rasped.

Adele spun around, the towel flying off her head, her wet hair swinging, flicking droplets of water onto his face. There were no words to describe the look of utter shock on her pretty face as she recognized him.

‘
Tristan
?!’ she gasped, hands clutching at the towel around her breasts. ‘But we
killed
you!’

That was all of the admission he needed. ‘Not quite!’ he barked, advancing on her, giving her a shove. ‘Sorry to ruin whatever it is you and Ardhi are plotting, you crazy bitch! But it ends now!’

To his amazement, Adele’s blue eyes filled with tears. She took a step towards him, holding her hands up. ‘Tristan-please-you have to hear me out-’

Tristan wasn’t in the mood to hear anything she had to say. For the first time in his life he raised his fist to a woman-and knocked her out cold.

⁓

One moment, Ivyanne had been laying amongst the coral, demonstrating her ability to camouflage herself amongst the shells and seagrass with a serene and sparkling smile, and the next, she was a blur of periwinkle and gold shooting around the submerged oyster rock behind him, disappearing from view and leaving Lincoln frozen and blinking after her.

Was was that?
He thought, taking off after her in a daze, glancing around nervously for sharks. He hated it when Ivyanne left him alone in open water-and it was eerie when she did it without comment first.

In order to show him a few tricks, mainly concerning camouflage, and how to reverse coral bleaching with his own energy on his RDO, Ivyanne had taken Lincoln an hour north of Bracken, to a environmentally protected zone she’d helped Michael Donnelly develop a few years before. It was a small cluster reef near a very small island-Griffin Island, and the water was thick with the bounty of her efforts-more alive than any he’d ever encountered. He was having a wonderful time with her.

But Lincoln knew his day was about to take a turn for the
weird
the moment he saw Ivyanne wrap her delicate fingers around the base of a reef anchor embedded in the sea floor, and maneuver it out of the coral gingerly. Her actions were gentle and deliberate-a stark contrast to the fearsome expression on her beautiful face.

‘What are you doing?’ It was the first time Lincoln had ever spoken underwater, and he was surprised by how normal it sounded. No oxygen bubbled out of his mouth as it would have when he was a human.

Ivyanne clasped the anchor with one hand and hitched the slackened length of chain with the other, pulling it tight. She lifted her narrowed eyes to the surface some twenty feet above, lips twisted in a sneer. ‘They’re not allowed to fish here.’ She said. ‘And I’m going to make sure they don’t try it
again
.’

Lincoln followed her gaze up the anchor chain to where it became rope, slicing through the teardrop clear water from above and connected to the water-magnified hull of a white fishing boat.

‘Why?’

‘It’s a green zone. Off limits-to everyone and for good reason.’

‘Is it
that
big a deal?’ He asked, gesturing around him. The water was a pale shade of turquoise within the depths, and it was writhing with colors thanks to the multitude of fish milling about them.‘It’s not like we’re
short
of them or anything...’

Ivyanne rolled her green eyes. ‘That’s the
point
Lincoln-that’s what a green zone is
for
-to make sure there
are
plenty.’ She watched a be-speckled blue and burnt orange coral trout whip by, her brow furrowed with concern while she tracked its course. ‘The fish here aren’t used to being hunted, like those out in the sport areas. They’re too naïve, too easily caught. If these
idiots
-’ She snapped her eyes back up the surface above, ‘take advantage, there
will
be nothing left.’

Lincoln tried to look supportive, even though he still didn’t really understand. He’d gone from having zero interest in politics, to being the subject of a monarchy who took things that Lincoln had never even thought about very seriously.

But his life was different now, and it had the potential to be an incredible one. So if green zone fishing was a problem for her, he’d
make
it a problem for him. It was that simple.

‘So, you’re going to set them adrift?’

Ivyanne returned his smile, a wicked gleam in her eye. ‘Oh… I think we can do a little better than
that
. Hold this-don’t let it go loose or they might pull it up to cast it again.’ She thrust the anchor chain into his hands and then took the spokes of the anchor in her own. Her body went taut, her tail curled up until her fluke was touching her lower back, and then suddenly, the steel gave way, bending in the opposite direction with relative ease. After she’d done the first two, she alternated her grip and did the second, briefly tilting her elbow to swipe the tail end of her long, floating blonde braid out of her eyes.

‘I’ll get it.’ Lincoln reached out and caught her hair under the guise of assisting. Really, he’d take any opportunity to touch her-even if it was just her hair. But to his horror, Ivyanne flinched from his touch.

‘Sorry,’ he muttered, retracting his hand, stung by the rejection. ‘My bad.’

‘No. It’s not you...it felt good, Link. I wasn’t expecting...I mean, you know that I-’ Ivyanne glanced down at her hands, to the anchor she’d mangled. Instead of being shaped like a waterfall now, it looked more like a claw.

That’s when Lincoln realized that this was more than a revenge urge, but an outlet for her frustration. ‘It’s okay.’ He assured her. ‘I won’t take it personally.’

‘I’m sorry. I just can’t talk about it.’ She shook herself off. ‘Look, I better do this, before they move on.’ Her voice was strained.‘Follow me-and don’t let it loose, okay? They can’t know anything is going on while we’re this close.’

Lincoln nodded, glancing down at the rusting chain in his hands, noting the metallic scent was pungent, even in the water.

Ivyanne flicked her lavender-blue tail gently, and she took off at a graceful speed. Lincoln followed suit, adjusting his position so that he was coming up under the shadow of the boat, as she was. As he ascended, his skin breaking out in gooseflesh from paranoia, he took note of the four drop lines in the water around him. They were fishing all right. And it looked like they were about to regret it.

Ivyanne was well ahead of him after a few seconds and so he trailed after her wake, his heart rate beginning to pick up pace as his new mer senses smelled bloodlust in the water. Not from a shark, but the princess. How far would she take this? He had visions of her pulling on a fishing line and yanking an unsuspecting human into the water to meet his death. As someone who had been both human, and ignorant of fishing laws just a few weeks before, the situation made him incredibly uncomfortable.

Once only a few meters of water separated them from the white hull, which was marred by scrape marks, Ivyanne glanced back at him and held up her free hand, motioning for him to wait. And so he did, pulling on the chain as tightly as possible, watching her,and the water near the surface warily. It was harder to hold back the slack in the chain now and so he added his other hand, pulling down with some of his body weight. It wasn’t nearly enough to keep the boat steady, but if they noticed movement and tugged, he’d be able to resist it enough to fool them into
thinking
they were still anchored. He smiled, feeling his new strength course through his arms. A moon before, pulling on a rope would have grazed his palms and made them ache. Now it felt like nothing.

It wasn’t until Ivyanne floated towards the submerged blades of the outboard motor, that alarm overrode his self-satisfaction.

‘
Hey
!’ Bubbles shot out of his mouth. ‘Get
away
from that!’

Ivyanne looked back at him. ‘They won’t start it until they’ve pulled up the anchor, Link.’

‘
Some
do! My mum used to do it when she thought we’d come adrift, to get the anchor to catch again!’ Lincoln’s memories of fishing with his parents in Tasmania-his mother had been especially good at it-were hazy now, but he could remember sitting at the back of their little boat, pulling on a thick rope, testing for tension while his mother slowly steered forward.

Ivyanne hesitated for a moment, but then she looked back and smiled ruefully. ‘Then I better be quick, huh?’ With that she turned, flicking her tail in a tiny movement, elevating until her lovely face was in line with the propellor blades. She brought her hands up, and to Lincoln’s disbelief, begin to slip the mangled anchor over the blades.

‘You can’t be serious!’ Lincoln was torn between wanting to let go of the chain and tearing her away from the dangerous engine, and wanting to hold the chain tighter to avoid disturbing the men above-who could rip Ivyanne’s face to shreds with one push of a button.

‘
Deadly
serious.’ Ivyanne was flexing again, squeezing the long prongs of the anchor around the blades, caging them in. She worked quickly, her movements appearing effortless-like bending steel was something she did for kicks. Which he now suspected she
did
. After the longest time, which had probably only been fifteen seconds and two hundred heartbeats, she flung out her arms and scooped her arms back, distancing herself from the lethal blades while obviously admiring her handiwork. She had two prongs wrapped around the blades, and the other two clamped around the leg of the engine.

‘There!’ She announced proudly, tail flicking lazily at the water. ‘If they ever fish here again, it won’t be with
this
motor!’

Lincoln gaped at her, knowing the engine she’d just sabotaged was worth at
least
seventeen thousand dollars. ‘You’re insane!’

‘Only a little.’ Ivyanne bit her lip, but she couldn’t hold back her delighted grin. ‘Ardhi once-’ but she snapped her mouth shut, her expression darkening, becoming distant, she dropped her head. ‘Never mind.’

Lincoln released the chain, and it drooped, forming a loop near the propeller, taking her in his arms. ‘Hey,’ he used a finger to raise her chin. ‘It’s okay to talk about them. Especially the stuff that makes you smile when you remember. They’d
want
it that way, Ivyanne.’

But Ivyanne’s eyebrows knitted together. ‘I don’t know if I’m ready to remember the good stuff about Ardhi yet.’ She looked up into his eyes. ‘I miss him, but I’m still so,
so
angry with him- and now that Tristan’s dead, like Ardhi wanted-I’m hating his memory more.’

‘Fair enough. But if you want to talk about Tristan too, I’ll listen. I actually miss his face, can you believe that?’

‘Yes, I can.’ Ivyanne mimicked his hold on her, cupping his face. ‘You’re a good man Link, and you’ve been so patient lately. I know watching me go through this would have wounded you, and I’m sorry.’

‘I hope I’m not crowding you,’ he said, pushing strands of hair out of her face with a confident hand. ‘But I just can’t stay away.’

She pressed her forehead into his. ‘And I don’t want you to.’

Lincoln felt a stirring inside him. He looked down at her lips, and was overcome with the need to press his against them. He waited for her to sense the shift in his intentions and stiffen, but she swallowed and tilted her face to hi, wide-eyed.

‘I don’t know if I’m ready, but-’

The sound of the prop roaring to life fragmented the tension between them and made Lincoln flinch in shock. Ivyanne yelped, ducked, and pulled him down towards the coral with surprising strength. Seconds later, there was a metallic screech that even the ocean around them couldn’t muffle.

Tristan found lots of useful stuff while Adele slept off his attack. For one, the call index on her mobile phone was filled with the same number, over and over again, which was listed only as ‘PSYCHO’ and the her text inbox was loaded with short, cryptic messages to the same number. He scrolled through them, raising an eyebrow as the plot thickened before his eyes:

Thursday January 26th:

Adele: Happy Australia Day

P: Like I care

Adele : Whatever. Got the cash.

P : Good. Call made.

Adele : Did he buy it?

P: Yes. Book the flights, but he wants two seats.

Adele: Two?!

P: Yes. Just humor him, he won’t be needing the second.

Adele: How can you be so sure?

P: I know her.

P: Delete these messages from your phone please.

Adele: Ok. (Which she clearly hadn’t)

Friday January 27th:

P: Eta 6.00pm SPLASH! Have boat ready at co-ordinates.