Heart of the Sea Read online

  Copyright © 2018 by W.M. Fawkes.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  Content Warning: this book is intended for adult audiences only and contains mild violence and a graphic sex scene.

  Cover art © 2018 by Madeline Farlow

  Editing: clause-effect.com

  For more information, click or visit:

  Fawkeswrites.com

  Contents

  1. Out of His Shell

  2. The Devil & the Deep Blue Sea

  3. It Comes in Waves

  4. Sunburn & Shimmer

  Cast & Glossary

  Prince of Darkness

  About the Author

  Out of His Shell

  Poseidon lounged in the sand as the sun began to move across the sky for the first time in centuries. Zeus had decided that the titans had suffered enough since the war he and his siblings had waged against their father. If they would swear fealty to Olympus, Zeus would give them their freedom.

  It was a ridiculous proposition, but Poseidon’s younger brother enjoyed nothing more than seeing people on their knees before him.

  He sighed and leaned back to soak in the warmth. He would take a nap in the sun and enjoy the benefits of his brother’s ego, as glad as ever that no one expected him on Olympus.

  Sleep had only just laid its shroud on him when a shout made him jerk upright. Sand clung to the backs of his arms. He whipped his head around to see Nerea bounding toward him across the sand.

  She was one of the Nereids who tended the Aegean. When the war with the titans had ended, Poseidon had splashed down from Olympus and swam straight east to the sea. He’d hardly gone farther inland than the shorelines that framed the waters he loved since.

  As she came closer, he saw she cradled something against her chest with both hands, like it was too precious to drop. Unlike her knees, which left small dents in the sand when she fell next to him.

  Her wide eyes shimmered with salt tears. In the sea, he never would’ve noticed. Here on land, the tears welled and trickled past her lashes to trail streams down her round cheeks. She looked just like her twin brother, Nerites. They had matching dark hair and eyes the light blue of the clearest tidal pools.

  “Please, help him!” Nerea pressed the thing she held into his rough hands—a conch, and a heavy one.

  Poseidon blinked, staring at it. He saw the ripple of opalescent flesh inside the swirl, but nothing came out. He didn’t understand what she meant him to do for this creature, or what about it had upset her so much.

  Before he figured it out, she grew impatient with him. “It’s Nerites, my lord.”

  Poseidon’s stomach dropped. “What happened?”

  Her lips trembled and a small line appeared between her brows. She cupped her hands around his, like she meant to provide her brother an extra layer of protection.

  “We were at the shore last night. The sea turtle hatchlings dug their way up from the sand, so we spent the night watching over them. We were swimming with them when Helios came down in his chariot. He said that he had not forgotten Nerites in all his time in Tartarus, and he wanted to take him into the sky in his chariot. Nerites refused to go, so he turned him into—into that.”

  Poseidon stroked the edge of the cream-and-white-striped shell with his thumb, as if that were any comfort to the nymph trapped inside. He frowned, and Nerea sat back on her heels and released him.

  They’d all heard tales of Daphne, who’d turned herself into a tree to escape the lusts of Apollo. She remained stuck. Could nymphs return once their form had changed? Daphne had not.

  “You have to help him,” Nerea said.

  When Poseidon had taken up his mantle as lord of the seas, he had vowed to protect them. That meant protecting the water nymphs who lived there too. As formidable as they were together—more terrifying, even, than Dionysus’s maenads—their energies were better put to caring for the world. They were tied to it. When the sea flourished, so did they. When it suffered, they did too. Gods were too invested in themselves; nymphs were better.

  He cradled Nerites’s shell in both hands. It was as perfect as the nymph it housed, and no small wonder. In any form, Nerites would be splendid.

  When Poseidon had thought to woo Demeter, he’d made many creatures. They were all beautiful—okay, perhaps he was biased about some, but he’d made them. He knew the forms beings took, he had magic to make and unmake them, and Nerites had always been part of his realm.

  Okay, it didn’t hurt that Poseidon had spent a good amount of time considering the shape of Nerites in particular. But he could do this.

  Poseidon closed his eyes and reached out with his senses, let power flow through his touch. Poseidon considered the shell and the nymph inside it—Nerites, with his quick smile and razor-sharp tongue. Though he’d never felt the strength of that lithe body under his hands, Poseidon knew every line of it. He knew the sound of his laughter, how it rose from his chest like the bubbles from a fissure under the sea.

  Nerites was one of a kind. Poseidon would not allow the world to turn without him.

  As he allowed his magic to surround the conch, he sensed when the creature inside caught it and pulled on his power. The shell trembled in his hand.

  Rather than drop it, Poseidon leaned forward to set it on the sand before both of them. He and Nerea edged back to give Nerites space. The conch continued to tremble until it cracked, and Nerites tumbled out, naked and panting, sinking his fingers into the sand to ground himself.

  Poseidon rolled forward to kneel before him. He reached out and cupped Nerites’s cheeks.

  “Breathe. You’re safe. You’re back.”

  He expected a nod, or for Nerites to pull away—Poseidon was not sure he’d want someone touching him when a titan had just changed him against his will. Instead, Nerites fell into him. His fingers pressed hard into Poseidon’s back where he clung to him. Nerites shook, and it took Poseidon a moment to realize that he was crying.

  For so much of his life, Poseidon had been the one to rail and fall apart. Hades and Hestia had comforted him in the dark of Cronus’s belly, watched his back throughout the war with his father and Atlas. He’d had children, but he’d never held them when they cried, only sought vengeance against those who’d wronged them.

  Now, with Nerites in his arms, Poseidon’s heart softened. His hand cupped the back of Nerites’s head and smoothed his fingers over his short hair.

  He frowned and met Nerea’s eyes. She seemed worried and unsure too, so since Nerites didn’t pull away, Poseidon stroked his hair until he calmed down.

  “Are you okay?” Poseidon asked when the nymph’s breathing evened out.

  Nerites had buried his head against Poseidon’s neck and nodded.

  “Do you want me to—” Before Poseidon had finished his question, Nerites shook his head, so Poseidon let it go. Nerites would say what he needed when he was ready.

  One of the worst things about being a god was that Poseidon had been born knowing—knowing when his father gripped him by his round ankle and hoisted him up, knowing when Cronus swallowed him, knowing he wasn’t meant to live alone in the dark with his siblings. He remembered what it was to have no control over his life or his body—a lesson that Zeus had missed. One the titans had missed too.

  It terrified Nerites that someone else had control. Helios had pressured and then changed him without invitation. And while Poseidon might never have experienced the same, Nerites�
��s shaking revealed how distressing it had been.

  With soft, slow movements, Poseidon repositioned them so he could keep his rough palm on Nerites’s cheek and look him in the eye.

  “I won’t let him hurt you again.” He spoke solemnly—an oath. He’d swear on the Styx if it would make Nerites feel safe. Nerites stared up at him, his eyes pools of despair. “Would it feel better to have a weapon? You can take my trident.” He was teasing, but it was easy to imagine giving Nerites anything he asked for. Poseidon would have relished the chance to make him happy, and what was a trident to that pleasure?

  The ghost of a smile played at the corner of Nerites’s lips. “You want me to grip your mighty staff, my lord?”

  Poseidon smirked. “There’s no finer the world over.”

  Nerea let out a loud sigh and crossed her arms. “Every god and every man says the same about his weapon. Come, Nerites. Thetis will want to see you’re safe.” She gripped Nerites’s arm and helped him to his feet. Poseidon leaned back on his hands to watch them. They had matching, luminous skin. No one in the habit of swimming every day worried over clothes—the chitons and togas and trappings that mortals insisted upon. There was plenty to appreciate about Nerites’s gleaming form, though this likely wasn’t the best moment to mention it.

  “I am glad you’re all right, Nerites,” he said instead.

  “Thank you,” Nerites said with a gesture. Under water, they couldn’t hear clearly, so the Nereids had developed a language they spoke with their hands rather than their voices. Poseidon had learned it when he’d first rushed into the ocean, buoyant and euphoric with the novelty of waves and the great blue sea.

  Poseidon nodded and watched the pair of them dive beneath.

  With the crisis averted, Poseidon lay back and napped in the sand. The sun had never burnt him, but when he woke up that day, his skin was tight, painful, and red.

  The Devil & the Deep Blue Sea

  Poseidon would keep him safe.

  That should have satisfied Nerites. It wasn’t that he doubted his promise, but he needed more. Helios would continue to drive his chariot across the sky every day, and Nerites feared that he would return. Helios would know Poseidon had broken his spell and returned Nerites to his proper form—he’d have seen by now. He saw everything.

  He sighed and put his chin on his knees. He’d never been fond of clothing. Any cloth only weighed him down or got in the way while swimming. That evening, when he’d returned to shore after assuring his sisters he was fine, he made an exception. He’d put on one of Nerea’s chitons. His sisters sometimes liked to wander inland from the shore to the settlements of men where they had markets and sweet figs and briny olives in amphorae. Nerites never went with them.

  He disliked men. When Poseidon had first come to the Aegean, Nerites had thought he was just like the rest. Thetis, who’d harbored a soft spot in her heart for Zeus for years, had told them that Poseidon had always been of their realm, but his father, Cronus, had kept him locked away. Nerites had been skeptical until he saw the Olympian turn back a kraken with a thought and a hard-eyed look, but he hadn’t been entirely won over until Poseidon had learned their language.

  But he hadn’t thought an Olympian cared enough about them to learn to understand what they had to say. Poseidon was clumsy at first, but he tried, and it was charming. That he’d learned to talk to them on their own terms proved beyond doubt that he was a far better god than Nerites had first given him credit for.

  And he had nice hands. Skies above and trenches below, he had lovely hands. Rough and weathered, sure, but broad and strong. It was a cruel trick of the fates that the only god he wanted was the only one who didn’t seem interested in him.

  Aphrodite had offered him wings to come with her to Olympus. When he’d refused, she’d given them to Eros, and she hadn’t been too unpleasant about it. Perhaps because she was a woman and used to unwelcome advances. Zeus had grabbed him without warning. Helios had demanded and transfigured him when he did not get his way. All because Nerites was the only one of his kind—the only male Nereid. Rather than being grateful for his rarity, it tired him. Was it too much to hope for more than a grope and a fondle in the dark, or promises of love from someone who didn’t know him at all?

  The sun was setting when the sand to his left shifted. His sisters were tending other nests—some near and some on shores on the far side of the Aegean. Sullen, he’d said he wanted to be alone.

  But was hard to hold on to his sour mood with the prospect of watching the baby sea turtles emerge. At first, it was just a few grains falling into the crack of a broken shell. Nerites bit his lip to hide his smile.

  A soft touch brushed his shoulder, and he jerked upright, expecting the worst. Poseidon was there behind him. He, at least, was not so afraid of the world that he hid in cloth to keep off the sun. Nerites only let his gaze flick over Poseidon’s bare skin for a moment.

  “Company?” Poseidon asked with a gesture. Even if they could speak on the surface, there were times to be quiet, and things you ought not disturb.

  Nerites nodded. Poseidon settled down beside him. When he leaned over to look at the nest on Nerites’s other side, his chest pressed against Nerites’s shoulder.

  “They’re coming?” Poseidon signed when he leaned back and caught Nerites’s eye.

  “Soon.”

  Poseidon grinned. Normally, he wasn’t as pale as Hades, but he wasn’t as hale and golden as Zeus, either. When Nerites looked closely, though, Poseidon’s skin was red all over and was dry and peeling on his nose.

  “What happened?”

  Poseidon rolled his eyes and gestured to the setting sun behind them.

  Nerites scowled. “I don’t want you to quarrel on my account,” he signed.

  At that, Poseidon laughed aloud. It was soft, and he stifled the wheeze with his hand in a moment. When he’d recovered, he shook his head again.

  “I’d quarrel with that bastard for less than what he did to you.”

  Nerites sighed through his nose and looked out over the sea. The sun caught the water’s ripples and reflected at them in glowing pinks and oranges.

  Eventually, it set. No sooner had the sun gone down than Poseidon’s burnt skin faded and healed.

  Nerites almost forgot why they were there, the crashing waves and the gentle breeze were so peaceful, but Poseidon nudged his arm, and they watched the first turtle wiggle out of its nest.

  Soon, there were dozens of tiny turtles crawling their way across the sand. Poseidon rose first and helped Nerites up to escort the tiny creatures. Nerites didn’t let it go, even once he was standing.

  Seagulls avoided Poseidon when he sent a glare their way. He and Nerites kept their distance from the turtles carving their path but meandered a few lengths away, just to see them safely to the water.

  When a wave swept over the last line of turtles, Poseidon tipped his head toward the water. “Should we follow, just to see they make it?” This, he asked aloud. Poseidon’s voice was a low, pleasant rumble. Nerites was used to going days without hearing a voice, but he liked Poseidon’s. In fact, he wouldn’t mind hearing it every day.

  “I think that’s wise.”

  The water was still warm from the sun. When they swam under, they saw the dozens of little turtles kicking their flippers, doing their damnedest to make it out to deeper waters. With easy strokes, Poseidon moved the current to help them. They swam out far enough that the sea floor disappeared beneath them.

  Nerites doubted the turtles knew their divine escort, but he thought they were lucky to have the god’s tender care.

  Poseidon did not like mortals—called them the playthings of his brother and the titan Prometheus—but he cared for the creatures in his realm. He swam with dolphins, leaping in a high arc above the water’s surface; he sang to whales; he bumped noses with sharks without fear.

  Nerites only wished that he was so bold. Nymphs were formidable when they worked together, but they tended to the natural world and t
hings that grew. They didn’t go impaling titan gods on the three prongs of their golden tridents. They didn’t summon up storms that changed the shape of land and sea. They only cared for what the earth gave them.

  What Nerites wouldn’t have given to return Helios’s aggression in kind.

  He shook himself out of his thoughts when he realized Poseidon was there, treading water and staring at him. His long dark hair rose around him and swayed in the water.

  “Tired?” he asked with a gesture.

  Nerites didn’t know what to say, so he nodded, and Poseidon beckoned him deeper.

  They swam to Poseidon’s palace. The chiton clung and twisted around Nerites’s legs. No wonder nymphs didn’t bother dressing to swim.

  When Poseidon had come to the sea, he’d built a home for himself of bright coral in every shade. Teals and oranges and yellows stood out brightly to those who saw under water. And the god’s magic created a barrier around all its sides. The interior was hollow, filled with air. Nerites had been there before—Poseidon would sometimes throw parties just for sea gods and nymphs—but he didn’t frequent. He’d never been there when it was this empty. Though there were times he could’ve used an escape from this or that god, or even from his fifty sisters, he did not want to be presumptuous, and more often than not, Poseidon spent his days lounging on the shore.

  The wall of water they stepped through shimmered at the edge of the palace entrance. The rooms and corridors were open to one another—the walls made up of bright coral and abandoned shells.

  He watched Poseidon reach for a decanter of wine and pour it into two goblets. He offered one to Nerites, then sat back on a coral protrusion that could’ve been a seat or a natural growth.

  “You looked sad, up there. Is everything all right?” Poseidon was using his voice again, and sometimes, that was harder. The inflection, the concern—Nerites didn’t know what to make of it. He knew what he hoped for, but he didn’t think it was what he’d get.