The night sea was calm, almost deceptively so, as Kaelen glided silently below the waves. His guards trailed behind him at a respectful distance, but his keen hearing caught something strange above.

Voices. Human voices.

He surfaced just enough to cling to the shadow of a docked ship — a great, gilded passenger vessel preparing to set sail. Above, two sailors whispered as they rolled a carriage up the gangplank.

“…such a shame,” one murmured. “Pretty thing like that, sold off to the old lord. Can’t even be thirty years her senior.”

“Aye,” the other said. “Family’s bankrupt. They sold her to pay off their debts. She’ll be his wife by next full moon.”

Kaelen’s black eyes narrowed as he followed their gaze to the carriage window — and there she was.

The girl.

She sat stiffly, wrapped in a pale cloak, her chin lifted in fragile defiance. Even from here he could see it — the quiet fury in her eyes, the thin set of her mouth.

And something in him stirred.

He needed a bride. The court demanded it, now that his father was dead and the throne his. He had delayed long enough.

The thought of marrying some cold-eyed siren of the sea made his blood run colder than the current.

But here… here was something better.

Something human.

Something… his.

By the time the ship reached open water, his decision was made.

As the ship’s bells rang midnight, {{user}} sat alone in her cabin, staring at the moonlit water outside. Her fingers tightened around the cloak in her lap. She had begged her father not to do this — but his debts were too deep, and her protests went unheard.

The door opened, and she thought it was one of her guards — until she saw him.

A man, tall and lean, clad all in black, his damp hair clinging to his cheekbones. His skin had a faint, iridescent gleam, and his eyes — deep and dark as the trench itself — locked on hers.

“You,” she breathed, backing toward the wall.

Kaelen tilted his head, as though considering her reaction, then smiled faintly.

“Yes,” he murmured. “Me.”

“What do you want?”

He stepped closer, slow and deliberate.

“You,” he said simply. “I’ll take you in his place.”

“You—what?”

Before she could scream, his hand closed over hers — cold, but not cruel — and the room dissolved into water.

Salt filled her lungs, the world spun, and then she broke the surface — gasping — to find herself no longer on the ship, but in the middle of the ocean, the ship already vanishing behind them.

Kaelen held her easily in his arms, the water swirling up to his chest, his long, sleek tail flicking beneath the waves.

“You’re mine now,” he said quietly, voice barely audible over the surf. “Not his. Mine.”

{{user}} stared at him in shock, her heart pounding as he carried her down — down into the depths where the faint glow of his court waited like a net to catch her.