“Please,” Lazell sneers. Krakens cast nervous glances between us. I’m sure they’re wondering if they’re burying another friend today. “You are an abomination who calls himself a kraken. You don’t recognize your own reflection, yet you think you’d recognize your mate?” A snarl rips from my throat. He ignores it. “Since you are incapable of logic, let me put it in simple terms for you. The Witch would have never forced a human to suffer the fate of marrying the very kind that killed her offspring. You have one chance. Do not waste it on pests.”

My nostrils flare. I have no rebuttal. Other than my grandmother, a mating of any kind between a kraken and human is unheard of. There is nothing for me to go off.

“Watch how you speak of your future queen. It is an affront to the Goddess to question her will. Is that what you intend to do? Offend Edea?”

“The Goddess has no domain over humans, Your Majesty.” He says my title in mockery.

“Had you not cowered in the palace and continued your schooling, you would know this.”

Again, nothing.

I have no basis to deny his claim beyond personal belief. The Goddess has taken the life of many humans, both in the water and on land. Our teachings only ever concern krakens and our worship of Edea. It makes little sense that she reigns over every being in the sea, yet her powers end with the souls of humans.

Lazell continues. “There are krakens for you to choose⁠—”

I’ve heard enough.

“I have decided!” Cindi is my mate. This is not a point of debate. “Or have you forgotten the Curse requires the bride to be willing? That I be willing. We have one final chance, and I pick my mate.”

“Mate?” He arches a brow, dragging his blatant perusal over my torso and the notable lack of marriage mark. “Yet you have not bonded with her.”

My teeth grind. “I will not be rushed.”

“We are starving, and you want to take your time with the human female?” He hisses. “You will never deserve to be king.”

“We’ll kill her,” a kraken barks. I snap my attention in their direction, unable to pinpoint the culprit.

Counselor Ronet nods her agreement. “We will not bow to a human.”

My blood burns. I shift forward to gut every kraken on this shore for threatening my mate. I forget I’m holding Cindi, her small hands falling onto the width of my tentacle, halting me in place. It’s a silent reminder she’s alive and my stupidity would be the death of her.

My response to their claim is simple. Certain. The weight of my venomous glare falls on Counselor Ronet. “Then I kill myself, and all hope will be lost.” She shifts her weight, referring to Lazell for his support. “Then there will be no saving these lands.” I hold up two fingers, a reminder to everyone that even though my hands are different to theirs, their existence is in the palm of mine. “You have two options, and I suggest you think carefully about your response. Leave and never return, or learn why I am just as deadly as Chlaena.”

A collection of sharp gasps echo through the crowd. Their last hope is the two things they despise most.

That would be the Witch’s last laugh.

“Kraken-kind will be eradicated because of your selfish delusions,” Lazell states, cutting Ronet off before she can speak.

My lips peel back, and I bring Cindi right up to my side for all to see me stake my claim. “Decide. Die by my hands or the Witch’s. One is more certain than the other.”

I tuck my mate tighter against me when everyone’s attention falls on my woman. There’s a pregnant moment of silence. Cindi sinks her nails into me. No amount of pumping my venom into her makes her relax. Finally, Lazell speaks.

“You have until the full moon in eleven nights. If the Curse has not ended by then, we will come for the human, and our kind will finally be rid of you.” He turns and begins his descent into the water.

The blood drains from my face. Eleven nights? Cindi will not be any closer to loving me by then.

Or I could leave, reside on the mainland with Cindi where we’ll be safe. But then, all of kraken-kind will be damned, making my family’s death meaningless. They would have died for a kingdom I’m too selfish to try to save.

One female at the cost of an entire race, and the memory of the only ones who ever cared for me.

I snarl in frustration. I want to save my territory. I want any cub I may have to see the beauty of our land—the land every person I’ve shared blood with has sacrificed to save. I want to look my mate and my offspring in the eyes and tell them a whole kingdom is at their fingertips. A kingdom I, my brother, and my sister all brought back to life.

I address Lazell, making all krakens pause to look back at me. “Then a blood oath, here and now. If the Curse is broken, no harm will befall my female or me.”

I can’t lose her. It can’t all be for nothing.

He stops but doesn’t grant me the respect of turning his body to speak to me, angling his head to the side.

“I will not spill my blood for you, most definitely not for a human.” Before he dives into the water, he repeats, “Eleven days, King Ordus.”

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28

Cindi

I dig my trembling fingers into Ordus’ meaty limbs. They’re looking at me. The fucking krakens are looking at me.

They say there are only two responses: fight or flight. But freeze needs to be added to that list.

Shock made me stupid.

I should have run for the cave the moment Ordus told me to. Instead, I’m out here being stared down by actual creature-of-the-night monsters.

Monsters stare me down like they want to eat me alive and gnaw on my bones like a drumstick. I’ve seen that look on the Gallagher men a hundred times. But now, I have no doubt I may very well be turned into octopus chow.

They could be talking about how to season me right now, and I wouldn’t have a clue. Nothing in their language sounds remotely similar to anything I understand—not Indonesian, Thai, or English. There’s a lot of weird clicking and gulping being thrown around.

I wouldn’t stand a chance against them. With every fiber of my being, I trust Ordus to protect me, but one against thirty isn’t exactly a fair fight.

They’re frightening. Hideous-looking. The stuff of real nightmares. Not a single one of them has Ordus’ beauty—shit, if I didn’t have context, I could be convinced they’re an entirely different species.

They have elongated oval skulls that protrude well over the top of their spines. Their heads look squishy. If I were to poke one, it’d cave under my fingers as I imagine would happen to a real octopus. I think it’s called a mantle—something Ordus most definitely doesn’t have hiding beneath his hair.

The similarity with Ordus starts with eight tentacles and ends with two arms and a humanoid torso—minus the webbing between their ribs and biceps.

It’s a good thing. A very, very good thing. If any of them showed up at my house and kidnapped me, I would have put a blade through their chest, and I wouldn’t have missed.

No two kraken look the same, other than the general attributes of their bodies. Some have spiked ears like Ordus, others are tube-shaped like Shrek. Hell, some don’t look like they have ears, just a hole in the side of their head.

That’s not the worst part.

A couple don’t have lips that close, so their sharp, toothpick-shaped, yellowed teeth are on display. My skin prickles imagining what those incisors would feel like turning my skin into ribbon.

There’s no two coloring that’s the same either, but they all remind me of the octopuses I’ve seen in the area; the blue-ringed octopus, coconut octopus, reef, mimic, and a bunch I can’t name. Deedee is obsessed with them and always took me out to snorkel.