Chapter 1

Beneath the surface of Olindale’s sea, sunlight was sadly different. Upon the sandy bottoms it danced like dim shadows. Its true brilliance hid among long stalks of glowing pink plant life and pebbled chips of light crystals.

Even something as enormous and powerful as the sun could be reduced so much where it was meant not to be.

Empathetic bubbles, Ellirae blew.

A school of yellow, black-striped flapper fish shot away from her in chaotic directions. Around vestiges of an ancient human city they swerved, leaving trails of shimmery light to distract their predator.

It worked. With thoughts, distracted she was that light, brighter than the sun, even these delicious fish down here could produce.

To the surface she wanted to swim.

But forbidden such things were.

Rules.

How she truly despised rules. Out there, a whole world waited to be seen on lands above where humans walked in the sun’s true light.

Humans. Warmth tingling, her marks filled with white. To the pattern of excitement they glowed and fluttered on her blue skin where her two pieces of fish-scale armor covered not.

In the water she happily twirled, imagining what a real human would be like. Enemies they were said to be, but maybe not anymore? She knew not anyone who had seen a human. Myths and legends they were. Stories of old they were.

Forbidden they were. . . .

Rules.

One day, an explorer she would be, and rules would rule her not anymore.

With a strong kick, she shoved off the remains of a crumbled building. Between the rubble on both sides of a forgotten street she glided. Seagrass and pink Siren’s Lace gently waved, growing from cracks where Shadowfins hid, luminous white dots for eyes watching.

Too familiar it was. Every path in and out of the ancient city—save one—had easily been memorized. Outside the boundary the last remained.

Amid that path to dark unknowns and above the sand-swept flagstones, she paused. A tower on its side, at an angle it leaned, making a pocket of black beneath. The plants glowed not.

In a spiral her marks warmed, more curious than afraid. But upon the stonework, annoying symbols barred her passage. To cross their glowing magic, the patrolling guards these symbols would alert.

Unsatisfied bubbles, Ellirae blew.

Away she darted, swooping beneath a tall arch and through a second-floor window to a long hall. Creeper Brambles—twisted, scraggly, and dark gray they were, covering the dilapidated walls—bloomed in light from Glowghast Minnows.

The alarmed fish, in little spheres, puffed big as big could be, which big they were not at all. Their orange insides crackled and pulsed, eyes half their size stretched around, tiny mouths pinched shut.

She giggled. In amusement her marks flittered. Baby suns, they looked, holding their breaths and pretending not to be seen.

Past them she eagerly rushed, lights brightening and dimming in a wave. The hall turned, and out a large gaping hole she went.

A garden courtyard the rubble of buildings formed. Except, instead of hedges and flowers, seagrass and Siren’s Lace grew and swayed.

The curve of stone, like a scoop of jellied algae, wrapped the space, preserving it in a dome from all those who would destroy it.

At the center—beneath star-like crystal chips in the ceiling—lay her forbidden secret: a single pristine statue of a human man, triumphant he stood, cape flowing behind.

Ellirae’s marks fluttered.

Every time she saw him they did that.

To the stone man she crossed and cupped his cheek. This statue—the only reference of humanity she knew of—revealed a handsome face, his jaw strong, his small eyes determined, his enormous nose holes so strangely . . . enormous. Big enough to fit her finger! His nose she fondled, tracing the protruding shape.

Serlonsa—the closest person to a friend in their cluster—a thought she proposed: humans, with their small eyes and ears, a heightened sense of smell to compensate they had. Thus obviously, by smell they could see!

What would that be like?

And their skin, not blue or marked. To know each other’s emotions, on facial expressions and smell they used.

What smell was discontentment?

No doubt, Ellirae reeked of it.

Her watch beeped. Empty-handed she would return if she kept this up. A hunter that hunted not would have their red marking crystal—the one fastened to her ankle—revoked. Then, what chance of becoming an explorer was there?

The best hunter she would be!

The statue, on the nose, she kissed for luck, sliding her fingers into its fascinating nose holes.

Back through the hallway she swam. The minnows puffed and glowed until she passed. To ensure no patrols were near, at the window she paused.

Safe it was.

Out in the ancient city Ellirae worked, hunting fish for her guild. A year of this—of good and valuable contribution—then an explorer, she could request. Rare, such a position was, coveted by many but granted to few.

Her level 3 Glaive Gale, against each fish she triggered, light weaving the skill into its first variant: a single circular glaive of dazzling white that through enemies could pierce.

An hour passed, then two.

A patrol moved by, their expressions stern and their marks white and commanding beneath fancy blue-green fish-scale armor.

Rule sticklers.

Glare at them she did not but wanted to.

What value were they? Fight, they did not. Only the rules they enforced. More like prison guards than protectors of Thalassia, their capital city beneath the sea.

Angry bubbles, at their backs, she blew.

Later, returning to her first hunting grounds, a Crimson Tidefin she spotted. A most valuable and lucky find!

The council members of the Correxium, look upon her with favor they would for such a catch, favor she needed to cultivate.

But away the black fish darted, long beautiful fins glowing in red hues. Streams of bubbles the heat of those fins made, trying to obscure its escape.

Determined, she pursued.

The warmth of mana down her arm surged. Out from her fingers, light streamed and danced. Her glaive, from an artful weave, formed. Through the water it sliced but missed!

Another she made and another, swimming as fast as she could and barely keeping up. Around a building, under an arch, through a window, and out the other side—the chase continued.

With mana almost depleted—only one glaive left—to Lightsong, her divinity, she prayed.

In answer, the fish mercifully slowed.

Ellirae, hope in her chest building, her bright weapon in hand, took aim and threw. Her all she gave it. The weapon launched and spun.

The Crimson Tidefin, away it shot!

And the glaive, quite regrettably, into the leaning tower it slammed. Bricks cracked. The symbols, the ones her passage barred, flickered.

She froze, jagged teeth locked, marks dim.

A symbol’s destruction? Very not good! But its light it still had . . . with a flicker. Nothing too bad.

A single brick slid free, and her breath she held. Against the sandy flagstones it clonked. Silt from the impact puffed, but nothing else moved. Even the flicking stopped.

Relieved bubbles, she blew.

Much worse that could have—

The tower collapsed! All the bricks and all at once they crumbled. A cloud of detritus billowed, filling the water with murk.

Away she turned, eyes shut. Tickling particles, her skin they brushed, gritty yet soft, getting beneath her fish-scale armor.

After minutes, the worst of it had settled. Dismayed, her brow furrowed deeply. Absolute, terrible, unfixable destruction. Gone the symbols were. Out of her pay this would come. But the real consequence? Her perfect record, perfect no more.

Remorseful bubbles, she blew.

For a patrol she waited, marks dim. Take responsibility, to the ancients she promised. As such, she waited. Waited and waited and waited some more.

But a patrol came not.

Clear the rules were. If the patrol came not, then—by duty of a hunter—she must report it.

Or . . . not?

Around she glanced.

If in solitude a tower collapsed with no eyes to witness, could it really be her fault? But to the ancients she promised. . . . Only a Turbulent One, a criminal, a promise would break.

The unexplored path, now open it was, leading to the surface where humans walked. The sun she could see, unfiltered by the place it was not meant to be.

Like her.

Toward the path she glided, slow and suspicious not. Take responsibility she would. In . . . five years! Yes. Break a promise she would not.

Across the rubble she swam, and her hunter license—the red crystal—reacted not.

Free to explore she was!