Well... most don’t. My mom and Bay loved nothing more than making the entire ocean worry about them, so that probably explains things. I guess this is where Kayla gets it from.
“So, you’re the princess of Kolox?” I swim forward, stopping next to Bay. Myko follows, which makes Onyx flinch and drift back a little—eyes wide—but she nods quickly.
“I was banished because I made a mistake and woke up—” her voice dips. Her gills flare. “The beast.”
Myko’s roar tears through the water. His violet light flashes in a sudden blast of fury, and it rips across my skin like heat lightning.
What the hell isthe beast?
Onyx goes rigid, then shoots behind Bay, hiding from Myko’s rage.
“Myko!” Bay scolds, spinning to block him.
He doesn’t move.
But I canfeelit. Not just anger—pure, ancient rage boiling under his white scales.
Not annoyance.
Not overreaction.
Hatred.
“I didn’t know!” Onyx cries. “I didn’t even know he reallyexistedbefore that happened!”
“Who’s the beast?”I demand, but Myko’s so consumed by fury I can barely reach his mind—like shouting into a hurricane.
“Whoisthe beast?” I repeat, this time aloud.
Only then do Bay’s stunned eyes shift toward me.
“The Beast of the Depth,” Onyx answers quietly. “Kolox City was chosen to detain his dormant remains. Our bloodline bears the mark of the warriors who helped the Guardian lock him away. His name is whispered in ancient battles and old wars.”
She grips Bay’s arm like she’s the only solid thing left in the world. “I found the chamber by accident. I touched it, and the entire thing began to collapse. The stones started glowing. And then... I saw it.Him… A massive red eye—blinking at me through the cracks…”
Her voice fades, trembling at the edges, like she’s reliving a nightmare she never fully woke from.
I blink. No one in our family got any report of this.
“We never heard a word about Kolox falling into chaos,” I say, narrowing my eyes.
Bay shrugs and looks back at her too, waiting for more.
“The chamber’s power is still holding him in somehow, but because I woke him, they saw it as treason, so they exiled me here.”
My sight blurs.
Myko.
His fury is rising again. I can’t focus.
“What the hell is wrong with you?”I snap.“Control yourself. You’re affecting me!”
“I was the one who locked him away!”His growl is a mental earthquake. Bay clutches her head, too. She hears it and feels it—just as violently.
“He was hatched with me. But he was unstable. Too powerful, with no anchor to ground him or a source of power to relyon. He killed more than ten ancient royal bloodlines before we were even fully grown. He tried to destroymyCoral.”
Another blast of sound rips through me. I'm trying to process it all—
