“I am surprised, for you seem altogether decisive to me,” Melisse returned.

“Spoken by a Nadirii,” he said. “Those who do not wish one wouldn’t know. Those who have found them do. This being, in finding a mate, it is not about deciding what you want and then searching for someone who fits it. It is finding her, and realizing she is what you always wanted.”

Lena again leaned into Melisse. “He is also known to be exceptionally wise.”

Melisse watched as Jorie smiled very slowly.

“Can I touch your trident?”

They all looked down to see a bold little boy of about six years on the earth standing there, staring up at Jorie with a mixture of bravado and terror.

“Who is your true ruler?” Jorie asked.

“The Prince Regent, Cassius of Airen,” he replied.

“Do you say this because it is what you think I wish to hear?” Jorie pressed.

The boy looked confused. “No. It’s because mama says, thanks be to the gods, the Prince Regent, Cassius of Airen is now our ruler.”

“Yes,” Jorie tipped his trident slightly out, “you may touch it.”

The boy pulled his hand back twice before he struck up the nerve to set his fingertips to the staff.

The instant he did, it glowed a blue-white so bright, Melisse blinked against it as the light filled the square.

The boy jerked his hand back and the glow ceded.

But Melisse knew Jorie was teasing him with the way his mouth was twitching.

“Do I have magic?” the boy asked in wonder.

“Everyone has magic,” Jorie answered. “Tomorrow, make your mother laugh. And when you do, watch her do it. Then you will see you have magic.”

“Vitus! Come over here!” a woman yelled.

The boy whipped his head around, then whipped it back to Jorie, and said, “I want to be Mer when I grow up.”

Jorie smiled and replied, “How about just being a good son for now?”

The child nodded, and it took a second for him to understand Jorie’s meaning, and when he did, he raced across the square to his mother.

It was then Melisse saw the area around them had filled and all were gazing to the skies.

She sensed no threat.

None at all.

“It appears you were rather thorough in clearing the guard,” she noted.

“A job is not worth doing if the doing of it isn’t done well.”

“Ah, would that my daughter were a Mer,” Lena sighed.

Melisse found to her surprise that she was grinning.

It would take some time, but not much of it, for in preparation, The Drakkar had moved them close, when there was a murmur waving through the crowd.

And then the flapping could be heard in the distance.

But the noise grew eerie, sinister, threatening, as it got closer.

And closer.

Suddenly, she could see.