Chapter 45 - 43- What to Do

Darian just stared at Neria.

His hands had fallen from her arms to his sides, slowly curling into fists.

When Neria had been taken, he had assumed the men wanted to sell her. He thought the merchant considered get too much if a valuable good to damage. He hadn’t imagined they would actually lay their hands on her.

With everything that had happened that night, he hadn’t thought to ask Neria what had happened before he found her and Ryver. He had simply assumed she had been with Ryver the entire time they had been taken.

Now he realized how wrong he had been.

His jaw tightened as he looked at her.

"The guard from the market..." he started, but the words seemed to catch in his throat.

He wasn’t sure how to ask her. He didn’t want it to sound like an interrogation or that he was blaming her for anything.

"Tell me everything that happened." His voice came out softer than she had ever heard him speak to her.

Neria’s head remained lowered.

Darian took a slow breath. "Tell me what he did to you, Neria."

For a moment, she didn’t answer.

Her fingers began to fidget with each other nervously in front of her.

"I..." Her voice cracked slightly. She swallowed calming herself. "He... he lifted me off the ground."

Darian’s eyes narrowed.

Neria’s shoulders had drawn in slightly as she continued. "Then his hand started pressing on my backside."

Darian let out a slow, shaky breath. His hand went to his hair, fingers dragging through it as he looked away from her for a moment.

He could feel the anger building again. He wanted to chop off that man’s hand and feed it to him.

"He did that to you?"

Neria nodded faintly.

Darian’s hand dropped back to his side. "Did he go further?"

The question came quietly. Almost carefully.

Neria shook her head. "No."

Darian closed his eyes for a brief moment.

Relief came first.

But the anger still burned deep in his heart

He opened his eyes again and looked at her. "You kill him?"

Neria’s fingers stopped moving.

"Yes." She said it so quietly that he almost missed it.

Darian stared at her for several seconds. Thinking back on that night he had had seen blood on her clothing earlier after dragging her out of the water, for some reason he hadn’t questioned it.

He should have.

"You killed him because he wouldn’t let you go"

Neria slowly nodded.

Darian looked away again, his expression hardening.

He had been ready to condemn her for murder without knowing the full story. He hadn’t even asked her and just assumed she had murdered one if his men.

Darian reached for her again, but this time his grip was gentle.

He carefully took hold of her arms and pulled her a little closer, leaning down until his eyes met her blue ones. He could see the uncertainty in her expression as she tried to make sense of his sudden change in behavior.

"Listen, Neria..." His voice was low and serious. "The next time someone touches you like that, you tell me."

He wasn’t sure if she fully understood what had happened to her. From the way she spoke about things, there were moments when it seemed Neria didn’t realize how wrong some people’s actions towards her were. But he needed her to understand one thing.

If someone touched her in a way that made her uncomfortable, he needed to know.

"Whenever someone touches you like that and you get uncomfortable, you tell me, okay?"

Neria simply stared at him.

Darian waited.

"Say you understand, Neria," he said firmly.

Her brows pulled together.

"You’re hurting me." Her voice was small.

Darian froze.

His eyes dropped to his hands. He was still holding her arms.

"When you touch me sometimes..." she continued quietly, "you hurt me."

Darian’s hands immediately dropped from her arms. For the second time that evening, he stepped back from her.

Neria rubbed one of her arms where his fingers had been, and Darian felt something twist uncomfortably in his chest.

He hadn’t even realized how tightly he had been holding her.

"Okay..." he murmured.

He lifted both hands slightly, palms facing her, making it clear he wasn’t going to touch her again.

"Okay."

It wasn’t much.

But it was a start.

From this day forward, he would have to be more mindful of how he handled her. Neria wasn’t a soldier. She wasn’t one of his men who could be grabbed, pulled into place, or ordered around without a second thought.

She was someone who had already been handled enough by other people.

Darian lowered his hands.

"Anyone else?"

Neria was quiet for a moment.

Then she answered without hesitation.

"The Emperor."

Darian’s expression changed.

She lowered her head slightly. "I don’t like it when he touches me."

Of course.

Darian already knew Erik would be on that list.

That bastard wearing a crown had always had a particular way of crossing boundaries, especially when it came to women who had no power to stop him.

His jaw tightened. "Of course."

His voice had gone colder. "I’ll make sure he doesn’t touch you again."

Neria looked towards him.

Her lips parted as though she was about to say something, but before she could, Edina’s voice called from inside the farmhouse.

"Neria... I have some apple slices left," she called, her voice warm and coaxing. "Do you want some?"

Darian glanced towards the window before straightening himself. The warm glow of the lanterns inside spilled faintly through the glass, making the farmhouse look even more inviting against the darkness settling over the fields.

He looked back at Neria.

"You can go back inside."

Neria nodded.

Without saying anything else, she adjusted her grip on the cane and slowly made her way towards the door. The tip of the cane tapped against the wooden porch with every step, helping her find her way. After a moment, she disappeared through the doorway, and the warm light swallowed her small figure.

Darian remained where he was.

The sky had grown completely dark now, painted in deep shades of blue with only a few faint stars beginning to appear between the clouds. The evening air had cooled, brushing against his skin as the sounds of the farm settled around him.

He let out a long, heavy sigh.

He had no idea what he was going to do with Neria.

For a while, he had considered returning her to the sea. Perhaps he could arrange everything so it looked as though she had escaped. He could claim she had somehow slipped away while they were travelling and let the Calypso disappear back into the ocean.

It had seemed like the simplest solution.

Now he wasn’t so sure.

Not that he didn’t want to let her go.

That wasn’t the problem.

The problem was that he didn’t know where she belonged anymore.

Neria had told him a few days ago that she no longer had a tail. She couldn’t breathe underwater anymore. Whatever had happened to her body had changed something that no one seemed to understand.

So what was he supposed to do with a Calypso who had legs?

Darian rubbed a hand over his face.

Perhaps, when they returned to the capital, he could give her a little more freedom.

Not complete freedom, obviously. He wasn’t that foolish.

But perhaps she could have more space to move around the estate. She could be allowed into the gardens without guards following her every step. Maybe he could even have someone educate her properly.

After all, the girl hadn’t even known what a rooster was until three days ago.

He glanced towards the window.

The memory was amusing. Those big eyes widening when she heard that sound had come from an animal

Darian sighed again.

"What a headache."

___

Neria couldn’t sleep.

She had tried, but for some reason her eyes remained wide open, refusing to give in to sleep. She shifted on the floor where she lay, turning onto her other side and facing the bed where the Grand Duke was probably sleeping.

She could barely make out the shape of the bed in the darkness, but she was sure it was there. The room was quiet except for the faint sounds of the farm outside, the crickets chirping in the distance.

Neria sighed softly.

When would she ever get her vision back?

Would she ever be able to see properly again?

What was she going to do now?

Why was she so trapped?

Her eyes began to sting as tears slowly gathered in them. She tried blinking them away, but it only made them spill over faster. A small, choked sob escaped her throat.

Neria immediately covered her mouth with both hands.

She couldn’t let Darian hear her.

She didn’t want him to know she was crying.

Talking about the guard and all those deaths had made her miss home more than she wanted to admit. She missed the sea. She missed the familiar voices of her people that never hurt her.

But most of all, she missed Nerissa.

She missed her sister so badly.

Neria squeezed her eyes shut as another sob escaped behind her hands. Tears rolled down her cheeks, disappearing into the pillow beneath her.

She wanted her sister.

She wanted to go home.

If only she were back in the sea with her pod. She wouldn’t have lost her vision or her tail.

If only that night had never happened.

Her shoulders trembled as she curled into herself.

If only she had died with everyone else.

She wished she had died with everyone.