should she, if she has no friends, spy on her enemies? And does she have enemies? The spy’s eye is clearly designed to spy on ill-wishers. The Morgens invented it for a reason. Even at the bottom, they wanted to maintain control of the world.
“Your kin from the sea can probably see everything that’s happening to us right now,” Desdemona commented thoughtfully on the power of the mirror.
“I don’t think they’re that interested in us,” Moran rearranged an intricate game of live shells on the lomber table. It was called sea chess. The board was divided into a water field and a land field.
“One person plays on land, the other on water,” Moran explained.
“It would be symbolic if you yourself were not the king of the land.”
“Do you want to play on the water side?”
“Oh, no, I don’t!” Desdemona picked up the black shells symbolizing the earth. As it turned out, there was no need to touch them with one’s hands. All you had to do was give the command (aloud or mentally) and they moved on their own. Moran proved to be a more skillful player. Desdemona’s projectiles were sinking in the blue water fields of the board.
“Let’s play for land,” she suggested after a quarter of an hour. “After all, a land king (even as a Morgen himself) has a duty to protect his islands from the sea.”
Moran didn’t bother to remind her that she herself had never become a priestess of the sea god, but allowed her to play on the water side of the board. It wasn’t proving to be so easy. The blue water projectiles burned up, barely hitting the earth fields.
“How can you win like that?” Desdemona was indignant, shuddering at the sight of another flash of flame as another of her projectiles was trapped and burned.
“The principle here is the same as in ordinary chess. You just don’t know your way around the obstacles.”
Desdemona tried again, but again failed and even burned her palm.
“No, I do not know how to play it,” she gave up.
“It’s simple! Not without reason it is a favorite game at the sea court.”
“The shells are burning, and I’m scared. Sea chess is beautiful, but when you start playing it, you realize it’s more creepy than entertaining.”
“You should see the sands!”
“What is that?”
“It’s a game of the goddess Alais. She invented it to drive kings and warlords mad.”
“It must be a terrible game,” Desdemona agreed. The mention of Alais brought to mind the dragon goddess who roamed the flaming palaces of Tioria.
Desdemona gave a sigh of relief. It was easier to think of it that way. The thought of some deity taking Moran away from her did not please her at all. In the king, she’d finally found the friend she’d never had before. She was also in love with Moran. So just looking at him was already a pleasure. And from talking to him, you could learn a lot of secrets that people don’t even know about.
“Have you ever met forest or heavenly spirits?” She wondered. “What are they like?”
“They are delightful to look at, and quite insidious.”
“Are they more insidious than water spirits?”
“I told you, we all come from the same legion. We all have the same habits.”
“I thought only watermen were malicious enough to sneak up on human ships out of the water and sink them.”
“Don’t feel bad!” – Moran decided that she was still sad about the loss of the “Queen of Aquilania” and took her hand. His webbed skin was cool and pleasant, like the touch of a forest spring.
On top of his sea crown, which grew straight from his skin, he wore the traditional wreath of the King of Aquilania, made of gold and rubies. He looked magnificent now. The ladies of the court sighed languidly at the sight of him, but he preferred to sit in solitude with Desdemona.
Perhaps he was the first king of the entire Aquilanian’s dynasty who, instead of searching for favorites, entertained his queen with games. Today he’s forgotten even the cares of state. And he kept saying that as king he had many urgent matters to attend to. Apparently, burden was placed on the shoulders of Quo and other morgens, crawling on the walls and ceilings of the palace, as on the seabed.
It was not good to get into politics, but Desdemona remembered the wailing of the cook and reported:
“The commoners complain that their husbands are drunk on your generous allowance.”
“What do you mean?” His handsome eyebrows raised in bewilderment.
“Wouldn’t it have made more sense to keep them busy with some useful work instead of feeding a kingdom of slackers?”
“What useful work can ordinary people do for me?”
Moran stood up and beckoned her to the window.
“Look!” The sea was swarming with Morgens, pulling barrels of wine and pearls from shipwrecks. “Humans can’t do that. They’re weak!”
“But you shouldn’t feed your subjects for nothing.”
“It’s not free.”
“Are you scaring me? You want to make the population entirely marine? Will touching your gold make them all sick like my father?”
“It is enough! You’re not my first minister yet,” he joked.
“I’m your wife, which means I have more rights over you than the first minister.”
Moran grinned, showing that he was still happy to have such a beautiful burden. With his morgen’s claws, he could have easily tamed his wife’s stroppy temper, but he didn’t.
Desdemona is bolder.
“Who is the lady who sits at night on the queen’s throne in my place?”
“Is that of interest to you?”
“Yes, it is.”
“Are you afraid she’ll take some of your jewelry? She loves shiny things, like a magpie. She hoards treasures, hoards stolen or repossessed gold.”
“Don’t scare me! I will not give my jewels, that is, the crown jewels, to a rival.”
Nor my husband, she wanted to add, but was too shy.
“All beauties sin by greed,” Moran joked again.
“It’s a matter of principle, not greed.”
“That’s what Sephora says. That’s why she’s holed up in Tiora, the capital of Tioria. It has the most caches of riches, but the rulers there are cunning. I wonder who’s going to get the better of whom? Did it ever occur to you that dragons have the same instincts as magpies when it comes to shiny things?”
“What does that have to do with dragons? Or is the lady really a dragon?”
Moran faltered.
“I don’t remember telling you about Sephora and who she really is,” he glanced suspiciously at the mirror. “Did it show it?”
Desdemona did not dissuade him. Outside the windows, the midday sun was shining brightly, but suddenly darkness fell, as if a giant had risen from the sea and covered the sky.
“Is it a solar eclipse?” She worried. Being in the dark, in the middle of the day was scary. “They say there is a solar eclipse before the sea god takes the sacrifice.”
But Moran wasn’t alarmed. Wouldn’t he be sorry to lose his wife? True, there was still a belief that before the country sank, there would also be an eclipse of the sun. Somewhere in the heights