I head to my Jeep. Lo’s driving himself in a tricked-out truck that looks more like beast than car. When I stare at it, he shrugs. “Gift from my mom. She overcompensates a lot.”
“So where are we going? Black’s?” I ask, pulling up alongside Sawyer. Black’s is a tricky break with perfect conditions because of an underwater canyon, though it’s usually crowded.
“No, too many nakes,” he says. I snort. He’s referring to the nudists. Black’s used to be known as a nude beach, and even though nudity is outlawed, put it this way...if you want your eyes to bleed, you go to Black’s.
“Aw, nudies need love, too,” I shoot back, grinning.
Since Speio and I have to swing past the house to pick up my board, we all decide to meet at Lower Trestles, which is about an hour’s drive north of where we are. It isn’t a gentle surf spot but I assured an overconfident Lo that he didn’t need to accommodate any groms. He grinned and told me that he hadn’t expected any less.
Once our boards are strapped up top, Speio and I don’t talk about anything other than classes and the weather...pretty much as mundane a conversation as you can get. Neither of us wants to acknowledge the giant gorilla in the backseat, which I’d inadvertently brought up at lunch.
Bonding.
But I can’t get it out of my head. I can’t stop wondering what it would feel like to let someone into you so much that you can think and feel as one. Even thinking about it is secretly thrilling.
It’s for life, Soren had explained to me once years ago during one of our training sessions that she still took very seriously. As much as Echlios was responsible for my physical development, Soren saw to my grooming and preparation as High Court heir.
“As a species, we don’t bond more than once,” she’d told me.
“How come?”
“Too painful. When you become a part of someone else, and they a part of you, bonding with another would be too complicated.”
“But what if one of us dies?”
“Then a part of you dies, too.”
It was as simple as that. The thought of it terrifies and excites me at the same time, and the older I get, the worse it becomes—the heavy sense of anticipation, knowing that a part of me is out there somewhere, waiting for me as much as I’m waiting for it.
With me, bonding would be so much more than it’d be for any other Aquarathi. If I had returned home, my Dvija would have been celebrated with all kinds of ceremony, because any partner of mine would become my royal companion. But since my father’s death, everything changed. There was nothing for me to return to—no crown, no ceremony and no family.
My mother died when I was very young, and for years it was just my dad and me. As a child, I’d been willful and stubborn to a fault, always getting into trouble and disappearing.
“There are better ways to get attention,” Soren had said to me after an ill-advised disappearing act during an important court banquet in Waterfell. “Like being a daughter and princess he can be proud of. You should have been there today. Your absence was noted by many.”
“I don’t want to be a princess,” I’d said sourly. “And I don’t care.”
“You can’t keep running from who you are, Nerissa. One day you will be queen.”
“I’d rather live in a cave full of vomit.”
Looking back, I was far more trouble than I was worth. Our people faulted him for being so indulgent and not taking a firmer hand with me, saying that if he couldn’t control his own child, how could he control his people? Put it this way—when I left, no one missed me. After all, as the humans say, no one mourns the wicked. Without my father, the thought of returning to Waterfell alone was—and still is—terrifying.
“What’s wrong?” Speio asks, sensing my change in mood.
“Nothing. I was just thinking about...my father,” I say after a few seconds. “At least you still have Echlios and Soren, even if we aren’t there. My father’s gone, and I’ll always be a constant disappointment to the Aquarathi.” Speio doesn’t answer right away, but I can see a sudden tightness at the corner of his mouth and in his fingers on the steering wheel. My voice fades to a whisper. “How can I face them? They only remember a silly child.”
“The people will give you a chance. You’re the heir,” he says. “Look, you’re almost seventeen. Dvija’s bound to happen soon. When you come of age to rule in a few months, everything will change.”
I glance at him. “Spey, does it hurt?”
“Does what hurt?”
“Transitioning. Dvija.”
“A little.” Speio’s voice grows as tight as his fingers. “It’s more like you feel everything, like everything is heightened, all emotions.” He shoots me a look. “Riss, you know all this, how we work, how all of that sense of awareness goes away once you—”
“—bond,” I finish, hesitating before I ask the real question. “But what if we never do? What happens then?”
“If we stay human,” he says quietly, “it hurts less.”
“Oh.” Which explains why Speio very rarely accompanies me on my occasional deep-sea jaunts when I transform into Aquarathi form for hours at a time. “One more question, and I’ll shut up, I promise.”
“You can ask me anything, Riss, you know that.”
“Can we bond with a human?”
I already know the answer, but I risk the sudden sharp look that Speio launches in my direction because I want to hear him say it. I need to hear him say it. I need to know that the butterfly sensation in my chest caused by this human boy means nothing.
“No,” he says, his green eyes searching. “But it doesn’t mean we can’t love them.”
“Did you ever? Love one of them?”
“No. It’s just not as real for me. No matter how much they love you, or you them, you will always want more. You will always search for the missing part of yourself.” He pauses. “And that can never be a human.”
We don’t speak again until we pull into the deserted stretch of gravelly road. The others are already there and getting changed. It’s a bit of a hike down to the beach so the plan is to gear up first and walk down. I pull my hair into a ponytail and shrug out of my jeans to pull on a shortie wet suit over my bikini—it may be spring, but the water is still chilly, and even though water temperature doesn’t affect me, I need to keep up appearances.
“Hurry up, slowpokes,” Sawyer yells, already dressed and heading down the path.
I notice that Jenna isn’t changing. “You’re not surfing?”
“Here? No way. It’s like overhead out there, if you haven’t noticed. I prefer the baby waves.” She thrusts a camera in my face. “I’ll just take some shots of you guys. Looking good, Lo,” she says loudly with an exaggerated wink.
I try to force myself not to look at him but it’s too late. My eyes connect with a killer six-pack made even more killer by the ridge of black neoprene riding low on a pair of very lean hips. With a sharp intake of air and scolding myself in the same breath for even noticing, I tear my eyes away. What’s wrong with me? It’s not like I haven’t seen tons of showboating surfer dudes flaunting their chiseled bodies all over La Jolla. I make myself look up, keeping my expression nonchalant.
But Lo makes no such effort. He’s staring at me with a look of blatant appreciation on his face, and this time I can’t stop the blush that rises like an answering tide through me, nor the feeling of complete dissolution taking hold of my body. I barely even notice Speio’s frown or Jenna’s ecstatic face.
I know one thing’s