Chapter 7 - The Choice of the Deep
The archive chamber was now half-submerged in a churning, dark ocean swell that beat violently against the ancient stone walls. The ceiling above them cracked open, letting streams of torrential rainwater pour down into the subterranean vault like a waterfall.
Dorian lunged forward through the waist-deep water, his hand outstretched to snatch the spinning crimson pearl from the air. His face was twisted into a mask of frenzied triumph—the absolute embodiment of human greed and conquest.
"Mine!" he screamed. "The ocean is mine! Aethelgard is mine!"
Before his fingers could close around the glowing sphere, a flash of silver-blue lightning erupted from the water.
Nerissa breached the surface directly between Dorian and the pearl. Her hands—slender, webbed fingers ending in sharp, pearl-tinted claws—shot out with the speed of a striking viper.
Her left hand caught Dorian by the throat with an iron grip that instantly choked off his triumphant roar. Her right hand reached out and snatched the crimson pearl from the air, pressing it directly against the center of her own bare, iridescent chest.
The moment the pearl touched her skin, the crimson light vanished, replaced by a blinding, glorious explosion of pure, living azure and gold.
Dorian choked, his eyes bulging in sheer terror as the life force he had stolen surged backward through the mystical bond into its rightful owner. The prince’s skin grew instantly gray, his golden hair turning brittle and white in a matter of seconds as every ounce of stolen youth, power, and vitality was violently reclaimed by the sea-dweller.
"No..." Dorian whispered, his voice rattling like dry leaves as his knees buckled beneath him. "No... the power... it belongs to men..."
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"Men take," Nerissa’s voice echoed through the cavern, sounding not like a single voice, but like the combined chorus of a thousand waves crashing against a shore. "But the sea remembers."
With a final, contemptuous twist of her wrist, Nerissa hurled Dorian’s crumbling body into the churning dark water, where the undertow dragged him down into the lightless depths of the castle foundations.
