Enchanting Arana, page 1
part #2 of Sci-Fi Fairytale Fusions Series
Enchanting Arana
Sci-Fi Fairytale Fusions
Book 2
Leann Ryans and V.T. Bonds
Copyright © 2021 Leann Ryans and V.T. Bonds
All rights reserved.
Cover by Dazed Designs
Render Art by Merel Pierce
No part of the book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author.
Leann Ryans and V.T. Bonds
Enchanting Arana
Sci-Fi Fairytale Fusions Book 2
Chapter 1
Arana
Wait, what?
Arana stared in wide-eyed shock, trying hard to not show the anger festering in her chest. She looked between her mother and sister, ignoring the cheers and congratulations floating around the room, unable to smooth the crease in her brow. When the crowd of family members swimming forward to congratulate the lucky couple lessened and the bulk of merfolk left the dining hall, Arana forced her tail to propel her toward the two females who should be her staunchest supporters, not her biggest frustrations. She softened the mini fins trailing down her spine, hoping to appear calm when in fact she wanted nothing more than to scream and scratch the smug smile off her oldest sister’s face.
“Mother?”
“Ah, Arana. How nice of you to finally get off your tail and come congratulate your sister and her fiancé.”
Always the thinnest female with the most extravagant shells adorning her bosom, Arana’s mother held her shoulders back and her head high, her regal bearing almost more pompous than the carvings on the lofty ceiling and curved walls of the oppressively large room. Gritting her teeth, Arana swallowed the pain of her mother’s underhanded jab at her rounded figure and fought the urge to hunch her shoulders to appear smaller.
“Mother, isn’t it a little soon for their union? Can’t it wait another week?”
A carefully plucked eyebrow rose and emerald irises hardened before Hystina opened her mouth. Arana knew her response before any sound emitted from her mother’s throat, but the slice to her self-worth came sharp all the same.
“Of course not. Brenda’s wedding has been decided and takes precedent over any other events. She’s worked hard to earn Kyler’s attention, so you will not make a scene or mope about like a spoiled child. This is a time for celebration.”
Arana’s control broke.
“But next Friday is my graduation from finishing school!”
“Arana, stop. Your whining will get you nowhere. It’s nice that you’ve finished school but your sister’s wedding is far more important. Congratulate your sister, then leave if you can’t show more enthusiasm for her.”
Sucking in the urge to sob, shaking because she hated how unfair her life was, Arana dutifully turned to Brenda and her soon-to-be mate and wished them a happy union day. She twirled toward the ornate doorway and flicked her tail, not fleeing the scene, but desperate to find some privacy. She’d poured her heart into school, learning everything she could about etiquette and hoping to finally please her parents, only for them to snub her yet again when she reached the peak.
For a while, she’d been the youngest in the family. If she thought about it, she could remember a time when everyone doted on her. When she always had a warm body to cuddle up against, or a group of merfolk to swim with, but then her parents had surprised everyone with one last child.
Arana held no malice toward Gillian, but his current appearance in the common hall as she tried to avoid everyone on her way to her room made it difficult to answer his hello politely. At seven years old, Gillian shone with the best qualities of their parents—golden hair, shimmery red scales, and orange fins along his back—but he lacked the horrible disdain the rest of her family seemed to feel toward her. He didn’t deserve to be mistreated just because Arana was hurting.
Waving at him across the hall, Arana turned and aimed for her room, needing some space to cool down. She ignored the buzz of voices as news spread among her home’s occupants, excitement over the couple’s announcement making the rounds to those not privy to the original group.
No doubt Brenda meant Arana’s invitation to the gathering as a slight. She’d known how excited Arana was to swim across the theater and accept the diploma she’d worked so long for.
Scrunching her nose and closing her fists at her sides, Arana undulated her spine, pouring on more speed so she could reach her room faster. She grabbed the doorframe and swung herself inside, letting the ends of her tail brush the other side of the entryway before reaching out and flicking the door closed.
It didn’t help.
Three of her sisters’ side-eyed her, not bothering to give her more than two seconds of attention before they returned to their pruning. Arana’s stomach tightened, their long, bright hair making her dark locks seem dull.
It was ridiculous that in a palace so large her mother forced her to share a room with others, but only Brenda and Gillian were special enough to have their own space. She could already imagine the squabble to come over who would take Brenda’s old room when she joined her mate.
Not wanting word of her upset to travel to her mother or Brenda’s ears, Arana swallowed her scream and swam to the corner. In the smallest alcove, she ran her fingers along the mound of kelp she’d gathered for her bed, proud of how securely she’d woven the thick strands together to cover the living pocket of algae she laid her body on during slumber hours. It was the only thing she could really call hers, even if she was limited as to when she could enjoy it.
Now was not an appropriate time to slide inside her haven, but she wanted to. Glancing between her sisters and her bed, she sighed and moved to her shelf in the wall. If she slipped inside her mock nest during daytime hours, Brenda would no doubt target it again. Last time she’d done so, Arana had been without a proper sleeping space for a week, since Brenda had hidden lyse—parasitic creatures that burrowed under scales—in Arana’s bed of algae and shown their mother. Hystina had destroyed Arana’s nest and forced her to sleep on bare rock, claiming she was stopping the spread from infecting the rest of the house, even though Arana luckily hadn’t been infested with the things.
Rearranging the trinkets she’d gathered over the years, Arana smoothed her fingers over the bright shells and petals and busied her hands while trying to stop her mind from replaying the last few minutes over and over again.
She’d been looking forward to her graduation for months. Years even. It would be the biggest milestone of her life thus far. Her greatest achievement. The one thing she had over the others who’d been too lazy to continue when father didn’t require them to.
It should mean freedom. She should be happy and excited about graduating, not feel disappointed and sad that she’d wasted so much time. Now, with Brenda stealing the limelight, which Arana truly did not care about, Arana was left with a bitter taste in her mouth.
She didn’t want attention for the sake of attention. She didn’t want praise where she hadn’t earned it.
All she wanted was to feel like she belonged. Like she was cared about. Like she was loved.
It sucked to be a stranger in her own home.
Maybe she’d go for a swim later.
Chapter 2
Ursuli
“He’s still bleeding.”
“He can’t be. I found everything and stopped it.”
“There’s still blood pooling below him.”
Crimson sparkled in the overhead light, the color one of the most vibrant things he’d ever seen. He paused and watched as it grew, wasting precious seconds as his mind drifted back to the blood coating his friend’s back.
“Master Sergeant?”
“Shit. Where the fuck is it coming from? Roll him.”
The chest beneath his hands stopped rising as his assistant helped lift the patient onto his side. She peeled the shirt off the man’s flesh, smearing the pool of blood and diverting his attention once again. Only the fresh surge from the man’s back drew his eyes to the knife wound he’d missed amidst the other injuries the man suffered.
Smoke poured from his hands to wrap around the still torso and fill the hole, seeping inside to seal the broken vessels, but he already knew it was too late. The heart had stopped and there was more blood on the table than in the body.
He looked down into the flat yellow eyes of his friend Blaide, the blood soaked into his gray fur turning it black. His tail hung limp over the edge of the gurney.
“Master Sergeant, we need you over here!”
The shout pulled his head to the left, but he was stuck in slow motion. He could see the soldier on the gurney behind the medic, legs mangled beyond repair, even for someone with his talents. There was another further down the line of gurneys, screaming as he clutched the stump where he once had an arm. All around him the cries of men surprised by the enemy resounded, claimed by the beast called war.
The assistant in front of him asked him what to do, but the words stuck in his throat when he looked back and the assistant had become another beloved member of his unit. A broken wing hung limply behind Quasim as the stump next to it spurted blood, the flesh of Quasim’s cheek hanging open and revealing the skull beneath.
Another medic called out for him. He was the only one who could fix such extreme injuries. They all needed him. Men were dying around him as he stared at Quasim, but he was frozen in place,
To speak.
To do something.
But he’d failed.
Ursuli jerked upright on his cot, the screams fading into the calls of birds flying over the ocean beyond the opening of his cave. Sunlight glared into his eyes, forcing him to raise an arm to block it as his chest heaved.
The nightmares never left him for long. He’d thought he was finally getting past them after a week without waking from sleep in a cold sweat, but the last few nights had proven him wrong. Blaide’s visit had brought them back, intensifying the dread each night as the newer versions featured his closest friends as the dead and dying, their wounds more graphic with each replay.
Shoving his dark hair back from his face, he swung his legs over the edge of his bed, the cold stone beneath his feet anchoring him in the present. Scrubbing a hand over his face, he snarled when the trembling in his limbs prohibited him from rising, his legs too weak to support him as adrenaline seeped away.
Ursuli’s lower half disappeared into smoke with the flick of a thought, but he still struggled to lift himself from the cot. Even in his incorporeal form, he needed enough mass beneath his torso to move. He couldn’t fly like many assumed, though he often wished he could.
Pushing himself to the nearby table, he snarled again when he saw his empty food containers. He’d been planning to slip into town to stock up the day Blaide had arrived but having to operate again had left him shaken and drained. The nightmares every night since had cemented his resolve to stay away from others.
His legs solidified as Ursuli turned to pace the floor of his cave. His stomach gnawed at him, fraying his already thin temper, but he refused to go into town in his current state. He couldn’t find his normal control, so he knew he’d frighten the locals if he went, and he wasn’t willing to deal with the fallout.
With no other choice left, he turned toward the water. At least he wouldn’t be able to hear the screaming of the birds beneath the waves. He’d thought choosing a remote cave would allow him to forget the past, but the birds tortured him morning and night with their calls, so similar to the screams of the dying.
He let himself shift completely away from his solid form, slipping into the waves without a sound. Ursuli both loved and hated being in the water, the darkness and silence of the deep comforting, but the unpredictable pull of the currents made him feel stretched too thin.
He could fish from the shore like the others from town, or swim in his solid form, but only being ethereal let him stay beneath the waves for a longer period since he needed less air. While he usually appeared as smoke when he wasn’t solid, in the water he was more of an inky blot that oozed through the currents.
Pushing himself away from shore, Ursuli headed toward where he’d found schools of fish in the past. It wasn’t the first time he’d caught his own food because he couldn’t stand the thought of being near people, and he doubted it would be his last. The solitude he’d craved so badly didn’t appear to be helping as much as he’d hoped, though.
Diving deeper into the water, he collected seaweed along the way to the fishing grounds, knowing he would need something besides protein if this episode lasted too long. Living on the rocky shore, there was nowhere for him to grow or forage vegetables, so he had to get what he could from the sea.
Though he could feel the drain on his energy as he swam, the hunger didn’t bother him as much when he wasn’t solid, so he took his time. He’d woken about midmorning, so it was well after noon before he approached a school of fish.
Rising to the surface to absorb fresh air before he caught them, he took a moment to float and stare up at the pink sky, the hints of a storm building on the horizon. While some people saw his species as air elementals who could control the wind and storms, he’d never known a Reaper who could. He felt the energy in the air heralding the coming wind and lightning, but he couldn’t manipulate it.
Knowing the storm might push the fish further out to sea and ruin his chance to make it back to shore quickly, Ursuli turned and dove beneath the surface again, spreading himself out into a billowing cloud of ink dense enough that nothing could pass through. He separated a group of fish from the rest, herding them back toward his cave where he’d be able to take them from the water. He’d used the technique after watching fishermen pull in their nets and found it allowed him to catch more at once, meaning he needed fewer trips.
He barely made it back before the storm hit, tossing the fish up into his cave as winds whipped his hair into his face. He gutted them to the sounds of thunder growling overhead and fought the gale to keep his fire lit long enough to cook. He finally conceded to the gusts of wind, tossing the rest of the cleaned fish into a pot buried in the coals as the flames died, before settling onto his cot to watch the tempestuous weather.
It matched his mood perfectly.
Lightning lit the sky, striking the water and crawling across the clouds in a startling show of force. The savagery of it soothed him, and he drifted off to sleep amidst the grumbling of nature.
Chapter 3
Arana
The sweet morsel turned sour in Arana’s mouth as Brenda rushed into the dining room. Her sister’s pathetic sobs and wails made Arana want to roll her eyes and slink away, but she knew any movement would only draw unwanted attention to her. She chewed the lump of food, trying to swallow it, but too disgusted by the unfurling events to choke it down.
“Brenda! Whatever is wrong?”
Her mother rose from the table and wrapped her arms around the seemingly inconsolable female.
“Mother, the shells are pink!”
Arana blinked and forced the bite down her throat, the exclamation and utter disgust in Brenda’s tone not making any sense. Of course the shells were pink—that’s what Brenda had demanded. Arana and two of her other sisters had spent an entire day gathering them.
“Pink does not match my hair! I cannot have pink shells anywhere near me during my wedding. It’ll ruin everything! Kyler will refuse to marry me if I look hideous on our union day!”
Lessening the scrunch of her eyebrows took work, but Arana held onto the edge of the table and fought to keep her thoughts out of her expression. She didn’t want a union where looks were most important. She knew marrying well was highly regarded, but if one colored shell could ruin a relationship, then she wanted no part of it. Arana may not know exactly what her perfect courtship looked like, but that definitely was not it.
Brenda obviously had different expectations.
Hystina’s bright emerald orbs scanned the massive hall and landed on Arana. Arana’s gut tightened as her mother gestured for her to join them at the head of the table. With a blush heating her cheeks, aware of the way everyone’s focus zeroed in on her while she tried not to swing her hips too much, Arana swam to her mother and ignored Brenda completely.
This felt like an attack. Arana couldn’t force the small fins trailing down her spine to relax, too uncomfortable to relay proper respect to her mother despite the audience they had.
“Arana, you’ve obviously had enough to eat.”
The snap in her mother’s voice and disdain in her eyes cut into Arana’s soul, but she did her best to not react.
“Gather two hundred purple shells before tomorrow.”
Brenda hiccupped before shaking her head.
“No, mother. Two hundred isn’t nearly enough.”
“Very well. Arana, make it four hundred shells. Before midday meal tomorrow, since we only have four more days until the wedding.”
Arana opened her mouth only to be rebuked by Brenda.
“I don’t think you have time to argue, sister. It’s not like you have anything else to do. Hurry on your way. Only the dark purple shells. Light purple will clash with my fins.”
Needing to get away before she said the words boiling inside her, Arana left the room, her movements tight with anger and disbelief. She’d only taken two bites of her morning meal, and technically she still had assignments to complete and things to do before her graduation. Plus, it’d taken three people an entire day to gather two hundred pink shells. How was she going to gather four hundred dark purple shells, which were much less common than pink ones, all by herself in barely more than a day?
