Love is Always Write Anthology Volume 1

slightly. He had no desire to threaten anyone— yet.
    After a couple of minutes, the first guard reappeared and gestured for him to come. "She will see you at once, my lord."
    Yes, she would, or she would be in for a great deal worse than a lecture. Seree followed the guard down a hallway decorated with nothing more than flowers, shells, and a smattering of paintings. All in all, the palace had the feel of an oversized beach cottage.
    The guard led him into a small room filled with sunshine and furniture enough for a small group of people. Lana rose from the sofa as the guard left, the door clicking shut behind him. "Seree!" she said and then burst into tears and covered her face.
    Seree stifled a sigh, dreading the childish apologies and pleas that would follow because his sisters were always very sorry for the way their plans went wrong, but never really sorry they'd done it, and he was tired of the excuses. Did they never think ?
    He strode to the sofa and first scooped up the black-bladed knife lying on the couch, wanting to shake her just for being that careless. He slid it into its sheath beneath his jacket to join its brothers and sisters, then finally turned to Lana and pulled her into a hug. "I'm here. I'll fix everything, so stop crying Lana."
    "You don't understand," Lana said softly, and the tone was so lacking in her usual whining and pleading that it stopped him short. She looked up at him, eyes wet, and he realized for the first time that her crying was quite different than usual. Quieter, sadder, less like a girl upset she'd been caught. "I messed up," she said, drawing back, hands twining together in front of her and tangling in the fine linen of her gown. "I don't love him quite the way I thought I did, and he will never love me, and now because I did not listen, one of us… one of us… I do not want to kill him, but I do not want to die."
    Seree gently took her hands, squeezing them in his own. "So you realize all that you've done wrong, Lana?"
    She looked up, fresh tears falling, but met his gaze unflinching. "Yes, Seree. I am sorry."
    He kissed her forehead. "I'll take care of it— don't I always? But it is long past time that you went home."
    Her brow furrowed. "But I can't, that's why—"
    "I said I'd take care of it," he said, actually managing a faint smile. "I can't break the sea witch's spell, but I have a plan. First, we need to arrange for your abrupt need to go home. What do you do here in the palace all day?"
    Lana smiled crookedly. "I sing, of course. They think I washed up in a shipwreck and that I was running away from home. My family is very strict, you see, and I'm terrified now that they'll never forgive me my brash behavior."
    He rapped her lightly on the forehead with his knuckle. "Clever. But I'm afraid your family has hunted you down and you must be going home. Father is quite distraught."
    "I know," Lana said softly, her momentary levity falling away. "I'm sorry."
    Kissing her forehead again, he hugged her. "At least you've learned something, huh, jellyfish?"
    She sniffled. "What are you going to do?"
    "Get you home, first. Then I will deal with the sea witch's spell."
    "You can fix it?" she asked, looking up at him the way she had when she was little, like she thought he was the most amazing brother in the ocean. He'd hated it when she'd started to regard him the same as everyone else: warily, never trusting or liking his knives, his magic. The same way he knew they had looked at his mother before she'd fallen ill and died. The way they never looked at his stepmothers and his half-siblings, though he never considered them merely half.
    He mustered a smile for her. "Of course I can fix everything."
    She laughed, relieved and delighted. "She said he must fall in love with me if I wanted to stay on land forever, and that if I failed to do so in three months, then I must kill him if I wanted to live and return to the sea. I knew you'd be able to outsmart her!"
    The smile was harder to maintain, but as exasperating as she could be, he would do anything to keep her looking at him as if he was a wonderful big brother and not merely a frightening half-brother born from the sea witch's daughter. "I'm smarter than everyone, haven't you learned that yet? Now, give me your hand— the one she cut."
    Lana held out her left hand, displaying the long, thin scar that cut diagonally across it starting just below her first finger. Seree reached beneath his jacket and pulled out a knife