Song of the Abyss (Deep Waters, #2)

by Emma Hamm

He was the nightmare that had come to his people and promised hope. But all he’d given them was death.

he wanted to prove that even if he was broken, he was still worth something.

So pretty and perfect and wrong for him. A monster would leave smudges on something so lovely as she.

Daios bared his teeth in what he was certain was an evil grin. She had no idea that he was coming for her. A part of him he didn’t recognize unfurled in his chest. A demon, surely, because it whispered words he’d only heard in the darkest times of his life before.

her fingers feathering over his had made him feel... something. Daios wasn’t sure what that meant. His hearts had slowed down for a bit. All that rioting chaos calmed. He’d held his breath while she touched his fingers and he swore there was something going on with his gills that had never happened before.

he was ready to see her. To impress her. To take her away from her home and fight off anyone who tried to keep her from him.

That little achromo was his, though. And now he was going to take her.

Maybe that was what called to her about him. He was angry, and she was angry, and maybe two monstrous people were supposed to find each other. They’d either end up like a bomb or they would fizzle out beating against each other’s rage.

He must have heard her talking in their first encounter, but he couldn’t for the life of him remember it. Maybe that was because he wanted to remember this as their first meeting forever. With her pressed against his chest and all that long, lean body at his mercy.

She was a monstrous little thing underneath that strange exterior. Or she was insane. One or the other. He wasn’t sure which was better. Part of him wanted her to be insane, because no achromo should so easily throw herself at what was a terrifying creature from the depths.

Daios preferred knowing everything that might happen in any situation. Knowing everything was his safety net.

He could hurt her like he had hurt everyone else, and he’d already thought about her blood. Daios made mistakes. That was his fate. He fucked everything up. Why did he think he wouldn’t hurt her? He swallowed, suddenly afraid of what would happen if he stayed any longer.

if everyone thought he was the villain, he could take the attention away from anyone who messed up as well. His broad shoulders could hold their hatred, and they could forgive others. It was his place. And he intended to keep it that way.

“I don’t think you’re ready for what it will make you feel.”

Arges murmured. “I did not want her, and she did not want me. But the longer I was with her, the more I realized there was a strength in her heart that I admired. A kindness in her soul that I did not have. A wit in her mind that matched my own. She was unexpected and resilient in a way I had never attributed to their kind before.”

she watched Alpha disappear behind them. Her home was gone. But her heart was free.

Instead, all he could think about was that she was wrapped around him. Her warmth pressed against him as he swam, and—for fuck’s sake—was that his fins fluttering against her thighs?

with disgust at himself. He could not, would not, flutter for an achromo. Daios was not trying to impress her, and he did not want a mate. Or perhaps, something deep inside him whispered, he did not think a mate would want him.

He would be her shield if that kept her safe.

this undine? He just wanted to keep her safe. Such a simple thing to say, and yet she felt like she might never recover.

So easy for him to hurt and he didn’t want to hurt her. He shouldn’t want to mate a weak creature. He should search for the strongest, the most powerful, the best. Someone he couldn’t best or overcome in a fight. The People of Water valued strength, not delicacy.

The darkness and the depths do no favors for my state of mind. I should not seek out the shadows when there is so much to see in the light.”

His claw tugged the lapel of her borrowed suit. “You turn so many colors, kalon. I can’t wait to see how many.”

He would give her up, just as he was meant to do. Because that was his role in this life. He was to sacrifice for others, and then he could truly protect them. Nothing could be more important than his people. Certainly not a mate.

Daios wanted to turn to her and say that he would keep her safe. If she wished to send him out into the world as her weapon of destruction, he would massacre anything in her way. But those thoughts were madness. They were the sickness that toyed at the edges of his thoughts.

She had no idea why he was touching her, only that it made everything in her stop. All the anxiety. All the fear. All the self hatred melted out with the tension in her body as she sank into his touch.

“Because if I was whole, I could brace myself above you and still touch you. I wouldn’t have to lie on my belly just to feel the softness of your hair.”

She knew there was probably a special place for deviant women who looked at a monster and wondered what he would feel like between her thighs, but... Fuck. These were where her thoughts were.

“Wet and salty isn’t on my list of things that I like to eat.” He opened the next one a little harder, and his claw thunked against the metal floor. “I am wet and salty.”

Because I want to keep you for myself. Because if I keep you, feed you, bring you everything you ever dreamt of, maybe you’ll give me a chance. Because no one has made me want them as much as I want you.

He dug his fingers into her hair, massaging her scalp again until he heard the slightest moan again. She was holding back. Trying to keep those sounds from him when he wanted to hear them. He deserved to hear them. He was owed the sound of her pleasure and her pain and every bit of sound in between them.

“Care. Me. You.”

“I want to find someone who doesn’t fear me. I want to know that when I come home, there is a soft place to rest my head, and someone who cares if I had a hard day, or if I am upset. I want someone to take care of, and who takes care of me in return. That is what I dream of, kalon.”

“And above all else, I don’t want to have regrets with you.” Anya leaned forward and kissed him with every ounce of raw and ragged desire that burned through her. For him. Only for him.

No achromo could ever be pretty. But he was wrong. All that pale skin was revealed with a quick jerk that showed every inch of her to his hungry gaze. And by all the gods of the sea, was he hungry for her.

Perhaps he was too violent for most of his kind, but he had a feeling he was the right kind of violent for her.

“How I wish I could keep you. But I cannot. No matter how much I want to.”

he hated the achromos. Her people were a plague upon this sea and he would gladly see them all dead. Just not... her. And that was a strange emotion to even get through on his own, regardless of everyone judging him while he did it.

He just wanted to hear her voice. And that was terrifying on its own.

Daios told himself that she didn’t even see the old wound. That she touched him without fear because his arm was still there. That he was a whole man who could do whatever it took to keep her safe and happy. Together, they would live out their lives without struggle or fear. It was just... them. Breathing in the ocean as he exhaled into her lungs.

to everyone and now to her, he was a beast. A weapon. The brute who attacked and killed whomever and whatever he was told to kill. He was a murderer and a monster through and through.

“It is a special word. We save it only for a rare pearl that we find only once in our life. It means a beauty that is more than skin deep. It refers to a soul that radiates inside a person, so much so that you can see it on the outside as well.”

Kalon

“But I do not find you ugly.” “Do you not?” “How could I? When your hair is the color of the sun on a cloudless day? When your smile warms the entire ocean around me? When I touch you, your soul is so familiar to me. It is like I have known you in a hundred lifetimes before this, and some part of me that I’ve forgotten wishes to bury itself inside you. It tells me to cling to the curve of your waist, to clutch at the feeling in my chest that lingers when you are near. My soul wishes to keep you and never let you go.”

“I am made of rage and pain. I do not want to give you any of that, my kalon.” “I want you, Daios. I don’t know why or how, but I do. Every bit of you. Your anger, your rage, your pain. I want that just as much as I want your attention and your adoration.” Her hand pressed flat against his chest, her palm so warm against his skin. “I am not afraid of you.” “I am.”

Now he knew he wasn’t the only one with claws. Because with one word, she could break him. Snap him into a thousand pieces and shatter his soul into shards that dusted the sands of his home. He’d given her that power. He had handed her the leash to his heart and now he couldn’t take it back.

“Gods of the sea, cast pity on me. I have found myself a woman who dares to test me at every turn.”

something felt... wrong inside of her. Anya didn’t know how to feel about him getting “fixed” when she’d never thought of him as broken.

“My lack of arm has nothing to do with feeling whole. A metal device or not, I was never whole before you. You were the first person to look at me and see a man after my injury. Not a mistake, not a failure. You were the one to see me. My kalon, if you wished me to shed my skin, I would. If the arm makes you uncomfortable, then I will drop it into the deepest pits of the sea.”

“I am only whole because of you.”

“It’s not about the word itself. It’s about the feeling in here.” She moved one of her hands to his chest. “It means that living without you feels wrong. That to be parted from your side makes me miss you more than I miss breathing fresh air. And that I will always think of you, no matter how far I am from you.”