#sunry

Though she suspected Kunt’s involvement, she did not end up here by his hand. Not directly, at least. But the weapons of great psychic force, greater than she had ever faced from any natural creature, felt like Kunt’s design. Kunt and another, it seemed, had synthesized something or other to overpower her as she never had been before. 

It’s unclear if it would have been more or less embarrassing to have seen Kunt in the raiding party that captured her. She had heard of and seen him in passing over the years, as he was a notorious figure among the nobility and business interests for the country at large. He had offered her alliance when he came to power as Chancellor. She refused; not only did she not ally herself with anyone, she would certainly not make an exception for someone like him. Marids were known for their power and ability to survive at any cost, but they still had some semblance of dignity. 

And still there was no pride in being bested by Sunry’s underlings. Armed with enhanced psionic weapons and gauntlets, they confronted her with surprising force. Her own overconfidence was admittedly a factor in her undoing, as she had sorely underestimated them. They appeared no different than the other raiding parties that she had snuffed out with little or no effort. 

But she was wrong. She was numbed by their blasts and found herself unable to move, floating helplessly in the waters she had commanded as her own. Sunry’s trident at her throat and the smug sneer on his face were the last things she remembered before seeing nothing. 

When she woke up, she found herself in chains. 

“You were spared Kunt’s personal handiwork.” She could not yet turn her neck or move, but Sunry’s deep voice beside her was unmistakable. “He proposed a psionic cage, but since he’s preoccupied up north, the chains he supplied will have to do.” It is probably not only the chains that Kunt provided, Zura knows, but a cage formulated by his own hand is one less thing to worry about. 

Sunry finally moves from her side to face her as he speaks. “He has been a very generous ally to my people. Still think I’ll lose everything?” The sneer returns to his face, one that he refrained from using with her during times of neutrality. Clearly, those days are over now. He swims away, smug still, apparent even in the saunter of his tail as it waves through the water. 

Hours after he leaves, Zura finds herself able to move again slowly, finger by finger, limb by limb. She can now bring her wrists to eye-view and turn her neck and body to better observe her surroundings. 

These are chains unlike any that have ever touched her skin, and the only that have ever managed to hold her. She finds that the magic usually so easily called to her fingertips does not respond to her prompting, and the hollow space within her echoes in the magic’s absence. 

Never has she felt so powerless. 

She clenches and flexes her fists beneath the weight of her shackles, to test them, in frustration, for all of the reasons. She has never been so attuned to the muscle, the stretch, the sinew of her bare fingers in the absence of the magic that usually courses through them. There is strength in them, yes. But is it enough? 

Sahaugin and hydroloths swim around her and pace the sea floor below her. Her eyes are drawn to the stone ruins and sunken ships worn deep into the sea floor by time and immense water pressure. It’s to these massive pieces of debris that Zura finds her chains connected. The chains are tended by sahaugin warlocks, who take turns chanting with arms raised. Zura sees that they all wear identical gold bracelets as their arms stretch up towards Zura’s chains, maintaining the faint pink and red magical glow that seems to be holding her where she is. 

She does not know how she will get past them. But even if without her powers of Seeing, she knows that it will happen eventually. She finds herself reduced to intuition and instinct and knows it is just a matter of when she will get past her captors. 

The last was a meeting that Hanzi could not be bothered to attend. This was not unexpected, nor was it a cause for bother for the parties that did arrive. Zura and Sunry, the latter agreeing to come alone but with guards in tow at an agreed-upon distance, discussed matters of interest, particularly word of the conflict erupting in the rest of the country under Dunghill Kunt. 

“It is nothing we have not seen before,” Zura mused. She effortlessly maintained a shimmering barrier around herself and Sunry, making their conversation inaudible to all creatures surrounding them undersea. 

“Yes, but you know the old rules. If they come into our territories, we will purge them as they see fit.” Sunry stroked his long, graying-golden beard as he spoke. Though his days of battle and glory were behind him, he was nonetheless impressive in stature and apparent strength. 

The landfolk always made war, Sunry knew, whether it be orc, elf, or human; the perpetrators and victims always traded back and forth such that it was immaterial to those undersea. Sunry’s father before him had seen those wars, as had his father’s father and every generation beyond living memory. Centuries had come and gone and the story had never changed. 

“They will extend offers off alliance, without a doubt,” Zura said. “It matters not to me whether any of you take those offers. But our rules still stand, and anyone who does not belong on my land will be dealt with. I will not make allowances for you.”

She was straightforward about it and the warning was apparent in her words. Sunry was accustomed to this and either himself returned the seriousness or attempted cordial, yet detached, banter. It always depended on the tone of the conversation and the message he wanted to send. 

This time, he opted for the latter, as if to scoff at the notion of an alliance with the land dwellers. 

“Ally myself with Kunt and sully the good name of the kings before me?” Sunry laughed. “Please.” The merpeople had never in their long history had to ally themselves with the land dwellers for survival.  There was no reason to start now. 

“Nonetheless, you have been warned accordingly,” Zura said. “A king would do anything to insure the safety of his people.”

“Oh yeah?” Sunry laughed. Zura was always speaking in riddles and a sort of wisdom that was so vague as to be applicable to anything. The legends always told of the powers of marids, of their abilities to grant wishes and see beyond, but Sunry would only go so far as to believe in the tangible, earthly damage the marids could do. Wishes and prophecies, he was sure, were simply tales of legend but nothing more. 

As such, he could not resist prodding a joking nudge at what he was not seriously scared of. “And how will this king lead his people past this current age of war amongst the land dwellers?” he asked.

Zura looked him coldly and straight in the eye, not once blinking or faltering in her words. 

“In this age of war,” she said, “Sunry of the ancient family Hortath, King of the Trident Sea...”

All other sound and movement around them seemed to freeze as she spoke, her words pounding in Sunry’s ears.

“You will lose...everything.” 

There was something about how she spoke the words that struck Sunry in a way that he had not expected. Her words reverberated as everything else within him went hauntingly quiet. He did not believe the words had any force, and yet he could not help but feel that there was some sort of weight to them, whether it be the weight of threat or prophecy. 

He did not know if he believed the words or why they had taken such a grip on his voice, his throat, his composure. She could not be right about this, could she? Unless she was planning to make it so? Sunry could not tell. 

He thought she would grin in the smug satisfaction of being able to strike him silent. But she continued to stare at him with an unreadable look and dissolved the barrier around them. 

Then she vanished, leaving Sunry alone with nothing but her words echoing in his thoughts.