Chapter 2
Despite appearances, Kellen was not human. The pale skin and washed-out hair were reactions to the air and the sun. After a lifetime spent beneath the waves, where his hair usually wisped around his face like golden silk and the greenish tinge to his flesh was not uncommon to his race, the human form was harsh to Kellen, dry and unprotective. Derek remembered the feeling well; for the first few months after he’d left the ocean behind for good, he had spent an excessive amount of time in the shower stall at Tad’s apartment, just standing beneath the chlorinated spray, wishing the water coursing over him held even a smidgen of brine.
Kellen belonged to an ancient race of sea-dwellers known as merrows. Derek knew this because he had also grown up among their number, in the rough w
