Gates of Eden: Starter Library

by Theophilus Monroe

  "What about my son?" I asked. "Dragons are similar."

  "Yes," Cleo said. "But he still had a human spirit, despite his dragon-shaped form. This is altogether different."

  I shook my head. "I don't know how I can help. And I don't even know how I can do it, but whatever it is from the dragon left inside me, maybe I can use that to help. Sort of like how I'm able to talk to the wyrm?"

  Cleo nodded. "It's worth a shot. If you can focus the creature's spirit around the wound, perhaps I can direct it. Hoping, of course, that whatever kind of spirit the wyrm have can heal it similarly to how earth-bound spirits behave."

  "What other choice do we have?" I asked. "If we don't pull this off, we'll not only have to try and evade two, healthy, and pissed off wyrm but a gathering swarm of sharks. Probably a hundred hammerheads up there by now."

  Cleo sighed. "Hammerheads? Really?"

  I shrugged. "At least they aren't Great Whites."

  Cleo shook her head as she pressed her hands into the wyrm's wound. "Contrary to popular belief, hammerheads are actually a bit nastier. Not like I'd ever invite a Great White over for tea and crumpets or anything."

  I raised my eyebrow. "You have tea and crumpets in Fomoria?"

  Cleo smirked. "Probably not what you're expecting."

  I shrugged. "I don't have a clue what the heck a crumpet is. So I'm not expecting much. And if you can sweeten the tea, I'm game."

  Cleo nodded. "Maybe I'll make you some after we get through this."

  I swam toward the wyrm's head. He was passed out, probably from blood loss. "They really are beautiful creatures," I said. "When they aren't trying to eat you."

  "I agree. Which is exactly what they'll do if this doesn't work. I don't know how to tell you what to do. So try what you're hoping to try. And pray it will work."

  I nodded. Going to Sunday School growing up, I was told God knew what I was going to pray before I said it. So, I decided to bank on God's foreknowledge at the moment and bypass an actual prayer. Half the time, it seemed to me when people prayed out-loud, it was more a show for other people to see how pious they were. Not something I was particularly concerned about, especially now. I wear my impiety on my sleeve—metaphorically speaking, I wasn't actually wearing any sleeves at the moment. Not that I didn't believe in God. I've always had my beliefs. But the way I saw it, if God exists, he certainly knows my truth no matter what facade I might put on. Why bother with pretenses?

  I gently stroked the wyrm's dragon-like head. It was remarkable how similar it was to Merlin's head before. When he was stuck in dragon form. The various ridges, the horns on either side of its head, and the single horn protruding from its snout back toward the top of its head. Its pointy chin and sharp teeth. The only difference between a wyrm and a dragon—beyond the fact that the wyrm lived under the water and didn't (so far as I knew) breathe fire—was the body to which the creature's head was attached.

  No wonder I could connect to it. No one really knows where a spirit, or a soul, resides in any creature or person. It's not something doctors can pick up on an MRI or an X-Ray. In fact, so far as I knew, it was mostly all theory anyway. What is a soul, or spirit, anyway? Does it really exist? Or, is it just an idea, a construct we've come up with to make sense of whatever consciousness the brain produces?

  I suppose you don't need to know the answers to those questions to grant there is something... something deep inside the dragon's essence attached itself to within me... that might as well be called a spirit or a soul. While, perhaps, not scientifically verifiable, I knew it was there. I felt it. I sensed it.

  And since this wyrm was still alive, whatever sort of spirit it had was in there somewhere.

  I gently stroked the wyrm's head. Not like I knew for sure what I was doing. But I figured it might take closer contact to get in touch with the soul of an unconscious wyrm than I required when communicating with momma wyrm before.

  Apart from sleeping, I'd never been unconscious before. Never been hit too hard in the head. Never even drank so much to experience the so-called blackout. Haven't so much as had a simple surgery. But that didn't mean I didn't have experience with this sort of thing. When my momma was in a coma, she said she could sense us when we were close and even more when we touched her.

  If the wyrm was going to let us help, it had to know we were here, first, and that he could trust us, second.

  I took a deep breath.

  I exhaled.

  I gently ran my hand across the wyrm's face.

  I'm here to help... Your wife has sent us to help...

  It might take some convincing. I mean, just because we'd said his wife sent us wasn't proof or anything. And it was merfolk, like us, who's injured him to begin with.

  I'm sorry about what happened to you. Those men, they don't understand. Not like I do... not like we do. We want to help you.

  He didn't respond with words. Not like momma wyrm. But I sensed something... he was in there, he had a spirit of some kind. Presuming I could coax him out, build some trust.

  Your wife, she told me about your baby. We want to help find your baby. Find the one who took him from you. But you have to trust us. Let us help you heal.

  The vague sense of presence I detected before it grew stronger. It's not a sensation I could easily describe. My daddy used to sneak up behind me to tickle me, give me wet willies, the generally annoying things dads like to do in the name of being playful. After a while, no matter how quiet he was, I had a sixth sense he was there. I'd turn around quickly, usually just in time to dodge his saliva covered finger as it went for my ear.

  The sense I had of this wyrm's spirit was similar to that. I didn't hear it. I didn't see it. I didn't even feel it. Not in the usual sense. But I knew it was there. And as he trusted me more, the sensation of the wyrm's presence grew more substantial.

  "He's here," I said. "Can you sense him?"

  "I feel it," Cleo said. "Try to convince him to move closer to me, where my hands surround the wound."

  You are in pain. My friend can help you heal. Do you feel her touch? Focus on where she's at. Let her touch your spirit. She can show you how to make the pain go away...

  I glanced toward Cleo, and a golden glow surrounded the area of the wyrm's skin where she touched.

  She drew her hands in closer, pulling the wound together. The glow shone more brightly as it concentrated on the gauge in the wyrm's scales.

  Then the light dissipated.

  The wyrm began to move, his whole body shaking back and forth with fury.

  I gripped my trident...

  The last thing I wanted to do was hurt him...

  He was afraid.

  I reached out with my mind again. Would momma wyrm hear me this time?

  He's healed... but he's in a panic... can you help?

  He's healed? I can't believe it...

  I told you, I said. You can trust us.

  The next thing I knew, momma wyrm came charging through the blood clouded waters. As she penetrated the cloud, displacing the waters, the haze from her husband's blood dissipated.

  She met her husband head on and wrapped her body around his, constricting slightly. The sensation calmed him instantaneously.

  My mate thanks you... I thank you, La Sirene.

  I furrowed my brow. I wasn't sure what it was she called me. Maybe it was a term of endearment, like sweetie, or darlin.'

  You're welcome, ma'am. I replied.

  What is this ma'am? Call me Nammu. That is my name.

  When I was a little girl, I was taught to curtsy upon an introduction. It's a bit old-fashioned, I suppose, but I grew up in a family with a lot of history. In our old home, in fact, we had journals from my ancestors going back generations. I used to pour over those as a child. And, as was often the case in well-to-do southern families, I was given lessons in etiquette. Funny how ingrained those habits become.

  Without legs, though, a curtsy was out of the question.

  Instead, I offered a subtle bo
w of the head. Pleased to meet you, Nammu.

  Agwe and Cleo were now beside me, looking at each other with furrowed brows. Apparently, the way I was communicating with Nammu struck them as odd. I imagined it probably looked that way since they couldn't actually hear what I was saying. Probably sort of like watching a movie on mute and then trying to guess what was being said.

  Used to play a game like that with my friends when I was a kid. Put a movie on silent, pick a role, and make up words when my chosen character spoke. It was always lots of fun and good for a lot of laughs. I could only imagine what Agwe and Cleo thought I was saying at the moment.

  "We need to get moving," Tahlia said, still hanging onto my arm in Eel form. "Not that you and Nammu don't have plenty you could discuss."

  "Wait," I said. "Can you hear us?"

  Tahlia uncurled herself half-way from around my arm and looked at me. She was a lot prettier as a mermaid. "Of course I can. Look at me. I look more like them than you right now."

  I chuckled. It was strange, no doubt, talking to an eel. But probably no stranger than speaking to a wyrm. And it was nice to know I wasn't the only one who could engage Nammu in conversation.

  "Her name is Nammu?" Agwe asked. The way his eyebrows were raised, he was apparently surprised.

  "Yes," I said. "Does that mean something?"

  Agwe nodded. "Presuming this is the same Nammu of Sumerian legend... she was there from the beginning when the creator made everything. She's older than the earth itself."

  I bit my lip. Nammu? Are you the one who was there at the beginning? Like before all of this was made?

  I suppose so, but in the void, there is no such thing as time... your beginning was for me a part of what is and always was. Where we come from, there are no beginnings.

  I scrunched my brow. I didn't even know how to wrap my mind around something like that. No beginnings? Presumably, that meant no endings, either. Back when I was with Elijah, he had a friend, Tyler, who was into quantum physics and all that. He'd probably have an explanation. Maybe, if I ever made it back to visit them, I'd ask. But, for now, the whole thing made about as much sense as tits on a bull. It was one of those things I'd just have to accept.

  12

  I TUCKED MY hands under Nammu's scales. Without legs to hold myself to her slithering body, I didn't have many options. I did my best to drape my tail over one side of her back, which, at the very least, would prevent me from falling off the opposite side.

  She was mostly cool to the touch. Slick, but not slimy. Her overlapping scales sealed around my hands. Without much to grip, it was the best chance I had.

  Tahlia tightened herself around my forearm.

  Riding a regular dragon might be a challenge. As Nammu took off through the waters, though, the sheer force of the water pressing against my face and torso as she slithered was jarring. It was like being waterboarded with the entire Gulf of Mexico.

  If I wasn't in my mermaid form, it would have been unbearable. There's no way I'd survive it without drowning. But like this... I'm not going to pretend taking so much water pressure to the face at what was probably a fifty-mile-per-hour clip was enjoyable. But something about it also felt natural. There was a warmth in my chest. Was it, perhaps, the dragon's essence that remained within me? Moving with Nammu, my skin touching hers, it was like we were no longer two creatures, one mounting the other, but a single being.

  The force against my body went from being a nearly unbearable pressure to something of a thrill, a pleasure, like when I used to ride in the back of my gran pappy's pick up truck on the old plantation. When the wind would flow through my air. I'd never felt so alive in all my life... until now.

  I laughed out loud as we made our way closer to the shore. There weren't any beaches real close to New Orleans, and I didn't know if dropping me off so close to the city was such a good idea, anyway.

  I mean, if people still freak out over one or two shadowed photographs of Nessie at Loch Ness, the good Lord only knows the kind of hubbub that would follow if someone caught Nammu on camera.

  I mean, my ex... it struck me this was the first time I'd referred to him as an "ex," when he was first coming into his Druidic abilities, accidentally awakened an acorn beneath the pavement of Interstate 64, on one of the busiest stretches of highway in St. Louis. By the time he made it to school, the photographs had already gone viral.

  Of course, in the digital age, no one can ever be sure of what they see. Images are too easily manipulated. Eventually, most people dismissed the incident as a hoax even though a hundred or more people claimed to see it happen. The whole affair was now relegated to poorly-designed conspiracy theory websites. The sort that had links in Comic Sans.

  Still, I learned enough from that incident to know, all things being equal, it's better to avoid having anything magical—especially a magical creature—caught on film. And these days, even if we found a remote beach and made landfall in the middle of the night, there was still a chance someone might be around, or some kind of camera might happen to capture us. Unlike a random smartphone image someone might post on Facebook or Twitter, something like that would be a little harder to debunk.

  So I told Nammu to drop us off before the waters got too shallow that she couldn't remain wholly submerged. That would bring us close enough to shore, I imagined, I could return to human shape and still make it to land with minimal risk of drowning. I didn't know exactly where all the Fomorian beacons were located, so I didn't want to risk making the last stretch of the journey as a mermaid. Even then, though, the medallion on my neck, fully recharged with Fomorian magic, might ping one of the beacons. I needed the medallion to make my way back later.

  Release your form, Nammu said. Become human again. You can ride on my back just above the surface.

  "Brilliant!" I exclaimed out loud. I wasn't sure if she could hear me when I spoke with my regular voice the same way as when we connected psychically. But it was a natural response. If she could bring me to the beach with most of my upper body above the surface, the medallion wouldn't be traceable by the Fomorian beacons.

  But Nammu's body was thicker than I was tall. I'd still have to swim part of the way. Unless...

  Hey, Nammu... your tail end is thinner than the rest. When we get close, can you extend your tail out toward the shore so I can dismount your back in shallower waters?

  Of course, La Sirene.

  Why do you keep calling me that? I asked.

  Is that not who you are?

  My friends call me Joni. Joni Campbell. I cocked my head. I don't know why I told her my last name. Not like it meant anything to her. And friends don't typically use my surname in common parlance.

  I should like to be your friend. Perhaps, I shall call you Joni La Sirene.

  I smiled. Pretty. I like it. Does it mean something to you?

  Obviously, while my creole was a bit rusty, and I'd only had two years of French in High School, I knew enough to realize the name she'd given me simply meant "the siren," which I suppose one could also translate as "the mermaid." But the way she used the name, ascribing it to me like some sort of unique title, not something she'd call any run-of-the-mill Fomorian merperson, suggested a more profound significance.

  It means you give us hope, Nammu replied.

  Thank you, Nammu. I hope I won't let you down. I'm going to do my best to figure out who called you from the void. And if we can do that...

  Then we will be closer to finding my baby. Again, Joni La Sirene. You are our hope.

  I smiled a little. Without the dragon's essence, could I have ever even spoken to her? If I hadn't been cursed, would these incredible creatures ever be heard? King Conand, it seemed, was dead set on eliminating them. No one else understood them—they saw them as a grave threat.

  But I sensed more than Nammu's desperation. Yes, she was a frantic mother whose baby had been taken from her. But she was also brave. She loved and wanted to be loved.

  She could be terrifying. But she could also be
gentle.

  Not that different than me, all things considered. I mean, I guess I'm not all that terrifying. I knew what it felt like, seeing my own reflection and realizing how horrifying I might be. No, I'm not talking about the bathroom mirror in the morning pre-makeup. I'm referring to the brief time I was cursed to a dragon's form. Staring in a still pool, seeing a monster staring back even while hurting and afraid on the inside.

  They say beauty is only skin deep. I suppose the same thing could be said about hideousness. We're all basically transformers—more than meets the eye! And you don't have to be a shape-shifting mermaid, dragon, or wyrm for it to be true.

  Even as a girl, before all this craziness started happening in my life, I felt different on the inside than on the out. Look at Joni. Such a pretty girl. That's what people saw and said when they met me. You'd think I'd take it as a compliment. But sometimes, when you're the pretty girl, people don't see past what's skin deep.

  They don't bother asking, "is she smart, too?" Or, "I wonder what talents she might have?"

  I know, fending off a lot of boys is a problem many girls think they'd like to have. But how do you know if someone really sees you for more than your looks? In my experience, many men can't tell the difference between lust and love, and those who can are often more than willing to pretend they love you if they think it will get them into your pants.

  They say there are lots of fish in the sea. I could testify to that fact. But what if you're looking for just one... and you find yourself in a hatchery with thousands of fish that all look the same. How do you find the one you're looking for?

  For a while, I thought I'd found the one. Elijah. My baby's daddy. A good man. He loved me. He loved our baby, even before he was born. But now...

  When you catch a fish, I suppose it is liable to slip out of your hand and flop its way back into the sea if you don't put it in its cage and fry it up quickly.

  Not that I should have put Elijah in a cage... and I never really considered deep frying him.