To Enchant a Mermaid

by S. L. Williams

  I was the one who was learning how to live in a different world. I was the one going through endless piles of scrolls just so I could learn about the different kingdoms and the hundreds of tribes that lived on the land.

  I was the one who spent time tending the gardens and learning the names of the numerous flowers, herbs, and vegetables that grew from the earth.

  I volunteered to help the stable boys with the horses and the hounds. In turn, they taught me about the animals in the forest and the ones who graced the sky.

  I did any and everything to keep myself from slipping back into that abyss where my dark thoughts restlessly waited.

  I had grown used to Cyntheria and Kamryn sitting with me. In Irkalla, I could close my eyes, and one of them would be there when I opened them.

  Back in Nueva Vida, the large rooms felt cold and empty. Xio was always in the library, shadowing the scholars. Etan’s advisors barely gave him space to breathe. And Kamryn had been in a sleep so deep, I had to check his pulse through the day to make sure he was still alive.

  Lunch with him made me realize how lonely I truly was. Things weren’t getting better, and I wasn’t adapting. I was doing anything to get by. I was alive, but I wasn’t living.

  “That’s it. Feel,” Dymphtna softly coaxed. “Release what you feel with each exhale.”

  I took in a deep breath and slowly released it through pursed lips. The pain in my throat increased as the tendrils of smoke curled in my lungs and cleansed the anger from my chest.

  “Peace.” Dymphtna swept the burning bundle over my legs. Slowly, she moved up until she was hovering over my head. “The blockages are here.” She pointed at my neck. “And there.” She lightly tapped my temple and looked down at me with sad eyes. “I can try to remove the one suppressing your memories but your voice, that wall you have to break down on your own. Sometimes we are the ones who cause ourselves the most damage. We give fear the ability to block our connections to self and the world around us.”

  She grabbed my elbow and helped me into a sitting position. “The blockages in your crown are not all of your doing. I felt something that doesn’t want to be found. I have to tread carefully.”

  What she said sounded foreign. I didn’t know what blockage she talking about. I was free. I wasn’t locked away in my head like I was back home.

  Dympthna walked back to the wooden table, placed the burnt bundle on a silver plate, and grabbed the bowl with the eggs. She picked one and made her way back to the cot. “I need you to lay on your back.”

  When I eyed the brown egg, she explained, “It will draw out the impurities from your body.”

  I laid down with my arms to my side. She placed the cool egg against my temple and carefully rolled it to the opposite side. Then she slowly brought it down the bridge of my nose, over my lips, and down the side of my neck. She did the same with my chest, stomach, arms, and finished with my legs.

  “Now, let us see what the shell contains.” She snapped her fingers and another bowl materialized from thin air. “This part is for you to do.”

  She handed me the bowl and the egg and stepped back from the cot. “Go on. Crack it.” She stared at my hands expectantly.

  I tapped the egg against the rim, emptied the contents into the bowl, and gagged. There were streaks of black in the yolk, and the whites were frothy and tinged with red.

  Dymphtna stepped forward, peered into the bowl, and frowned. “One of blood, the other of shadow,” she murmured as she took the bowl from my hands and rolled it in a circular motion. “A shield, not a block. Cast to restrain. A power like no other.” Her words were fast and slurred.

  Power? A shield? Pressure built in my head, and an awful creeping sensation made its way up my back and made my scalp prickle. A simple egg couldn’t possibly reveal all that information. I wanted to snatch the bowl from her hands and toss it in the fire.

  Dymphtna placed the bowl on the table and pulled a silver pin from the pocket of her immaculate dress. “I have to see what is inside,” was all she said before she pushed the pin into the yolk.

  Something popped in my mind, and my neck snapped back. My lips parted, and tentacles burst from my mouth. Agony like nothing I’d ever felt ripped through me.

  Dymphtna screamed as they twisted and curled toward her. One wrapped around her wrist while another wrapped under her arms and around her chest. Her eyes bulged out of their sockets, and her lips glistened with blood.

  I scratched at my neck, at my mouth, at the monster that was ripping me apart from the inside out. As I dropped to my knees, the tentacles that ravaged my throat thrashed against my fingers. They filled my mouth and split my lips.

  A burst of light filled the room. “What have you done?”

  Etan lunged forward and wrapped his hands around the thrashing tentacles. An unearthly sound filled my ears, and an acrid scent filled the space.

  “Dymphtna, black salt!” Etan roared.

  She pulled a small pouch from her dress, threw the black grains over the tentacles, and began to chant. My body froze, and the thrashing stopped. The vines hardened and crumbled into ash that filled my mouth.

  I didn’t know what to do or what to say. Blood coated my tongue, and my lips felt swollen. Every inch of my body ached as if I had been dragged behind a horse-drawn carriage. With watery eyes and a rancid mouth, I turned and faced Etan.

  His lips were white, and his hands shook. His chest quickly rose and fell. “What was that?”

  Dymphtna had angry purple welts on her face and arms. Her tattered dress hung from a thin strap at her shoulder. She stood and stared at Etan with glassy eyes.

  “Sarai,” he repeated. “What was that?”

  I used the back of my hand to wipe my face. I didn’t know how to answer. I wasn’t able to find the words to explain what had just happened. I was struggling to understand myself. I looked down at the soiled dress and shuddered. I licked my lips and tasted salt.

  “I don’t know.” I shook my head as if it would clear the shock. My throat was sore, and my lips felt dry and cracked.

  “Get out. Get out!” Dymphtna screeched. “Cursed.”

  Etan wrapped my robe around my shoulders and led me through the leaves and out of that deceivingly perfect world. He rubbed my back the entire way back to the palace, carried me to my room, and laid me in my bed.

  Shame? Fear? Disgust? I felt it all. I couldn’t describe what it was that had sprung from my body and attacked the healer. I had never felt anything like that before, and I never wanted to experience it again.

  I thought I knew myself. Come to find out, even that was a lie. I was a monster. An anomaly that even Etan seemed to fear. If someone had truly placed a block on me, I understood why.

  I was cursed.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Kamryn

  I stepped onto the balcony in time to watch Etan and Sarai pull off. Minutes later, a second carriage pulled up, and Phadrah jumped in. Gritting my teeth, I returned to my rooms.

  I fought the urge to shift and follow them to their destination. I had no right to Sarai, but I felt the need to be around her, to protect her.

  I threw myself onto the bed and stared at the ceiling. I hated the palace. No one wanted me—the strange child of the late queen—here walking their halls, telling them what to do. To the Nueva Vidans, I was anathema.

  Etan liked to forget that I was the son of death and so did his advisors. I guess it made it easier for them to sleep at night. They disguised their fear as hate. They didn’t want to face the inevitable. I was a reminder that life and death lived side by side.

  I’d learned to ignore them all, but the Icarian always made me uncomfortable. Anyone would think we would have been the best of friends, but Phadrah despised me more than the others for no reason whatsoever. I was only eight years old when I met her, but she’d hated me since the day I saw her, whispering and giggling behind her hand on the palace steps.

  She made my childhood miserable. She cut up my clothe
s, ripped the pages from my books, and pulled all my plants from their roots. No one believed me when I told them it was Phadrah, and Mother turned a blind eye to her behavior.

  She grew into a sadistic woman who displaced her aggression onto others. During the day, she walked around acting heartbroken over Etan. At night, she shared her bed with any unfortunate officer who had the misfortune to catch her eye.

  Even with her nasty disposition, I wished Etan had married the damn woman. Once made, a contract had to be fulfilled. Nothing good would come of his breech.

  I put my middle and pointer finger between my lips and whistled. A warm wind blew into the room. Riding on it—bright and blazing—was Naga. I waited as he shook his tail and licked a paw.

  “Hey, Naga,” I greeted when he finished. He raised his nose in the air and gave me a side-eye. “I know. Tramere is livid. I feel it in the earth.”

  He growled.

  “I feel bad as it is. Don’t make it worse.”

  He barked twice.

  “I’m fine. Just a little tired.”

  He was worried about me, I could see it in his eyes. Naga knew something was different about me, but he wouldn’t understand what it was. I hardly understood my feelings myself. Sarai had walked into my life and changed everything I thought I knew. Now I felt like I was stumbling through life, trying to find my footing on steep terrain.

  “I will. I swear. But right now, I need you to search Phadrah’s rooms for anything…interesting.” He sniffed the air and whined. I clenched my jaw. “I know she’s wretched. But I need to know what she’s up to.”

  He walked to my door and raised his nose.

  “Thank you.“

  He sniffed before sliding out into the hallway.

  I made my way back to the balcony and looked out at the mountains. The lingering light of the sun was quickly swallowed by the night, and a menagerie of stars materialized among the velvet folds of the sky.

  Back in Irkalla, the spirits would be rising from their sleep. The markets would be opening, and the hot springs would be preparing for the new round of souls to be cleansed.

  “This isn’t fair!” I shouted at the stars.

  Etan always got what he wanted, and I never complained. Even when the council sat me down and asked that I give him the crown, I did so willingly. I never envied him for what he had. Never.

  “Why her?” I asked the Eastern Star. “Out of all the beings on this cursed world, why her?”

  Sometimes I wished I could be a star. To gloriously burn in the sky, oblivious to the world and its problems, seemed like a dream.

  Stars didn’t love. Stars didn’t hurt. They didn’t want things they shouldn’t and couldn’t have.

  “I shouldn’t feel like this about her.” I slammed my fists against the wall.

  Across the ebony depths of the heavens, a star blinked and flickered out. Pain, bright and burning, speared through me. I dropped to my knees and grasped my chest. It felt like the air had been taken from my lungs.

  This wasn’t the searing burn of my magic. This was something else.

  I dropped to my hands as another wave of emotion rolled through me. Pain. Disgust. Desperation. I leaped to my feet and scented the air. Terror and dark magic tainted the cool wind. A wordless cry echoed in my mind, and I instantly knew.

  “Sarai.”

  ∞∞∞

  I knocked twice and waited for a response. Minutes later, Sarai slid the door open and peeped through the crack.

  “Let me in?” I waited for her to decide if she wanted company or not.

  She closed the door and reopened it seconds later. I strolled into the room and did a quick wall-to-wall scan. Nothing seemed odd or out of place. I didn’t scent anything in the air.

  I turned around to face her. “What happened?”

  She shook her head and wrapped her arms around herself. I caught the glint of fear in her dark eyes.

  “Are you hurt?”

  She shook her head and walked into the adjoining room. She sat down on her bed and tapped the empty space beside her. I joined her on the overly soft mattress and reclined against the wall. She laid her head on my shoulder and sighed.

  I inhaled the sweet scent of cocoa butter and settled into the pillows. “Something happened.”

  Times like these, I wished I could read her mind. She seemed lost and alone. She rarely smiled, and I found myself wanting to make her happy. I wanted to chase away the shadows that seemed to plague her thoughts.

  I knew next to nothing about her past life, but I wanted to learn. I wanted to know all about the kinky-haired, full-lipped, earth-toned mermaiden with the expressive eyes.

  “Would you like to share?”

  “I’m a monster,” I heard the ghost of her words in the air. “I don’t know who I am.”

  “Did Etan say—" I began to rise from the bed.

  She placed her hand against my chest and pushed me back against the pillows. “No. He didn’t say anything. It’s me. I’m cursed.”

  I took in her words. “Cursed?”

  “Yes, the curandera said—”

  “The cura—” I sat up. “Start from the beginning.”

  She told me about her trip with Etan and the attack on the healer.

  I cleared my throat. “What happened to you is not necessarily a curse, Sarai. The spell is a type of shield.”

  She stood from the bed, her fist clenched. She looked so fragile beneath the weak light. Her face was open and vulnerable. “Why would anyone do that? What kind of magic lashes out like that?”

  “Magic that is meant to protect. The question is from what?”

  Mother had told me Sarai had been born with power that wasn’t meant to be understood by mere mortals. She was a descendant of a great Sirensian family. They were known to possess a range of magic.

  “Grandmother.” She dropped back onto the bed. “And her deal with the Sea Witch.”

  “What?”

  “I saw it in the mirror.”

  I reclined against the pillows and gave her my undivided attention. What she told me was a strange tale full of lies, greed, and twisted love.

  I understood her confusion and frustration. To see your grandmother possessed by a witch and your father accidentally enchanted by your mother, then turn around and not only abduct her but wipe her memories had to be traumatic.

  The news did answer a question many have asked since her mother’s disappearance. Everyone wondered why she had never returned. She didn’t have a reason to. There was nothing here for her. She had no recollection of the life she left behind.

  “I’m sorry.” There wasn’t anything I could say that could make her family’s history disappear “Sometimes, it is beneficial to visit the past, but we have to leave it where it is.”

  I couldn’t sit there and tell her that her sisters would be okay. Things didn’t look too bright for them. The witch had power, and she had the king’s mother in her hands.

  “Sarai, what are you going to do when and if you recover your voice? This Sea Witch sounds dangerous.”

  She froze, and her features hardened. I didn’t regret asking the question. She had to plan for what happened next. Only a fool leaped into battle without strategy.

  “I save my sisters.” She lifted her chin.

  “How?” I hated to add to her already long list of problems. “You have to sit down and think all of this through. The witch has been plotting for years. If she gets her hands on you, not only will she have the power of the merfolk, but she will also have access to whatever is being contained within you.”

  I watched as the magnitude of the situation dawned on her.

  “With your magic, any creature with free will is at her disposal.”

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Sarai

  “That woman had your hair tangled at the roots.” Xio had her hands wrist-deep in my hair, the chalky scent of the raw shea she was using to condition my scalp heavy in my nose.

  I was relieved when s
he dismissed the dry servant who had been struggling with the texture of my unruly hair.

  My hair was my crown, an extension of myself. I could feel her frustration channeled through my scalp. She didn’t understand that each strand had a life of its own.

  “What do you have planned for the day? Would you like to go for a ride?” She looked at me through the glass.

  I nodded enthusiastically. “A ride sounds nice.” I used a hand towel to wipe my face. The shea had my forehead and cheeks shining. “Where is Rylo?” I raised an eyebrow.

  I hadn’t seen him on the field during training or at breakfast. In fact, I hadn’t seen much of anyone besides Xiomara this morning. Etan had an issue come up with his advisors, and Kamryn received a message from Cyntheria that called him away the day after my memorable visit with the curandera. It had been four days since I last saw him, and I was beginning to miss his company.

  “Rylo went with Etan and the advisors.” She gently pulled on a vicious knot. “How do you want your hair done?”

  “Just two braids straight back will be fine.” I studied her through the glass.

  She seemed distracted. The simple braids seemed to give her nimble fingers trouble.

  I reached up and placed my hand against hers. “You know what, just pull it back in a bun. Braids have been giving me headaches.”

  Relief flooded her eyes, and she quickly combed my hair up and tied it with a bright red ribbon.

  Her unease didn’t lessen as we led our mares, Luna and Estrella, along a worn path that headed into the forest. Xiomara wore a stiff smile on her face, but I saw through her horribly constructed mask. She was a terrible liar.

  I snapped my fingers twice to catch her attention. “Xio, what have you learned of the Sirensia?” I tried to incite conversation.

  “Not much more than you, Your Highness. They are said to be a reclusive group. Their kingdom was once the center of the trading world, and the royal family rumored to possess magic given to them by the gods.”

  “All magic is given by the gods. How was theirs any different?”