by Amy Bearce
“That’s the place we saw it.” She pointed to the towering rock, trying to keep her finger from trembling. These merfolk needed to see a show of strength to follow her into such darkness.
“It went that way.”
The merfolk swam into forbidden territory.
Entering the waters of the midnight realm was like swimming into an ink-spill. Phoebe had to use her moonglow to even see where the trench might start. Those two wraiths couldn’t have dragged the beast far. The ground below her contained only grey powder, barren of any signs of life.
Despite how it felt to Phoebe, it wasn’t long until even the deep floor of the midnight realm opened like a gaping mouth. The trench was below them.
The waters near the trench faded to a black darker than a night sky devoid of stars. A clammy chill sifted through the currents. The Abyss had come by its name honestly. The water looked empty, but she knew it wasn’t.
Tristan kept his eyes roving, squinting into the cloak of blackness. “The creatures here hide from the few predators that lurk. There might not be many of them, but they’re worth hiding from.”
Gathering her courage and humming a quick tune beneath her breath, Phoebe swam to the fissure’s entrance. The crack was narrow at the top but opened wide along the way down to the depths. A temple below would easily fit. Phoebe shivered.
Tristan and their small crowd of merfolk hid among the strange orange coral that lined the opposite side of the fissure, but Phoebe swam openly. She called every bit of light she could. Her blue light flickered across the faces of the nearest merfolk still within her vision, their eyes wide with awe. They were too well-disciplined to murmur, but their unwavering attention weighed against her very skin.
“Come to me, water wraiths!” she called and began to sing without holding back. She sang a song of hope, of light, of dawn, of love. She imagined the blue light filling her and pulling the wraiths to her.
Things hissed, deep inside the channel, but Phoebe kept singing despite the darkness she felt drawing closer. The magic was amazingly rich here, a feast for her senses. It sang through her veins, intoxicating with its power. She gorged herself, fear making her take more than she might have otherwise.
“Come here, come forth, come to me!” she sang, louder and louder.
And they came.
Four water wraiths, perfect in face except for those red eyes, slithered forth from the trench. She had been expecting two. Her heart stuttered in her chest. She couldn’t fight four. But she couldn’t admit that. If she did, the others might not risk their lives to fight with her.
The wraiths blinked in Phoebe’s blue light, their forked tongues flickering. She backed away and taunted them. “Surely you would like another prisoner for your sea beast?”
The creatures exchanged a glance and then burst toward her, faster than she could escape. That wasn’t the plan at all!
In a panic, she spun around, dodging a claw. Which way was up? Which way to go? She had to move. She chose a direction and swam furiously, hoping she was going the right way. Everything was dark except her own glow. Confused, she sped past another swiping claw, and a strange building came into focus in the distance below her. A temple, the one from her vision. It was actually in the fissure, on the bottom of the trench.
The bottom of the trench… her light pulsed brighter in response to her panic. She was supposed to lead the wraiths up and out, not down. They were too close. Beyond the temple, the impossible lake shimmered, its darkness easily discernible and somehow separate from the water in the trench.
She shook her head in amazement. To the side stood the temple, its clamshell roof an otherworldly blue in her light. Mina was in there, if the vision was correct. The plan would never work if Phoebe stayed this far down. She had to get the wraiths away so the others could reach Mina. A single water wraith nearly killed Tristan once. Four of them could kill all the merfolk without Phoebe to distract them. She darted upward with a hard kick of her tail.
Before she traveled more than a tail length, though, a fifth wraith slid out of the temple like an evil shadow, its pale skin gleaming like marble that should never be so alive. It sped toward her, looming suddenly, unnaturally fast. Phoebe screamed, and the creature slammed her into the wall of the fissure, rattling her ribs. Her face mashed against the rough stones. Grit pressed into her cheekbone. The wraith grappled with her arms, and she fought to keep it from getting a grip on her. Talons tore along her skin, raking along her new tattoos. Blood was black ink in the dim water. Her cries were muffled, but the screeches of the wraith were as loud as ever, right behind her, reverberating through the water.
Come on light, come on light, Phoebe chanted, pulling it from deep within. Her concentration disintegrated as something heavy leaned against her shoulders, and a giant hand gripped the back of her skull, pressing sharp points from five claws against her scalp.
At the base of her neck, she felt a sharp prick. The bleached skeleton from the beach flashed before her eyes. The half-destroyed skeleton in the cave. The skeletons! Both had died like this. Five crushed holes in the back of the head. Sucked dry.
Coldness drenched her, radiating from the wraith’s touch as it drew her magic from her. She gasped. The magic spun from her slowly, resentfully, long blue tendrils that resisted leaving Phoebe’s center. It was nothing like sending her magic to Tristan. That had been a gift. This was a theft.
No! The wraith would not drain her to a husk. She would die before giving up her power to a monster like this. She fought the increasing pressure on her skull. The wraith growled, irritated by the insufficient droplets of energy it was receiving. Phoebe kicked her tail backward, but the wraith blocked her. She squirmed, but the claws tightened. Whimpering, she froze.
The tiny river of magic trickled from her into the wraith and then streamed through it to somewhere else, a deep pit of need that wanted everything Phoebe had. The greed from that shadowed presence just beyond the wraith oozed toward her, as if tentacles wrapped around her. Her magic had definitely attracted something seeking power. A lot of it.
Well, whatever was lurking couldn’t have it. Wouldn’t. Scowling, she stopped trying to free herself. Instead, she leaned into the wraith, sending her consciousness through the blue magic tendrils linking them. When she reached its mind, an explosion of blue light lit up the waters like fireworks.
Eyelids flickering, Phoebe shook as images burst into her, pouring into her mind from the wraith as the path of the energy reversed. Her magic rushed backed to her, like waves sucking back into the sea.
Visions rife with emotions―one right after another―sped through her. She looked out of the eyes of the wraith, and for this one moment, they shared a mind: she was the wraith.
Never-ending darkness in the cave, so alone, so hungry… so empty.
A screaming merman with face in agony, delicious, but not enough, not for all of us.
Sisters arising… together again after so many years, dark glee.
Master waking… but weak. So weak. Rumbling. Reaching. Calling me.
We dance around a shadowed body of our master, hungry for magic, we will serve.
Master needs energy, energy we can feed him. It is our ancient function.
A red, seething haze filling the darkness, finally healing, but so slowly…
A new, strange mermaid―human but not―is filled with light, far away… we feel her―so strong, so rich, so… powerful. Yes…
Get her.
Burning hatred swamped the thoughts, and Phoebe cried out. She might burn up from the rage. She fought to sense the claws on her skull, anything to remind herself where she was.
I’m right here. I’m in the fissure. These aren’t my memories… The torrent of images slowed.
The blue light grew around them, refracting through the water, making her squeeze her eyes against the brightness.
The wraith shrieked, a sound of agony and rage, and the pressure on her skull eased. Phoebe shook her head and spun around, fighting to orient her
self. The wraith floated in front of her, stunned, mouth still curled in violence but unmoving.
No time to lose! She darted toward the opening of the fissure, her vision clearing. This one wouldn’t be stunned long, and there were all the others to contend with still. The walls of the fissure sped by, jagged cracks and crevices full of deeper shadows.
Phoebe’s mind raced. What was waking? Was that Baleros? The last memory was a sense of ownership from whatever was watching her. Though no words were spoken, the greedy hunger clearly pronounced: Mine.
Not if Phoebe had anything to say about it. She was nobody’s prize. She wasn’t a little girl, and she wasn’t a victim. Not anymore. She had a chance to prove it today.
creams met Phoebe’s ears as she sped out of the fissure. Tristan and a mass of merfolk were swirling through the water in dizzying acrobatics, just out of reach of four very angry wraiths. By keeping the wraiths distracted, they had probably saved Phoebe’s life, but they couldn’t last long. Her heart jumped at the sight of Tristan brandishing his little clam knife at one of the wraiths.
She only stood a chance against them because of the magic that made her unique among the merfolk. She had to get the monsters away from the others. Phoebe raced past the wraiths at the edge of the fissure, catching them by surprise. The fifth flew up from the crevice, rage on its face.
She focused as hard as she could, and her blue light came again, billowing out around her like a shield.
“Mina’s down there! Go!” she cried and fled.
The wraiths cawed like crows in the forest back home and then took up the chase.
She led them throughout the orange coral before dodging behind a sharp outcropping, dousing her light, and hiding as best she could. She’d never be able to outswim the hulking beasts. The sea might claim her, but the wraiths would not. She would not end up as a corpse with five holes in her head.
She needed to concentrate enough to create a stronger burst of the blue light. This time, though, she’d need to be able to direct it at one of them on purpose. It was too dangerous to hope that her body would produce a bolt of magic at just the right time. And while shining with blue light appeared to draw them to her, it didn’t seem to hurt the creatures. Only the powerful flash of light did that.
Phoebe waited, the coral rough against her back as her chest heaved. The wraiths, swimming above and below her little section of coral, were black shadows undulating through the water. Looking for her.
She’d taken on too big a job. She couldn’t defend herself against all five. At least they were still searching for her, instead of guarding the temple like they should have been. The tie between the wraith and her… the thought made her shudder, but at least she knew her magic attracted even evil sea creatures, not just the merfolk. She’d read the wraith’s mind like she’d read Elder Seamus’s. But she never wanted to experience that vileness again.
The wraiths started to drift away, and Phoebe slid to a different location, curling up in the coral. Sending off another pulse of light, she quickly doused it and pressed back into the rock.
Thanks to her gills, there were few bubbles to give her away, but she held her breath just in case. The chill of the nearby wraiths crawled along her skin. Her muscles cramped from holding so still, and she cautiously flexed her fin. All she needed to do was keep them occupied long enough for the rescue team to grab Mina from her prison, which shouldn’t take long. Tristan was the fastest swimmer she’d ever seen.
Had they found Mina? Phoebe tried to picture the merfolk in her mind’s eye but was far too distracted by the wraiths. Tiny shrimp-like creatures crawled along next to her, testing her skin with their pinchers. They acted like little fairies, curious about their surroundings. She smiled at the comparison. Then one pinched her with shocking strength, and she let out a yelp.
A dark silhouette with a whipping, slinky tail moved in the coral beside her, and she ducked. A claw plowed into the space where her head had just been.
With a gasp, Phoebe darted along the edge of the reef, scraping her shoulder as she went, leaving a trail of blood in the water. A long shark passing by backtracked and swam closer to investigate. A tiger shark was almost as dangerous for her as the wraiths. Could this rescue attempt get any worse?
One of the water wraiths screeched at the tiger shark, swiping at it with its claws. The shark charged, beginning a fierce battle above Phoebe. She snuck away, eyes fixed on the five wraiths and the shark as they dodged each other in a massive underwater dog fight. Snapping teeth and ferocious howls echoed through the water.
She reached the fissure in time to see Tristan and Odessa hauling an exhausted Mina past the edge of the trench. Phoebe sped toward her friend.
“Mina! Are you okay?” Phoebe cried, wishing she could pull the girl into her arms, but Odessa and Tristan held Mina wrapped between them. She was thrashing in her family’s arms but wasn’t even crying. Phoebe hadn’t realized just how terrible something had to be in order to produce mer-tears. She once again touched the empty spot where the pearl had rested. Who had sent her that gift?
Mina shouted, “They have Liam. He’s down there! You’ve got to go to him!”
Odessa disregarded her daughter’s protests, checking her over for any wounds. Other merfolk were already dashing away now that Mina had been found.
Phoebe turned her senses to the space below, searching past the brilliance of her friends beside her. Phoebe sensed him now, along with some other strange presence she didn’t understand.
“She’s right,” Phoebe said. “There’s someone else down there. Definitely another mer.”
Odessa’s lips thinned, and she wrapped Mina up in a sea frond blanket, ignoring Mina’s struggles to get away.
“But, Mother, Liam needs us. He’s in the temple. That hideous temple with its bloodstained altar! He’s going to die. We have to go to him!”
Odessa didn’t blink. “We’ll come back soon, after we regroup. We can’t risk any more lives.”
She whisked Mina away, calling the others. The remaining crowd of merfolk followed, and Phoebe was too stunned to even consider using her powers to make them stay and fight.
Tristan remained beside Phoebe. Odessa’s attention was so focused on her daughter that the venerable mermaid didn’t notice her son had not immediately obeyed. The group of merfolk swam with such speed that they would be too far away to reach within moments.
“Should I make them stop? Or try to?” Phoebe spun around, unsure what to do. She tried to imagine controlling that many merfolk, but couldn’t fathom it. Impossible.
His eyes were dark when they met hers. “They’d never forgive you overriding their free will.”
“I don’t care!”
“But I do. It matters a great deal to me that you’re accepted by my people after this is done, Phoebe.”
The sweetness of his words took her breath away, but she realized in a moment of clarity that if she loved him, she needed to let him go. Even if he would accept her as she was, being involved with a mer-charmer wasn’t safe for him, not with power she might unconsciously use on him.
He’d never abandon her, not now that he’d confessed his affection, but she loved him too much to accept anything but his total freedom. He didn’t know what he felt for her, not really. How could he, with a mer-charmer like her around? He needed freedom to make his own choices. To decide what he really wanted. And his heart wanted to help his people stand strong. She’d seen it time and time again.
Thinking only of his happiness, she restrained her power as closely as she could, careful not to leak a drop of suggestion, and said, “Go convince them to stay! I know you want to! Tell your mother that you won’t stand by her decision!”
How could anyone leave a child behind? What kind of leaders were these elders? They needed lessons on how to lead.
He bit his lip, glancing over his shoulder at the departing elders. She winced at the indecision and worry on Tristan’s face. He wouldn’t just be defying his elder
s but his own mother, his own family. Beyond unthinkable for a merfolk.
He squared his shoulders.
“I’ll be right back! Don’t do anything!” he said, tracing one hand along her cheek.
A blush stole across her face as she watched him speed away, strong tail fin almost a blur. That was the Tristan who led her to safety. That was the Tristan who could lead his people to a truly safe and peaceful life one day, though it might mean changing the rules they lived by.
The others were moving so quickly they had faded into the murky waters. If anyone could catch up and talk sense into them, it was Tristan.
In the heavy silence, the presence of the merfolk in her mind grew fainter. Except for one, invisible below, which flickered like a candle about to go out. If Liam was indeed down there, he might not have enough time for her to wait for Tristan to return. Dread swamped her. If she was going to judge Odessa for leaving the little child behind, how could Phoebe pretend she didn’t know the child was dying now?
Simple. She couldn’t.
Phoebe chewed her bottom lip, looking back at the entrance to the fissure. The seawee’s fear bit at her, goading her into action. She had to save Liam. She just hoped her power was enough.
Extending her senses as far as they could reach, she carefully maneuvered her way back to the entrance of the fissure. At least Tristan would not be in any danger.
The swishing of the sea currents was the only sound other than the very faint call of a whale many furlongs away. Where were the wraiths? She was tempted to mentally look for their location. But no, extending her senses would draw their attention to her.
As Phoebe stared down into the dark hole of the canyon, the blackness wavered, bringing to mind another darkness, one she tried hard to forget: the darkness of a jail cell, with the acrid stink of sweat, urine, and blood.
She shook her head. The terror of being locked up by Bentwood couldn’t touch the loathing she felt now at the possibility that her hesitation could cost a seawee his life.
She squinted, trying to discern any shapes in the shadowy depths. The temple was there, the wraiths were gone, and she had to swim down. But her fin did not move.