Just as Arianna was about to give up and put these thoughts on the waxy leaf, their practice was interrupted.
“It’s happened!” someone shouted from the distance. Arianna and Mae looked up to see Piero swimming toward them at top speed. He held a waxy leaf in his hand, but it looked nearly torn to shreds by the time he got to the cave. “The Sea Crown,” he panted between each word, “has died.”
All Arianna’s annoyance with Mae dissipated. Her grandfather was dead? She closed her eyes and sought to take control of the shuddering breaths that were threatening to overtake her. She hadn’t known him well, as her grandparents had only visited a few times when she was a child, and yet . . . another piece of her world was gone. One more chunk given to the unknown.
As it was evening, enough of Mae’s followers had returned from work for a chorus of gasps to go up around the cave. Some had been watching Arianna practice and others had been talking in hushed tones, but now all eyes turned to Mae, who didn’t seem to notice Arianna’s distress in the slightest.
“Then the contest will be in three days,” an older merman named Bo said, a Nurturer from what Arianna could tell of his song. “That’s not much time.”
“Indeed it’s not.” Mae pursed her lips and tugged at one of her gray curls. Then she looked back at Arianna. “Surely you know of the contest for the crown?”
Arianna gave her a single sharp nod, still bothered by the woman’s callousness. Arianna may not have been raised in the palace, but she wasn’t a bumpkin. Why do you ask? she wrote.
“This means you have only three days to find your soulsong.”
Arianna gaped at her. You mean you want me to be in the contest?
“Who else?” Mae gestured to the merpeople surrounding them. “We all believe in the prophecy, but none of us are royal born. Only the direct descendants can participate.” Her eyes narrowed. “That leaves you. You are the direct granddaughter of the Sea Crown.”
But my father will surely try. Or Lalia.
Piero shook his head. “Your sister is with child?”
Again? Arianna almost gave a silent hysterical laugh. That was quick.
“And your father says he doesn’t feel fit to rule after what happened with the Sun Crown.” Piero lowered his eyes, as though ashamed to speak the words. “That leaves only Renata and you.” He sighed. “She’s in the Sea Palace now, telling everyone that you got lost on the way here.”
Lost was an interesting way to phrase it. Arianna frowned.
“She still has to win the triton, even if she is the only competitor,” someone near the back of the throng said. “Even if there are no competitors, the triton could decide that no one is ready to win. It could simply wander the Deeps for years until it found a contestant worthy. It could even wait until Princess Lalia’s children are of age.”
“But this is Renata,” Bo added woefully. “She’ll use whatever means she must in order to win.” The merpeople around them murmured in agreement.
You said she’s planning something terrible, Arianna wrote. How do you know what she’s planning? How did this all fit in with what Renata had told her?
“We don’t know for sure,” Mae said, glancing at Piero. “But we have reason to believe it involves the Deeps.”
Before Arianna could respond, another mermaid arrived. This time it was Nereza. As usual, she talked to no one when she entered, only whispering into Mae’s ear. Mae turned to Arianna.
“There is a human at the palace.”
Arianna nearly forgot to breathe. He was there . . . nearby. Her heart twisted and soured at the same time.
“What do you know about him?” Mae folded her hands.
Arianna suddenly got the feeling that she was princess in title only to the woman. Mae held all the power, and she knew it. He’s the prince of Maricanta, the future Sun Crown. Why?
“Nereza says he’s screaming your name.” Mae fixed her with a hard stare. “Nereza also believes that your aunt, upon winning the triton, plans to wed him.”
Even if Arianna had wanted to respond, her hands were trembling too hard.
“I don’t know what your connection to that young man is. But I get the feeling that you’re more familiar with him than you’re letting on, judging by the look on your face. So if there was ever a motivation for you to gain your voice, this should be it.” Mae’s voice was solemn, but a merry light danced in her eyes.
Arianna took her waxy leaf and wrote the only words she could think of. I don’t know how.
Mae stared at her for a long time, and Arianna held her gaze miserably.
“Come on, Mae.” Piero finally broke the silence as he swam between Arianna and the older woman. “Maybe she just needs some more time. She’s only been here three days.”
“We have resources,” Mae snapped. “We have believers all over the city. We have support within the palace itself. What we do not have is time.” She looked at a few of the older merpersons in the group and gave an exaggerated sigh. “We need to council. Perhaps there is a way to stall them until we know where to go from here.”
Half of the group went with Mae deeper into the cave. A few others moved back to talking, and some began to drift out of the cave completely. Only Piero stayed by Arianna’s side.
“Please don’t worry about them,” Piero said, laying a hand on Arianna’s shoulder. “They just didn’t expect the Sea Crown to die so soon.” Then he yanked his hand back and grimaced. “And . . . I’m sorry about your grandfather.” He glared at the huddled group in the corner. “They could have been nicer about that,” he said in a low voice. “They’re just worried. Most of them have work they’re neglecting for this. The stakes are high here.”
Arianna’s mouth tasted metallic as she stared at the merpeople conferring together. Once again, she had been tossed out like a naughty child. Once again, she had failed someone’s expectations. Her blood felt hot, and the ocean cave with its ever-present attendants was suddenly too confining. She turned toward the entrance and bolted.
“Wait!” Piero called after her. “You’re not ready to go into the open ocean yet! You need another charm!”
But Arianna didn’t stop. The pressure still often made her dizzy, and the speed at which she was swimming only made the dizziness worse. Still, it was better than sitting and waiting for someone else to decide her next step. Again.
The water around her became a darker, deeper shade of blue, and the weight of it nearly made Arianna’s ears buzz. With the added weight, however, there also came exhilaration.
Though her parents had turned a blind eye to Arianna’s surface visits, they had never, under any circumstances, allowed her to go farther into the ocean than their city mansion, which had been only two miles from the Sun Palace itself.
“I’ll take you out one day,” Rinaldo had promised her once when she’d protested their parents’ rules.
Creatures of all colors, mammals, and plants sped by her. Schools of purple fish scattered in a tizzy as she whooshed through them. Soft, thin gray rays rippled below her, and sunfish lazily floated on their sides above. Millions of fish and plants in every color imaginable filled the seafloor, blending into a rainbow of life as she bolted over them.
If you’d let me do this earlier, Arianna thought wryly to the Maker, I might not have sought out the sun. But then, no, she was forced to admit. She would have sought the sun anyway.
Arianna broke off her sprint and flipped up, pushing herself to the surface so fast that for a moment, she couldn’t tell which way was up and which was down. Leaping out of the water, however, was too thrilling to care. Then back down she went, even faster. This time she embraced the pain of the pressure as she dove. This is what it meant to be a mermaid.
If only she had someone to share it with.
Unbidden, Michael’s face flashed in her mind, the look he had given her when they were dancing out on the terrace. If Drina had waited a moment longer to call his name, he just might have chosen her.
Arianna c
ame to a halt. Her desire to swim melted.
The mournful call of a whale floated through the vast, lonely water around her, and its call touched Arianna’s heart. Raising her head, she saw the giant body in the distance. It had no whale pup, nor did it have a mate.
I would sing with you, she wanted to call. If I could.
“Princess Arianna!”
Arianna turned to see Piero staring at her, a look of wonder on his young face.
Had he really followed her this whole way? She quirked an eye at him. Could she not have one second to herself before some sort of nanny caught up with her?
He swallowed hard, then gave her a shy smile. “You have a lovely voice.”
38
Praying Man
Michael’s head still hurt as he pried his eyes open once again. How long have I been out this time?
He shut them immediately, however, when he saw Princess Ines, or rather, Renata Atlantician sitting on a stool in front of the excessively large white vanity just five or six feet from his bed. He pretended to sleep until he was convinced she hadn’t seen him. Then Michael peeked through his lids to see what the woman was doing.
Renata looked older than Princess Ines ever had. Michael could only guess she’d used some sort of dark power to conceal her true age. Not even Arianna had recognized her. She held a little conch shell to her lips, just like the one Arianna always wore, and was singing into it. Her voice was so low that he could hardly hear the melody at all, but she was keeping the song for later, he was sure.
A knock sounded at the door, and Michael shut his eyes again as the woman flitted over to answer it. “I’m working on it now,” she whispered to whomever was at the door. “As soon as the plans are in the conch, I’ll send it over with one of my girls. . . . Yes, I trust her. I wouldn’t send someone I didn’t.” Her voice grew testier with each word. “Go back now, and don’t come here again until I call for you.”
Whatever Renata was planning must have been complicated, for it took her nearly another hour of singing before she laid the conch on the vanity and went over to a nearby wardrobe to stare into it. Just when Michael thought the woman would never leave, she pulled some sort of bag from the wardrobe’s drawer and left the room. Not, of course, until she’d given him a long look, which Michael prayed would convince her he was still asleep.
As soon as she was gone, Michael leapt out of the bed. Unfortunately, he forgot about his anemone bindings. The shock they delivered to his wrists had him unable to move for ten minutes. He lay, half on the sponge bed and half off, as spots danced in his vision.
As soon as he was able to push himself up on his elbows again, Michael did his best to crawl in slow, smooth movements. His already sore arms screamed in protest as he leaned on one hand and stretched the other out toward the vanity’s edge. His arms were barely long enough to reach. His left elbow didn’t have much feeling in it, however, which caused him to slip and receive more painful jolts to his arms, enough to make a groan escape him when he most needed silence.
Just let me get it, he prayed, grinding his teeth as he tried again. I don’t know what I’ll do with it, but I need to do something. If Arianna is dead . . . he squeezed his eyes shut . . . I know her blood will be on my head. But you are the Maker. So if you have kept her alive somehow . . . just please let me do something to help her. Please let me get this conch!
And yet, Michael continued to fail, sometimes touching the shell only to push it even farther back on the vanity top. After being shocked over and over again, Michael came to a point where he could no longer raise his arms higher than his shoulders. His wrists felt like they were on fire from the anemone stings, and his shoulders and neck throbbed with a stabbing pain from arching his back for an hour.
In anger, Michael struck the vanity’s leg. To his surprise, the leg crumbled beneath his fist, and the vanity tipped. The conch slid right into his hands.
Michael stared stupidly at the conch for a long moment before he realized just how half-baked his plan had been.
What now? he asked the Maker. How do I get it to Arianna or someone who can help her? Just then, he heard someone hum and the lock turning in the door. Michael dropped the conch into one of the sponge holes, praying he wouldn’t forget which one it was. He had barely lain back down when Renata burst in. He could hear her stop in front of the vanity.
For a moment, she was silent. Then without turning, she asked, “Where is it?”
A soothing melody, much like a lullaby made of aloe, blanketed the burning in Michael’s ears and skin. He blinked up at a lovely woman as she sang a quiet song, running her fingers lightly and repeatedly over his burned arms. Michael tried to place where he had seen her before, but couldn’t.
“He looks rather dense in the head to me.”
Only then did Michael notice a man standing beside her. The woman’s face was focused and calm, but the man’s face was disgruntled, at best. He also looked familiar. His gray hair was cropped close to his head, and he fingered his short gray beard in agitated flicks. And he was making his opinion of Michael no secret as he continued to glower at him.
“Hush now,” the woman said in a low voice. “He has the look of a siren song to him, and you know that. You’re just being petty. Look how young he is.”
“What . . .” Michael tried to speak, but his throat was oddly parched. “What day is it?”
“She got you there, too,” the dark-haired woman muttered, reaching up and placing her hand on his neck. She closed her eyes and tipped her head forward, a look of pinched focus on her face. After a few more moments of singing, Michael felt his throat loosen. When she finally leaned back and opened her eyes, she looked tired. “You have been here in the Sea Palace for five days.”
Five days. And he only recalled waking up three times. What was the matter with him?
“I need to . . . Arianna,” he finally groaned, leaning back into the bed. “I need to find Arianna.”
The woman glanced at the man, her brown eyes suddenly wide in her oval face. “What do you know of our daughter?” She squeezed his hand hard. “It is of the utmost importance that we find her. Where is she?”
“I don’t . . . I don’t know. Wait.” He propped himself up on his elbows. “You’re Ambassador Amadeo. And Lady Giana?” He squinted at her, trying to recall her face from when he had met her years before. “I tried to speak with you, but the servant lied . . . How did you find me?”
“One would have to be deaf to miss your bellowing,” Amadeo said. Then he looked down at his wife, who sat on the edge of Michael’s sponge bed. “I’ll go stay with her. You finish with him.” He glared at Michael as he rose up into the water. “Quickly.”
“Where is he going?” Michael asked when Amadeo was gone.
“He’s keeping Renata busy, but we don’t have much time.” She scooted closer. “You have to tell us about Ari!”
Michael closed his eyes and tried to sift through the bits and pieces of memories that were drifting around in his head like clouds. “She stayed with us for . . . months, I think.”
“Stayed with you?”
“Yes. After she got her legs back and was chased from the water by a sea creature. But then Renata came and lied, saying she was a foreign princess. Then she invited Arianna to come over to her new kingdom—”
“Arianna has legs?”
If Amadeo had looked at him like he was a little loose in the head earlier, it was nothing compared to the incredulous look Lady Giana gave him now. She looked so much like Arianna that it made Michael’s heart ache as guilt wrenched his gut, though he couldn’t exactly recall just why.
“She has legs on land and fins in the sea. They come and go depending on where she is. But when Renata pushed her into the water, her fins didn’t come. Right after I . . .” Michael looked at Lady Giana in horror. “Why did I kiss Renata?”
“You’re under a siren song,” she said impatiently. “Now what about Arianna?”
“But what’s a siren song
?”
Giana pulled in a deep breath through her nose and closed her eyes. When she opened them again, she spoke slowly and deliberately. “Siren songs are forbidden to my people for a reason. They touch the parts of others’ minds and souls that shouldn’t be toyed with. One must harness the Sorthileige in order to successfully weave a siren song.” She eyed Michael warily. “My guess is that Renata’s trapped you under a partial song, since you seem to maintain control of your faculties at certain times.”
“How do you know that?”
She nodded at the side of his head. “You had blood in your ears when I found you. That means you must have managed to displease her somehow, which means you aren’t under her complete control all the time. Yet.” She leaned forward. “Now, you said Arianna has legs?” She shivered.
Michael frowned at her. “Arianna’s legs are not disgusting. They’re lovely. I mean . . . she’s lovely.”
“Don’t let her father hear that kind of talk.” Then Lady Giana sighed. “If she has legs, and Renata knows about it, then . . .” She sat up straight. “Renata’s been using her!”
“I was the one Renata had planned to marry.”
“But don’t you understand?” Lady Giana was almost shouting as she swam back and forth in short, frenetic bursts. “It was never about you! It was always about Ari and the prophecy! I told him! I told him we should never have let her keep Ari! Never!”
“Do you mean that old prophecy about the silent . . . ?” Michael searched his memories, trying to recall the old poem Bithiah had taught him when he was small. Something about two natures. And silence. And singing?
“But she still can’t sing!”
“That won’t matter to Renata. She’ll hound Ari until she gets what she wants.”
Michael pushed himself higher. “You have to take this siren song off me! I need to find Arianna before her aunt does!”
Silent Mermaid: A Retelling of The Little Mermaid (The Classical Kingdoms Collection Book 5) Page 23