by Ruhi Jain
“Callum told me this just a few minutes ago and he explained everything.”
“How —” she almost yelled but realised that it would prove fatal and so lowered her shaking voice down to a pained whisper. “How would he know?”
“He didn’t know before, because he wasn’t looking for it. But now …”
She stared at him-wide eyed. “No. Sh-she is horrible! And she’s not my cousin!” she spat out.
“Don’t make this difficult for me!”
“I’m not! I don’t want to hear what you have to say!” She backed away till her back hit the stone wall of the boulder. “She’s a spirit in the form of a mermaid; my dad and my uncle are humans. There is no connection between them!”
She sounded hysterical and she took a deep gulp of water to calm herself.
“Your father wasn’t human.” Lukas said hesitantly.
She glared at him. “Shut up.”
Her Dreign warmed up and she poked it angrily.
“Brell, don’t be difficult.”
“Don’t you dare say that Zeldae is my —”
“She’s your cousin, okay? Stop acting like a child – you have to face it! I didn’t believe it either, but you have to listen. Everyone is searching for you, and you don’t have much time. So can you please just listen? You deserve to know.”
She looked at Lukas, and then thought of Callum. “What if… I don’t want to know?” She said aloud and in her mind.
“Then we won’t tell you.” Callum said.
She bit her lip and steeled herself. “Okay, tell me.”
“You sure?” Lukas frowned.
“Yes.” She shook herself. “Yes. Tell me”
“I didn’t know this before because it didn’t strike me but I realised that the mixture I gave you before you came to Gelled should have worn off by now. And since you haven’t drowned yet and no one has heard your heartbeat yet, that means that you are… a half-mermaid.”
Lukas hadn’t said anything yet. He just watched her changing expressions. Her eyes widened.
“What?” she shrieked.
“Well, just listen!” Callum said. “I went to the fortune teller Zahraa, she told me everything. Before there were individual rulers to the Seven Seas, there was just one family that ruled all the Seven Seas. In 1925, there was only one heir, Princess Annitine. She went on land once with her father and fell in love with a hunter there — a human. She soon carried his child. She was just eighteen at that time. In order to uphold the honour of the Ruling Family, she was hastily married off to a merman of Royal Blood. Her daughter, Florence, was born here, in the Seas. A few years later, her husband died. Annitine took help from Zahraa’s ancestors to get a spell that would help her breathe on land. Everyone thought she died on land, but in truth, she survived, married the hunter she had met when she was eighteen and had two more children.”
“Two more?”
“Yes, your father David and your Uncle Sam. They were fraternal twins. Florence was the eldest. There was a ten year gap between her and your father. Florence gave birth to a child when she was twenty. The child was —”
“Zeldae.” Brell completed breathlessly, her heart pounding. “Oh my …” Her head spun.
“Your father was a half-merman and Florence was a half-mermaid, your uncle a complete human. Your father was born on land that’s why he could survive. He married a human, further diluting the mermaid blood. Timmy, it appears, is fully human. You inherited your father’s mermaid traits. When Florence gave birth, Zeldae was half and half, but being born in water made her a spirit. She took the form of a mermaid, but couldn’t survive without a human heart each year.”
Callum hesitated before going on. “I’m really sorry Brellitine. I would stay longer but I need to go. Zeldae is demanding to see everybody who was inside the castle at the time of the Transfer.”
Lukas clasped both her quivering hands in his. “When they ran the second and third tests on your hair, they both showed mermaid results. That’s why there was no follow up action. You are a half-mermaid, Brell.”
Brell’s tail trembled, and she thumped down onto the cold stone floor. Shudders racked her body and she wrapped her arms around herself, drawing her tail in until her body curled up into a ball.
Zeldae — that horrible, terrible, merciless, ruthless person — was her cousin. They were related by blood. Her arms fell down limply to her sides, and her gaze fell on the bright red blood oozing out of her fingertips. Her stomach churned, imaging the same blood running through Zeldae’s veins. She crawled backwards, desperate to get away from the ghost of Zeldae, her heart pounding furiously.
Lukas sat down next to her and squeezed her uninjured shoulder gently.
“I know what you’re thinking,” he said. “But you and Zeldae are different. She chose the path of evil, but that doesn’t make you bad. You are… you. You’re good and kind and helpful.”
She closed her eyes.
“Brell look at me.” He shifted so that he was sitting right in front of her. “Don’t think for even one nanosecond that this changes who you are.”
She opened her eyes. He was so close, his dark eyes burning with something that sent a warm shiver through her.
She couldn’t describe exactly what she felt at that time… almost like a confused jumble of emotions. Frustration, hurt, confusion, pain, loss… he wrapped his firm, strong and steady fingers around her trembling hand and gave them a small squeeze. Then he lifted her hand to his lips and kissed the top of her hand.
“Lukas.” She sighed. Her hand tingled. A warm sensation spread from her hand all the way up to her toes and heart. She slowly got up, and tucked the wild mess of her hair back. She saw her reflection in a mirror next to Lukas, and frowned.
“I look terrible,” she admitted.
She heard a chuckle and turned to see a small smile on his lips.
“What?” she asked self-consciously.
“You look beautiful.”
“Thank you,” she said simply. “Although I’m sure that’s not true.”
He was quiet for a moment and then placed both his hands on the sides of her neck. Her heart skipped a beat, wondering what would happen next.
“I want you to know,” he said in an urgent, rushed whisper. “That you are the most stunning woman I have ever met. You are so brave, so resilient. When I first saw you I couldn’t understand what it was about you that drew me in. Now I know. It’s a fact that no matter what cards you have been dealt with you make the most out of them. You still have a place for kindness in your soul despite all that you’ve had to go through.”
“Zeldae —” she said, torn.
“I don’t care that you both are related. What should I say for you to believe that you are unique? Our blood relations don’t define who we are. Only we can do that.”
She gave him a half-smile but she knew he could see her confusion. It seemed to her that he wanted to do more, to say more. But she wanted to, as well.
“Lukas,” she whispered softly, her fingers gently brushing his lower lip. Can you please just read my mind?
Apparently, he did. In an almost synchronized move, her fingers reached for his face the same time his arms closed around her waist. The kiss felt like she was being scorched and soothed at the same time, burned but healed. Adrenaline pumped through her veins, making her feel powerful. She didn’t want it to stop. Perhaps, in another world, this moment would have been simple and sweet.
“Brell,” he gasped, pulling away, panting. His voice sounded restrained. “You should be going.”
“I don’t want to hear that,” she said stubbornly, although she knew he was right.
His eyes flickered behind her and in a second the softness in them hardened. “Get down!” he hissed, grabbing her arms and pulling her down anyways.
“What is it?” she mouthed, slightly dizzy from what had just happened. Her lips tingled as if they were on fire and she was pretty sure her heartbeat could be heard aloud.
He jerked his chin towards the mirror behind her. It reflected the view of the street through the window. A large group of guards armed with swords and bows and arrows were throwing open the doors of all the boulders. Searching. For her.
When she looked back, she saw Lukas skimming his tail over the floor of the boulder. A dark sangria-coloured mist swirled, forming a gaping hole. He reached for the cupboard and pulled out a brown overcoat. She nearly cried out in amazement when she recognized it. It was her father’s coat; the one she thought she had lost the day she had entered Gelled. Happiness flooded her, mixed with the fear of being caught.
“Oh Lukas!” She hugged him, remembering the day when she had told him about the coat in the Garden of Faith. “You have no idea how much this means to me.”
She slipped on the coat and buttoned it up, careful to stay below the window level.
He had picked up her brother and was now looking intently at her.
“You have to go,” he reminded her. “Now.”
She gathered Timmy from him, thankful for the fact that he was asleep. “When will I see you again?” she asked him, searching his face.
“I don’t know.” He frowned, his dark eyes turbulent. “But I’ll miss you.”
“Me too.” She sighed. So much.
“They’ll be here any minute now.” A sense of urgency crept into his voice. “Go!”
She looked around. The water glided around her. How she would miss this place… the place where she felt so free. Where she had control over her own life. She burrowed her face into Lukas’s jacket, with Timmy squashed between them.
“I’m sorry if this causes you any trouble,” she whispered.
Suddenly, a sharp screeching sound in her head made her wince and then she heard a female’s voice in her mind. “The plan worked perfectly.”
“Did you say anything?” she looked at Lukas.
“No.” The confusion on his face was clear.
“I wish I could tell her, Meaken. She’s my friend and she trusted me. I hate this.”
“If you don’t want to hurt her then don’t tell her about… what we did.”
There was a conversation going on in her head. Was she sane? One person was clearly Meaken.
“Brell, you need to go.” Lukas nudged her towards the portal. “They are coming closer.”
She mouthed the word ‘wait’ to him and pointed to her head. He stared at her, bewildered.
“Callum, this is for the good of our people. Don’t forget all the pain we have had to go through.”
Okay, Callum was definitely there too. But how was this possible? Only she and Callum were connected by the Dreign… or not?
“What about the pain she has had to go through? I was okay with it until her brother’s memory got locked. Zahraa’s idea to get Timothy into the sea to lure her in backfired, and you know it.”
She stilled and her breathing stopped for a minute.
“Why are we talking about this now? Shouldn’t this conversation have occurred a long time ago? And we agreed that this had to be done for the prophecy to come true.”
“WHAT!” Brell screamed, in her head and aloud.
“What happened?” Alarmed, Lukas reached out to her.
She spat, “Oh, don’t you dare touch me.” He yanked his arm back, a hurt look crossing his face. She couldn’t care less.
“How is this possible?” Meaken’s perplexed voice drifted in her head. To her, it sounded like the voice of a poisonous snake.
They had used her brother. Used him shamelessly and mercilessly to get what they wanted. Zahraa must have known that Brell would follow her brother into the sea. So she had somehow helped to get Timothy captured. Brell wouldn’t be surprised if Zahraa had done the capturing herself. Callum had been a part of it too.
The sense of friendship and familiarity she felt shattered and betrayal tore through her. Everything had been a lie.
Everything!
About the Author
Ruhi Jain is a London born author who loves reading, asking questions and interacting with people from all walks of life. Her novel ‘Brellitine Grever and The Sea of Gelled’ gives readers the delightful experience of an unexplored world as they accompany Brellitine through her dramatic and adventurous journey. Ruhi hopes that it will empower young adults to fight for what they believe in, no matter the odds. To have courage to not just rescue themselves, but others as well, just like Brell. She is currently working on her second novel of the trilogy. Ruhi lives in Mumbai, India with her family.
She would love to hear your thoughts and reviews on:
Website: www.thebrelltrilogy.com
Email: [email protected]
Facebook: You can find her @thebrelltrilogy
Instagram: thebrelltrilogy
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