by Erin Hayes
I bent forward, pressed my face to water, and said to the murky depths, “Finn, I’m here.”
I straightened myself up and waited, knowing that I wouldn’t have to for very long. Finn would be here any minute.
All at once, something caught my legs, and I crashed into the water, dragging me out to sea. Before I could protest and shriek, something covered my mouth, giving me a playful, passionate kiss.
Finn.
Despite the fact that I was fighting it the entire time, I ended up closing my eyes and getting lost in the feel of his lips against mine.
When our lips finally parted, I was breathless, even with my gills. He, however, was grinning sheepishly at me as he pressed his forehead to mine.
“You did it!” he exclaimed. “You saved Kai! You saved us all.”
I smiled. “He’s okay?”
“Yes, he’s with Levi and Nadia now.”
“Good, I’m glad.”
Finn grabbed my hand, pulling me back out to the sea. “Come on,” he said, grinning triumphantly at me. “You need to transform and come back to Thalassa. My father wants to see you. And Kai’s parents. You’re a hero, Tara.” His expression turned passionate. “You’re my hero.”
I was glad that we were underwater or else he’d see my tears.
“I...I can’t, Finn.”
My words must have surprised him, because my fingers slipped from his. He looked back at me, shocked.
“What?”
I swallowed uncomfortably, averting my eyes. “I’m going to stay on the surface. For now. I have so much to do, I can’t stay here, not permanently.”
It broke my heart to see how his face fell at my words. I wanted to stay. Oh, I desperately wanted to stay so bad.
I couldn’t.
His nose was inches from mine as he searched my face. “You can’t be serious.” He grasped my shoulders. “You can’t.” He kissed me again, desperate for some sort of explanation.
I could feel my resolve slipping slightly. Then I thought about the other animals that would have been wrongfully captured like Kai and left to die. Neptune was right when he said that he could do more on land than in the sea, and the ocean didn’t have a voice without a hero.
That was the role I was born to play. Half merwalker, half human. I was meant to do this as much as Finn was meant to be the protector of sea creatures. Two sides of the same sand dollar. Two hearts beating as one in different worlds.
It went against every fiber of my being to pull back from him. To break his heart too.
“I have a family that I need to take care of,” I told him gently. “My mother was worried about me when I went missing. And...” here was going to be the hard part, “and I want to help you out from the land.” I touched a hand to his face. “I don’t know how I’m going to do it, but I want to help you. Keep you safe. And keep the sea safe too.”
His green eyes burned straight through me. “You should be here,” he said. “With me.”
“I will be,” I replied. “I’ll be right beside you. You have a mission for your people. I have a mission for me. We can make this work. Trust me.”
He kissed me again. “What did you have in mind?”
Epilogue
Six months later
Summer break was a time for all of my college friends to get jobs or go study abroad. A lot of them were trying to get ahead with internships or squeeze in some summer classes to make up for classes that they’d failed in the spring semester. Everyone had plans, it seemed. Still, I knew they weren’t anywhere near as special as mine.
I’d told my mother that I got an internship on a research vessel in the Gulf of Mexico, so I’d be out of touch for most of it, and not to worry. I was going to be studying marine life and getting good experiences for my marine biology degree at Texas A&M University of Galveston. It was unpaid, sure, and I wasn’t getting any class credit for it, but my board, food, and all expenses would be taken care of, I told her. While she wouldn’t budge on her opinion that I should be studying pre-law or pre-med, she begrudgingly supported my decision.
I loved my mother so much for supporting me, even though my decisions seemed crazy. By all accounts, they were.
I didn’t care, though. If I learned anything, it was to do what I wanted to do.
That was how I found myself on the shores of Galveston’s East Beach, an hour’s drive from the Houston Aquarium, which felt so long ago.
There was no one on the beach with me at six a.m. on a Saturday morning, and that was exactly what I was going for. It was going to get weird in about five minutes, and I didn’t want anyone to see.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, breathing in the salty air.
I wasn’t going on a trip. I was going home, at least for the summer. I’d been here every weekend during my spring semester. I told my roommate Elyse that I was spending it with my boyfriend.
I was telling her the truth.
I dipped a toe into the ocean, the sea foam cold against my bare skin. My skin turned to goosebumps initially, and before my very eyes, I saw the spread of scales trail up my legs.
I took off my shirt, revealing a bikini top underneath. Here was where it got weird, no matter how many times I did it. I took off my shorts, the bikini bottom along with it. I wasn’t going to need it where I was going.
I stowed the clothes in a waterproof plastic bag between two rocks. I hoped they’d be all right for two months. If not, I’d cross that bridge when I got to it.
For now, I was itching to get back to the sea and see everyone.
I started out at a run and dove into the waves. They parted, welcoming me with open arms, like the ocean had been expecting me. I dolphin-kicked, and as I did so, I felt the skin between my legs zipper all the way down to my feet, which weren’t feet anymore. A long, beautiful tail fin sprouted from where my feet were, iridescent in all its splendor.
I looked down at it, and despite myself, I grinned. It never did go away, did it? I was a full merwalker, one of the few that could go between the sea and the land.
I submerged, swimming farther out to sea, meaning to call the two most important people to me. “Kai,” I called out softly, “I’m here.” I took a deep breath, because my voice wavered in my anticipation, and said, “Finn, I’m here. I need you.”
The length of time impossibly stretched out before me. Impatience tugged at me, I couldn’t wait to see them.
I saw a dark shape in the water first, much bigger than I remembered. It barreled at me like a torpedo, slowing down enough before he got to me so he wouldn’t crash into me. Kai stopped and embraced me with his fins much like a human would. I held him back, feeling the tears of happiness spring to my eyes.
“Kai!” I cried happily.
“Tara!” he said, like he couldn’t believe I was here. I couldn’t believe it either. “How long are you here this time?”
“A long time,” I told him. “Did you think I’d forget you?” Kai eyed me suspiciously, and I laughed.
“For good?”
I shook my head, feeling the dark cloud of sadness come over me. “Not yet,” I said. “But soon.” Finn and I had been discussing what was next in our relationship. The plan was to eventually end up living together somehow. For now though, I was busy being his eyes and ears on land.
“Tara!” another familiar voice cried.
“Ponce!” I grabbed the snapper and hugged him close. “You look great! How are you doing?”
I swear, the fish flushed scarlet. “I’ve got a girlfriend,” he said sheepishly.
“A girlfriend?” I laughed. “She’s a lucky girl.”
My voice caught in my throat when I saw the other familiar figure in the distance. Unlike Kai or Ponce, he stopped further out, watching me. My heart fluttered.
“Hello there, stranger,” I called out to him playfully. My heart was pounding in my ears, as it always did when I saw him.
“You’re here.”
Before I could react, I found mysel
f in his arms, his lips on mine, his hands holding me to him. He kissed me with the fervent passion of someone who had found everything he wanted.
I knew because I was kissing him that way too.
He pulled back and wrapped his arms around me. I couldn’t tell who was doing the holding and who was doing the clinging.
“I’ve missed you,” he said.
“Me too.”
“Tara, so much has happened while you were gone!” Kai interjected. With finals and everything, it had nearly been a month since I had joined them in the water.
“I’ll bet,” I said, offering him a smile. “A lot’s happened on land as well.” Whatever translated my words into Mermish changed “two months” into “two moons”.
Finn held my hand, not taking his eyes off me. “You can tell us all about it,” he said, his sea green eyes soft.
“Just so long as you keep showing me how to be a proper mermaid.”
He smiled at me, the brilliance of the entire city of Thalassa in that one smile. “Of course.”
The End
Continue the Cotton Candy Quintet with Jordyn’s story in book two, I’d Rather be a Witch.
https://www.erinhayesbooks.com/young-adult
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About the Author
https://www.erinhayesbooks.com/
Sci-fi junkie, video game nerd, and wannabe manga artist Erin Hayes writes a lot of things. Sometimes she writes books.
She works as an advertising copywriter by day, and she's an award-winning New York Times Bestselling Author by night. She has lived in New Zealand, Hawaii, Texas, Alabama, and now San Francisco with her husband, cat, and a growing collection of geek paraphernalia.
You can reach her at [email protected] and she’ll be happy to chat. Especially if you want to debate Star Wars.
Soul Stalkers
Norma Hinkens
Soul Stalkers © copyright 2017 Norma Hinkens
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. For more information about the author, please visit www.normahinkens.com
All rights reserved.
No part of the book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Published by Dunecadia Publishing, California
Soul Stalkers
Kyra Williams leads a charmed life until the day she dies. Or does she?
Plagued by her bizarre encounter with an unseen realm, and an ominous warning from a mysterious stranger, Beware the Soul Stalkers, her perfect world quickly spins out of control.
Her mysterious psychiatrist’s naturalistic explanations of how the mind deceives itself are convincing, but Kyra’s convinced his sinister practice is taking her further from the truth and into the clutches of the Soul Stalkers. Her paranoia leads her family to fear she is losing her mind, and when a body is discovered in her car, they suspect she is the killer.
Caught in the crosshairs of hell, Kyra finds herself in a desperate struggle to defend her sanity and prove her innocence. Can she overcome the powerful forces of darkness operating against her before they claim her soul?
Chapter One
The flushed tones of daybreak seeped across a sky that curdled with the threat of thunder. Not the karma Kyra Williams was counting on. Her heart hammered under her blue, thrift-store Chanel suit as she accelerated her Lexus SUV onto the I-95 freeway toward Detroit. Everything hung on this deal, the largest Buffington & Associates Advertising had ever bid on. Securing the contract would sway the board. Her tough-talking-Texan boss had kept his cancer under wraps until now, but Don had six months at best. Kyra glanced in her rearview mirror and pressed her glossed lips together. If she pulled this off, Buffington’s board of directors would be looking at their new Vice President of Marketing.
Five miles from downtown, a heavy rain fell from a giant swathe of gray. Cars bunched up like widgets on a conveyer belt and screeched to a halt. Kyra gripped the steering wheel tighter and looked at the clock. Only forty minutes to make her meeting. Slamming the shifter into park, she pressed her back into her leather seat and turned her head toward the window. It had been raining hard the day her mother left too. She blinked back unexpected tears, desperate to shut down that frightened little girl beating the car window with her small fists as her mother turned her head and drove out of their lives, her matching suitcases bungeed to the cargo rack of the family car. Some things changed your life forever, no matter how hard you fought in the intervening years to prove it didn’t matter.
The deluge pummeled the roof of her car, drowning out the classic rock station she liked to listen to on her commute to work. She flicked the wipers to maximum speed, cranked up the music and stiffened. A barely perceptible shadow melted into the downpour in front of her SUV. She slid up in her seat and peered through the cascading rain. Was someone out there? Broken down, perhaps. She scanned back and forth between the vehicles and along the hard shoulder. No hazard lights that she could see. Perturbed, she glanced behind her and then in front again. No one.
An eerie shiver rippled along her spine as she reached for her coffee mug. She must have imagined it. Early morning jitters. With a multi-million-dollar contract at stake, she’d barely slept in a week. She sipped her latte and frowned. She was an emotional wreck. And today was not a good day to fall apart.
A loud honk alerted her that traffic was moving again and she shoved her mug into the cup holder and settled back in for the final stretch of her commute. Traffic thinned as she sped along. The rain had almost petered out and miraculously she was still on schedule. She might even make it in time to run through her proposal again before her nine o’clock meeting.
What in the—
A scream clawed at her throat as a massive eighteen-wheeler truck thundered toward her, extended red mirrors glistening like the flared nostrils of a monstrous beast. She jolted up, knocking her coffee mug to the floor, and coiled both hands around the steering wheel. Heat flooded her eardrums. The truck’s giant, metal grille loomed in front of her. A muffled rumbling filled her head and the car shook. Before she could react and twist the wheel, the mammoth truck flew over her SUV, clipping her cargo rack, and vanished through the guardrail into a ravine.
Pressure exploded like a gunshot in her ears as her car flipped and barrel-rolled across the asphalt.
“Help! Somebody help me! Please!”
Her screams clashed with the deafening crunching of her vehicle caving in on her like a metal coffin. The airbag deployed and the acrid smell of explosion engulfed her, glass shards spraying her flesh like toxic glitter. Clawing hysterically at the nylon airbag, she gagged on the chalky fumes as her car careened through the guardrail and plunged into the rocky, ravine below.
As suddenly as it had begun, the grinding din dissolved into silence. Kyra lay motionless, barely daring to breathe as a wave of panic etched an acid trail from her gut to the warm saliva beneath her tongue. Cautiously, she nudged her eyes open. The sky spun like a giant merry-go-round. White-feathered apparitions gazed solemnly down on her, slowly penciling into focus.
Clouds!
Tears of relief leaked down her cheeks. She’d survived after all. She tried to lift her hand to wipe her face and instantly a fresh swell of panic surged through her. A garbled sound came from the back of her throat.
I can’t move!
Her jaw trembled as the truth of her predicament ricocheted through every nerve ending. Choking back a sob, she blinked helplessly, her useless limbs draped around her. That truck driver had come out of nowhere. Why hadn’t she seen the eighteen-wheeler smash through the divider? A fog of confusion filled her brain. If the semi hadn’t gone airborne at the last second, he would have killed her. It didn’t make sense. Forty ton trucks couldn’t levitate like that. A co
ld shiver prickled the nape of her neck. It was all wrong.
All wrong like the shadow on the freeway that had melted into the rain.
She needed to calm down and clear her thoughts. She took a few deep breaths and slowly scanned her surroundings, struggling to clear the haze from her eyes. Twenty feet from where she lay, small spires of orange flames writhed through the corrugated metal pyre that had been her SUV. Her heart jammed in her throat. If the fuel tank exploded, she had no chance of making it out of here alive.
Sweat trickled down her face as she locked her gaze on the wreck. A flicker of movement in the shifting flames caught her eye. Blood drained from her temples as a wraithlike charcoal form slunk from the blaze and faded from sight.
She fought for breath between fresh waves of panic. Her windpipe constricted, as if strong, stubby fingers had latched around it, and her scream evaporated into the morning air. She panned her eyes around the deserted ravine again.
The figure had vanished. She stared fixedly at the wreck for several minutes, but the shadow didn’t resurface. Maybe what she thought she was seeing wasn’t there at all. Her injuries might have triggered some kind of brain short-circuit.
“Help me, please.” Her voice trailed off, mocking its way back to her from the other side of the ravine. She glanced around, troubled by the feeling she was being watched. But by whom? Shadows, that didn’t exist.
A suffocating silence followed her plea for help. She gritted her teeth. This couldn’t be happening. Not today of all days. By now the entire department would know she hadn’t shown up for the negotiations. Her boss would be in panic mode as he struggled to salvage the twenty-million-dollar contract. The one they’d all be shaking hands on by now if it wasn’t for the fact that she was lying in the dirt at the bottom of a ravine, unable to move or even feel anything. She had worked tirelessly on this deal over the past year, and her boss had trusted her to close it. Maybe her mother hadn’t thought she was worth hanging around for, but other people knew her worth.