They were laughing when I caught up to them, holding a blood-soaked rag in the current.
“This should lure her a little closer.” Nereus laughed, wringing the rag between powerful hands as the blood curled from between his fingers into a sickening stain through the turquoise water.
The force of the fragrance was unbearable, and I stifled the scream that was building in my throat by clamping my hands over my mouth. It was Merrick’s blood – so much of it – swirling around me in the current.
I allowed myself to sink onto a small patch of white sand, as I half listened to them discussing how they had soaked the rag.
“How long do we wait before we go and get some more?” one of them asked.
“Oh there’s another rag already being prepared,” Nereus replied as the others laughed cruelly.
Fury burnt hot at my centre as I pulled all of my focus into creating the most powerful ball of energy I could make, feeling it form on the palms of my hands and blowing out a stream of bubbles as I prepared to launch it at them.
Nereus stopped mid-sentence.
“Did you feel that?” he whispered.
“Yeah, that wasn’t good, that’s gonna hurt,” replied another.
“No, no that is very good,” Nereus replied.
“She’s very close. Spread out and see if you can find her.”
“I’m not facing that alone,” another replied.
“It wasn’t a request.” Nereus’s anger was tinged with fear.
Their immediate movement dissolved my plan of attack. I couldn’t incapacitate them if they weren’t all in one place. I reabsorbed the energy ball I’d been about to release on them with a shudder as it skittered up my arm coldly, and focused all of my attention on disguise again.
They swam around me for ages, one of them dipping into the hollow where I was pressed into the sand, his beautiful face completely inhuman in the water. On land Oceanids looked human. In the water, their skin held an alien undertone of rainbow hues, some, like the Miengu, an emerald green, others varying shades of yellow, red and blue. Their pupils dilated to almost completely cover their blue irises as they searched the water for me.
“She’s over there,” one of them whispered urgently, “I just picked up her scent.”
The Oceanid floating above me swam quickly away.
“You go and see if you can find her, I’ll wait here,” replied Nereus.
I waited, holding my body completely still.
I jumped when my name curled around me in the current, his voice sickening as he described in infinite detail what he planned to do to me when he caught me.
I focused on containing and burying the revulsion and fear his words sparked in me, realising that he must be watching for the colour these emotions would release into the water.
Sabrina had commented once – what felt like a lifetime ago – as she watched me contain my frustration, on how she’d thought that would be useful someday. I hadn’t understood what she meant, but the longer I spent in this foreign liquid world the more I understood how easy communication was, even when that communication could be lethal.
“Let’s go,” Nereus ordered eventually. “Neith thinks she might be using a different tactic. Maybe she didn’t follow the scent from the rag.”
Their voices were fading again as they moved and I slipped after them, relieved to finally put my plan into action.
“I’m not sure that wasn’t her we felt earlier – all that rage is difficult to disguise.”
“Then why did she disappear?”
“She is weak,” Nereus said dismissively. “She places individuals’ lives over the good of the group. I probably would have followed her, if not for that pathetic quality.”
“I thought you hated her?”
“Yes, but she is the most powerful Oceanid ever born and I want to be on the winning team, because only the victors get the spoils.”
They laughed, picking up their pace so that I had to swim with every forwards push of the current to keep up.
“I’m glad we’re protected by rock though,” another one muttered. “I wouldn’t want to be in the open ocean when she unleashes that fury.”
“Yeah, at least at Ferengren there are multiple layers of protection, out here we’d be fish food.”
I allowed them to swim ahead of me, wanting a little distance between us and using the scent from the rag they carried as a guide to their hideaway.
Within a short while they’d left the reef. I dithered on the edge of the life-encrusted rocks and colour-infused coral, staring out at the expanse of white sand and shimmering water. The reef was the only real landmark I knew in the confusing sameness of the open ocean. Once I left it there was no guarantee I’d find it, or anything else I recognised again.
Once I left it I was committed to going after Merrick alone.
His scent was fading in the ever-flowing current being swept gently away and distorting the direction they were going. I couldn’t leave him to whatever cruelty had produced that much blood. I couldn’t abandon him. And so I swam into the never-ending blue, determination and fear warring in equal parts as I followed the trail of blood of the only man I’d ever loved.
4. Ferengren
The ocean floor was disturbingly void of any appearance of life, the white sand a gently undulating desert that spread out on all sides around me. It was at least relatively easy to disguise myself and swim at the same time.
I’d been gauging the depth of the water for some time, wondering if perhaps Ferengren was on land and not underwater as I’d assumed it was, when the scent I’d been following all but disappeared. I stopped, turning slowly in the water and trying to control the fear that blossomed in my chest at the thought of losing that scent. I could search for weeks and never find them, the ocean here was a vast white and blue canvas with nothing to indicate direction.
A whirling of water leapt out in front of me, a froth of bubbles and a cacophony of clicking that seemed to come at me from all sides, adding to the confusion of the sudden and obviously inanimate object moving straight at me.
I pushed ineffectively at the water with my hands, all pretence at disguise quickly forgotten in the face of being run over and only just managed to push myself flat on my back into the sandy floor before it whirred over me.
It looked like the ribcage of a large animal, maybe a whale, had been used to create a type of vehicle. Within it several Oceanids chatted amicably, some of them involved in moving the contraption quickly through the water, and others allowing the current of the movement to pull them along, long sharp-looking lances casually strapped to their sides.
I threw up the disguise just as they were passing over me, my heart hammering too loudly in my chest and fear I struggled to contain blossoming around me as the belly of the contraption skimmed across my skin.
Within moments they were gone, not a trace of sound or sight of them anywhere. Once I’d calmed down I allowed myself to float off the sea floor and looked more intently at the blue they’d burst from.
The water held just the slightest deepening of colour and it wavered like the heat off a hot road.
As I neared it the sandy floor rose towards the surface, imperceptibly at first but quickly forcing me closer to the sunlight than I’d been since I entered the ocean. Sabrina’s warning about the surface made me more cautious than I would normally have been as I scanned the sun-rippled skin of the sea.
Dark large shadows peppered the surface of the water in every direction. I couldn’t quite make out what they were at first as I swam cautiously towards them, my initial impression being a tangle of sea weed, but the casual brush of fingertips and the muffled murmur of voices from the one closest to me froze my curiosity.
As I turned away from it I happened to glance at the sand below me and dived, squirming my way quickly into the sand. I could imitate the sea floor and possibly even the dappling of the water in the sun, but the one thing I couldn’t do was stop my shadow forming on the paper
-white sand.
Who or whatever it was that was floating on the surface would see my outline instantly and the closer I got to the sun-dappled surface the more definitive my shadow would be.
The sand was irritatingly itchy on my skin, gnawing at the tenuous hold I had on the fear that pulled my muscles taut. I inched forwards minutely slowly, aware that each shift in the sand might give my shape or position away to the guards at the surface.
I’d managed to creep only a metre or so when a swirl of water above me dislodged the sand I’d been trying to use as cover, exposing me completely. I froze, desperately concentrating on my disguise and wondering what had created such a massive movement of water.
A strange chattering and liquid clicking noise filled the water around me. I opened my eyes slowly, almost losing my desperate mental hold as a large school of bottlenose dolphins swam joylessly in front of me. Behind them the wildest looking Oceanid I’d ever seen maintained the constant clicking and warbling that seemed to provoke a vicious response in the normally friendly dolphins. They reminded me of a pack of hunting dogs, their uniformly choppy movements as they dipped from the surface into the blue and back again accompanied by a black swirl of menace and focused intent.
Merrick had mentioned that there were Oceanids with every possible type of talent. This one seemed to be able to speak to or maybe even control ocean creatures. The idea of anyone with this type of talent was potentially terrifying, dolphins could be the very least of my problems.
If this Oceanid managed to dredge up some nightmarish creature of the deep I’d have giant squid, great whites, whales…the list was endless and not one I was sufficiently familiar with either. It would have been helpful to have some first-hand experience in animal behaviour, the information I’d so eagerly gleaned from nature programmes leaving me ill-equipped to deal with the reality of the situation. Could they smell, could they see spiritus, would they respond to me as they responded to the raggedly dressed wild man that darted beside them?
I lay as still as possible, watching as one of the dolphins turned its head towards me and began to break formation. A series of sharp sounds from the “herder” had it turning back into the formation with a resigned exhaustion that made me angry over the captivity it was obviously forced into.
Several dolphin patrols had me pinned to the sea floor for the rest of the day. I managed to move only another metre up the steepening sand bank, each movement minuscule and gut-wrenchingly tense.
I’d eventually decided to wait out the sunlight and use the cover of dark to edge up to the top of the ridge of sand that seemed to rim the darker water ahead of me. The water was a dusky deep blue, the last of the sun’s rays having tinted the ocean in violet and shimmering pink as it gave up the day to the insistent night.
I waited until the last dolphin patrol had faded into the shadowed water before using the swirl of their aftercurrent to swim up the graded sand and peer nervously over the edge.
At first I couldn’t see anything but the rich black blue of the very very deep. I’d been staring into the abyss for a few moments when a blast of blisteringly hot water shot up beside me, the water around it hissing and popping as I flung myself away from it, the skin on the right side of my body singed and stinging.
I’d been lying on my back dazed for a few moments when the same sound burst into the water on my left. I cringed away from the sound, curling into a ball and waiting for the scalding I felt sure was coming. Nothing happened for a few moments and then the sound repeated itself on my right again, the water warming perceptibly as it did so.
I straightened and turned towards the left. The heated water wavered as it shot for the surface in a steady blast before repeating itself on the right.
A National Geographic I’d watched on underwater geysers leapt into my mind. I began to count between each blast of water, finding that each one performed exactly on cue. I moved forward quickly after the right one had gone off, counting as I did so and using the time to try to find other tell-tale blasts of heat.
It took me a while to map out the geyser field and work out the timing for each one but by the time the faint glow of the moon had begun to glitter on the skin of the sea I was ready.
Taking a deep breath I began my choppy and terrified navigation of the natural minefield. Whether I moved or stayed still each action held a weighted risk that carried horrible results if I got it wrong.
I’d just managed to swim across the last geyser when the sand fell away in a shaft of black unadorned rock. Knowing the blast of bubbling water was about to explode out of the earth behind me, I drifted off the edge allowing my weight to pull me slowly into the gloom as I sank into the unknown darkness.
The first sign of danger was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. It shimmered in brilliant shades of turquoise as a billion tiny sea voices muttered and chirped to each other, a swarm of bioluminescent plankton discussing their existence amongst themselves.
I watched them well up from the deep where they’d been hiding for the day, the cloud spreading out in a florescent blanket that showed the perfectly circular shape of the not-so-dormant volcano I was in.
I was so enthralled by the spectacle I didn’t think about the consequences of so much food until the mutterings of the plankton turned shrill with panic and dark holes began to form in the blanket of light. Occasionally I’d see the shape of fish backlit by their prey as they gulped bellyfuls of food.
The plankton continued to swarm towards the surface, the water filling with the sickening flavour of fear and death as they moved over me. I looked down to find them all over me, destroying my disguise as they lit up my outline like a beacon. I scanned the rock face that swept away from me, expecting at any moment a pod of triumphant Oceanids to appear.
It was only much later that I realised why they didn’t need to patrol Ferengren at night. Far greater dangers lurked in the depths.
The first of the giants swept past me in a swirl of plankton, huge wings pumping at the water and narrowly missing me as enormous manta rays, metres wide, swooped into the feeding frenzy, scooping up the plankton and leaving large swathes of black water where their light had been.
They fed for a surprisingly short time until they turned their massive heads to the surface and flew in elegant wing beats over the top of the volcano and away.
I’d just watched the last one slip over the edge when something very big swirled the glittering water as it swept past me. It moved in fits and starts and swirled around the edge of the volcano frighteningly quickly. Within minutes it was approaching me again.
I flattened myself against the rock as much as I could and watched in fascinated horror as it slowed. A huge black eye regarded me coldly from within a volume of red flesh that was far wider than the length of my body and expanded rapidly as I watched. A jet of swirling water sent it skimming away from me at an incredible pace. Its tentacles trailed behind it, one of them curling and searching the water before reaching out lazily and wrapping experimentally around my thigh before whipping away.
My leg burned where its cold flesh had touched mine and within moments I could smell blood.
In the glow from the plankton I could see several puncture marks mid-thigh where the octopus or squid, I wasn’t sure what type of creature could get that big, had touched me.
Clamping my hand over the wound I searched for somewhere to hide. The rock face formed an impenetrable wall around the circumference of the volcano. The only escape was up or down and both routes were filled with water I was sure the creature could move through faster than I could.
I couldn’t see it any more, so I followed the perimeter of the volcano searching for the pinkish glow that had surrounded it. There was nothing. Perhaps I was too big for it to eat and it had found some other prey. The thought seemed more hopeful than likely.
The absence of colour and light directly in front of me expanded rapidly until suddenly a cloud of blindingly bright luminescent ink stunned me momentarily. Imm
ediately several tentacles snaked towards me through the day-bright water.
Sound filled the space around me with a series of booming clicks that seemed to reverberate around the volcano and echo through the water. The combination of speed and light and sound was overwhelming as I watched the creature attack. The bite of a tentacle as it wrapped, snake-like, around my waist shook me from my shock. I grabbed at it, pulling with all my might as it curled in on itself and drew me towards the red-tinged black just beyond the still fading light it had injected into the water.
Desperately focusing my mind on strength I yanked at the tentacle again, this time managing to pull it from my waist just in time for another to wrap more firmly around my hips and a third to encircle my arm.
I screamed then, ineffectual blasts of sound that no one could hear and would do nothing to deter the hunter from making me its prey.
I was trying to loosen my arms from its painfully determined grip to make a ball of energy when I felt rather than saw the creature’s demise. A brief shudder of horror and fear rippled through its tentacles and was cut short as it stopped pulling me towards its mouth and released me instead, before it abruptly disappeared in a swirl of water.
The unmistakeable silhouette of a whale against the still luminescent water was macabrely marred by the wavering tentacles of the creatures in its mouth as it dove into the blackness of the depths.
I was horribly aware that where there was one hunter there was likely to be others, and if the whale ate creatures that big, I would be just as tasty a snack.
The realisation that I was helpless and very much alone solidified my impending death in my mind, because whether I swam out of the volcano or deeper into its belly, predators lurked everywhere and I was badly injured.
I was angry with myself, unable to make peace with the death I knew was coming, unable to say goodbye to Merrick and my family, unable to give up the responsibility I’d been given to help the Oceanids. My defiance seeped methodically away from me as I drifted in a cloud of pain and disappointment and the smell of my own blood as it filled the water around me.
Fire (The Mermaid Legacy - Book 2) Page 3