The Vicious Deep

by Zoraida Cordova

  A tiny woman wrapped about a hundred times in a deep red shawl stands at the top of a small mount. Her face is blocked by shadows and a mess of black hair. She stands and stares, tilting her head to the side as if something about me is amusing. Then she turns and walks right into a passage of trees, so it looks like the darkness swallows her.

  The ground is too littered with rocks and broken branches to take the bike. We feel our way clumsily.

  “Keep your dagger out,” Gwen whispers behind me.

  I unzip the familiar pocket of my backpack and feel for my blade. I can feel Gwen’s cool fingers reach out for my wrist, then slide down to my hand. Even on a nice summer night like this, my skin prickles.

  “Why isn’t she saying anything?”

  I shrug but then realize she can’t see me in the dark. “Maybe she’s mysterious. Aren’t oracles supposed to be mysterious?”

  “Maybe she’s not the oracle. Isn’t New York famous for crazy humans?”

  “If something is funky, you need to leave without me, okay?”

  She doesn’t respond, because I know she isn’t going to listen to me. The downward slope of the path comes as a surprise. I miss the step and slide down on my heels. My flip-flops come off, and I lose them in the dark. Gwen isn’t far behind. I land in a puddle that is part of a small pond. Tiny specks of light wriggle and laugh over my head. They’re fairies, about the length of my hand. One of them comes close and presses her whole body against the side of my face. I can feel her teeny, tiny mouth kiss me before she pulls away and hides in the hole of a gnarly tree.

  “Fairies,” Gwen says distastefully.

  I go, “Tell me how you really feel.”

  “I feel ignored,” says a raspy voice on the other end of the pond.

  The fairies gather around a white boulder beside the oracle. I can see her face, bathed in the soft fairy light. I know why she wraps herself in so many folds of cloth. She is unlike any of the merpeople I’ve met. Her face is round and wide. The wrinkles on her cheeks are like the grooves on the side of a melting taper. The whole of her eyes are black, and I shut my eyes against the memory of the black blood coming out of the merrows.

  “Does something so ugly offend the young prince?”

  I try to right myself and put on my best smile, like she’s Lourdes the lunch lady and I want some free chocolate milk. “I’m not offended.”

  The sound of the park fills her silence—the ripple of the pond, the leaves brushing against the push of the wind, fairy wings flitting faster than batting eyelashes in Van Oppen’s class, the very distant sound of cars honking. That’s it, the cars honking. It’s the only thing that reminds me I’m in the city.

  “Come closer,” she tells me.

  I step a foot in the pond. In five steps I’m in front of her.

  “You wait till I ask you to sit,” she observes.

  In truth, it’s because I’m afraid I’ll crush one of the fairies.

  “What will you give me, Tristan Hart?”

  I don’t think I’ll ever get used to people just knowing my name. I feel for the pearl in my pocket. “What will you give me in return?”

  She laughs, a raw brittle sound that reminds me of twigs breaking. “Will you tell me I’m beautiful? The other champion told me I was most beautiful.”

  “Have there been others?”

  “Just one. The golden son of the West.”

  “Dylan,” Gwen offers. She sits with a few of the fairies watching her curiously.

  I don’t think I should lie to the oracle’s face. Wouldn’t she know? Instead I say, “What if I can give you something that was taken from you?”

  She sits taller. She smooths her hair away from her face and frowns when she sees my hands are empty. “What can anyone take from me? I, who have nothing to give.”

  “You’re an oracle, though. Right?”

  She harrumphs. “In truth, I got the dregs of my sissies. The shaft, as you humans call it. But I like you. Not just because you’re young and as lovely as the calm of the sea seconds after a storm. Though you are, you are. Would you stay with me so I can look at you prettily? But no, Sea Kings cannot stay. Unlike golds and souls, you aren’t meant to stay.”

  “Stay where?”

  “Why, right where you ought to be, of course.”

  Of course. Maybe she is a crazy New Yorker after all. I reach into my pocket, and she recoils from me, almost falling off her boulder. I hold my dagger with my free hand and wave it so she can see I mean no harm. Then again, waving a dagger isn’t the universal symbol for I come in peace. “Don’t be afraid. It’s only this.” The marble-sized pearl hangs between us on its long gold chain.

  Her eyes fall on it instantly. Her hands reaches out, bony fingers like twigs in a nest waiting to catch it. I pull it away.

  “Your mother. Always the troublemaker she was.” She smacks her lips like she tastes something sweet and sticky. “Do you know what that is, boy?”

  “It’s Tristan,” I say, annoyed that she’s speaking about my mom. Oracle or not. “But you already knew that. What’s your name?”

  “That’s none of your concern.”

  “Fine. And no, I don’t know what it is. I thought it was just a necklace.”

  “Just a necklace,” the oracle says to the fairy closest to her. The fairy laughs, a thin prickly sound that reminds me of pine needles falling in a cluster. “It’s the Venus pearl. It’s only made when two clams stick together and have one baby pearly.”

  I go, “That sounds incredibly gross. Plus, I knew that. What’s so special about that?”

  “It’s the only one I’ve ever seen of its kind. And it’s rightfully mine.”

  “Finders keepers.”

  She reaches inside her red shawls, and I pray to whatever gods are out there that she’s not trying to seduce me.

  “Like I told you, I was born last. The youngest of the last generation of sea oracles.”

  If she’s the baby, I’m afraid to see what the others look like.

  “I do not have the powers of sight. Not for the past. Not for the present. Not for the future. My eyes are as blind between the veils as a human to the world.”

  I’m starting to think we’re in the wrong place.

  “And yet I can interpret the bones of the sea to the querent. That is you.” In her frail hand she holds a handful of something. They click against each other like marbles. Maybe they are bones.

  “Ask me anything.”

  “Anything?” Will I win? is at the top of my list. Will I die now? Will Layla love me? Will Nieve find me? It all seems sort of trivial when I say it to myself. When my friend is dead because of me. And for what? A piece of ancient Sea Court? An oversized fork that conducts electricity? Will I ever get my life back? Do I even want my life back? What if after the end of all of this, I screw everything up? Can my team win another championship without me? Can I rule an entire race? How many more are going to die because of me?

  “Ask me now, Master Tristan, or the time will pass!”

  Why is it that when someone wants to tell you the truth about the matter, you’d rather just not know. We want the truth, but what we really want is to be lied to, to pretend things are going to work out when they probably won’t. No one wants to hear, I don’t love you. That dress isn’t your size. You’re pregnant. The paper you worked so hard on is a C- at best. We’re better off as friends. And here she is, asking what I want to know, and all I want to do is put my fingers in my ears and wait and see what happens.

  “Tristan,” Gwen urges me.

  “I want to know if you actually have a piece of the trident.”

  She smirks and rattles the things cupped in her hands, and they click like die. She lets go, and they fall on the surface of the pond but do not move. They float around each other until they’re completely still for her to look at. “Are you sure?”

  She’d make a good poker player, good enough to even play with Mr. Santos. But then a dark shadow crosses over her featur
es. The seashells sink to the bottom of the water, and I’m no expert, but I’m pretty sure she’s not too happy about it.

  She sets her black eyes on me. “Who have you told of this place?”

  “N-no one. Why?”

  “You have been followed.”

  As she says it, my dagger heats in my hand. I turn around when I hear Gwen gasping for air. All the light fairies scuttle behind leaves and boulders, so the light is stretched out too far and the shadows grow longer.

  I don’t need light to see who followed us here. Elias’s hand holds her at the neck. Her pale fingers hold his wrist. Her eyes are open like small bursts of lighting.

  “Don’t you touch her,” I say.

  “I already am.” Elias’s voice is a growl. “She’s mine to do with as I please.”

  He steps forth, still dripping water. He’s in the same clothes I last saw him in, but the chain mail around his waist looks more rusted, his skin more green than tan.

  “This isn’t very champion-like.”

  He still isn’t looking at me. The skin around his eyes is breaking apart. The smell of rotting fish is heavy in the air, and this time I have to do something. Gwen kicks at the air as he raises her up with one arm.

  Behind me, the oracle in her red shroud is waddling away to safety. I don’t really blame her. I just wish my body didn’t feel so frozen.

  “Especially when she’d prefer a champion like me, right?” I say. The effect is instant. His face shoots sideways at me. “At least I don’t stink.”

  He turns back to Gwen slowly.

  I keep going, “You didn’t really think she’d sit around waiting for you. She needs a real merman, not a fake king who lost to a human girl.”

  He tosses Gwen to the side, and I fight the impulse to run to her and make sure she’s okay, because she isn’t moving.

  Elias charges at me, all arms and bare chest, a blurred shadow.

  “A little help, ladies,” I mumble. One of the light fairies flies around us. She pulls at his ears and kicks him, which is like getting smacked around by a Barbie doll, really. All I need is for her to stay close enough that I can see him.

  I grab his arms, dropping my dagger, and hold them above my head. He has no weapons, just brute strength. With my knee I get him right in the gut. He tenses up and clutches his stomach. He grabs at his throat, his chest, and heaves for air. I roll over him and start punching him in the face.

  I’ve only ever seen guys get into fights at school, in the park, in the middle of the street. I used to wonder what made the guy winning look so vicious. Now, with Elias’s face bloody and tender under my fists, I don’t feel any pity for him. I think of how he let everyone think he was dead, how he hurt Gwen. And in this moment, I swear to myself that I will never hurt a girl again.

  Elias stops moving. I can feel his body go limp under me.

  I can’t breathe.

  I roll over.

  Fall into the pond. The water is shallow enough that it doesn’t cover my face. The cool of the water is the best feeling against my skin. A fairy floats above my face and lands right on my nose on her little toes. Her body is a slick Thumbelina version of a perfect woman, and her hair lights up at the very tips. Huh. So it’s her hair that’s the light, not her wings. She flies to my chest and lies there, right over my heart, which feels like it’s going to tunnel right out.

  I notice Gwen standing over me. The little fairy gasps and runs away, taking the light with her. Gwen puts her head on my chest where the fairy just did, like she’s listening for my heartbeat or just looking for a pillow. I rake my shaking fingers through her hair.

  “Ouch,” she says when I hit a tangle.

  “Sorry.”

  “It’s okay. You saved me.”

  I guess I did. She sits up and stares at her ex-fiancé. I wonder what she’s thinking. Is she even a little bit sad? Is she going to hate me tomorrow?

  The oracle isn’t coming out of her hiding spot behind a small boulder.

  “It’s okay,” I call out to her. “He’s not getting up anytime soon.”

  But he does, because the next thing I feel when I sit up is arms bending me in a headlock. Motherf—

  And the voice that screeches in my ear doesn’t belong to Elias anymore. It’s the one I’ve dreamt of for days. It comes in heaves, a deep scraping thing. Something inside him gasping for air. Then I realize that the gasping sound is coming from me. I can’t breathe.

  Closer is the only word I can make out.

  Then Elias goes stiff. He falls on top of me, and I have to push with everything I have to roll him off my back. He lands sideways with my dagger in his back. Smoke fumes around the golden hilt.

  “Any further and you would’ve scratched me,” I say, crawling over to Gwen, who is holding her hands out like she’s waiting for rain. Her palms are raw and red, black in places where fire has burned her.

  “Did the dagger do that?”

  She nods once, wincing in pain. She dips her hands in the pond and shuts her eyes. The water running over her hands glows. When she pulls them out, the skin is starting to grow back, but it isn’t healed completely. “It isn’t meant to be touched by anyone but your family line.”

  “Duh, Triton’s blade.”

  “Triton’s blade, indeed.” The little voice comes out from its hiding place.

  “Thanks for the help, lady.”

  “Don’t you get smart with me.” She wags a finger in my face. “I haven’t lived as long as I have by fighting battles.” The oracle is pulling on a small wooden box with gold handles on either side. From here it looks just like a treasure chest I had when I was in my pirate phase. I used to keep baseball cards and food and a plastic sword in it. This one is solid wood. There isn’t a lock that I can see.

  “This,” she says, “opens to my touch.” She grazes her fingers along the lid, like tickling the back of a cat. The lid pops open.

  Part of me is expecting smoke and sparklers. Something a little more dramatic than this. Except it really is amazing on its own. It’s the bottom of the trident scepter. A piece of long, pointed glass that glows when I hold my hand closer to it. I grab the gold handle of the chest, and the lid swings closed. It’s much heavier than it looks.

  “Solid quartz,” she says, “from the depths of the earth.”

  It’s the same feeling I get when I hold the dagger. Like it belongs to me. I can feel a current, something more ancient than my blade, older than the ground we stand on and the trees that surround us. Still, it doesn’t look like it could do much damage.

  “It has power on its own,” says the oracle. “But it is still incomplete.”

  “I thought you could only read the bones of the sea,” I say.

  She chuckles. “Your emotions are plain on your face. You must work on that. Some of us play poker on the nights of the quarter moons. You should come. Learn something.”

  “I think I will.”

  She runs her fingers on the chest again, and this time it doesn’t open. “You won this with your strength. A king must be strong.” She holds the Venus pearl toward me. “You won this with your heart.”

  “But—you’ve been missing it for years.”

  She nods and the soft folds of her face upturn into a big smile, until even her eyes are smiling slits. “Some things have so much more power when given willingly.”

  I hold out my palm and she lets the pearl drop into my hand.

  A gagging noise comes from Elias. And this time it’s because he’s breaking apart. Poof, into nothing.

  “I think he’s been dead for days,” Gwen says.

  The oracle shakes her head. “And now you have more to worry about than putting pieces back together.”

  “Yeah, thanks.”

  “You’re welcome to stay here,” she says, which emits squeals from the little fairy girls. “But I’d think you’d want to get a move on.” She looks up to the sky, and I wonder what she sees.

  I unzip my backpack, and the chest hardly fi
ts. I pull the dagger out of Elias’s back. It comes away dripping black. I dip it in the shallow pond to clean it.

  “Let’s go, girls,” the oracle says. She takes one last look at Elias’s form. “The squirrels can have him. Won’t take long for him to dissipate. Our kind, we don’t leave many traces behind in this world.”

  After rinsing and repeating about three times, I don’t smell like rotting fish anymore.

  At least I smell like rotting fish washed in my mom’s lavender and honey shampoo. I trade my muddy backpack for a gym bag that has enough room for the treasure box, a change of clothes for the girls, clean shorts for me and Kurt, a bag of trinkets my mom thought might come in handy, a loaf of bread, peanut butter, jelly, beef jerky, and some regular old junk food.

  “I think you forgot I’m the one carrying this thing,” I tell her, opening the trunk door to the car.

  Dad’s still in the driver’s seat. The sound of the Beach Boys hits me right in the gut, familiar and distant all at once.

  “I’m not going. I can’t keep saying good-bye to you,” my mom says, pulling a sheer scarf around her shoulders. Her red hair falls like flaming waves around her, and the turquoise of her eyes glistens in the light of the street.

  “I’ll be fine. I’ve got good company.”

  Gwen sort of curtseys at my mom. She’s wearing one of Mom’s long blue dresses.

  My mom nods back at her but doesn’t say much else. She kisses my forehead. “Don’t forget, you have school on Monday.”

  “I know, I know,” I say, taking on her tone: “I didn’t become a human in this country just so you could drop out of high school.”

  She turns on her sandaled heel and marches back upstairs, where she’s going to curl up on the couch, pull out one of her fairy-tale books, and wait for my dad to come back home.

  •••

  Dad leans against the Mustang in the Coney Island parking lot. I grab the gym bag and hoist it over my shoulder.

  “I don’t have to tell you—”

  “Be careful, and don’t take candy from strange mermaids.”

  Dad shakes his head. “No, if you break another cell phone, I’m cutting you off.”