Underwater

by Brooke Moss

  Something flashed in his eyes, but flickered out when he nodded. Yes. He’s being held in the same place as me.

  “Is he being bound like you? Is he hurt?”

  Ian’s jaw twitched. He isn’t bound, but he’s being watched all the time. He’s been hurt a few times, because he keeps trying to escape. To come here.

  A small, anguished cry escaped from the back of my throat, and I slapped a hand over my mouth. “Tell him to behave and do as they say, so he won’t get into anymore trouble.”

  I will. He tightened his grip on my hand. But you don’t understand these people. They’re unlike anything I’ve ever seen. They reign over the Mer like tyrants, using brute force to keep them in line. The clan members are terrified of them. I’ve heard them talking. They’ve torn people limb from limb, starved people, and sacrificed them to the—

  “Luna! Are you talking to someone? Is that Ian?” Evey’s voice interrupted him as she charged toward the dock, her blonde hair whipping her in the face.

  Ignoring my sister, I widened my eyes at Ian. “What? They sacrifice them to what?”

  I don’t know. But it’s something big, and they’re all terrified of it. Even the Council.

  “Is Ian down there?” This time it was Hayden’s voice ringing from above. I could hear their feet thumping on the boardwalk.

  Is that my brother? Releasing my hand, he looked down again. When his face jerked back up, his eyes were as wide as half dollars and all of the color had drained from his face. Go!

  “What?” I tried to clutch his fingers, but he slipped away.

  They’re here. Don’t let my brother see me. They’re here!

  Ice flooded my veins. I sat back upright and put my hands out to stop Evey and Hayden. “Stop!” I cried. “Don’t move!”

  Glancing down at Ian, his huge eyes locked on mine as he melted away from me. I could hear the ferocious cries of the angered Mer approaching and held my breath. Go, Luna! A flash of arms and fins came out of nowhere, tackling him with a muted thunder. Get out of here now!

  I turned my body and began dragging myself away from the edge of the dock, half crying, half shrieking. “It’s too late.” I was sputtering, grasping at the footrest on my chair and jerking it toward me. “He’s gone…they’ve taken him back.”

  Chapter Twenty

  I stared at the stars through my window and drew a shuddering breath.

  It made my whole body ache knowing that Saxon was down there, suffering, because of me. I’d exhausted myself trying to think of a way around the Mer law, and time after time, I’d come up empty-handed. It felt as if the only option I had left was to surrender myself.

  I’d thought about drowning before.

  Right after my accident, when I wasn’t sure if I’d ever be able to put on my own pants again, much less swim, I thought about flopping out of my chair into the darkened waters of Pend Oreille. Then letting myself sink to the bottom. Then I wouldn’t be a burden to my family. A burden to my friends. Or a burden to myself. But every single time I’d toyed with those dark thoughts, I’d chickened out.

  Now I was healthier and happier and had a list of reasons why living was what I wanted and needed to do. Especially now. For the first time in two years, I felt pretty. I felt desirable. I felt like the teenager I’d been before the accident…maybe even better. Well, except the fact that someone was going to die because of me.

  Flopping onto my side, I tugged my blankets tighter around me. My room was dark and sad, with the shadows from my desk and wheelchair casting dark splotches onto the walls. I couldn’t believe I was toying with these ideas again. I didn’t want to die, for hell’s sake. I just wanted Saxon to live.

  I heard the waves splashing against the rocks below the house and shuddered. Maybe being altered wasn’t such a bad idea. After all, I was more mobile in the water than I was when I was on land. Maybe once I became a Mer, I would feel like I had a whole body again. Sure…half of it would be a tail, but anything was better than two puny legs that didn’t even work.

  Evey and Declan’s faces flashed in my mind. Leaving them to become a Mer would be ten thousand times worse than just running away with Saxon on land. If I became Mer, coming home for visits with the old family wouldn’t be an option at all. Not unless I wanted to suffocate or give away the existence of Mer to my parents. Neither of which were viable options.

  I whacked my pillow a few times, trying to find a comfortable position. There was a dull ache in my chest, and I rubbed at it absently. How far was I willing to go to save Saxon? Was I willing to give up my human life to save him?

  The dull ache increased, and I choked on a sob. I was. I really was. I guess this was what real love felt like. Suddenly I cared about someone else’s life more than my own.

  Evey poked her head into my bedroom, her blonde hair shining in the moonlight filtering through my open blinds. “Are you awake?” She was shivering. “Why is your window open?”

  I pulled my bedspread up over my shoulders. “Just hoping, I guess.”

  A knowing frown pulled the corners of my sister’s mouth tight. “Got it.” She crawled under the covers next to me. “Do you think he’ll come tonight?”

  I shook my head slowly. “Not really. Ian said they’re watching him pretty closely. And that he’s getting the crap kicked out of him when he tries to come back here.”

  “Oh.” The quiet despair in her voice mirrored my own.

  “Tell me about it.” I stared up at the ceiling. “I told Ian to tell Saxon to stay put. Just do what they say until he can offer his alternative. You know, to killing him.”

  Evey nodded. “Good. Do you…do you think they’ll listen to him?”

  “I honestly don’t know.” Squeezing my eyes shut, I reminded myself not to fall apart. I missed Saxon so much my insides literally ached.

  “What will happen if they refuse?”

  “He’ll run away…if he can escape.” I kept my eyes shut and tried to breathe steadily. In and out. In and out.

  She dropped her voice low. “Will you go with him?”

  Turning my head, I looked into my sister’s greenish eyes. I’d come to love her so much over the past few years. When everyone else suddenly couldn’t see me, she was the one person who never left my side. For two years we’d been inseparable, and now I was contemplating abandoning her. It hurt my heart as much as worrying about Saxon did.

  “Yes,” I said carefully.

  She didn’t look surprised. She blinked a few times, but no argument came from her mouth. We lay there in the darkness for a few minutes, the faint sound of the lake lapping on the rocks below the house filling my ears.

  A few months ago, life had been so simple. Boring? Yes. Mind-numbingly mundane? Yes. But it was safe. Now? Not so much. I slid closer to Evey and slipped my hand into hers. Her fingers squeezed mine, sending a pang straight to my heart.

  “Are you scared?” she whispered.

  “Yes.” I bit my lip. “Really scared.”

  “I am, too.” She paused. “Mom and Dad are going to get a divorce.”

  Her words socked me in the gut, and I sucked in a sharp pull of air. “Ev, no. They’re going through a rough patch, that’s all.”

  “They’ve been going through that rough patch for years. Think about it.”

  I had thought about it—more times than I could count. After all, it was my fault money was so tight, and it was my fault they were so tense. I knew that much for sure. “Once I graduate and go away to college, things will get better. They’ll have more money, and they won’t have to cart me around so much.”

  “You just said that you were going to run away with Saxon.”

  “Only if I have to.” My voice cracked. “Besides, I’m eighteen years old now. Even if I leave with Saxon, I can still go to college. Just because I’d be running away doesn’t mean I’d be living in a cave.”

  “I don’t want you to go.” She shuddered. “Not while Mom and Dad are getting ready to spit up.”

 
I pulled her even closer. “They’re not splitting up. They do this, remember? They fight and make up. Then fight and make up. You know that.”

  She shut her eyes, and a tear rolled down the side of her face and soaked into my pillow. “It’s different this time.”

  I turned to look at her. “How?”

  “I heard them in the bedroom tonight.” She made a sound that toed the line between a hiccup and a gasp. “They were fighting again.”

  I covered our laced fingers with my spare hand. “And?”

  She sniffled. “Mom’s sick of Dad ignoring her all the time. And Sad thinks Mom’s got something going on with her trainer.”

  “What?” I suddenly felt too hot under my blankets and threw an arm out to cool myself.

  “She says that working out helps her keep her mind clear, that it calms her.” She wiped her nose with the end of her sleeve. “He says that jogging and lifting weights all of the time isn’t going to take away her guilt. He says that she acts like a machine and doesn’t even attempt to connect with us kids.”

  I chewed my lip. “Sounds about right.”

  “Mom says that Dad walks around like a zombie.” She released my hand and twisted a thread from the bedspread around her finger. “She says the day we had the accident, he checked out and left the parenting to her.”

  The words stung because they were all true. My parents’ marriage was a slippery downhill slope, and I’d been watching them slide for two years. “They can do counseling. You and I can offer to watch Declan, and they can go talk to someone. They can go talk to the lady that I had to see after the accident.”

  “They don’t want to.” She wiped the tearstains off of her cheeks. “Dad’s been looking for an apartment. He says he’s moving out after your graduation. He’s leaving her. He’s leaving us.”

  I rolled onto my side and faced her. “You’re kidding me. Tell me you’re overreacting.”

  She was crying now, her face splotchy in the bluish light. “I heard them say it. They…they’re getting a divorce.”

  Pulling my sister close, I covered us both with the bedspread. My eyes filled with tears as my sister cried into my shoulder, her chest jerking in and out as she wept. I brushed her hair back from her face and sank my teeth into the inside of my cheek until I saw stars. I had to stay strong, no matter how much my world seemed to be falling apart all around me.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  “Miss Prosser, do you need something from me?”

  Blinking, I focused on my trigonometry teacher, who was standing in front of me with her hands on her hips. “Uh…sorry, Mrs. Hobert. Just zoning out.”

  “I’ll say.” She went back to pacing. “You need to focus.”

  I looked down at my empty test page and stifled a sigh. I’d been staring out the window at the tree line beyond the football field. I would have done anything for a glimpse of Saxon. Yet another night had gone by without a visit from him, proof that he’d listened to the message I sent back with Ian.

  At least I hoped.

  Anxiety roiled in my stomach, and the equations on the white test paper blurred together. I couldn’t focus for crap. Ian’s impending memorial service hung over the school like a dark cloud heavy with rain. I was pretty sure I was going to get stress-induced ulcers before prom night.

  Mrs. Hobert glanced up at the clock ticking quietly on the wall. “Kids, I’m going to run to the office. I’ll be back in two minutes.”

  We exchanged a collective glance as she skittered through the door. Things around Sandpoint High were starting to get more than a little relaxed. Hence, my teacher wandering out of a classroom filled with seniors getting ready to take their last final. As soon as the door clicked behind Mrs. Hobert’s back, heads turned and the room filled with the sound of conversations.

  My eyes immediately rolled back to the window just in time to see a speck of black at the edge of the pine trees. Gasping, I dropped my pencil and grabbed my wheels.

  Saxon. Saxon. Saxon.

  His name pounded inside my ears with every beat of my heart as I shoved myself toward the classroom door, ramming into at least three desks as I moved. The other kids watched me, open-mouthed, as my test sheet fluttered to the floor and my backpack slid off of the back of my chair with a thud. Calling a half-hearted apology over my shoulder, I jerked the door open with all of my strength and rolled through before it swung closed again.

  I was down the thirty-foot hallway in a flash, nearly knocking Mrs. Hobert off of her feet when she came out of the office.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” she called as I whizzed by.

  “Sick!” I yelled, skidding around the corner. “Gonna hurl!”

  The air in the hallway behind the gym was thick with steam from the locker room showers and carried the faint stench of sweaty socks. I pushed my wheels with all of my strength, praying Saxon would still be there when I managed to get outside and around the field.

  Saxon, Saxon, Saxon.

  He was alive. I shoved the heavy metal door open and searched the tree line, my heart skipping when I saw Saxon watching me with a hand held up in a silent wave. A relief-filled cry escaped the back of my throat, and I let the door shut right as the boys baseball coach called something from the opposite end of the hall. Ignoring him, I wheeled down the bumpy cement ramp. My eyes blurred with tears as I muscled my way across the rough parking lot to the football field.

  Saxon rocked up onto his toes, then back onto his heels as I approached. His hair was dripping, his black T-shirt had wet spots on it, and the laces on his thick boots were untied. In the bushes where he lurked, a crumpled shopping bag lay in the ferns. My arms burned from pushing my wheels as hard as I could, and when I approached the tree line, he took a step out of the bushes.

  “No!” I called, looking all around. I didn’t want him to be seen. By any of the teachers in the classrooms, who could see me as I huffed and puffed along the track…or by any members of the Council who could be lurking. “Stay there. I’ll come to you!”

  He stopped, clenching his fists at his side, pacing in the thick fern. My biceps seared as I shoved my wheels—faster, faster, faster—toward the trees, bouncing on the cracked cement edge of the track. A lump formed in my throat, making it hard to suck in oxygen as I crossed the last six feet of patchy grass to the tree line.

  Saxon, Saxon, Saxon.

  My heart hammered through my chest from the inside. He wasn’t in the best shape, either. The cut above his eyebrow looked to be in desperate need of some air so it could congeal. The skin around it was puffy and sagging like chicken skin hanging off of the bone before my mom put it into the pan to fry. The bruise below his left eye cast a purplish green shadow down his cheek.

  Saxon dropped to his knees when I released my wheels and rolled to a stop. Gasping, we crashed into each other, his arms enveloping me and filling my body with their all-too-familiar warmth, our lips pressing together. Without even stopping to ask if it was OK—which, of course, it was—Saxon lifted me up with one arm around my waist, my legs dangling as I pressed my face against the side of his neck to draw in his scent. He carried me back into the thicket, dragging my chair out of sight, letting the pine tree branches snap closed like a hinged door behind us.

  Once we were out of view, Saxon sat down on the soft ground, bringing me to rest in between his bent knees, with my back against his chest. Winding both his arms around my middle, he pressed kiss after kiss on my temple. I was so afraid I wouldn’t see you before I had to go back. I don’t have much time.

  I wiped my eyes and released a long, guttural sigh. “I’ve been so scared. I saw Ian. Did he tell you?”

  Saxon nodded. He said you wanted me to stop fighting the Council so I wouldn’t get hurt.

  “Which you obviously didn’t listen to.” I shifted my body so I could look at him. “Your face…what happened to you?”

  Saxon’s aquamarine eyes flashed, and anger brewed just below his surface. I just wanted to tell you I was OK. T
hey wouldn’t let me leave.

  I fingered the reddened skin next to the cut, making him hiss. “So they decked you instead?”

  Decked me? He pinched his eyebrows closely together.

  “They punched you in the face to keep you from leaving?” Pulling a piece of crumpled napkin out of my pocket, I used the corner to dab at some blood.

  A vein in Saxon’s neck bulged. I was shifting, and they didn’t believe me. It’d been over a day since I’d shifted, and I couldn’t control it anymore. They thought I was coming to see you, so they…restrained me.

  “Sax, you could have drowned! You’ve got to get away from these monsters. They’re going to kill you.” I raised my voice, and he pressed a finger to my lips.

  The teachers will hear you, and come looking. I nodded, pressing my lips together tightly, and Saxon tried to smile. The sentiment didn’t quite make it to his eyes. They’re trying to do the right thing. They think they’re protecting me from myself.

  “That’s nuts.” I closed my eyes. Until a few months ago, nothing got through my hard candy shell, and now I spent most of my time either crying or worrying myself into a total freakout. I needed to get my grip back.

  It’s not just me they think they’re protecting. He lifted his hand and tucked my hair behind one of my ears. He touched my skin, leaving a trail of sparks.

  I’d missed these simple, innocent touches so much. It wasn’t as if my time with Saxon was spent ripping our clothes off in a horny frenzy. Every movement, every brush of his fingers across my knuckles, or his knee brushing my leg when we sat close together, solidified the fact that we loved each other and that this was something bigger and more permanent than anything I’d experienced before.

  “You’re not hurting anybody by being here with me. Besides, they want you to drown me. What do they think they’re protecting me from?”

  They’re protecting all the other Mer. From me.

  “They’re crazy.” I clenched my jaw. “You’re not a threat to them. The Council is. Look at your face.”