by Sarah Porter
When Luce tried again, the death song came back, and it was even more beautiful, even fiercer with tenderness and hunger, than ever before. Luce was ready to cry from sheer frustration, and suddenly she was tempted to give up. She'd almost discovered a new song, but then she'd immediately lost it again. She swam disconsolately back to the main cave.
Luce drifted in the smooth green water near the cave's floor, watching the blue medusas pulsing their way along. It seemed like the cave was empty, even though the rain was still splattering down outside. The others must have gone out to get something to eat, and Luce rolled deep underwater, glad that no one was there to notice her depression.
Then she heard something, and realized she wasn't alone. A single high, piercing note sustained for a terribly long time and then an endless fall ... Except the voice singing was thin and tinny, and the notes didn't fall in quite the right away. Luce was bewildered, and then she understood. It was Samantha. Samantha was doing her best to copy Luce’s song!
Luce had never liked Samantha much, but now that she heard her own song thinned and mangled this way she actively detested her. Samantha made the song seem so feeble, so worthless! The emotion in it was ridiculous. It didn’t promise forgiveness anymore; it didn’t promise that everything lost would be restored. Instead, at best, it gave you the kind of feeling you might get from a stranger asking to take your picture or maybe from seeing yourself in the background on TV. You would be flattered, and the weaker kinds of humans might be enchanted for a while, but the feeling definitely wasn’t worth dying for! Luce let out a single, hard laugh of pure contempt. The song above stopped abruptly, with a kind of gagging sound.
Luce’s contempt turned into embarrassment. It was pointlessly cruel to humiliate Samantha for her singing when everyone already knew Luce was so much better than her, the second-best singer in the tribe. Luce slipped carefully back out through the entrance, hoping Samantha hadn’t realized who had laughed at her.
***
Luce found all of them at what she thought of now as the dining beach. The rain had finally stopped, and Catarina was talking closely with Jenna, which, Luce realized, was happening more and more often. Luce had the sudden miserable thought that she was too young for Catarina really to consider her a friend. Catarina had simply been through too much; she might feel protective of Luce, she might regard her with a slightly condescending affection, but she couldn't possibly think of her as an equal. It was only Luce's singing that had made Catarina respect her at all.
Luce was even more hurt when she realized that Catarina was talking about her first tribe, one that lived on the Russian coast. She had never mentioned a word about it to Luce.
"The queen was Marina,” Catarina was saying. "She was crazy, but so brave ... She'd take on any kind of ship. Things I would never dream of trying now ... Once we made two container ships crash into each other in a storm, far out at sea, and some of the humans managed to escape in lifeboats. We were up all night hunting down the survivors. It was madness!” Even though Catarina's words were critical, her eyes were shining from the memory. "One man—I don't know how he managed to resist her. Marina was a singer like no one I've ever heard; her voice could swallow a ship whole. But he held out, so three of us shot up from beneath his lifeboat and capsized it. Marina pulled him under herself.” Luce couldn't help feeling dismayed by the story, but Jenna was laughing. No wonder those two had become such good friends, Luce thought bitterly. Jenna shared Catarina's ferocity, her rage at humans. Luce had been surprised to discover that even Dana was excited by the thought of sinking ships; she agreed that humans deserved it. After all, they'd left fourteen orphans alone with a homicidal lunatic, and no one had done the smallest thing to protect them. Dana was eager to try singing to a ship as soon as possible, but Catarina insisted that they had to wait a while longer. Too many ships sinking soon after one another might make the humans suspicious.
"What happened to her?” Luce asked hesitantly. "To Marina?” Catarina suddenly turned somber and stared down, and Jenna glared at Luce.
“She wasn’t talking to you,” Jenna snarled. “And you should know not to go around asking questions like that! Like, do you ever think that maybe there are some things Cat doesn’t want to be reminded of?”
Luce’s face turned hot, and her only comfort was the thought that Jenna couldn’t sing at all. The two new mermaids who showed signs of real talent were Dana and the fragile, skittish little blond girl, Rachel, the one who had insisted on the first day that she wasn’t crazy. Secretly Luce thought that Rachel was a little crazy. She would wake up screaming in the night, and she imagined monsters lurking everywhere they went. But her craziness gave her singing a disturbed, haunting, feverish quality different from anything Luce had ever heard before. Luce thought it might make people want to die simply by making them too terrified to remain alive.
Samantha popped up through the water, shot one furtive look at Luce, and then turned her face away, her lips compressed with resentment. Luce swam off on her own, feeling almost as lonely as she had when she was still human.
She didn’t want to be shut up in a cave, not when she was already so sad. Instead she decided to explore farther up the coast. She still hadn’t been very far from her home cave, and as long as she stayed next to the cliffs she probably wouldn’t have any trouble with orcas. She swam for half an hour, finding a few more small hidden caves with entrances on the water—too far away to be convenient, though—and eventually the cliffs dipped away, wide rocky beaches spread out along the sea, and in the distance Luce could glimpse the docks and bright fishing boats of a small village. She curled into a crevice between boulders; it was risky to come too close to a human settlement, and she'd have to be very careful not to be seen.
Anchored in the water outside the village Luce noticed an immense, shiny white yacht, and even from this distance she could see the gleam of what looked like a chrome tiller. The water made voices carry much farther than they would on land, and Luce could hear a booming man having some sort of tantrum. It sounded like he was screaming at his cook; Luce could just make out the words, "A very inferior sauce ... What do I pay you for?”
Ugh, Luce found herself thinking, humans. Still, she was relieved that the yacht was keeping a safe distance from the mermaids' cave.
By the time Luce strayed home, around twilight, she was somehow more determined than ever to master her singing. It was the only thing she had ever had that made her special, after all. She started spending more time alone, grappling with the music that lived in her, and as time went by, controlling it got just a little easier.
The days were lengthening rapidly now, and the nights were starting to dwindle. Their darkness had softened from the black of winter into the color of deepest twilight.
***
A week after Luce saw the yacht she was in the main cave with Rachel, Dana, and a few other mermaids she didn't know very well. Dana was encouraging Rachel to practice singing. “Everyone says you’re going to be really good, Rachel, but you have to keep working on it. Okay?” Rachel looked terrified, as usual, but Luce knew she worshiped Dana and wouldn’t want to disappoint her. Rachel opened her mouth. At once an enormous, devastating sound leaped out of it, metallic and savage, spinning with dark chords. Rachel threw herself backward with a splash as if she thought her own voice was an attacking lion, and then cowered and gasped. She reached to shove up her glasses, forgetting that her eyes had been perfect since her change and she didn’t wear them anymore. Luce couldn’t help smiling at Rachel’s reaction. She’d almost felt that way herself sometimes.
“Oh, Dana.” Rachel was sobbing. “I can’t! I can’t stand it! I can feel it; it wants to take me over ... Like it’s going to eat me up, from the inside...”
“I’ve had that problem, too,” Luce said gently. “I’ve been working on getting more of a hold on it. You want me to show you, Rachel?” Rachel looked over through her tears, shaking her head in alarm, but Dana was interested.
“I want to see if Rachel doesn’t,” Dana said. “ ’Cause my voice gets away from me, too. I’ve been wondering how you guys all deal.” Luce smiled, and saw that Rachel was still peering curiously.
“Just try and hold one note,” Luce suggested. “Like, it’ll put up a fight, but just hold it steady for as long as you can...” Dana tried, and at first her voice jumped away. Her song was so different from Rachel’s, lulling and warm, like being sung to sleep by the perfect mother. After a few tries Dana managed to keep her voice in one long, constant hum.
"Wow, is that hard!” Dana said at last, breaking off the note with a gasp. They hadn't moved at all, but she was out of breath from the sheer effort it had taken her to maintain control. "It is like having some kind of weird animal inside you, isn't it?”
"That's because it's magic,” Rachel whimpered, but she couldn't keep the curiosity out of her eyes as she added, "Dana, I don't like it.”
"I'm going to try that again,” Dana said after a moment. "See, Rachel, I bet it's going to be a lot more fun if it doesn't feel, I don't know, like the song is just pushing you around.” Then Dana added something unexpected. "I'm so sick of being told what to do! Jenna just keeps getting bossier, now that she's, like, second in command here.” She didn't seem to be aware of how her words affected Luce. For a second Luce found herself fantasizing about sinking another boat, a bigger one, even a container ship; everyone would see who was really second in command then! Then the implications of the fantasy sank in, and Luce felt sick with shame. How could she be so exhilarated at the idea of killing people?
"I'll try this time, too,” Rachel said. Luce was surprised, and relieved to have something to distract her from the awful thoughts that had just been crowding her mind. "Luce, how do I do it? I mean, you say to hold it. But it's way too big to hold. Like it's going to maul me...”
Luce let out a very small low note, then smiled at Rachel. "Just try to copy me, okay? I'll sing one note, really softly, and when you feel ready you can join in. Okay?”
Luce's new method made it easier for both Rachel and Dana to keep a handle on their voices. After an hour she was leading them in a run of a few notes, the beginning of a new little song she’d been practicing alone, and Rachel’s terror seemed to be leaving her. Other mermaids swam in now and then, watched for a while in disbelief, and then dove out again. Luce didn’t pay much attention. She was too absorbed now in coaxing Dana and Rachel carefully through the opening notes of Rachel’s own ferocious song; it took all of Luce’s concentration to keep the song from overwhelming all three of them.
“You see, Cat!” The voice was Samantha’s, and it was almost spitting with vindictive glee. “I told you what she’s doing! Luce is teaching them singing!”
Luce was confused, but she was even more annoyed. There was nothing in the timahk about not teaching singing, after all. But when she met Catarina’s icy gray stare Luce could see she was upset. It didn’t seem fair, and Luce braced herself to listen to a burst of irrational rage. Then she noticed something else. Catarina was furious, yes. But she was also doing her best to pretend not to be.
“What do I care?” Catarina snarled, and her rage was directed not at Luce but at Samantha. “It would be fantastic, of course, if Luce could actually succeed in teaching them anything. But all she’s doing is wasting her own time, and Dana’s...”
“She’s taught me a lot!” Rachel objected in her shrill, panicky, mouselike speaking voice. “She’s taught me a lot already! I’m not as scared to sing now. Luce, you’re not going to stop teaching me, are you?” Samantha’s face fell, and Luce felt unexpectedly warm inside.
“Really, Rachel?” Catarina asked coldly. “I suppose there could be some kind of psychological benefit.” Catarina managed to say this in a tone that suggested Rachel wouldn’t need singing lessons if she weren’t half crazy, and Rachel’s face crumpled in humiliation. Dana was looking around at everyone, and from something sly in Dana's face Luce knew she guessed all the hidden reasons Samantha and Catarina had for acting so unfriendly. Luce appreciated again just how sensitive Dana was and how clever at figuring out people's secret emotions.
"Luce is a really good teacher, Cat,” Dana said levelly. "Maybe it's a talent of hers you haven't had a chance to see before. But now you know, it would make sense to take advantage of it, right?” Catarina stared blankly into Dana's warm, round eyes. Dana's look was innocent, but Luce thought she could detect a trace of suppressed amusement. "Like, maybe Luce should start teaching everybody, right? That way you'd have a lot more help. Next time you decide to tackle a boat, I mean. Hasn't it been long enough since the last one that we could try it soon? Without making people pay too much attention?”
"I'll think about it,” Catarina snapped, and then all of Luce's happiness left her in a rush. She hadn't let herself think it through, but Dana's words forced her to recognize the truth. If she taught the other mermaids how to sing better, she'd just be helping Catarina kill more people. Once she finally discovered some new magic it might be different, but for now!
Luce turned away abruptly without even saying goodbye to Dana and Rachel, and dove.
"What's got into her now?” Samantha sneered behind her. "I swear, Luce just gets more neurotic all the time.”
There was one mermaid, Luce thought angrily, that she definitely wouldn't help in improving her singing. She swam off fast, lashing the water with quick, circling strokes of her tail until she shot out of the tunnel and dashed off through the waves, not coming up until she was a mile out. She was too upset to pay attention to where she was going, and she almost knocked her head against something white and glossy. She felt a jolt of alarm at not being able to reach air before she realized what was in her way: just a boat. She could easily slip up around the side and breathe where no one on board would be able to see her. She skimmed along the curved white underside and came up in the waves that lapped against the shiny hull. Wind wrapped her face like a scarf of cold silk.
The boat wasn’t moving. Luce knew, of course, that the people on board had no way to know how dangerous it was to anchor here. How were they supposed to guess that a mermaids’ cave was just a few minutes’ swim away? Even so, Luce felt a stab of disdain; humans could be so careless, so stupid.
“Kitten?” a man’s voice said. It was so close that Luce jumped, but then she realized it was coming through the ship’s glossy side. “Kitten, it’s really exciting to see all the wildlife here. I’m sure you’d enjoy yourself if you’d just try coming out on deck. Just for a teeny little while?” The voice was distorted by the ship, reverberating strangely in Luce’s ears, but after a second she was sure she recognized it. It was the booming man she’d heard yelling at his cook. But now he was simpering, pleading...
Whoever he’d called “kitten” didn’t answer. Luce could hear a thump, probably someone throwing themselves face downward on a bed to sulk.
These were disgusting people, Luce thought. What did she care if Catarina killed them? Then she remembered the cook, the crew. She knew a man like that wouldn’t do any of the actual work on his own yacht.
She wanted to see more. But where could she hide out in the open ocean? She couldn't allow any of these people to catch sight of her. She stared around and spotted a small motorboat that had been left tethered to the yacht at the end of a long rope. Luce dipped underwater and came up on the far side of the motorboat so she could peek up over its edge and watch while she decided what to do. She had the vague idea that she should somehow try to sneak a note to the crew, warning them to get away from here immediately. But it was a ridiculous plan, and she knew it. How could she possibly get her hands on a pen and paper?
A middle-aged woman with a white bandanna tied over her head was standing out on the deck. A girl about Luce's age in a dark blue hoodie and jeans was standing with her, her head tipped over while the woman carefully brushed her long brown hair. They were both giggling about something.
"So, okay, so you know how she never reads
anything?” The girl was shaking with impish laughter as she told the story, and the woman smiled down at her with such tenderness that Luce almost choked from envy. "So I told her that in the Narnia books Peter turns out to be a vampire, and she actually believed me! And then I said he eats Lucy at the end of Prince Caspian, and she believed that, too, so I just kept on making up crazier stuff...” Even the woman was laughing now, though she kept trying to stifle her giggles and pretend to disapprove.
"Oh, Tessa! Can't you be more careful? You know if she ever realizes you've been fooling her all this time she'll probably get me fired? I don't think she has much of a sense of humor, unless somebody hurts themselves ... Now straighten up and I'll do your braids.”
“She’s not going to figure anything out!” Tessa said confidently. “I mean, she’d have to actually read the books to realize I was lying to her, right? Even in school she just pays other kids to do her work for her. And she actually brags about it!” Tessa went off into another peal of laughter. “I just pretend to be really impressed. Like I say, 'Oh, I wish I were rich like you ...Oh, wow, there was a pony at your birthday party? I’m so sad my mom is only a cook and not an idiotic, noisome, sadistic banker like your daddy!’ And she falls for it!”
“You don’t actually use those words, though, do you?” But Tessa’s mother was still beaming, stroking Tessa’s hair as she worked it into braids.
“Okay, I wouldn’t say idiotic ...” Tessa admitted. “Even she probably knows what that is. She asked me what I meant, and I told her 'sadistic’ meant he was incredibly smart at business, and 'noisome’ meant, like, he has really, really good taste in clothes and stuff.” Her mother bent and kissed her on the cheek.
“You feral beast,” her mother said softly. “How am I supposed to finish my dissertation if I have to keep putting it aside to look for work? But honestly, that little sociopath is asking for it. Just try to be a touch more discreet from now on, all right?”