by J. L. Imhoff
“Isn’t there a way to avoid them?”
“Hunters are plentiful—the most dangerous of all being humans as they are prone to killing indiscriminately rather than due to hunger. But, yes, we do have ways of avoiding them, though nothing is full-proof. We have a smaller, secure netted-dome to keep the larger predators out—it’s safe for us to swim there. For our health, we need to swim frequently. Every day is best, but you could possibly go several days will no ill effects.”
“Also, if we have to go out of either dome, we have a tool we take with us that emits a disturbing frequency, encouraging certain predators to choose another meal. Do not fear sea creatures, you’re one of them now. There’s a natural and delicate balance to respecting life, one you will more fully grasp over time. But… again, there is no guarantee of safety. Learning to outwit your enemies is your first defense. Strength and agility, second.”
“Roman said we would die if we were out of the sea for an extended period of time.”
She nodded, a barely perceptible movement, but didn’t elaborate.
Her lack of concern bothered me, and my shoulders tensed accordingly. I cleared my throat in an attempt to give myself a moment of composure. “Roman and Lucas both mentioned this Mer thing.” Saying it made me giggle and I nervously tugged on a lock of my hair. I was still in disbelief.
Again, answered with only the barest of nods.
Determined to get her to elaborate, I pressed, “But you guys all have legs. And when I breathed air, I regained my legs.”
“We have legs when we are out of seawater, breathing air and not water. The seawater has special minerals and elements, which trigger the transformation. It has to pass through your gills in order for your body to change. Some among us, the more powerful ones, have evolved with the ability to change at will,” she said.
“You mean some kind of shape-shifter? And that’s why I can shower and not transform into a… Mer—it has to be seawater.”
Back to the nod. Does she think I already know this stuff? Or that it’s not important for me to understand?
Ok, try another subject. “A netted dome, what’s that?”
“You’ll see later.”
“Will I be given one of those tools to keep sharks away when swimming out in the ocean?”
“Predators,” she corrected, “and when we feel you’re ready.” Walking to a new set of rooms, she still maintained her cool aloofness about the daunting threats they lived with.
I followed her with my jaw set square, wearing no expression to give away my impatience. Just go with it.
“This area is for weaponry training,” she waved her hand out.
Surprise brought me out of my pout. My brain had formed the impression these were a passive and peaceful people.
Lily must have noted my surprise. “This is a newer practice for us, but we have found it necessary to train ourselves in various forms of combat. With the increase in human population, the world has grown more brutal. It’s an unfortunate reality.”
“You use it enough to need this kind of intense training?”
“We need to be prepared for anything. As I’ve said, you have much to learn.”
I turned my attention back to the activity in the rooms in front of me. Inside the first room was Roman. My heart traitorously skipped a beat at the sight of him.
He wielded a sword effortlessly, instructing five people. As we drew closer, my mouth fell open in shock, and then I snapped it shut, remembering some tact.
Roman was mouthwateringly beautiful as he moved, so much more than handsome. Why hadn’t I noticed before? Now in a different setting and light, details about him, which had escaped me before, made themselves known. Is it because my sight works better now? My eyes traveled over his bronzed body, taking in every visible detail.
Muscles rippled underneath a short, black, and well-worn wrap, showing off a generous amount of his toned thighs. Knee-high leather boots scuffed against the soft flooring. Where did he learn to dress? The Middle Ages?
Scars crisscrossed his bare chest. When he moved closer to us, he flipped his long, dark brown hair from his face. A scar crossed his face on the left side, from his temple to the bottom of his cheek, standing out from his bearded stubble. His hair had hidden the scar in our previous encounters. The darkness of the cave, and my poor eyesight, hadn’t helped.
What happened to him? How come he didn’t heal himself the way he did me?
He spun around and around, nearly dancing with his sword, as if it was an extension of him, his muscles bunching and elongating as he turned. The brutal look on his face was enough to scare anyone into submission.
Roman must have sensed me staring, as he stopped mid-turn, holding his sword above his head.
I held my breath as our eyes met.
He didn’t move a muscle or utter a word, confidence brimming from every pore of his body. Finally, he turned, fully facing the doorway we were standing in. The movement sent a jolt of desire straight to my loins.
What is wrong with me?
A slow and mischievous smile crept across his face. I broke the tension, bowed my eyes, and blushed.
“Roman instructs all weaponry training. This class is called Sword Form,” Lily said. “He is gifted.”
“I can see that,” I muttered.
He sank his sword into the rubbery clay floor between his legs, embedding the tip. His eyes licked me up and down, lingering on my body for an eternity.
My heart hammered fiercely inside my chest, understanding he was a predator and I was prey.
“She didn’t run away today?” He turned his attention to Lily, not speaking to me.
I hated to be spoken about in the third person, treating me as though I was invisible. It was a huge pet peeve of mine.
“Because I’m tired of playing fetch with this one,” he continued.
“She’ll be joining your training today. Take it easy on her,” Lily admonished.
Today? My eyes widened in fear. I had no grace or strength to do this. No way. He will rip me apart.
His eyes locked with mine. “She will, will she? She’s puny. She won’t last a week.”
Good job. Intimidated to infuriated in two heartbeats.
Anger crept up my neck, and I blurted, “Don’t speak about me as if I’m not standing right here. If an ogre in a skirt can do it, I’m sure I can. And why are you wearing a skirt anyway?” I bit my tongue, stopping myself from saying more. Defiantly meeting his eyes, not showing weakness, even though I’d made a fool of myself. Don’t let him know you think that.
He stared at me and then laughed a deep hearty belly laugh. “It’s for easy access, my dear.”
Heat coursed through me as I stood there, at a loss for words, distracted by my body’s raging desire.
He then turned back to his class and resumed his instruction, ignoring us.
Lily nudged my hand to lead me out, but before we were out of eyeshot, I glanced back at Roman. Probably sensing my gaze, he peeked back at me out of the corner of his eye and winked.
Great. Now I looked stupid and trivial. I usually filtered those sorts of ramblings before I said them.
Lily led me back to the first room and we sat in on a meditation class. After, we did yoga and stretched before lunch. My muscles ached and I ambled after her. It was busy, but a good day, until she dropped me off in Roman’s class and left.
Roman stalked around the sword training room, barking orders at people. My mind devilishly wandered back to our encounter in the cave, remembering my fantasies. His head whipped around and caught me staring at him, causing my breath to hitch in my throat. I don’t want to be here. He makes me feel… angry with myself for being attracted to him.
I hadn’t thought I missed him, but my body told me otherwise. A new surge of heat crept up into my belly, and I turned my head to focus on something else. What is wrong with me?
“Don’t stand there. Get to work,” he commanded, the sweat glistening off his broad shoulde
rs.
Embarrassed, I walked across the room, and examined the swords leaning up against the wall. Unable to maintain a clear thought with him so near, I pretended to know what he wanted me to do.
While I stood there dumbfounded, he stalked over and placed a sword into my hand. It was so heavy I couldn’t lift it off the floor, yet he spouted orders at me, instructing me to assume a form I was unfamiliar with.
Lost and overwhelmed, I tried my best to follow along. Roman didn’t say a word about our encounter in the cave, ignoring me except to bark in my direction. My anger and frustration grew until I was ready to explode. He then put me in a corner, cut off from the rest of the students.
“You’re disrupting my class,” he scolded, in a hushed voice.
“Excuse me, Lily put me in here, I didn’t ask to attend,” I retorted, feeling mortified and angry.
“I think you need a toy sword to play with. The real thing is too much for you.” He replaced my sword with a small plastic one. “This is what my weak students use. Now, do the move I showed you.”
Resisting the urge to smack the crap out of him, I grew angrier, but determined not to give him anything to make this experience worse. Reluctantly, I took the toy sword and did as he demonstrated, perfectly.
“Again,” he bellowed as he paced back and forth, while the whole class stopped and gawked.
Grinding my teeth, I repeated the move. I don’t deserve this treatment.
“Again,” he repeated.
You have to be kidding me.
“Again. Again, again, again, again.”
Even though I did it perfect every time, he refused to acknowledge my success, nor show me anything new. I’m on the verge of losing it—I’m going to explode if I don’t get out of here.
“Again, I said,” he ordered.
“No. I don’t see the point of this move other than to embarrass me. I’ve had it,” I fumed, threw the toy down, storming out the door and through the common area.
Chapter 10
I wandered aimlessly in the gardens, stopping at a semi-circle, littered with stone benches, near the edge of the dome.
Desperate to evaporate my anger and frustration by soaking in the lush beauty, I did a few deep breathing techniques. The aroma of the flowers had an intoxicating effect and my irritation melted away.
Lily approached from across the yard. “I thought I might find you here. Don’t be so hard on yourself—it’s your first day training. All will come in time,” she consoled as she drew near.
So you keep saying. Resembling a caged animal, I marched back and forth in front of the dome. “Roman is the one being hard on me, not me.”
“Roman is simply challenging you, pushing you to test your boundaries. He rather enjoys it, I think,” she responded, smiling. “You two have something in common, so you should get along well.”
Lily observed my pacing, remaining calm and happy. Her joyful mood had an effect on me and more of my irritation vanished.
“What could we possibly have in common?” I quipped, stopping in front of her, genuinely perplexed at the comment.
“Your anger—it’ll poison you. You must learn to let go and forgive, or rage becomes a disease that will consume your body and mind.”
Anger? Forgive? “I cherish my anger. It keeps me warm at night.”
“Roman’s anger has kept him from fully integrating into our Connective. He’s stuck in between. It’s not a good way to live down here.”
Whatever. Turning to face the dome, I became spellbound by the magnificence of hundreds of fish happily swimming along, oblivious to me. In fascination, I stared out into the ocean. Gently, I traced my fingers along its surface, feeling the texture. How does it stay in form? How come it doesn’t jump out at me now, suck me through, and spit me out like it did before?
Lily walked over to where I stood, took my hand, and pressed it firmly against the dome. The substance pulsed under my fingertips. After how it pulled me through the other day, I had the urge to take my hand away, but Lily held it there. Despite the contact, it didn’t reach out for us and throw us through to the other side. Why? What is it made of and how does it keep all the water out?
“The dome handles the pressure of the ocean on top of us. It’s porous—oxygen diffuses across the membrane, so we can breathe. The netted, or swimming, dome is in the same material, but the design is different,” she informed, flattening my palm into the gel of the dome no more than a quarter of an inch. It gave way, and absorbed my hand.
“Does the netted dome keep out the sharks?”
“There are openings so only smaller species can enter. It keeps out larger predators, giving us a safe place to swim. An effective and non-violent way we’ve learned to live in harmony.”
Relaxing my hand, I observed, “It feels alive. Why do I think that?” I wiggled my fingers around. The material moved slowly, but didn’t pull at me.
“It’s organic in nature. No substance could handle the pressure of the ocean at these depths, other than something which lives in it, and grows.” She let go of my hand and removed hers.
Resistant to removing my hand from the dome, I inspected the texture a while longer. The dome hummed the way a cat would purr—apparently loving my touch.
Satisfied with my exploration, I pulled my hand out. “There’s no residue.” I examined the front and back of my palm.
“The dome absorbs all excess moisture,” she explained.
“Yeah, I noticed that when Roman brought me back through the dome, after the attack.” In the distance, I saw my dolphin friend approaching and smiled. She swam back and forth in front of the dome as if she wanted me to join her.
Lily watched her antics. “The feeling of the Connective is much stronger in the water. You’ll feel the innocence of every creature—when you’re integrated, of course.”
“Do you speak with fish?”
“We converse, but they don’t think exactly as we do. Their thought processes are more images and emotions. When you learn to interpret it, you will know how to communicate with them.”
“I think I got a taste of that.”
“You did? Please describe,” she said, tilting her head toward me in a curious way.
“Well, when I fell through the dome and transformed, that same dolphin swam up to me. When I touched her, I sensed some odd emotions, but when I removed my hand, the sensation went away.”
“She connected with you. That’s interesting you were able to communicate already. It’s unexpected, but I guess it’s why she helped you. She sensed your desire to leave.”
“Why is it unexpected?”
“You’re not integrated into our Connective. I’m surprised you’ve experienced this ability so soon.” She brought her brows together.
“Why doesn’t the dome spit me through? Like it did before?”
“It senses what your true intentions are—that you truly do not wish to leave us.”
Stunned, I stared at Lily. When exactly did I change my mind?
“I don’t know exactly when, but sometime after you learned you were a Mer. Perhaps Roman said something to change your mind,” she speculated, glancing back at the dolphin as it swam away.
“What did you say?” I tested, turning to face her.
“I said, perhaps Roman had an influence on your change of heart.”
“No—you said, ‘I don’t know exactly when, but sometime after you learned you were a Mer.’”
“I did say that. In response to your question of ‘When exactly did I change my mind?’” she acknowledged, as her eyes darted back and forth.
“I… didn’t say it… out loud.” My throat tightened. How? Wait—no. The Connective?
“Of course you did,” she said, her voice revealing her uncertainty. Lily walked over and sat down on one of the stone benches. Leaning forward, she put her elbows on her knees, staring at the ground.
“No, I’m sure I didn’t say it aloud. How did you know?” The irritation from my session wi
th Roman resurfaced and I rubbed the back of my neck.
“You… project your thoughts,” she revealed, carefully looking back up at me.
“I do what?” I shouted, squaring my hands on my hips.
“You project… your thoughts,” she repeated, concern and then confusion, evident on her face.
“You can hear my thoughts?” I crossed my arms over my chest while tightly bunching my fists.
“I can—I’m sorry. It never occurred to me you didn’t know. I thought you understood from our conversation about our Connective.”
I closed the distance between us while indicating the bumps on my arms and the covering over my hand. “I thought this… sensory dampener protected me from that. Can you hear… everything?” I whispered, closing my eyes and counting to ten in my head.
Returning to pacing, I tried to recall everything I had thought over the last few days.
“Only what you project.” Lily patted the space on the bench beside her. She lowered her voice, “When you think in the form of speech.”
“How long?” I asked, feeling mortified while stepping toward where she sat on the bench.
“Since… you woke up.”
“Today?” I sat down next to her, calming myself.
“Since you woke up in the Healing Center from your coma.” Reassuringly, she placed her hand on my shoulder.
“Can everyone hear my thoughts?” Humiliated, I covered my face with my hands.
“Only if they are close enough physically to you.”
Oh, shit—Roman. How will I ever face him again?
“Is that how it works? This Connective? What, can no one do anything without everyone knowing? Not even have sex, or… or… or a bad day? Will all my mistakes, experiences, and internal dialogue be broadcast around the city for everyone to know?” I asked, waving my hands around. Shakily, I rubbed my temples and forehead with my palm. Breathe.
“It’s not broadcast in the way you mean.” She patted my back.