by Amber Garr
Graham’s head slammed into a boulder and he dropped to the ground. I screamed and almost ran after him. He may be a liar but he’d been trying to protect me from Lucian. Only the sound of footsteps running in my direction kept me moving forward.
“Eviana!” Lucian yelled. “You can’t get away from me this time.”
As soon he said those words, I couldn’t move my legs any more. It was as if I was sinking into the ground and being swallowed by the earth. When I looked down at my feet, I noticed that was exactly what happened.
I panicked. Drowning in the sea was one thing, but being suffocated in the earth was not a death I wanted to face. Looking over at Graham, I tried to force him awake with my mind. If Lucian had that ability, and I was his daughter, then I should too. And if Graham woke up, surely he would help me, right?
But Graham didn’t respond. In fact, I wasn’t sure if he was even alive. I struggled against the water and the ground that I was now knee deep in. Focus on the element. My water control was nowhere near Kain’s or Graham’s but I had to try.
Kain. What would Kain do? He was rational and calm and always knew what to do next. He was stable. He was the only stable part in my life and I suddenly understood how much that meant to me. I didn’t want to live a life without him in it. I don’t even know if I could.
Thinking of my friend helped give me the strength I needed. I concentrated on the water and forced the tendrils to dissipate into the earth. In another few seconds, my body rose out of the ground as the water pushed me toward the surface. I was doing it!
“Impressive,” Lucian said directly behind me. I gasped and turned around to see him standing there with a smug look on his face and a glimmer of pride in his eyes.
Someone called out my name. Lucian and I turned toward the path where I could only assume Caleb and Gregory were coming to rescue me. For the first time in the last hour, I finally felt some hope. Lucian wasn’t going to win.
“I guess that’s our cue,” he said and grabbed at my arm.
Jerking away from him, I stepped around the puddle and moved closer to the path. “I’m not going with you and my protectors will be here any moment.”
“Come!” The headache slammed back into my skull but I pushed against it. Lucian sighed in frustration and threw out his arm at me. “Fine. Sleep Eviana! Sleep now!”
An overwhelming urge to close my eyes and curl up on the ground flowed through my body. I could barely keep my eyelids opened and it was hard to focus on Lucian. The shouting from the woods got louder. I just had to hold out a little bit longer. They were almost here.
“You are as stubborn as your mother,” Lucian snarled and that brought a smile to my face.
“You can’t have me,” I said. “It’s too late.”
“It’s never too late,” he replied and barreled toward me.
I thought I saw Caleb out of the corner of my eye, but my focus stayed on Lucian. He reached behind his back and pulled out a broad sword that I couldn’t believe I hadn’t noticed earlier. The silver metal gleamed in the sunlight and the look on his face sent a wave of terror through my bones. He was going to kill me!
“I’m not going to kill you,” he said just as he slammed the hilt of the sword against the backside of my skull.
There was a moment of pain, followed by one of numbness. I began to fall to the ground not really capable of moving any other part of my body. I thought I saw someone running in slow motion into the meadow with a gun in his hand. The world looked hazy for a moment, but as soon as the fog lifted, my vision narrowed and everything went black.
Eviana
I never thought I would beg for death. It simply wasn’t my style. I was stubborn and determined, not broken and weak. When life turned against me, I fought back. I never gave up. So why was it so hard for me to open my eyes right now?
The door creaked open with a groan. A single beam of light catapulted my room into an altogether different landscape. The dark walls were highlighted enough for me to see the intricate ridges and grooves of the coral stones. Skeletons of an ancient reef surrounded me on all four sides of my prison. The irony wasn’t lost on me. I was a creature of the sea, trapped by a once living animal now reduced to nothing more than a stone. Its purpose in life stolen away the moment it was removed from its home. Just like me.
A silhouette of a small woman temporarily blocked the light and I was thrust back into darkness. I’d become accustomed to the dark. It was safe and comfortable and it matched the way I felt inside. Alone and empty.
“La sirenita?” a tiny voice called into the shadows of the room. When I didn’t answer, she opened the door wider and I threw up my arm to block the light from my eyes. “Ah, la sirenita. Ven a comer.”
She placed the plate on the floor and crouched down next to it. Holding out her hand, she beckoned me to come toward her and the fresh food, coaxing me like a stray dog.
“Venga!”
I shook my head and turned away from her. We’d been through this numerous times. She would come in, put the plate on the floor, and leave when I refused to acknowledge her existence. As if on cue, I heard her sigh and gather up the uneaten food she’d brought in a few hours earlier. My Spanish was rough, but I swear she mumbled something about me being a stupid little mermaid before slamming the door shut again.
Not long after she’d leave, another stranger would enter the room. He was much larger and smelled like he bathed in dead fish. Although he never spoke to me, I could hear him breathe as if it were difficult for him to use his nose. At first I was scared and would try to fight. But it was always a useless attempt because the moment he got close enough I would feel the prick of the syringe. Within seconds, the world blurred and I’d slip back into an endless coma of sleep and despair.
It was the only routine in my life since I’d been kidnapped by my estranged father. Estranged probably wasn’t even the right description although I just recently discovered his true identity. Words like delusional, crazy, or psychotic would be a better depiction of the man who killed my parents, my uncle, and my friends along with many others. His insane ideas and extreme behavior created a divide amongst my kind and I imagined that by now, we were officially at war with one another.
I’d been trapped in this room for days. Or at least that was my assumption. The back of my head, where my loving father had knocked me out, still ached. I hadn’t been in any water, although I sensed some nearby, so my body was unable to heal quickly.
If I could just get to the water, maybe I could escape. Maybe it would give me the desire to fight against my captors. Each time I got an injection, my will to survive seemed to fade into a haze like my surroundings. I knew I was being drugged but I couldn’t bring myself to care anymore.
When the door squeaked open again, I didn’t even bother to acknowledge the large, fish-smelling man. He was right on schedule with his syringe and when he stuck the needle into my shoulder, I felt a tear roll down my cheek. Maybe this would be the last day I had to endure.
But when I opened my eyes to find the tiny Spanish speaking lady changing out my food plate again, I realized my life wasn’t over yet. It took me a few moments before I noticed she wasn’t speaking to me, although she chattered a mile a minute. I heard the heavy breathing of the fish man who grunted in acknowledgement of her comments.
My brain forced a command through my body to sit up and turn around, but the muscles and bones didn’t want to listen. It wasn’t until the sound of the man’s feet shuffling out the door that I finally mustered up enough energy to focus on my surroundings.
The woman stood near the doorway, shifting nervously side to side while her attention darted between me and the open door. I almost laughed. It’s not like I was in any kind of shape to dash past her, but as long as she thought that way, I wouldn’t correct her.
I heard some kind of mumbling from outside and a few seconds later, the light was blocked when two figures entered the room. The woman jumped out of the way as the large man t
hrew a body toward my corner with a little too much force. It thumped and scraped against the hard coral stone causing me to wince in sympathy.
Yet what I heard next made me want to scream in frustration.
“You don’t have to be so rough, mate.” The perfect British accent sent shivers down my spine and caused my first emotional outburst since I’d been captured.
“What is he doing here?” I tried to shout, even though it came out as a whimper.
Instead of answering, the man and woman chuckled and left me behind with the one person I loathed more than my captor.
“I’m happy to see you too, tart.”
Graham. Graham Forrester was locked in this prison with me. He was a Council member, a potential suitor, and an all around traitor to his kind. His alliance with Lucian, my biological father, was what led to my capture in the first place. Despite his brief attempt to help me, the guy didn’t have a decent bone in his body.
“Don’t call me that,” I snapped, imagining the crooked grin on his face. I heard him sliding around on the floor and suddenly the adrenaline pumped through my body. “Stay away from me!”
Before he could respond, the floor began to vibrate. It shook so bad, I was forced to crabwalk backward against the far wall and huddle in the corner. Dust and coral pieces fell to the floor and ricocheted off my fragile body.
It wasn’t until I heard the scraping of stone on stone that I raised my head to see the floor literally splitting apart down the center of the room. The moment the crack appeared, I smelled the fresh salt and moisture of the ocean beneath its surface. An eerie blue light filled the darkness of my prison, allowing me to see Graham crouched on the other side of the room. If he knew what was happening, I couldn’t tell by the look on his face. His eyes were wide and his arms spread open to hold himself against the wall.
The floor slid underneath the platform at my feet for another minute. I watched in awe as the room lit up in a beautiful mixture of blue and white light that rippled across the walls and ceiling like a mirage. Several days in the dark had been torture on my psyche and this light aroused a new sense of hope inside me. I began to feel alive again.
Once the floor stopped moving, silence filled the room. Eventually, the gentle lapping of water against the stone gave way to the stillness and I closed my eyes to savor that noise. The water was such an important part of my life. Being deprived of it for so many days had literally made me want to wither away into nothing. I inched closer to the opening until Graham broke my focus.
“Do you think you should go in there?” he asked.
“Don’t talk to me,” I said, although wondering the exact same thing myself.
“It might be a trap.” Graham sighed and then slid carefully to the edge of the opening and tested the water with his hand. He moved it back and forth a couple of times before looking up at me.
When he did, I was horrified with what I saw. “Graham,” I whispered. “What did they do to you?”
His handsome face was covered in bruises and blood, and if the swelling was any indication, I think his nose was broken. The light suddenly seemed bright enough for me to notice the cuts and gashes on his forearms and hands. His skin looked pale and the dark circles under his eyes probably mirrored my own.
He glanced up at me with a smirk. “So now you care?” I stayed silent, refusing to acknowledge his snarky comment. Eventually he caved. “It seems as if Lucian’s trust in me has run its course.” Shifting so that his feet hung in the water, he leaned back, sucked in a breath, and closed his eyes. “This feels amazing.”
I was still pondering the explanation of his injuries. “Lucian did this to you?”
“Yes. Kind of.” He dropped his gaze to look directly into my eyes. “You’re surprised?”
“A little.” I moved to the edge of the opening and dangled my legs over the ledge. The warm, salty water engulfed my skin and I felt it tingle with the urge to transition. I, too, closed my eyes to briefly enjoy this sensation. I really hoped this wasn’t a trick. “I thought you were his golden boy?”
Graham laughed and rubbed his hand against the back of his neck. I heard a few vertebrate pop and tried not to watch as he cracked more of his bones.
“Apparently I’m not worthy of his attentions anymore.” He looked at me with a knowing smile.
“Because you tried to help me?”
“Because I tried to save you.”
“Lucian wouldn’t have killed me,” I said with certainty, arguing that I hadn’t required his help.
“He wasn’t thinking clearly,” Graham replied.
Just before I’d been knocked out, I remembered Lucian hurling Graham’s unconscious body at me in an attempt to stop my escape. One wrong step and I could’ve been smashed into a boulder or pulled under the earth by Lucian’s water control powers. Maybe I had underestimated my status as his illegitimate daughter.
“He tried to kill you,” I countered with more of a question than a statement.
“Yes, he did,” Graham replied solemnly.
“And that disappoints you?”
“Yes.”
“Because you were loyal to him and you delivered me right into his slimy hands.” My voice intensified and I got angrier with each word. Why was it that I couldn’t even muster the will to want to survive until they threw Graham in here with me? Apparently my energy thrived on rage.
“I didn’t deliver you,” Graham pleaded. “He wasn’t supposed to be there yet. I wanted to have a chance to explain everything and allow you to make the right decision.”
“To join your cause?” I questioned with disgust. “You guys are killing innocent people!”
“People die in war, Eviana.”
“You guys started this! No one wants to fight against their own kind.” My stomach swirled with rage and fear and even hunger. Arguing with Graham sent life surging back into my body. “He killed my parents!”
“It had to be done.”
“You killed an entire clan,” I whispered, barely able to say it out loud. I’d defended Graham against my closest advisors who accused him of capsizing a cruise ship. I never believed he would do something like that, until he betrayed me in Montana.
For whatever reason, Graham didn’t respond. Maybe he was developing a conscience or maybe he simply knew when to shut up.
“Why did they put you in here with me?” I finally asked.
He shrugged and used the water to wipe the blood from his hands and arms. “Maybe they thought you’d finish the job for them, tart.” He looked up and winked at me. I almost smiled at that thought. Almost.
“Tempting,” I said, but didn’t really mean it. I couldn’t take someone’s life. Even someone as despicable as Graham.
I twirled my feet in the water, realizing how much more energized I felt just from making contact. We needed the water to thrive. Our clans carried on as normal a human life as possible in order to blend, but without nurturing our other side, mermaids would become miserable and weak and could eventually die. Perhaps that’s why I’d had no will to live.
“Did they drug you?” I asked.
“Yeah. The big guy would get me every day.”
“Do you know what it is?”
“No. Why? What did it do to you?”
This time I shrugged my shoulders and noticed the aches and pains in my body. “Aside from knocking me out, I think it depressed me.”
“Could being locked in here possibly have anything to do with your depression?” he commented sarcastically.
I shook my head. “It’s more than that.” I didn’t want to tell him how every day when I felt that needle I wished my eyes would never open again.
Graham looked at me intensely for a few seconds then found something on his arm to occupy his attention. It annoyed me that I wanted to talk to him when he’d done nothing but betray me. However, having someone share my agony with certainly made the minutes go by faster.
I watched as Graham began to flick his hand along the sur
face to conjure a small mountain of water before him. I’d seen him do much more than that before, so I was surprised when the underwhelming pillar of water slammed back into the pool. I was even more surprised when Graham muttered a curse.
“What’s wrong?” I asked before I could stop myself.
“It seems as if that drug did more than make me sleep.” He tried to control the water again several times, but eventually gave up when no more than a droplet or two would rise from the surface. “Have you tried using any of your powers?”
I shook my head. “No, I’ve been asleep most of the time.” My talent was the compulsion, especially with humans. So keeping me knocked out while the humans tended my needs had definitely been planned. Destroying my will to live was just an added bonus for them.
“I told you he was a genius,” Graham said.
“You’re despicable,” I spat knowing he was admiring Lucian’s manipulator skills. “Look at what he did to you. Why do you still have this God-complex for him?”
Instead of replying, Graham pulled his shirt over his head and tossed it to the side. His toned body glowed in the aquatic light, but even with the limited luminescence, I saw where he’d been battered. A nasty bruise on the left side of his chest most likely meant a few broken ribs lay beneath. Despite all that, he still admired the man who’d beat him senseless.
It wasn’t until Graham unzipped his pants that I snapped back into reality. “What are you doing?”
“Going for a swim.”
“I thought you said it might be a trap?” I leaned forward to check if I could see anything below the surface, but the light coming from underneath essentially blocked my view. “Do you think we can get out of here?”
“Doubt it. But I need to fix this,” he said pointing to his body, “so I’m going to change.” And with that, he threw his pants back behind him and slipped into the water. He disappeared so fast I didn’t see him transition into his other form, although I assumed it must have been painful. The more injured we are, the harder it was.