Better to be safe than sorry.
I sink beneath the surface, holding my palm close enough to feel the magic without alerting the priestesses. A few feet below, the power fizzles out, just as it did at the river. I return to Erick.
"Take my hand and don’t let go. Whatever you do, don't rise to the surface until I tell you, okay?"
He opens his mouth as though to speak, but then closes it and nods. We thread our fingers together, take a deep breath, and dive.
Nymia would kill me if she knew what I was doing.
The priestesses would kill me.
Everyone would kill me.
And yet, not a single bit of doubt leaks into my heart as I break one of our most sacred laws and lead a human into our lands. I've stopped thinking of him that way—as other, as human. To me, he's just Erick.
By the time we reach the cave, I know dawn can't be too far off. Even underground, I feel the burn of the Mother as she reaches out with her light to push away the night. We can't stay long, but that's all right. I only want to show him.
"What is this place?" Erick asks, marveling at the rocky shelves while he treads water by my side. The faerie light drifts higher and higher, until the entire cavern is illuminated by the golden glow.
"My cave full of wonders," I say. "Come on."
With a few strokes, I swim to the edge and push myself up onto the rocky ledge beside the pool. By the time I turn to Erick, he's already half-out of the water. His white shirt has gone see-through from the moisture, leaving the ridges of his abdomen exposed, and the curves of his biceps too. I'm mesmerized by the way his muscles flex and pull as he emerges. By the time I finally find his face, I can't help but notice his gaze is on my body too, tracing the curves of my hips. When I glance down, I realize the reeds of my skirt stick to my legs, as tight as human clothes, leaving little to the imagination. I can't help but feel like Erick doesn’t look at other women this way. I want to believe that smolder burns just for me.
With a deep breath, he tears his gaze away, and then he freezes. "Are those dragon scales?"
I nod eagerly. "Yup."
He's across the room in a heartbeat, picking one up by the flat end and running a finger over the point.
"Careful, they're—"
"Ack!"
"Sharp."
"It's edged like a blade," he marvels, turning to meet my eyes as he sucks the blood off his thumb. "Are they metal?"
I shake my head. "Nope. They're just like our fingernails, but tougher and, well, sharper."
"Is that a unicorn horn?" He drops the scale to pick up the ivory spiral. "How'd you find this?"
"Ny—" I break off with a cough, unsure if she'd want Erick to know her name. "My, um, my sister and I were in the forest one night and we saw two unicorns battling for territorial dominance. I'm still not quite sure who won—their magic was so blindingly bright we had to look away. But afterward, we found the broken tip of a horn on the ground."
"Fascinating," he murmurs. "Does it still hold magic?"
"No," I answer sadly.
He tilts his head to the side, curious at my tone.
"The priestesses told us humans hunt unicorns for their magic, and strip them of their horn to try to steal the power within," I try to explain without sounding accusatory. "But the magic is connected to the soul of the unicorn, not its body. When its soul dies, the magic does too."
"I've heard of a king whose crown is crafted entirely of unicorn horns. He says it makes him invincible." There's a gloomy quality to Erick's voice, one I appreciate. "He's never been defeated, so people believe him."
"Words hold power," I murmur. For humans, it's in the stories they weave and the ones they choose to believe, like Erick with the shell. For faeries, it's a little different—our language is infused with magic. But I can't tell him that. I've broken enough rules for one day.
He nods as though he understands, then notices another shelf behind my back. "What are those?"
"Hmm?" I turn, still lost in my thoughts until I see what he's referring to. "Oh, those are my human things."
"Human things?" he repeats with a laugh as he rifles through the objects. "But most of this is junk."
"Junk?" I'm not sure I know this word.
"A rusty knife," he continues, "some broken saddle straps, the torn edge of a cape— Hey, I recognize this!"
I expect him to be holding out the pin, but he's not. It's my other favorite human item—the hollowed-out animal horn with gold-painted edges. My eyes go wide. "You recognize it? What is it?"
"Someone must've lost it during a hunt. It has my father's insignia on the side, see?" He points to the painted image of a bird on top of crisscrossing lines. "It's a horn."
"Yes, an animal horn, I know. But what is it?"
"No, we call it a horn," he explains with a grin. "It’s used for all sorts of things—signaling the start of a hunt, talking to each other from acres apart, notifying the others of a kill. It depends on the call that's used."
"Can you show me?"
"I don't see why not." He lifts the tip to his lips, takes a deep breath, and blows.
I jolt as the entire cave fills with a blast as loud as thunder, and quickly use a little of my water magic to freeze the waterfall near the entrance into a barrier to trap the noise—I don't want any of the priestesses to hear the sound and come running. As the echo bounces around the solid stone walls, I clap giddily. "That's amazing."
Erick holds the horn out to me. "You try."
Before he finishes speaking, I hold it to my lips and blow. A paltry little whine comes out—but I did it. He nods encouragingly, so I try again. It's a little louder this time, a little more self-assured.
"I have a room like this back at home, you know," Erick tells me. I nod and force my lips shut before I spill my secrets. I do, in fact, know he has a room like this in his home. I've seen it. And if I'm honest, it's what endeared him to me—the idea of a kindred spirit. "Humans call them curiosity rooms, but in reality, they're just collections of things from around the world, a way to try to understand nature and magic and science a little better. I wish I could show you."
"Maybe you can."
He watches, intrigued, as I press my palm to the slick wall of the cave, drawing on a little magic. The rocks bubble beneath my fingers, creaking as they stretch and straighten, until a new shelf emerges from the stone.
"It'll be my Erick shelf," I say as I place the shell he gave me and the pin from before on the ledge. Then I meet his warm gaze. "Next time you come, bring me something else from your room, and I'll bring you something from mine. We can build a new collection together."
"How could I possibly say no to that?"
We agree to meet again in two weeks' time, and then swim back through the caves. Ru is up with his tail wagging by the time we reach our meeting spot. Light creeps into the sky outside the entrance. Nymia is probably losing her mind.
Before I leave, Erick takes my hand and lifts it to his lips, murmuring goodbye. The magic beneath my skin brightens as though responding to his touch. When he pulls away, the glowing outline of his kiss remains, glittering for a few prolonged moments before fading.
"What was that?" he whispers.
"I don't know." I run my fingers over the spot as my lips twist into a grin. "But I am growing more and more fond of these strange human greetings."
The last thing I see before I run from the cave is the edge of his lip lifting into a smile. Then I'm in the forest. The moment my toes touch grass, Nymia emerges from the trees with a frown. The peace was nice while it lasted.
"You were in there for hours."
"I know." I sigh dreamily, unable to even attempt to put any sort of an apology into the tone. "We agreed to meet again in two weeks."
My sister groans.
But that's it, that's all. There's no protest, no lecture, no fuming look filled with all sorts of hostile words. By the time we return to faerie lands, it's as though nothing has happened at all. We're
back to normal, back to the way we were before we followed the phoenix through the woods—happy and silly and free. What's one more secret shared between us when we've kept so many already?
The next time I see Erick, he brings me a pair of silk slippers he says he stole from his sister's closet. They're much more comfortable than the boots, made of a pretty blue fabric stitched with flowers. I wear them the rest of the night while I enthrall him with the tale of how Nymia and I once plucked the feather from a sleeping gryphon. Well, I did the plucking, but when it woke, the gryphon didn't know that, so we both had to run swifter than the wind.
The next time we meet, he brings me a book full of painted images and words I don't know how to read—yet. Then a bow and arrow, so he can teach me how to shoot a target. Then a set of silk pillows, to make our little oasis a bit more comfortable. Before long, my Erick shelf becomes my Erick shelves, overflowing with more human items than I'd ever imagined seeing—a silver goblet, a porcelain plate, a jeweled dagger, a blanket made of woven wool, a little disk some humans use to tell time by the passage of the sun.
My favorite item is a music box.
When I open the lid, for a moment, I truly think it's made of magic, as though someone harnessed the stars and turned their twinkling lights into a song. The notes echo across the cavern, lifting my spirit as though I'm soaring through Father's infinite realm. Then Erick takes my hand.
"Do you want to learn how to dance?"
I know how to dance, I think, imagining the way Nymia and I thrum along to the wild winds in a storm. But I know that can't be what Erick means. "A human dance?"
"I'll show you."
He lifts my hand to his shoulders and places my glowing fingers against his smooth velvet jacket, then settles his palm around my waist. The magic in my skin responds to his touch now, glowing so bright he could trace shapes along my arms if he wanted to. I'm not sure what it means, but I'm so used to it now, I hardly notice. When our other hands join, my fingers glitter like the sun through leafy trees, bringing a smile to Erick's lips.
Our first few steps are clumsy and unsure, just like our earlier conversations. But then we sink into the movement, and before long, we're twirling around the small cave, spinning and gliding and moving as one. The world blurs, warping into shadows and light, blurry apart from him. All I see clearly are Erick's glimmering blue eyes, filled with this new type of magic we're creating together.
I wish I could talk to Nymia.
I wish I could tell her how Erick makes me feel.
How he's smart and funny and charming. How he's teaching me about a world I never knew existed. How he's making me want things I know I shouldn't—a life outside of faerie lands, a life filled with more than balance and charity, a life lived just for me.
But she doesn't want to hear it.
To Nymia, our time in the human world is a nightmare—forgotten the moment we step foot into the sacred meadow. To me, it's a dream I don’t want to leave.
Erick brings me more advanced human items, things he calls inventions, after seeing how much I enjoyed the music box. One is a wheel painted with little pictures, and when it spins, they seem to move. One is a long strip of metal with tiny holes, and when you blow into one side and move your fingers over the openings, different sounds come out. One is a circle with a needle that always points north, no matter how many times I spin and spin and spin trying to change the direction. One is made of clear glass that makes the world all blurry to me, but apparently gives some humans the ability to see. Who knew so many of them were going blind?
The last invention he brings is the long metal tube I'd seen pointed out the window of his curiosity room, aimed toward the sky.
"What is it?" I murmur, running my fingers over the cylinder.
"A telescope."
"What's it do?"
"It makes things that are far away seem closer."
"Really?" I snatch it from his hands and hold it to my eye, but nothing happens. "It doesn't work."
"Well, no," he murmurs, voice bubbling with amusement. "Not when you hold it backwards."
I gasp and turn it around. Suddenly his face is so close I can distinguish every single hair sprouting from the pores on his chin. I'm not sure humans were made for such magnified viewing. Instead, I point it at the ceiling, watching as a drop of water blossoms to life at the tip of a stalactite, forming a bead that eventually drops all the way to the floor.
"Is it used for spying?" I ask, thinking of my scrying water, a magical sort of telescope.
"Sometimes, but I mostly like to look at the sky."
I drop the telescope and turn to him. "Is it so different when it's not so far away?"
"No, not really, at least not through any telescope that I've ever managed to find. I guess I like to study the constellations and follow the map they form, the way my grandfather used to show me. It makes me feel closer to him, somehow."
"Grandfather?" I ask quietly, afraid to push. He doesn’t talk much about his family. I know his father is a king, which is apparently important in the human world. His brother is a prince, his sister is a princess, and he's something else—a prince-by-default he called it. His mother came from a small seaside village where his father used to keep a ship. She died when he was a boy, and that's when he moved into the castle with his father. I know some details, but not many, though the emotion in his voice when even the smallest bit of information passes through tells me it's important. Blood relatives aren't something I know very much about, but I do understand the notion of family—the special bond two spirits can share.
"He used to visit me in the castle once a year, after my mother passed," Erick explains softly. His eyes gain a distant quality, the same one they always do at the mention of his mother. "He didn't want me to forget where I came from, so we'd spend the night lying on the grass, staring up at the stars, while he told me the legends of the sea. He was a fisherman, and they used to use the sky as a map. The stories were how they remembered what each constellation means."
"Can you show me?"
He blinks, returning to this world, to our cave, and his gaze lifts to the dense ceiling overhead. "Not from in here."
"So let's go outside."
His brows push together and he turns toward the entrance. "Is it safe?"
I think of the dark shadows of the forest, the bright glow of my skin, the night Nymia and I chased that unicorn through the trees, unaware that we were targets for human arrows. We're in their lands. These are their woods. But it's the middle of the night, and the world is fast asleep.
I toss a wry glance at the hound snoring on the stones, then take Erick's hand and pull us both to our feet. "I'm sure Ru will protect me."
Nymia is, of course, adamantly opposed to my plan. As soon as we emerge from the cave, she comes barreling out of the tree line with a stern look on her face.
"Where are you going?"
Erick jolts a little at her sudden appearance, juggling the telescope to keep it from crashing to the ground, but I expected her. "Just for a little walk. We'll be fine."
"A walk?" She barely manages to get the words through her pursed lips. "Here?"
"It's the middle of the night. What could possibly happen?"
"Oh, I don't know…" She glares at me. "A human could find you, since we are in their lands, and this is their part of the forest, and no one knows we're here. Other than that, it's perfectly safe."
"A human already did find me." I shrug. "And it worked out okay."
"You are so…so…"
"Frustratingly correct?" I smile sweetly.
"Frustrating," she grumbles. "Just frustrating."
"We’ll be back soon. You don’t have to come if you're afraid."
"I'm not afraid," she bites back. I didn't mean it as a taunt—I meant it as a favor. But I don't think it came out that way, especially when she stubbornly continues. "And I won't. I'll wait right here."
"Fine."
"Fine."
Nymia huffs
and crosses her arms.
I link mine around Erick's elbow and force him to walk past her with me.
"Are you sure this is a good idea?" he whispers into my ear. "The sky will be there forever. We can wait for another night."
"No," I tell him, more stubborn than anything else. I want to hear his stories. I want to hear about his family. And though I don't say it, there's an urgency between us I'm not sure he understands. The sky will be there forever. I'll be here forever. But Erick won't be. Human time is so fleeting. "We won't go far, just until we find a small clearing."
We walk for about fifteen minutes before we find a break in the trees. I lean my shoulder against a thick trunk, staying out of sight while Ru circles the small meadow, checking for any scents he doesn't much like. Erick sets up the telescope while we wait. When Ru returns to me with his tail wagging happily, I know it's safe and I step into the moonlight. Erick stops tinkering with the invention when he hears me approach.
"So…" he murmurs, turning toward me.
"So…" I take a deep breath, studying the silver sheen of his skin and the way the wind plays with the loose tendrils of black curls framing his face. It's as if I'm seeing him for the first time—as if all our days spent in the cave were a dream, but this is real. We're out in the world, out in the open. We're exposed, and vulnerable, and I wonder if it's what we needed all along. I take a step closer. "Show me the stars."
"Right." He nods and dips his chin toward the telescope. "Take a look."
I press my eye to the cylinder and study the small circle of sky before me. There's one star in the center that's brighter than the rest. The way it twinkles makes me think the Father is winking at me, approving of my midnight mischief. "What constellation is that?"
"It's not a constellation, not really," Erick explains as he presses his palm to my lower back and gently rubs his thumb over the ridge of my spine. Everything about me goes still, except my heart, which races inside my chest. "But it is the most important star in the sky, along with its partner star. We call them the Lost Lovers."
Parting Worlds - A Little Mermaid Retelling (Once Upon a Curse Book 4) Page 7