by Brandon Witt
First the Volitans, then facing vampires alone. Yeah, that was helping my feeling of doom vanish real quick. Before I could raise another objection, a vision of a score of Wrell-like mers circling around one of their young swept into my mind.
I looked over at Wrell, who’d swum closer to Therin. “You really think that will be enough? That the Volitans are so protective that they’ll be open to helping us?”
Wrell imparted the image once more, this time a ring of fire encompassing the protective circle.
“No pressure there, Wrell.” He had a point. If any tribe was going to be open to having a demon in their midst, it would be the Volitan. I wasn’t sure if that made me have more hope that they’d be open to helping us, or feel that Syleen’s initial reaction to me had been the correct response.
The apprehension continued to tingle through me. I glanced over at Lelas and Nalu before returning to the two males. “You’re right, so maybe it’s time for Lelas to return to the tribe. Her situation has changed. The Volitan are going to respond to me, not her. There’s no reason for her to risk her life.”
Wrell’s handsome face broke into a small smile, bringing with it the feeling of sardonic laughter.
Dad reached out, pulled one of the spears out of the ground, and pushed the fish toward the center so they didn’t fall off in the movement. “You know Lelas better than that. She’ll not leave you, nor abandon the task of helping end the capture of our species. Besides, she is not yet with young, and Nalu is more than capable of defending himself. He was one of the Scarus guards, as you know.”
I knew Therin was right, and I didn’t want to be without her, but I wouldn’t be able to face it if anything happened to her. I couldn’t lose her. At the thought, the sense of tragedy increased.
“That’s a possibility I hadn’t even considered. She could be a mother anytime now that she’s mated. Even more reason for her to go back to be with the Chromis.”
Therin paused before he pulled a second spear, his expression soft at the sound of panic in my words. “A fact I am certain she has already considered. The possibility of being a mother will give her even greater desire to be with us. Losing little Ventait was bad enough, but Miline’s choice of death nearly destroyed Lelas. She would do anything to avoid such a fate.”
Much like the image of the Volitan protecting their young, the four of us, Wrell, Therin, Nalu, and I encircled Lelas, an unknown shadow outside the perimeter of our protective circle. With the vision came a sense of strength and power.
As I turned to look at Wrell, his expression was pure warrior. I wouldn’t lose her. He wouldn’t let it happen. None of us would. I nodded at him in thanks.
Even so. I was going to talk to her. Before we finished even one more day of travel and were farther from the rest of the Chromis.
Unable to wait even an hour, I asked Therin and Wrell if they would take issue with delaying our departure while I spoke to Lelas. As I was still unable to direct my thoughts only to those who I wanted to hear, Lelas heard the request and paused in taking her final bite of the herring she was devouring. She narrowed her eyes as if she could tell I was up to something.
Therin glanced at Wrell before replying. “Go and take the time you need. Wrell, Nalu, and I can go for a hunt. Perhaps we can quickly catch up to the rest of the herring you and Wrell found this morning.”
I nearly let that be the end of it, content to carry on like Lelas and I had since I’d joined the Chromis. Inwardly kicking myself for what I was about to do, I reminded myself that things weren’t the same. “This has to do with Nalu too.”
Therin didn’t reply, only waved us off.
Nalu addressed me before Lelas had the chance. “Are you certain you want my presence? If you need to discuss things with Lelas without my intrusion, I will understand.”
I really didn’t want to like the guy, but then he goes and doesn’t act like a jealous, controlling husband. He should have been around to give my grandfather lessons.
“No. I’d like you to give your input too. I’m sure Lelas will want it.”
Lelas glanced at Wrell and Therin as they took the newly emptied spears. “Would I be correct to assume that they have already been made privy to your concern?”
“Who says I have a concern?”
She smiled wryly. “Yes, who indeed. Let us hear, then.”
I was hoping for a little more leeway to ease into it a bit. “Fine.” I glanced at Nalu, intentionally doing my best to include him, but quickly turned back to Lelas. She was who I cared about. “I think you should go back to the rest of the Chromis.” Well, that was convincing.
She flinched back in surprise. “Now? You think I should return to the others now that we actually have some verification that our people are being stolen? Why would I ever do such a thing?”
“Because who knows what we’re going to face next. There’s no guarantee we’re going to find the Volitan tribe anytime soon. Even if we do, it’s gonna take months if we need to go to the Synchi. After all that, we may not learn any new information and be no better off than we are now. We’d have to wander around until we run into some tribe that can give us a clue to what the next step is. It could be years, if ever.” I knew I was exaggerating. At worst, if we found no more information about where to find the vampires, I could swim ashore and find them myself. I’d said as much to Therin and Wrell countless times already. Therin was always convinced, in the long run, that would slow us down, leaving more time for other mers to be captured. In truth, I couldn’t argue too much. I’d have no idea where to start on land. Finn and his family were adamant there were no such things as mers. If the mers’ existence wasn’t known by other supernaturals, how was I going to find the vampires that were taking them? Try to capture one vampire at a time and torture them until I found one that knew about mermaids?
Lelas let go of Nalu’s hand and leaned forward, her elbows resting on her lavender scales. “Brett, this is not new. We have known the vastness of this undertaking from the onset of our journey.”
I faltered, glancing around as if something here could help me convince her. All I saw were a few scraps of herring carcasses, seaweed, a school of fish off in the distance, and endless eternities of blue. I could already feel that I was going to lose this argument, and we hadn’t even started. Turning back to Lelas, my gaze fell on Nalu, and I tried to recruit him to my cause. If I had any shot at convincing her, I’d need his help. Surely the mate picked out specifically by Moheetla would carry some weight. “Things are a little different now. You’re mated.”
Lelas turned to glance at Nalu, then quickly back to me. “That is true, but I fail to see how it changes what must be done.”
“You need to be safe.”
She looked toward Nalu. “Our group has one more fighter. I would say I am safer now than before. We are all safer now because of Nalu. All the more reason I should stay.”
I gestured too wildly, already overly desperate. Even I wasn’t sure where my manic energy was coming from. All I knew was I had to convince her. I had to keep her safe. “Think about the babies!”
She blanched. “What babies?”
“Well, your babies, of course!”
“Brett. I think we may need to rest for a day or so before we continue. I fear you have overworked yourself.”
I looked back and forth between my best friend and her mate, beseeching with all I had. “I’m serious, Lelas. You’ll be able to have children someday, maybe even soon. You shouldn’t risk that.”
She shook her head. “We’re not even sure that a mating between a Chromis and a Scarus can produce offspring. But if we can, they will be more proof that I should see this quest to its fruition. I do not wish to bring children into this world if they are going to be taken by vampires.”
This time when I looked at Nalu, I kept my eyes on him, refusing to look away, pouring every ounce of manly emotion I had into my words. “Nalu, surely you understand what I’m saying. We need to keep Lelas safe. The
re are too many risks on this journey. Too many things that could happen.”
He looked at Lelas long enough that I wasn’t sure if they were communicating between themselves or simply staring into each other’s eyes, as they seemed apt to do. Finally, he returned his attention to me. “I am here to keep Lelas safe, as are the rest of you. We will all safeguard each other. I am now a part of the Chromis tribe, but my first loyalty is to my mate. Where she goes, I will go. Who she loves, I will love. I will give my life for her. I will give my life for you, because she loves you.”
Well, shit.
Desperation took full hold at this point. “Lelas, I need you to go back. For me. Please. Do it for me! Go back to the rest of the Chromis.”
In an instant, she closed the distance between us and reached for both of my hands, stopping them in their flailing. “Brett, what is going on? I do not understand where this is coming from.”
I felt my eyes burn, and my throat clenched. If I’d needed to speak out loud, I wouldn’t have been able. “I can’t explain it. I just have a feeling. I don’t know what it means. I’ve lost too many people I love already. I cannot lose you too. I won’t survive it. Please, I need you to go back.”
She pulled me close and wrapped me in her arms like she would if I were a small child, instead of nearly four times her size.
As she held me, I started to shake. “Please, Lelas. Go back.” From my blurry vision, I saw Nalu turn away from us—whether to give us privacy or in shame of seeing another male act in such a fashion, I wasn’t sure. Nor did I care.
Lelas continued to hold me, her grip tightening and relaxing depending on the severity of my tremors. For a while, it was as if I was transported back to my childhood, my grandmother soothing me through so many hurts.
After minutes or hours, I regained some amount of self-control, and she pulled away so she could look into my eyes, her hands never breaking contact. “I love you, my dear friend. My dear brother.” She raised her hand and stroked my cheek, another Beverly Wright expression, and I knew I was lost. “I must see this through. For my species. For Nalu and my children. For me. And to be here for you.”
I just stared at her, unable to form any more words. Nothing I would say would change her mind.
“I will be fine. We are going to stop the wrongs that are being done to our people. I feel it in my bones. We will be fine. You’ll see!”
Twenty-Four
BRETT WRIGHT
Two days passed in uneventful monotony. Sure, it was pleasant to be back in familiar waters, but it ate at me that we’d been so close to the Chromis and each stroke took us farther and farther away. I still couldn’t put my finger on why I was so convinced Lelas had to go back, but the sensation battered at me until it felt like my nerves were going to drive me mad. It was good I’d finally gotten control over my fire, or I would have been bursting into flames every few minutes.
As it was, my foul mood made me an unpleasant traveling companion. Even Lelas kept her distance, though she still swam close by at regular intervals. I’d stopped trying to convince her. It was pointless. I couldn’t even argue with her logic. With Nalu here, we were safer now than we were before. It wasn’t like Lelas was defenseless either. With the exception of my demon abilities, she was more equipped to face anything the sea might send our way than I.
And yet, try as I might, I couldn’t shake it. There had to be something I could say or figure out that would keep her safe, would make her see that she had to go back to the others. Not much chance of that happening when I couldn’t even explain it to myself.
Wrell had been sending out “feelers” to see if he could sense the Volitan or if they would answer his summons. I wasn’t exactly sure how this worked or if it was even a good idea. Did we really want to give them a heads-up about our location? Wrell was certain we were getting closer. When he got a confirmation of their presence, he shared it with the rest of us. Each time, the group sped up, excited about finding them so easily. I never felt much of anything when Wrell did this. I only felt an increase of the pressure closing in around my chest. Maybe I just didn’t know what I was looking for.
We’d been staying fairly close to the shoreline, traveling back the way we’d come with the Chromis ages ago. Since Wrell had started sensing his old tribe, we traveled in more of a northwest direction, taking us farther from the coast. I was fairly certain my entire time with the mers had been spent in a never-ending circle—from California, down to South America, over to Hawaii, then back toward South America. I was so turned around I had no idea where we were anymore, even though much of the coastline seemed familiar. Now that we were farther out in open water, the lost sensation was even more prevalent.
The farther we traveled, the more frequently Wrell shared his stress-inducing confirmation of the Volitan location. I was swimming in my typical place at the back of the group and couldn’t help constantly glancing over my shoulder, expecting a hoard of quilled warriors to be overtaking us. Luckily, the waters were bright and clear, and I could see for what felt like miles around. Schools of fish were scattered here and there around us, but not close enough to determine what they were.
Despite my anxiety and fear, I was once again struck by this existence. I couldn’t fathom how I’d survived on land. This was where I belonged, dangerous or not. It wasn’t like life had been free of danger before, anyway. Much less than I’d even realized until it was too late. Now here I was, surrounded in this vast other world, my friends and family around me. Friends and family. Mermaids. Still so bizarre. Yet, there they were. So beautifully alien from myself, their powerful tails brilliant in the sunshine that filtered over their scales. If only I could truly be one of them. It seemed so strange—wrong—that the majority of my blood came from the mer side of my heritage, and yet here I was, swimming with legs instead of a tail. Therin’s belief that it was my legs that would ultimately save the mers didn’t help make the situation any better.
A measureless forest of kelp rose in my mind, nearly blocking out the others in front of me. It was so vivid that I stopped swimming and waited for it to pass. It did, my eyes focusing on the rest, who continued to swim ahead.
So Wrell had found them. I peered into the distance, squinting to narrow my focus. Sure enough, far off, I could see the kelp forest. It was large, extending as far as I could see. From where we were, it looked like a mountain range rising up to the surface of the water. It seemed unusual for kelp to be this thick so far out into the sea, but this monster stretched as far inland as the view would allow. Possibly, it was large enough that we’d swam through it on the Chromis’s journey south and hadn’t realized we’d been in such a gargantuan mass of kelp. Probably, I was the one who hadn’t realized. The rest of the tribe would have known. For something so large, no way had it sprung up overnight. I wondered if the Volitans had been there already when we’d passed by and we’d never known. Chances were low, as the Volitans most likely moved around as much as the Chromis.
Our speed increased even more now that we had a clear destination in sight. I could feel the others’ excitement at being so close. No one spoke, at least that I was aware of, but their energies hummed at the prospect of having more answers. I, on the other hand, felt a heavier and heavier weight descend over me as we got closer.
Even with the kelp forest in sight, it took us most of the day to reach it. As we neared, part of the reason it seemed so large became more evident. It was still massive, but it indeed spread over large hills. From how low we were in the water, I was unable to view it from an aerial perspective to see how steep the rise of hills was, but it reminded me of photos I had seen of the hilly landscape of the Ozarks. Looking to the east, toward where I knew shore to be, the hills faded away, returning to a typical, though huge, kelp forest.
The combination of the onset of evening and the density of seaweed morphed the bright water to shadowy and ominous. When at last we reached the kelp and had traveled inside several yards, it really did feel like we were ente
ring a haunted forest. Even the others seemed to have lost some of their excitement over being so close to the Volitan and slowed down to the point that we were treading water as we tried to determine how to best proceed.
Wrell’s fins and quills were clamped firmly over the surface of his tail. I figured partly to keep them from getting tangled in the dense seaweed, but it also seemed like he was making an effort to look less threatening, which was a challenge for him. Even his spear hung at ease by his side. His knuckles were white as he gripped the shaft, betraying the casual air he was trying to portray.
“Are the Volitan communicating with you?”
Wrell looked over at me, the tension in his eyes saying as much as the way he clung to his weapon. He shook his head in response but shared a panorama of more thick clumps of kelp, nearly gray in the dim light. Even within his vision, it took me a second to notice the black, white, and brown striations of the Volitan tails visible through small gaps in the seaweed.
“It’s probably not a good sign that we know they’re here, and they know we are here, and they still aren’t revealing themselves. Maybe we should leave the kelp for the night, let them come to us.” I looked back in the direction we came, the edge of the kelp forest visible and within reach. I wasn’t sure why I was still trying to postpone meeting the Volitan. The die had already been cast. “At the very least, we could wait until tomorrow, when it’s bright enough to see.”
“Even then, things will not be much more visible. Not in such dense growth as this.” Strangely, the tension in Therin’s tone offered a sense of relief. I suppose it should have made things worse, but it was good to know I wasn’t the only one uncomfortable with what was happening.
I refocused on Lelas and Nalu. “What do you think? Should we wait?”
Nalu spoke up first in an uncharacteristic manner. “I do not see how caution could make the situation worse.”