Emerge (35 page)

A battlefield stretches out below me, the ocean floor strewn with spears, swords, and bodies. So much gore. So much blood. It stains the sand. Body parts litter the ground. Tails of every color lie sliced open—a macabre jewel box spattered with red and crusted brown. Turned up faces stare at me with vacant eyes.

It’s scenes like this that I’ve been sheltered from my entire life. I’m frozen in place, eyes fixed on the massacre below me. What caused these senseless deaths? Were they fighting to depose another self-proclaimed leader? Were they throwing away their lives to install someone new? Someone who tempted them with promises of breaking the curse, of restoring immortality? Or had they lost hope altogether and turned to violence and anarchy out of desperation?

Permanent agony contorts each lifeless face. So much suffering. Bodies battered and bloody, limbs twisted at odd angles, fins hacked off.

My stomach seizes. I can’t let myself be sick here; I can’t defile these dead any further. I kick my fin and launch myself behind a thicket of fan coral just before I lose my meager breakfast. Wiping my face with the back of my hand, I move to straighten up. Voices. I duck back down.

“This sword’ll be all right. Once we clean it off,”
one rough voice says in Mermese as it gets closer.

“These will fetch something, too,”
another, even gruffer voice replies. Through the coral, I can see a hairy hand rip a strand of polished limpets off a fallen fighter’s chest
. “You won’t miss it, will ya, fella?”
He nudges the body with his tail, and the head lolls toward the side, the glassy eyes staring into mine where I duck down low. Stuffing the limpets into a sack, the thief laughs.

I curl my tail toward my chest, making myself as small as possible. If these men plan to sell the stolen possessions of the dead, just what would they do with me if they found me? From my hiding place, I can see both of them are large and burly, with corded muscle winding like sailing rope beneath their skin. A layer of thick hair covers their chests and arms. One bears a squid ink tattoo of a tiger shark on his bicep. If they see me, I won’t stand a chance of fighting them off. As they pick their way through the gore, moving closer to me with every body they disturb, I will myself to be invisible.

“Let’s do a sweep of the coral. A stingray spear could’ve rolled in there.”

Every one of my muscles tenses.

“Nah, brother. I got more than I can carry as it is. We oughta get outa here before the sharks come and feast on all this.”

“Guess you’re right. I’m hungry anyway. Starril must be getting lunch ready by now.”

“Bet that’s not all she’s getting ready.”

Only once their crude jokes and barking laughter fade out of earshot do I relax. I peek over the coral, but there’s no one else. With one last, mournful glance at the destruction, I swim away from the scores of dead fighters.

The bond pulls me farther and farther out to sea. I’m deep enough now that the ocean floor stays in my sights. I’m too deep to see any trace of the sun, but I’ve been swimming for so many hours that it’s undoubtedly set already. What did my parents think when I missed dinner? When they called Caspian and realized I didn’t spend the day with him? They must be worried. Are they looking for me? It would never occur to them that I’d swim out past the Border, so if they are searching, that means my dad is driving around Malibu, stopping at every sushi restaurant and yogurt shop, while my mom and sisters call all my school friends. If I weren’t so worried about Clay, I’d feel terrible about it. But right now, my focus needs to be on getting to him.

What looks like a settlement comes into view below me. My instincts scream at me to hide before someone sees me. But as I inch closer, the town’s utter disrepair tells me it’s been long abandoned.

Homes and buildings made of what once must have been pristine white coral and polished stone are covered with algae. Amber windows are cracked and spires towering upward from rooftops have entire chunks missing. An eel slithers between broken ceiling beams. A tentacle peeks out at me from the opened doorway of a dark dwelling some creature now calls home. Weeds shoot up through the seashell-tiled streets.

Anything valuable has been stripped by looters, but remnants of life still linger here and there. A kelp doll lies half-buried in the sand. Urchins and anemones overrun carefully laid seaflower beds. As I pass each abandoned house and storefront, I can almost feel the hustle and bustle, hear the echo of store clerks and shoppers, of families with children. Where did they all go? Are they hiding in far off caves from the constant battles? Are they dead?

The bond pulls me through the eerily beautiful streets until I reach what’s left of the deserted town square. There, looming above me and the rest of the settlement, is a castle of crystalized ice and the same white coral. I try to picture it as the gleaming structure it must have been, but it’s hard to see past the dinginess from decades of grime. The many towers that twist into the blue water above are gray with barnacles. The oyster shells lining its roof and pathways—once regal and shining—are splintered and filthy, the pearls ripped from their bellies long ago. But even in its ruin, the palace is impressive. I swim a few feet closer and suddenly, the bond stops short.

No more pull. Just a gentle, pulsing sensation telling me I’ve arrived. Whatever Melusine is doing to Clay, she’s doing it in that castle. Kicking my tail, I move through the arching entranceway into the darkness within.

I swim alone into the elegant, decaying entrance hall. I’m hoping Melusine and her father will be distracted by the intricacies of whatever magic they’re performing. With any luck, I can get Clay before they notice me, and we can make a break for it. Since we’re in the water, I should be able to pull his extra weight without much trouble. It’s not much of a plan, but it’s all I have.

I expect to see Melusine fin-deep in an ancient ritual. I expect to see her father brewing some sickly-colored potion. I expect to see more creepy symbols defacing the walls. But I don’t. I don’t see anything. Because before my eyes can properly adjust to the darkness, someone grabs me from behind.

I struggle to pull my arms free. When I fail, I kick my tail, sending up swirls of sand and current. Then, whoever’s behind me presses wadded up kelp against my mouth and nose. A second pair of hands closes over the gills on either side of my neck. I thrash my head back and forth, trying to dislodge them, but it’s no use. I’m breathing in whatever noxious potion is on the kelp, and I’m growing dizzier by the second. Soon, all I see is black.

Pushing up the dead weight of my eyelids is a struggle. Once I manage it, I wish they were shut again because the sight that greets me is worse than any I could have imagined. Clay, bound from his shoulders to his ankles in seaweed with his face bruised and bloody, floats several feet in front of me, his eyes glued shut by the layer of ice clinging to his eyelashes. His skin a frosty, death-like blue.

My screams pierce the water.

“Relax.”
The saccharine voice is too calm, too cool.
“He’s alive. For now.”

I drag my eyes away from Clay and focus them on her. We must be in one of the other rooms of the palace. My intuition tells me we’re deep inside. Huge chunks of the columns that hold up the arched ceiling lie like ruins across the floor. An intricate mosaic of abalone, mother of pearl, and troca shell pieces peeks through layers of sand and dirt. I only catch sight of it because it shimmers in the light from above. About a hundred transparent, glowing jellyfish are strung around the large chamber like Chinese lanterns, casting the room in a greenish sheen.

Melusine wades in the center of it all, casually flicking her tail with the current. I want to lunge at her, want to rush to Clay, but I can’t do either. I, too, am bound in seaweed. It winds too tightly around my arms, pinning them behind my back. Then it loops downward around my tail, yanking my fin up toward my tied hands. It’s almost too painful to bear and renders me helpless. I pull at my bonds, hard, but it’s no use.

“What have you done to him?”
I demand instead.

“It’s a rather ingenious potion, if I do say so myself.”
Mr. Havelock sounds far too pleased with himself. He isn’t looking at me; he’s swimming at a steep angle, facing downward so he can draw more symbols on the dirty ground.
“It brings the human body temperature down nearly to freezing point, suspending function and making it possible for him to stand the temperature and the pressure this far down. It also keeps him breathing.”

“But it doesn’t last long,”
Melusine adds. She swims between me and Clay.
“I’d give it till sunrise, tops. After that, his breath will stop.”

Sunrise? How long until sunrise? How long was I unconscious?

Melusine leans close, her sapphire eyes cutting into mine.
“It’s in about two hours,”
she says, answering my unspoken question.
“But don’t worry, you’ll be saying goodbye to lover boy long before that. We’re almost ready.”

“Ready for what? What are you going to do to him
?” I tug at my bonds again. Ow.

She gives me an indulgent smile, as if I were a small child.
“Why, kill him, of course. How else did you think this would end?”

I stop moving.
“Why? Why Clay?”
I don’t understand.
“Is this all because he tried to break up with you?”
Even as I say it, I know how stupid it sounds, but why else would she have it in for him?

She laughs so hard, bubbles erupt near her mouth.
“Tides, Lia, just how high school can you be?”
Her lips curl into a superior smile.
“You still have no idea who he is, do you?”

My bewilderment must be written on my face.

She turns her back to me and closes the distance between herself and Clay.
“You see, Clay here, he’s not just any measly human. He’s special.”
She runs the back of her hand down his frozen cheek and neck. I want to rip her arm off and feed it to a shark.

“I thought maybe you’d figured it out, and that’s why you wanted him so badly. Why you took him from me. But, no. You just looove him.”
She makes the word a taunt.
“Disgusting.”

“But useful,”
her father pipes up, still focusing his efforts on the growing number of symbols emblazoned across the floor.

“Very useful.”
She looks back at me.
“It’s all about love, you see. She loved him so much, she sacrificed everything for him.”

“Who did?”
What is she talking about?

“The bitch who caused all our problems. The Little Mermaid.”

“What in the Seven Seas does she have to do with Clay?”
I’m losing my patience. Clay’s floating there, icy and trapped and running out of time.

“Everything. He’s where the story ends.”
She whacks Clay on the arm, and he drifts through the water. She moves to his other side and whacks him on the other arm. She keeps this up, treating his body like a bouncing ball, abusing him like it’s a game.