The Chained Maiden: Bound by Hope

by Ian Rodgers

  “I can help,” she finally agreed, nodding her head. “When will you bring me the patients?”

  “Tomorrow morning,” the mermaid said, voice tinged with audible relief. “We shall transport them here, to this spot, for the treatment.”

  Dora nodded, and then gestured to Enrai. He stepped forward until the lake water went up to his ankles. Then, he carefully lowered the girl into the water. Her aunt, the spokeswoman for the merfolk, swam forward and grabbed her, gently guiding the young teen back into safety within her embrace.

  “Thank you,” she said, bowing her head towards the Monk in thanks. He scratched the back of his head.

  “No problem!”

  The mermaid nodded and smiled before diving under the water. The rest of the merfolk followed suite, and sunk into the salty depths, returning to wherever they lived.

  “Are you certain we can spare time tomorrow for this?” Ain asked once the merfolk were all gone, and the ripples of their passage had faded from the water’s surface.

  “We made excellent time these past two days. We can afford to spend a day healing and helping,” Dora claimed as she headed back to the campsite.

  The Grand Elf sighed but didn’t argue. Instead, he looked over at Enrai. “So, any ideas as to what caused those wounds?”

  “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say that a Kappa had attacked the girl based solely on the wounds I saw,” the Monk said. “But I highly doubt a freshwater monster could make it over to the Dreadlands without considerable help. Odds are it’s some other sort of local, aquatic predator.”

  “What’s a Kappa?” Dora inquired.

  “Bipedal, humanoid turtle-frog thing with big claws and a weird, cup-shaped dent in its head that holds water. If the water in their head disappears, they become slow and weak. Nasty monsters that live in rivers back in Qwan,” Enrai explained. “But like I said to Ain, highly unlikely.”

  ∞.∞.∞

  “What was it you said last night, Enrai? ‘Highly unlikely?’” Dora teased as the Monk stared slack jawed at the large turtle shell the merfolk had brought with them the next morning. It was large and dark green with splotches of red on its surface. At the moment, the shell was being used as an underwater sled to carry the worst of the merfolk’s wounded.

  “How on Erafore did a Kappa get over here?!” Enrai demanded, still not sure he believed it.

  “You mean that ugly fish-turtle thing? We’re not sure. It appeared in the lake a few months ago. Right around the time a Qwanese man and his son stopped by with their guards, come to think of it,” the spokeswoman from last night revealed as she swam up to the shore.

  Now that there was decent lighting, Dora was able to get a good look at the mermaid, and she whistled in awe. The stories of a mermaid’s beauty were firmly rooted in fact. The spokesmermaid’s hair was long and lustrous and the color of ink. Her skin was the same pale blue coloration as the wounded teen’s, and her ample chest was barely covered by two pink colored clam shells. Around her neck was a cord of silk laced with a number of coral charms and polished pearls of varying hues. She was the picture of an elegant and refined merwoman.

  “Qwanese man… curse it, that must have been General Shey!” Enrai swore, kicking the ground in annoyance.

  “You know him?” the mermaid asked, curious. Behind her, other merfolk were carefully escorting the group of wounded half-fish people towards the shore where Dora waited.

  As soon as the wounded were close enough Dora moved forward into the water so she could reach the injured merfolk. She immediately began triage on the two heavily damaged mermen who’d been assigned to the shell-sled.

  “Sort of. He was a criminal on the run from Qwan. The boy you saw with him? Shey kidnapped him, and Ain and I were sent to bring him back. But why would he leave behind a Kappa?” Enrai wondered, utterly confused.

  “Maybe as a distraction, or an advanced warning? Shey knew people were going to be coming after them, perhaps he left the Kappa behind to slow down pursuers? If he’d bound it with a Familiar ritual, he could potentially see what it saw, and if anyone killed it, Shey would then know who was after him,” Ain suggested.

  “That makes a small amount of sense,” the Monk mused. “But not much. The Kappa is, at best, a low C-ranked monster. A single one would not have slowed down either of us. And then there’s the assumption we’d even pass by the Lake of Tears in our pursuit of Shey.”

  “To be fair, most people would assume you’d take a path that would lead you close to a water source when traveling through the Dreadlands,” Dora pointed out, even as she healed some cuts and contusions on a merman’s tail. “The fact that you and Ain did not is mostly due to luck. Or poor planning. Either one is true.”

  Enrai snorted, but Ain nodded. “Yes, that makes sense. Had we known there was a massive lake in the Cracked Land before we ventured off, we likely would have headed there one way or another.”

  “Why did you kill the Kappa?” Dora asked the spokesmermaid, turning her attention back to her patients.

  “About a month back, it started acting erratically. Before that, it was content to live close to the northern shore where it had been dropped off. But for some reason it became wild, easily angered, and then violent. Only recently did it dare to come close to our territory, though, which is why you had to heal my dear niece,” the mermaid explained.

  “Hmm, the sudden shift in attitude might have been due to Shey being killed. If he had made a bond with it, the master’s death could trigger aggression in a Familiar made from a monster,” Ain stated, thinking back on his old lessons about magic.

  “Regardless of why it happened, it did. After this ‘Kappa’ attacked my niece, we sent soldiers after it. It was surprisingly fast and fierce,” the mermaid said with a shake of her head as another merman thanked Dora for her healing skills. A feral grin spread across her lips, revealing pointed, shark-like teeth. “We got it, though.”

  “Tasted like turtle with a hint of shark,” one of the newly healed merfolk claimed, licking his lips.

  “You guys really have sharks in the lake? Damn, wish I’d known that earlier. I could’ve whipped up some delicious shark fin soup for dinner last night!” Enrai groaned in disappointment.

  “Why not for lunch?” the spokeswoman said, before snapping her fingers at one of the loitering fish-tailed men. “Dezzem, take a few others with you, and hunt down a shark or two. We’ll have a meal together with these kind dirt-plodders.”

  “Yes, my lady!” the merman exclaimed with a salute, before diving into the water.

  “I take it you’re an important person among the merfolk?” Dora asked politely, and the spokesmermaid nodded.

  “Among the Azulos, or ‘merfolk’ as you land-dwellers call us, I am of considerable station,” the mermaid stated proudly. “I am what you might call a ‘Governor.’ I lead the merfolk of the Lake of Tears on behalf of the High Priestess of the Coral Throne.”

  “Interesting,” Dora murmured as she ran her hands over the last patient. Healing energy washed over the merman’s torn fin and stitched it back together, making it as good as new. “Alright, I’ve tended to the worst of the injuries for now. I’m going to have to wait for a bit for my mana to regenerate before I handle the superficial stuff.”

  “Thank you, you have already done far more than I could have hoped for,” the Governor of the merfolk said gratefully. “I’ve never seen anyone with so much talent in healing. And your mana reserves are astonishing as well!”

  “I had a wonderful teacher, and a lot of practice,” Dora said with a wan smile.

  A large splash caught her attention, and she looked over to a group of menfolk who surfaced nearby. They were dragging a number of large shapes through the water behind them. There were two medium sized sharks, which had Enrai salivating and rubbing his hands together over, accompanied by a huge, fat fish twice the size of a merfolk. It had grey scales and a squashed head that looked like that of a boar.

  “Do you think this
will be enough to cook with?” the Governor asked, and the Monk nodded.

  “Oh, yes! More than enough! I’ll start cooking right away!” He then paused and shot a sideways glance at the elegant mermaid. “Um, is there anything you guys can or cannot eat that I should be aware of?”

  “Things that are toxic to humans, and elves and half-orcs too, I guess, tend to be bad for Azulos as well,” the spokeswoman said dryly.

  “Got it! No poison,” Enrai said with a laugh before beckoning to Ain for help setting the cooking fire up.

  “So, what’s it like eating underwater?” Dora asked as she watched her friends prepare lunch.

  “Messy,” the Governess said with a giggle. “If there’s one thing you land-dwellers have in your favor it’s all the various spices and cooking methods. Raw or boiled are the main options we have when it comes to food.”

  “That does sound limiting. Do you eat surface food often?” Dora questioned.

  “When we can. We do small amounts of trade with the towns and villages that ring the Lake of Tears, which gives us a few chances to sample local cuisines,” the mermaid stated. She sniffed the air and smiled eagerly. “Speaking of local cuisine, it smells like your boytoys are almost finished with the food!”

  Dora spluttered in shock and denial. “I-Wha-Huh?” she replied. The mermaid just tilted her head back and laughed. She continued to laugh while the half-orc grew increasingly embarrassed and refused to stop even as Ain walked over with two sets of dishware in hand.

  “We don’t have much in the way of plates and utensils,” the Grand Elf said apologetically. “For the soup, we have some tin cups, but that’s about it.”

  “That’s fine, I appreciate your efforts,” the Governess responded after calming down from her bout of mirth. “I’m sure some of my men brought dishes and such for the rest of them.”

  Still, she accepted the spare plate and eating implements with a nod. To Dora and Ain’s surprise, though, instead of using her hands to grab the offered items, thick strands of her long, inky black hair moved on their own and reached out and snagged the plate and utensils.

  “How did you do that?!” Dora gasped in awe, absently reaching up and stroking her own straw-blonde hair, pulled back into a ponytail.

  “Hmm? Do what? My hair?” the Governess asked, with a confused tilt of her head. Then, understanding sparked in her eyes, and she chuckled. “Ah, that’s right, you dry-skins don’t have this ability.”

  She leaned back in the water, lounge in the lake like it was a giant bath, with the plate held in her hair hovering at her side. “Underwater, having hair that moves this way and that is dangerous. It can attract animals that mistake it for seaweed, and obscures vision when it floats in front of our faces. Us Azulos have developed a way to make our hair less of a liability. Simply put, all of our people can use inherent magic to control our hair like it’s an extension of our body. When we swim, our hair remains straight and unmoving. And if we wish it, we can move and control our hair like extra limbs. It makes it easy to carry and hold things underwater.”

  “I wish my hair could act like an extra arm,” Dora sighed wistfully.

  “A part of me wants to know the context for that sentence,” Enrai said with an amused grin as he walked over, holding a large pot full of soup. “Another part doesn’t, because a lack of context makes your statement hilarious.”

  He then glanced over at the Governor of the lake, who was manipulating her dishes and cutlery with her hair and nodded slowly in understanding. He then turned back to everyone and gestured towards the large pot.

  “Alright, everyone who wants some shark fin soup, gather ‘round!” the Monk declared loudly, and loud splashes greeted his words as the merfolk who had been loitering around swam over eagerly.

  One of the splashes seemed to draw the Governor’s attention, causing her to stare at a merfolk who seemed smaller than the rest. With an exasperated sigh, the leader of the merfolk swam over to the smaller figure who flinched when the larger fish-tailed woman approached.

  “My, my, my, what’s this? A naughty little lobster sneaking out when she was told to stay at home?” the Governess cooed in a way that made Dora shivered in terror, memories of her mother scolding her coming to the fore.

  “I’m not a lobster!” a young voice cried out indignantly.

  “You’re right. More of a shrimp than anything else,” the Governess teased. She reached down into the water and pulled out a familiar teenage mermaid and dragged her over to the shore.

  “Someone snuck out, but I can guess the reason why,” the older mermaid said as she presented the young girl Dora and Enrai had saved last night. “She wanted to thank you for saving her.”

  The Governess cleared her throat as she prepared to do introductions. “This is my niece, Fenna. She’s cute but utterly precocious.”

  The teenaged mermaid scowled at her aunt for that, but her expression came off more as a pout than any look that would intimidate a person. She then turned to Dora, Ain, and Enrai and bowed her head politely.

  “Th-thank you for saving me,” Fenna said softly. Enrai waved a hand dismissively.

  “Don’t worry about it, we were glad to help. Especially helping a cute little coral flower like yourself,” the Monk said, his suave words causing the young mermaid to blush bright blue.

  “Keep your hands on the pot, Enrai! And stop flirting!” Ain shouted as the soup-filled container started to slip. The Monk muttered ‘Oops!’ and quickly reattached his waving hand to the pot’s handle.

  Ferra giggled at his antics, while Dora rolled her eyes in amusement. Enrai quickly ladled out the hot and spicy soup he’d made to everyone, and there were a few minutes of peaceful slurping and muttered praises.

  “This is really good!” Dora declared, praising Enrai. He smiled with a tiny blush at the praise.

  “It’s nothing. Ain can’t cook worth squat, so I had to learn how if we wanted to eat anything other than rations whenever we’re on the road,” Enrai said with a laugh. Ain grumbled at that, muttering something about ‘not my fault everything I cook turns into charcoal.’

  Lunch went well, the merfolk praising Enrai’s skills which caused the young Qwanese man to turn red from the effusive compliments. Fenna spent most of the meal floating as close to the Monk as she could, shooting him doe eyes whenever he was around.

  Dora and the Governess found the young mermaid’s crush of Enrai hilarious and hit it off quite well. The two spent most of lunch chatting with each other about the differences between living underwater and above. Of particular interest to Dora were the merfolk’s medical practices.

  “Fascinating! I would never have considered using poison to treat a different poison,” Dora mused.

  “Building up immunities to different toxins is hard work, but the payoff is worth it,” the Governess claimed. “By adulthood, most Azulos are resistant, if not outright immune, to many varieties of neurotoxins and venoms. The waters are swarming with deadly predators, most of which are delicious when prepared properly. If you want to eat, you have to eat properly!”

  Dora nodded in silent agreement before putting her bowl down and flexing her hands. A quick check of her mana levels showed she had enough to finish the treatments. She called over all the merfolk who had only superficial and minor injuries and began to heal them.

  “Anyone else feel the need for some additional healing? Problems or issues that aren’t the result of a fight?” Dora inquired as she worked. A few of the merfolk who’d carried the wounded over swam forth, expressing aches and pains and persistent coughs they’d developed.

  Completely healing everyone took a few more hours than expected, and it was late afternoon before she was done, but it was worth it to Dora as she saw the joyful, pain-free expressions on her patients’ faces. Healing the aquatic race had also given the half-orc an insight into a new and unique biology she’d never had the chance to encounter before. Learning about new people and creatures, and then healing them, was one of th
e few moments of pleasure she had.

  “You have our thanks, Lady Dora, for your help,” the Governess declared, bowing her head in gratitude. Dora accepted the thanks with a polite nod of her head towards the merlady and her niece. The rest of the merfolk all bowed their heads as well, a few shouting out praise or words of thanks for the green-skinned Healer’s efforts. At the lake’s shore, Dora and Enrai both said their farewells, standing with their feet in the water as they did so while Ain busied himself with cleaning up their campsite.

  “Here, this is the payment we owe you,” the senior mermaid stated as a strand of her hair extended, carrying a dark green pouch. Dora took the small sack woven from kelp and seaweed fibers and peeked inside.

  Within were several dozen small, lustrous orbs. Pearls! Mostly white, some pink and a single black pearl sitting atop the rest of the pile.

  “Gold and other so-called precious metals are too heavy and unwieldy for use in the water,” the Governess explained. “Azulos money takes the form of pearls. White pearls are the equivalent of your copper coins, pink pearls are silver coins, and black pearls are akin to gold coins.”

  “This is a lot of pearls,” Dora said, silently calculating what the trade-in value of these precious objects would be. A jeweler would pay handsomely for even a single pink pearl, let alone a rare black one!

  “You healed a lot of people,” the Governess replied with a shrug. “Plus, we know that for you dry-skins, pearls are worth slightly more than the equivalent in precious metals. It is a fair trade, in our eyes.”

  Fenna was fidgeting at her aunt’s side, before leaning over and whispering something to her guardian. The older mermaid frowned, but then nodded, a thin smirk creasing her lips.

  “My dear niece has something she’d like to present to you as well,” the Governess said, waving Fenna over to the shore. She wiggled a bit, her face bright blue with a flustered blush, but she eventually worked up the courage to hand Dora a small, glowing trinket.