Kingdom of Salt and Sirens

by J. A. Armitage

“On land?” I was taken aback. As far as I knew, she was unable to go on land.

  Her eyelashes fluttered as she laughed at me. “Why, of course, child. With your legs and your lungs, I’ll be whole again and finally able to fulfill my destiny.”

  My eyes narrowed as I took in her words. “What do you mean?”

  “Why, you don’t think I like living here in this cesspit of a cave, do you?” Her face contorted to a picture of evil amusement.

  “Do you really think this place is a fitting home for someone as powerful as I?” Her cackle somehow echoed around the cavern despite it being filled with water. It really was some strange magic. “The king banished me from Havfrue years ago, and although I do still pop in from time to time, I am unable to stay long, thanks to his magic. The closest place I could find was this cave, but I deserve better than this and with my new body, I mean to get it. The king of Havfrue is, unfortunately, a much stronger opponent than I can handle in my old age, but the king of Trifork, well, he has no magic, does he? Taking over on land should be a snap.”

  I stared at her in horror. “You can’t!”

  “My dear, of course, I can. You asked me to spare Havfrue. You said nothing about Trifork. Who is going to stop me? Not your boyfriend. He will die along with you. I’m so glad you told me that the pair of you were bonded. It will make it so much easier.”

  I stepped back again, but this time with good reason. I’d gone to the old hag in good faith, but she had never played fair, and it didn’t look like she was about to start now.

  “Don’t run, deary,” she called mockingly. “There’s nowhere to go.”

  With a smirk on her face, she swam up to me and grabbed me by the arm. Despite her age, her strength was exceptional. Out of nowhere, she produced a knife which she held up with her other hand right in front of my eyes so I could see it. A flash of purple ran through it. This was no ordinary knife. It contained magic.

  “Now, my beautiful darling, I’ll take those legs of yours. In a few minutes, you won’t be needing them anymore.”

  24

  The underwater palace

  I screamed as she lowered the knife down to the top of my thigh. This time, though, no sound came out. The strange underwater atmosphere had changed perceptively. We were now in real water. Real water where I couldn’t talk, walk normally, and most importantly, breathe.

  Salt water filled my mouth as I writhed to pull myself from her grip. In my panic, I couldn’t see what she was doing, but I could feel it. A sharp stinging sensation hit me as she ran the sharp blade through my trousers and across the skin of my thigh. If I could have cried out, I would have. The pain was intense, but I couldn’t make any noise as I struggled to pull myself away from the knife.

  I couldn’t hear her speaking either, but I could see the expression on her face. It left no doubt that she was laughing manically as she tore through my flesh. Blood—my blood— clouded my vision, and I honestly thought I was going to pass out. Dizziness engulfed me, and without being able to take deep breaths to quell it, it took everything I had not to succumb to the darkness.

  “Ari!” I shouted as loudly as I could in my mind. He was the only one who’d ever been able to hear me this way, but he was a mile away, tucked up in bed after consuming drugs to help him sleep. Even if by some amazing miracle I managed to drag him from his drug-induced slumber, there was not a chance in a million years he’d be fast enough to get to me. Not now. My time left was counting down in seconds rather than minutes, and yet, I still yelled his name. I wanted him to know that it he was the subject of my final thoughts.

  The water all around me was now bright red. My own blood had clouded it so much, I couldn’t even see the witch in front of me, but I could still feel her strong grip on my arm and the knife digging into my flesh.

  My eyes felt heavy as unconsciousness began to creep in, brought on by a lack of oxygen. Darkness pressed down on me and I knew I should let myself succumb to it. Anything was better than the excruciating agony that was now running through my leg.

  I’d come here completely expecting it to be my last act ever, but it had backfired on me. In wanting to save the people of Trifork and my own family, I’d inadvertently made things so much worse for them. With every ounce of the energy left to me, I fought against her, but like a mouse fighting a lion, I had no chance of winning. The best I could hope for would be to inflict some pain as my life ended. I grabbed her hand and forced the knife backward hoping to strike her. A deathly scream told me I’d hit my mark, but it was too late to save me. I was already dying.

  I blinked, ready to take my last look when there was a flash of something in front of me. The water all around us displaced quickly, and the pressure on my arm let up as the witch let go of me. Another great swish of water sent me hurtling backward and down to the seabed.

  My leg felt like it was on fire, but the shock of the sudden movement had me opening my eyes widely, trying to make sense of what was going on.

  Huge white teeth cut through meat in front of me sending another plume of red into the water. All I could see around me was blood. My own?

  I closed my eyes, ignoring the currents of water pulsating around me and finally gave in to the darkness.

  I felt movement. Either water was whooshing past me, or I was being pulled through it. I didn’t have the energy to open my eyes to see which it was. I had never felt so dizzy and sick in my life, but somewhere in the back of my mind, I wondered if it was Ari who was pulling me through the ocean.

  “I love you,” I murmured in my mind, but I was either too out of it, or he hadn’t heard me because there was no response.

  I was aware I was breathing again, although I could feel that I was still underwater. I drifted in and out of consciousness, neither knowing nor caring where I was going. After a while, the feeling of being pulled through water abated, and I was laid down gently.

  “Ari!” I shouted his name, but my voice sounded strange as though I was in a chamber of some kind. My throat hurt, and I could taste the salt in it. I was also aware that I was no longer underwater. The air around me was stale and smelled fishy, but at least, I was breathing again, really breathing, not aided by magic. My leg throbbed as I tried to pull myself back to full consciousness. I could definitely smell and hear, although the noises around me felt distant and strange. I could also feel and knew I wasn’t in a normal bed. It felt like I was on a beach. A cold beach. There was definitely sand beneath me. But opening my eyes to see was a struggle. I felt like I was trying to claw my way out of a dark pit.

  “Don’t fight it. You need to heal, to sleep.” I felt a damp cloth graze over my forehead. The voice was calming. Whoever had spoken was obviously taking care of me, but I didn’t recognize the woman’s voice. With everything that had happened to me, being incapacitated in a strange place with someone I didn’t know made me feel even worse.

  “Where is Ari?” I mumbled, my voice tight with the salt caking my throat. I should be asking for a drink to wash it down.

  “I don’t know, honey, but you’ve been calling for him in your sleep.”

  I had? I wanted to ask her who she was, where I was, but exhaustion was winning the battle. Wherever I was, I knew I was safe. Without opening my eyes, I allowed myself to drift into unconsciousness.

  When I awoke, maybe hours, maybe days later, I felt so much better. My leg still hurt like hell, but opening my eyes wasn’t the struggle it had been.

  I found myself in the strangest room. The walls were made of the most beautiful pink coral, and the floor was a bed of pristine sand on which I was currently lying. It looked and sounded like I was underwater, but I could breathe normally. It wasn’t the weird breathable water of the witch’s cave, but real oxygen. And yet, I’d never seen a place like this above the water. I pulled myself into a sitting position to try and get a better look at my surroundings to work out where I was, but as I did, pain flooded through me. I gasped, looking down at my leg. Someone had bandaged it tightly, but I could s
till see a few spots of red where my blood had seeped through. I gritted my teeth until the pain subsided and then looked around the room again. Apart from myself, the room was empty.

  “Hello,” I cried out, my voice straining.

  Less than a minute later, a woman walked in. Actually, she pulled herself in by her hands as she had no legs to walk on, only a breathtaking iridescent pink tail that trailed in the sand behind her.

  “I’m sorry,” she huffed as she pulled herself over to my side. “I’m not used to this.”

  She nodded down to her tail “I’ve always swum before. This is new.”

  She was stunningly beautiful with long red hair so much like my own and a face that looked eerily similar to my mothers.

  “You are one of the king’s daughters,” I observed, recognizing her. I’d seen her in passing the last time I was here with Ari.

  “Yes. My name is Adella,” she smiled pleasantly pouring me a glass of water, which she handed to me. I took it and drank it down greedily, thankful I was finally able to rid myself of the salt clogging my throat. She poured me another glass which I also downed quickly.

  “My father made that for you. He desalinated it.”

  “Desalinated?”

  “He took the salt out. You land dwellers don’t do well with saltwater. Can I ask you a question?”

  She looked at me in a strange way. I had an idea what she was going to ask. I nodded my head.

  “Are you Anaitis’ daughter? You look so much like her. Your hair...”

  “My hair is just like yours. I am her daughter. You must be one of her sisters.”

  She gave a small laugh, little more than a puff of breath. “I never thought I’d see any child of hers. I’m so glad that I have, although I would have liked to meet you under better circumstances. Are you an only child?”

  I shook my head. “I have a younger brother, but he’s not allowed in the ocean. My mother was always worried that the sea witch would take him...and me.”

  Adella took my hand and smiled widely. Tears pooled at the corners of her eyes as she spoke. “You don’t need to worry about the sea witch anymore.”

  “She’s dead?” I asked, not daring to hope it was true.

  “The king has been desperate to stop the sea witch for a long time, but there are laws here. He has known for a while that she has been up to no good, but until last night, he had no proof. She preyed on the people that she knew wouldn’t tell the king. That’s how she’s managed to keep what she’s been up to under wraps for so long.”

  “So, my grandfather killed her?”

  “He saw what the witch was going to do to you, so he set his pet on her.”

  I thought back to the fearsome shark in the cage above the king’s head in the throne room. It certainly explained all the blood I saw. It wasn’t all from my leg after all. It was the blood of the sea witch.

  “I thought the king hated me,” I mumbled.

  “He did. He hates all land dwellers, but then something about you changed his mind.”

  “What?”

  Her face brightened. “I saw you when you came to see him yesterday. There was something about you. Of course, you caused a sensation by just being here with legs instead of a tail. There was an uproar, but it was only after you had gone that I put two and two together.

  “I went to father with my assumption about who you were. He took a lot of convincing, but then he came around to the idea that you might be his granddaughter.

  “When one of the guards spotted you walking across the sand and told him, he decided to see where you went. I think he was surprised to see you heading straight toward the sea witch’s cave.”

  “What happened?” I asked. “I don’t even remember seeing him there.”

  “He heard what you said to her, about how you wanted Havfrue protected, along with Trifork. I think that’s what finally convinced him who you were.”

  I had wanted Havfrue saved. It was my ancestral home, and even though I couldn’t breathe underwater, I did feel at home here.

  There was something missing though. I now knew it was my grandfather and not Ari who had brought me back here, but I was surprised he hadn’t come looking for me.

  “Where is Ari?” I asked.

  Adella cocked her head to the side. “Ari? The boy you’ve been talking about in your sleep?”

  “My boyfriend.” It was the first time I’d called him that. It felt weird saying it to this stranger, but how else could I describe him?

  “Is that the boy you came here with yesterday?”

  I nodded

  “I’m afraid I haven’t seen him. There’s a good chance he won’t know you are here unless you told him where you were going. Even then, unless he saw the king save you, he wouldn’t know where to look for you.”

  Everything she said made sense. Of course, Ari didn’t know where I was. He had no reason to think that I’d be in the King of Havfrue’s castle.

  “How long will I have to stay here?” I asked, thinking that I’d go straight home and tell everyone where I was. It wasn’t just Ari that would be worried. My parents would too.

  “You need to rest. You got hurt pretty badly and need time to heal. The king has used his magic to provide a room of oxygen for you. In a couple of days, he will take you back to your own land himself.”

  “A couple of days!” I blurted, pulling myself up quickly. A slice of pain shot through me, making me whimper.

  “Yes. A couple of days. We will do what we can to heal you using our healing balms, but they take time.”

  I lay myself back as she gently removed the bandage on my thigh. She applied some green goop which soothed my painful skin and then rebandaged it.

  “Please, will you go to Trifork, to the palace and tell them that I’m alright?”

  Her eyes widened as she took in what I was asking of her.

  “I can’t do that,” she answered fearfully.

  “You have to,” I begged. “My family will be out looking for me. You know my parents are the king and queen. They already have half the navy called back to Trifork. They were going to use the ships to blow up Havfrue. Now, they won’t, but they will use them to come looking for me. Do you really want hundreds of ships above Havfrue, because here is the first place they will look for me.”

  She closed her eyes, inhaling a deep breath. “You don’t understand what you are asking of me.”

  “I’m only asking you to swim a mile and tell someone where I am. It doesn’t have to be your sister. You could tell one of the guards outside the palace.”

  “I’ll do what I can,” she conceded, “But you have to rest up. That leg isn’t going to heal by itself.”

  She finished bandaging me up and then pulled herself back through the door the way she had come. As I watched her leave, I saw a rippling effect at the doorway that I’d not noticed before. Beyond the doorway was water, only held back by magic.

  I lay back and waited

  The two days Adella promised me I’d be here became three, dragging on for what felt like an eternity. On the morning of the third day, Adella came to let me know that the king was on his way to see me. Since the first day, she hadn’t been back. Instead, merpeople I assumed were palace servants brought me food and water. I was just about to ask her if she’d had the chance to go to my parent’s palace when my grandfather came floating in behind her.

  The king had such an imposing presence that I was surprised when he came into my room without making a sound. Unlike Adella who had been pulling herself into and out of the room, the king used magic, floating silently towards my makeshift bed on the sand. On seeing him, Adella bowed and left as quickly as she was able to.

  “Thank you for saving me,” I began, but he raised his hand to stop me.

  “I’ve been angry for a very long time,” he admitted, his voice booming, resonating around the strange underwater room. “But I came to realize with the help of Adella and my other daughters that it is not you that I’m angry with.�
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  “My mother hates the fact that she has never been able to come home. She was terrorized by the sea witch and told that if she ever stepped foot in the ocean again, the sea witch would take her legs and her voice. She’s been afraid of the water ever since. I think she wanted to come home, she just couldn’t.”

  The old man turned his head away from me and brought his hand to his mouth as if he was crying. It was so incongruous to his fearsome persona to see him weeping. When he turned back, his eyes were dry, but the redness around the edges gave him away.

  “I could ask her to come visit,” I offered, “if you want her to, that is. I’m sure she would love to come home now that the sea witch is dead.”

  His mouth set in a hard line. “It is not just that. I have long since been wary of the land dwellers. Look how quick they were to declare war on us. She chose the land dwellers over us, and that is unacceptable.”

  I sat up and looked him straight in the eye. “She chose love. As her father, I would have thought you would want her to be happy.”

  He nodded his head slowly but didn’t answer.

  “I will take you back to the land. I believe you are well enough to travel now. Adella tells me that your leg is healing nicely.”

  I bent my leg at the knee. It still hurt, but not to the extent it had three days previously.

  “Adella has done a wonderful job. Please thank her for me.”

  He nodded his head and then, without asking, scooped me up and carried me through the door and out into the water.

  The journey back to the palace took almost no time at all, and my grandfather stopped by the small dock. One of the palace guards drew his sword and came running over to us.

  “Stop!” I yelled. “It’s me.”

  “Is this how all your people greet visitors?” asked my grandfather quietly in my ear. I was just about to answer him when my mother flew out of the house, her gray-streaked hair flying in the wind behind her.

  The guard stepped back to let her through, but she didn’t stop. With a leap, she dove headfirst into the water.