Our Bloody Pearl

by D. N. Bryn

The gray fabric clings to my tail, secure without much rubbing. It covers from the base of my large end fin all the way up past my hips, with openings for the smaller fins along my side. Silvery poles give it structure but still allow for some bending, with plates covered in a layer of sponge providing added support. A bit of fabric crosses over my back and chest too, preventing slippage.

  I twist, trying to get a feel for it. It sits bulky and cumbersome, but weight little overall. Hesitant, I give my hips a rock. My tail moves as one, awkward and unnatural, but with far less effort on my part. I look up at Murielle. “Good enough?”

  She squeals. “It’s perfect!”

  “You did good, Mur,” Dejean says, slapping her on the back so hard her pinned hair topples over, spilling a small, leftover pipe onto the ground.

  “Now we’ve gotta test it out.”

  “I’m not getting in the clamshell while wearing this. I won’t make it out again.” I buck my hips again for emphasis, my entire tail bobbing up and down stiffly.

  Nodding, Dejean grabs his sketch paper. “I was thinking of adjusting the elevator like this. No top, with handholds and a sloped entry. Perle shouldn’t have any problems.”

  Murielle hops up and down. “Wonderful!”

  His gaze shifts to me, his brow lifting. He hands me the illustration. “If you think you’re ready to go back out there?”

  I look the image over without truly seeing it. Running from Kian is one thing, but the ocean is my home. I will not fear it.

  Returning the paper, I give him a solemn nod. “This is our territory, as long as we’re here. I will swim in that cove, and the sea beyond it—whatever it takes.”

  [ 8 ]

  RIPTIDE

  The current rips a pod apart; tenacious, devastating. If I fight it, will we come together?Or will it only break us further?

  THE RECONSTRUCTED CLAMSHELL sways as it lowers. I grip the sides, my heart pounding with each motion. With the top half gone, the sky looms above me. I lay on a long, flat board at the bottom, far too exposed. At least this time I don’t have a dying Dejean riding beside me. He sits on the catamaran floating in the middle of the cove, dumping an anchor over its side.

  It’s a small boat compared to most, relying on sails and a rudder instead of a steam machine. Its too-long hollow hulls are shaped like funny porpoises, with a set of crossbars connecting them, finely woven netting stretching between. One tall mast springs from the middle, both its sails drawn in so as not to catch the soft breeze coming off the ocean.

  Dejean says we’ll keep to the cove until I feel comfortable. If I’m honest, it’s a relief to move slowly, to adjust at a speed that’s good for my body. It’s also annoying that he feels the need to coddle me so, but I don’t put up a fuss. In human terms, I think it means that he cares.

  The clamshell shakes as it plunges into the water, nearly throwing me off. I clench my hands along the metal and glare up at Murielle. I can’t see her expression, but she waves both her arms in such a way that I’m afraid she may fall in my stead.

  From the boat, a rope flies toward me with a hiss, slapping against the water near the clamshell.

  “Grab it!” Dejean shouts.

  I take a deep breath. I can do this. I pulled Dejean up from the bottom of the cove. Swimming down to the end of a lifeline is nothing in comparison.

  I dive for it. My tail thumps against the side of the clamshell, but the brace keeps it from twisting about. Pulling water through my gills, I use my arms to swim toward the rope. It sinks, and I snatch it just as it hits the sandy bottom. I wrap it around my forearm a few times and grip it firmly, drawing comfort from its firm connection to the boat.

  Twisting onto my back, I settle against the sand. It welcomes me, both soft and tough all at once. I close my eyes and let the wash of the water consume me. The song rises in my chest. I focus on pushing it away, though doing so hurts something deep in my soul, like the creeping sting of a jellyfish. But for Dejean and Murielle’s sake, I’ll refrain.

  I want to explore.

  Keeping a tight hold on the rope, I push off the sand. My tail floats behind me. With the brace to support it, the lifeless limb no longer weighs me down with the same helpless drag. The sharp twisting of my hips offers some forward momentum. I quicken the motion, laughing at the water that rushes over me.

  The reef comes in fast. I swing to stop myself, but my tail doesn’t turn like it should. Stretching out my hands, I catch some of my weight as I slam into the rocky ledge. Coral splinters under the impact, and I cringe, shaking small shards off my palms. I guess even a little speed does me no good if I can’t slow down.

  I’ll have to find a way to navigate without the aid of my fins…

  Still clutching the rope, I swim through a bit of the reef. Colorful fish flee my presence, along with a fever of rays and three decent-sized squids. Even the few nearby sharks give me a wide berth. The energy it takes to bring one down doesn’t make them profitable prey for a single siren, but they know to fear large pods. I fit my fingers into a sea anemone for the joy of it. It curls tightly, the sting it uses to paralyze small fish more sticky than numbing to something my size.

  Motion from the cliff catches my attention, and I glance over my shoulder to find Murielle swimming toward me, completely submerged. She wears a pair of loose, checkered shorts that go all the way to her underarms, clinging there. Her red hair poofs around her. Though ridiculously unpractical, the curls look beautiful, lit by the glow of the sun and flowing in gentle waves as she moves.

  Dejean says something from the boat, but his words dissolve into muttered chaos beneath the surface. I can only make out his feet, his weird, stubby toes trailing through the water. He leans forward. Through his rippled image comes a look of sheer longing.

  But it’s best for him on the boat. My body heals in the salt, and his in the air. As Murielle dives down to me though, her grin consuming her face, I miss him like a gentle throb in my chest. I turn away from the catamaran.

  Together, Murielle and I swim through the reef. I show her little sea jewels: fancy shells and pretty corals, the clams most likely to hold pearls, and sea creatures slow enough—or unafraid enough—for me to catch. She still only knows simple signs, but the treasures of the ocean speak for themselves.

  The sun has shifted somewhat by the time we head back to the boat. I pull my lagging body up using the rope, Murielle pausing for me to catch up every so often. My muscles ache, but I can’t remove the smile from my face.

  “You two enjoy yourselves down there?” Dejean asks.

  I loop my arms over one of the long, upside-down dolphin hulls, giving him the smuggest look I can muster.

  He glares at me in return. “I bet sirens taste like swordfish.” He stabs a fork teasingly in my direction.

  “I’m not a fish,” I correct him, for the millionth time.

  Leaning forward, he pokes his utensil at me again. “Maybe you’ll taste better than fish then?”

  I snatch the fork out of his grasp with my mouth and slip back under the water, coming up beneath the netting section to jab it at him from below. He yelps the first time it sticks him, but he topples backward against the net, his chest trembling with laughter. Murielle joins him. She watches Dejean, her eyes wide and her lips curled in a soft, wistful way, as though she sees something new and beautiful there.

  Moving back to the side of the catamaran, I toss Dejean’s fork at him. Murielle catches it and uses it to wrap up her hair, despite Dejean’s objections.

  She snorts. “What’d you even need a damn fork for? Didn’t you get us sandwiches or something?”

  “Yes, but there’s a jar of pomegranate seeds, too,” he whines, still eyeing the fork.

  “All fruit’s finger food!” Murielle snatches her sandwich out of Dejean’s hands, sticking the better part of it into her mouth in one go.

  I look at him expectantly.

  “Get in,” he motions me over. “I’ll throw out a line.”

  “But—�
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  “I’m not letting you swim with fishhooks in the water.” There’s no room in his voice for protest.

  I want to flick my tail defiantly, but I manage only a swivel of my hips. The urge to catch my own food gets the better of me, though. I doubt I can manage anything edible, but I won’t know unless I try. I slip back into the water, pausing long enough to sign Dejean a quick, “You can throw out that line when I get back.”

  Binding the end of the rope around my waist, I let myself sink. Just before hitting the sand, I turn to the end of the cove Murielle and I didn’t touch, swimming toward it in the lagging, lopsided way the brace allows. I try to be stealthy, but wiggling through the bright sunlight in my bulky contraption makes me more obvious than a single ship on a flat sea.

  I creep along the lip of the reef, pulling myself forward by grabbing outcroppings of rock. A few fish dart above me, far too fast to be worth my effort. I lower myself down, glancing into the caverns running like broken tunnels through the rock. Maybe I can find a lobster hiding somewhere.

  At the fourth large arch, something moves in the shadows. I slip my shoulders in, glancing down a side tunnel. Light streams through openings in the reef, creating a patchy network of green shade and golden beams. A murky blue siren tail flickers in and out of the light.

  Storm. I creep a little farther through the arch, baring my teeth at them. Storm returns the look with a hiss.

  My instincts all scream to attack. Storm isn’t one of my pod. They shouldn’t be here. They were already warned once.

  And they hurt Dejean.

  But I remember what I had been when Dejean found me, how easily he could have kept me a prisoner, or stuck a blade through my heart. He showed me compassion. Perhaps this siren, with their scars and missing fingers, needs the same offer of grace.

  “What are you doing here?” Like the signs I developed with Dejean, our language portrays the underlying concept instead of the exact words. “This is my territory. If you won’t join my pod, you must leave.”

  Storm flicks their tail, but their eyes drop to the sand beneath them. “I have no one,” they say softly. “This is a good place.” They hesitate then, returning their gaze to mine. “You took my prey… though you did not eat it?”

  “The humans aren’t prey,” I retort. “They’re my pod-mates.”

  Shock puckers Storm’s face, and they curl their upper lip. “You are crazy!” They hiss. “Humans are not meant for the ocean. We give them room to sail between the islands, and they disrespect it! They have no honor for territory. They kill us whenever they can.” Their fins flare, gills pulsing in time. “We should kill them first.”

  Everything they say is true, to an extent. But Storm doesn’t know my humans—my wonderful, terrible, devoted humans.

  “They’re not all the same. These ones are good. They’ve helped me. They would help you, too.” I glance at my palm, curling and uncurling my fingers. Determined, I offer my hand to Storm. “We could protect you.”

  They stare at my hand like an octopus grows out of it, but a look of hope passes over their face. Slowly, the softer expression fades, harsh lines pooling around their eyes. “The humans have always done their best to kill us. The moment they learned to ignore our songs, they began slaughtering our kind in droves and taking us from the sea to be sold like fish.” Storm creeps closer to me, coming out of the shadows. The scars across their chest glow as reflected light from an upturned shell bounces off the mangled scales. “Those humans you protect will hurt you too, just like the others.”

  “You don’t know them!” I snarl. “They aren’t like the ones who hunt us.” The twinkle that lights up Dejean’s eyes when he sees me happy proves that.

  “They took you out of the ocean! They made you dependent on them.” Storm launches forward with aggression this time, anger pinched across their face.

  I scoot out of the tunnel, clinging to the rock face to steady myself. My heart pounds and the end of the rope I bound to my waist wavers. There’s truth to what Storm says. I’m a siren—a siren living in a tub.

  They take my silence as a sign to continue. “You eat their food and let them fit you with pipes and cloth.” They burst out of the tunnel, holding onto the sides of the rock, same as I do, their fins flared. “You do not act like a siren. You act like the human’s pet.”

  Anger rushes through me. “I’m not!” I growl, a deep noise of defiance that quivers my chest. But doubts creep in. Without Dejean hunting for me, I can’t eat. Without Murielle’s brace, I couldn’t even swim in the slow floundering way that I do now.

  With a shudder, I shake those thoughts away. I’ve saved Dejean as often as he’s saved me. Maybe I depend on him for some things, but I repay him in the ways that I can. We’re valuable to each other, like pod-mates should be.

  I open my mouth to tell Storm so, but their eyes flash toward the double hulls of Dejean’s catamaran.

  “Come back to the ocean,” they demand. “You belong to the sea, not to them.”

  “They’re my pod. This is my home.” A slight tremble rises in my bones. I bare my teeth. “If you won’t accept that, then you must leave.”

  Storm’s gaze flickers between me and the boat. Their face hardens, and the remaining nub of one of their lost fingers twitches. “Even if you do not realize what the humans have done to you, I refuse to abandon you with them!” they snarl. In a gust, they swim toward the catamaran. Toward Dejean and Murielle.

  Something flashes upon Storm’s face as they move, the same burst of emotion I feel when I think of Kian; an agonizing mixture of hatred and terror. It stalls me for a moment, but I force down the rising memories and launch myself off the side of the rock.

  “You will not hurt them!” Ramming into Storm’s tail, I wrap my arms around the powerful limb, digging my nails in deep.

  Storm screeches with pure frustration. They slam their tail back and forth, but I grip harder, clutching onto one of their small side fins. We careen, a swirling mass of iridescence and darkness. My world spins one way, then the other, the sand and the reef and the sky alternating in chaotic pulses as water whips through my gills. The lifeline connecting my waist to the boat runs through it, encircling us as we roll.

  You will not hurt them. I pound the words through my head, my anger building with each pulse. Using our momentum, I release Storm’s tail and fling myself onto their shoulders.

  They spear their elbow into my ribs, shoving me away, but the rope wraps around us both like some kind of terrible trap, tangling us together. It burns against my scales, tightening as Storm thrashes, shudders racking through them. They grab the untangled section of rope, yanking themselves toward the catamaran. A coil connecting our tails drags me forward.

  I refuse to let go of their shoulders. “You will not hurt my humans!” They think they can help me by taking away my humans, but they know nothing of my life. They know nothing of me.

  Yanking myself up Storm’s back, I clamp my teeth into their arm, in the same place they bit Dejean. I bite down until my teeth meet bone. Sharp, briny siren blood clouds my vision, distorting the slowly nearing form of the boat’s underside.

  That’s for Dejean.

  Storm shrieks. They buck and wither, spiraling us through the water. I grip them with shaking arms as they thrash, rolling us under the boat’s shadow. They slam me into the side of the nearest hull.

  My head knocks against wood, pain shooting through my skull, down my neck, and into my shoulders. I hold in my cry, but a lump clings to the base of my throat, rage and pain and terror all churning together. I bite harder.

  Again, Storm slams me into the hull. Once, twice, a third time. I will not let them go. My vision wavers, black dots filling in from the sides. Panic rattles in my chest, seizing my gills. I will not…

  My grip around Storm’s waist loosens.

  Out the corner of my eye, a brown blur sweeps through the water in the shape of an oar. It slams into Storm, knocking the back of their head. Storm screech
es. Their flesh disappears beneath my teeth, leaving a cloud of red as they drop downward. The ropes coiled around us loosen, floating through the water like an endless, deadly eel.

  Storm darts out of the mess, but a coil catches their tail as they swim under the catamaran. It yanks the end of the rope I bound around my waist. I snarl in pain, grabbing the side of the boat. If they tow me away from it, away from Dejean and Murielle, if they leave me somewhere far along the reef, I will never make it back in time to protect my humans. My hands cramp up, burning as I dig my fingers into the wood. I grit my teeth. I can’t let go.

  Large, calloused hands grasp my wrists, Dejean’s face a swirling blur in the air above. He pulls me toward him, but the rope around my waist continues to tighten. My chest catches as terror sweeps through me, and I can’t tell if the agony comes from my fear or the feeling of tearing in two.

  I’m being ripped apart. But I can’t leave them. I gather my pain and scream.

  Suddenly another blur slides through the water, this one with a cloud of red hair. Murielle swims past me, a knife in her mouth. She grabs the rope connecting me to Storm and saws. After three quick cuts, it snaps.

  The poles on my brace grate against the ship’s hull as Dejean yanks me onto the boat. I collapse, gasping in air until it fills my lungs, spasms racking my core. Panic rushes through me.

  “Murielle!” I rush the sign for her name, nearly scraping into my head fins as I make an illustration of the tools in her hair. “Where is she? Get her on the boat!”

  A round, wet mass flops onto the catamaran at my side, grinning. “Thought you could get rid of me that easily, huh?”

  My body goes numb, then limp, and then I burn from the inside out. “You idiot!”

  “That was dangerous!” Dejean shoots her a glare, but his relief seeps through in the drop of his shoulders and the scrunch of his lower lip.

  I mirror him. The faintest murmur of a body shooting out of the sea attracts my attention. Droplets of water sprinkle onto the gentle waves, and a flash of storm-colored scales glimmers in the sun, heading straight for Dejean.