"Lad must've had too many oysters," Kaelan snickered.
Meanwhile, Dove paced in the yard, too embarrassed to go back inside, but too disoriented and sick to return home. This terrible thing growing in his stomach was taking over him. It wouldn't be too long before the others discovered what was what. And what would they do then? Hang him? Burn him at the stake? Or simply laugh him to death?
Chapter Seven
Dove sat at his desk flipping through his half-empty notebook but, not seeing the sketches and notes he'd taken. He wished to go back to a simpler time, when the contents of this notebook were all that concerned him.
His eyes came to rest on the tank he'd brought with him from the ship.
The male seahorse's pouch was swollen to bursting. Suddenly the seahorse began engaging in strange behavior: he jerked back and forth, and as he did so, tiny creatures emerged from an opening in the top of his pouch.
Dove realized the seahorse was giving birth. Automatically, he poised his hand with a feather pen over his notebook, ready to take notes.
The event lasted several minutes. When it was over, a cloud of skinny fry enveloped the pair of adult seahorses. Neither of them paid any attention to the fry once they were out of the pouch: no nuzzling, no feeding, nothing. The pair drifted across the tank, snouts searching for food. The fry buzzed around their environment nervously, not looking to the parents for guidance.
"So you don't take care of the young, do you?" Dove asked softly, leaning in towards the tank. "They're all on their own against the big, scary world." Dove remembered afternoons by the creek with his father, climbing the rocks and trying to catch frog specimens. What if his father had never been there? He probably would have been like one of those ruined children, the orphans he saw in the street with empty, hungry eyes and empty hands begging for handouts.
Dove placed a hand on his stomach. He could swear he felt a little push back from inside, from the creature he was harboring. He whispered, "I won't be like a seahorse father. I won't leave you all alone in the world."
Chapter Eight
Dove hadn't seen Polyp since he'd marched off angrily when she'd told him he was pregnant. According to his calculations, it had been four months. He wanted to see her again, to make sure she knew of his new resolve to protect the child. Besides, he wanted to see her again.
He made his way to one of their favorite spots: the waterfall in the clearing, the one that poured into the lake that snaked away into the village. He sat by the water among the lavender flowers in the tall grass and began singing one of Polyp's favorite English songs. He couldn't carry a tune, and his voice was wavering, but he tried anyway: "My lover is a sailor, he's bound to sail away, but like a fish in a fisherman's net, I'll catch him and he'll stay..."
After a few minutes, a familiar face poked out of the water. "That was beautiful," Polyp sighed.
"No, it wasn't." Dove smiled.
"All music is beautiful when it comes from the heart," Polyp sang in her melodious voice. "Are you up for a swim?" She held up her vial of caramel potion.
Dove took off his coat and boots and hopped in the water. "Down to the ocean?" He asked.
"The inevitable answer is yes," Polyp giggled. "You know me so well."
So the two followed the river's path, winding through the village. Rowynne passed by, holding a load of laundry. She gaped at the two as they passed.
Eventually, they poured into the sea, where they soared over the corals that Dove now knew by name. The lovers talked about an argument Polyp had had with her father. Neither of them mentioned Dove's condition or his earlier breakdown. The respite from the situation and the reassurance that Polyp wasn't angry with him, both gave him great relief.
This time they went farther out into open sea than ever before. Dove was about to pant to Polyp that they should turn back when they came upon the most majestic palace Dove had ever seen. Grander than the castle of King Charles back home, this ice-blue structure seemed to be built entirely of crystal. Arches entwined with sea lilies graced the entrance, and conical towers topped with conch shells stood guard on either side.
Polyp ducked under one of the arches.
Dove followed, coming to a silver door adorned with silver handles . "What is this place?" Dove breathed.
"Home. My home. I think my sisters would like to meet you."
"What about your parents?"
"I don't have a mother, and Father's on business elsewhere. Thank Neptune; I don't think he would like to meet you. He has something against humans, for some reason."
"Are you sure this is a good idea?"
"Of course, silly. I've told my older sisters about you, and they all adore men." Polyp pulled the door open, and the two came face to face with a burly merman with a head covered in flowing white sea snakes where his beard and hair should be.
"Polyp? What is this abomination?" His voice was like the whole baritone and tenor section of a choir, echoing against the high walls.
"Dove's my friend, Father," Polyp said, taking Dove's hand. Thoroughly shocking him, she added, "I think we'd like to get married."
Recovering quickly, Dove smiled his most charming smile at the mer-king. But it was to no avail.
The merman glared at Dove in the fashion that one glares at a cockroach on the bottom of one's shoe. "Put this man in prison," he ordered a nurse shark hovering at attention behind him. "He's seen too much to be allowed to return to the humans."
"No!" Polyp cried. "He's done nothing wrong!"
"And you," her father sneered at her, "may go to your room and think about your disgrace for bringing a human here. You are forbidden to visit the prison," he added before she could ask.
Polyp smiled at Dove, an apologetic, worried smile. Then she followed her father's orders, swimming up to a hole in the ceiling.
Dove was escorted by the nurse shark deep into a murky hole in the ground. The deeper into the abyss they sank, the lower his heart sank in his chest.
Chapter Nine
Dove hadn't been home for three days. Rowynne was at her wit's end. She'd searched the village, the forest, the beaches - with no trace of him. She broke into his house to look for clues to his disappearance. All she saw of note was a tank full of seahorses on the desk. They were lying on the bottom of the tank, looking despondent, so she fed them a few pieces of the bottle marked "fish food" on the bookshelf. Then, desperate, she went to Captain Hildebrand's mansion to discuss the mystery.
"Ye haven't searched the sea yet, have ye?" He inquired. "Sometimes a body don't wash up on shore for several days."
"So you think he's dead?" Rowynne's voice trembled.
The captain nodded enthusiastically. "We can put together a search party and look for 'im. 'Course, the body's prob'ly so swollen and pale now it's unrecognizable - "
"A search party, yes," Rowynne interjected. "Why didn't we think of this three days ago? If he's not on land, he must be at sea."
"I tell ye, he's prob'ly dead at sea," the captain clarified.
But Rowynne refused to let the image of Dove drowned enter her mind. If you keep up hope, he has a higher chance of survival, she told herself.
~~~
The ship surfed up and down on the crashing waves. Rowynne wondered how Adamson managed to stay on the slippery deck as it tilted from side to side.
Thankfully she was inside, watching the storm from Captain Hildebrand's quarters. He'd invited her to share his luxury, and she'd reluctantly accepted.
"Well, we's away from the crew, and safe and dry in here. Alone," Hildebrand emphasized the word.
"Yes." Rowynne's heart began to flutter as she realized she was trapped - it was either face a lightning storm or brave the captain's bedroom.
"They always say it's bad luck to have a woman on board a ship. But the smart men knows better." The captain grinned, displaying several gold teeth. He lumbered over to the bed and pulled back the covers. "Want to lay down, mistress?"
Rowynne eyed the door. "
I'm very sorry, Captain," she said softly, looking at her slippers. "I don't mean to offend. But I couldn't possibly get into bed with you."
"Why not?" The captain's grin stretched wider until Rowynne thought it would spread off his face. "Is it because I'm old?"
"No, sir! It's just that I'm saving myself for someone else."
"Ah, yes, yer precious Dove, who ye still think we're going to find - alive - out here in this storm..."
"I don't know if he's alive or not!" Rowynne sobbed. "And anyway, that's not whom I'm referring to," she added quietly.
"Eh?" Hildebrand looked genuinely confused. "Then who is it?"
Rowynne was sorry she'd said it aloud. Now she felt she had no choice but to tell the whole truth. "I want a certain mermaid girl," she wept. "I want her golden hair flowing freely down her back, her fiery red tail, her curvy torso with those seashells I want to strip off her sleek, tan skin... you'll have me hung for such words, I'm sure of it. But I can't help what's true..." She trailed off.
The captain shook his head. "That's a serious ailment ye got there, lassie. I know from experience I can't force ye to bed, and I wouldn't want to. But yer bound to get yerself in trouble, talking like that."
Rowynne nodded. "I've never had feelings like this before," she whispered. "Not even for Dove. I love him, yes, but this... this is like the pull of the ocean. There's no escaping it."
The captain touched his hat. "Then I'll pray for ye," he decided. "And don't go tellin' anyone else about this, savvy?"
Chapter Ten
Dove would have languished in prison had it not been for Polyp's nightly visits.
Each evening after sunset, as the day guard was leaving and the night guard arriving, she'd slip in through the bars. She always brought caramel potion to keep him alive, as well as some good royal food and hilarious stories of her shenanigans with her sisters and the dolphins.
Dove acquired a taste for seafood. A bulge was beginning to show on his belly.
Polyp tapped him there and teased, "You'd better lay off the buttered lobster!"
Dove said, "I think that's from the baby."
"Oh." Polyp was silent the rest of that visit.
One evening she came as usual just when the last blood-red rays of sun were leaving the sky. She said, "Today is the day I break you out."
"Why today?" If she had the capacity to do so, why had she not used it earlier?
"You need to go back to your people. The situation's getting dire. I used to think you'd be safe here... Now I think anything with two legs needs to get as far away from my father as possible."
"What? Why?"
"He's declared war on the humans of Mystycetii. We attack as soon as our troops are ready."
"We?"
"As princess, I'm expected to fight for my people." Polyp smiled wryly. "And I suppose you want to fight for yours as well."
"Actually, I'd be content to stay here in the palace where it's safe and - "
"Safe? I don't think so. My father has vowed to kill every human he sees. And he knows just where to find you."
"Oh." Dove swallowed.
"But don't worry. You'll be safe on the island - as long as you stay away from water."
Polyp swam over to the electric eels that served as bars to Dove's one window. She spoke softly to them in that language she'd been speaking when Dove first met her with the dolphins.
After a moment, they slithered away, leaving a gaping hole in the wall.
"Wow." Dove marveled, "You really have a way with words." Then he began to swim out the window.
Before he left palace grounds, Polyp called after him, "Be careful, Dove! I mean it! You're carrying my baby!"
"Would you care about my safety if it was just me?" He smiled down at her.
"There's no 'just' about you, Dove," she replied, leaving his head spinning as he swam away.
The guard, thankfully, was off duty - probably preparing for the battle tomorrow.
Dove realized he should warn the others. Then he looked down at the bulge on his belly. Will they notice? He wondered. Will they take me seriously? It occurred to him that, bulge or no bulge, they'd never taken him seriously.
Chapter Eleven
"Mr. Alastaire!" Rowynne screamed.
Some of the men looked over at her in surprise. They probably thought she was having a wishful hallucination.
But there he was, in flesh and blood, floating beside the wake of their ship. His eyes gazed up at her urgently. He was alive!
Rowynne cast him a rope.
He grabbed on, and she began heaving him up the side of the ship.
When Adamson saw the man on the other end of the rope, he quickly began to help. Soon, Randolph and Kaelan came over to watch the spectacle.
With no assistance at all from Dove's end, Rowynne and Adamson hauled him over the railing and onto the dock.
"Talk to me," Rowynne begged the pale man.
His hair was out of its ponytail and splayed around his head like a dark octopus. "They're coming," he croaked.
"Who's coming?" asked Randolph.
"The merpeople," Dove whispered. "They're going to attack."
~~~
No one believed him. Even after he'd rested up, drank copious amounts of soup, brushed his hair, and tucked it neatly back behind his neck in a red ribbon, the men refused to consider leaving the island. Jokes began circulating about Dove and his "beer belly."
Kaelan said, "A man need be drunk to say the things Dove's been a'sayin'."
Dove tried reminding them he'd never had a drop to drink in his life, but they just laughed him off.
"Do you think I'm drunk?" Dove asked Rowynne the next evening, as they sat together on her porch steps.
"No," she answered definitively. "I've seen a mermaid, and I know they're real. I'm not sure," she said slowly, "that they intend to attack us. But I suppose anything is possible."
"Will you help me convince the men?" Dove said. "We need to flee. Or fight. Preferably the former. But we need to take action soon. They could attack any day now."
"Yes, Mr. Alastaire," Rowynne said soothingly. "I'm sure you speak the truth. And I'll do anything to help you."
"You don't think I have a beer belly, do you?" Dove had to ask.
"I think maybe you need to lay off the buttered lobster." Rowynne smiled at Dove, a smile clearly intended to be comforting. But all Dove saw was the face of his mermaid girl. He was awake all night thinking about the lady he loved - and the one he didn't.
Chapter Twelve
"Finally," crooned the king of the sea, "we are ready."
Thousands of merpeople awaited his orders, some seated in armed dolphin chariots and some free-swimming. They were armed with poison-tipped tridents and barnacle-encrusted cannons.
The king called into his conch shell, "Attack!"
The legion swarmed up towards the shore.
The colonists were all in their beds when cannon fire erupted on shore. Some of the cannonballs traveled far enough to strike their houses. When Gaines awoke, the bed just south of his toes had been blown clean off. A burnt-fish stench filled the air.
"What in blazes is going on?" Randolph asked no one in particular, as the men met outside, each grasping his weapons.
They heard an echoing voice proclaim, "We are the United People of the Pacific Kingdom. You are being asked to leave this land."
The colonists looked at each other. They were all thinking the same thing. "Perhaps we should have listened to the blathering baby," Gaines mused.
"Surrender the land!" cried the mer-king.
"In the name of the king, we shall not!" Kaelan shouted boldly.
"Then this attack will proceed as planned." The mer-king turned to his battalion. "Fire at will."
~~~
Dove crouched in his cellar, both hands on the enormous pouch on his bare belly. He could feel the baby kicking against his hand, a firm push through the hard skin. He could swear the baby was trying to touch h
is hand, to make sure everything was all right.
"We're safe here," Dove said to the unborn child. "And they won't hurt you, anyway. You're their own kin." Of this last bit Dove wasn't entirely sure.
"Ouch. That hurt," Dove cried out as the kicks grew stronger. A pang of fear coursed through him: what if he was to give birth here and now, alone, with the world against him?
He placed a hand tenderly on his stomach, imagining caressing the head of a baby with his brown eyes. "It's all right," he said softly. "I'm on your side, even if no one else is."
A wave began to rise like a mountain in the sea. It swept towards shore, growing until it threatened to put out the sun. Then it crashed onto land. But it didn't stop there. Like an army, it marched deliberately forward over the land, breaking ancient trees like twigs in its wake. When it reached the village, it was still strong, flooding the houses, crumbling them to piles of logs.
Dove's house above the cellar was swept away until all that was left was the cellar, flooded with water and infested with mermaid troops.
They surrounded Dove, pointing tridents and cannons at him from all sides.
His heart broke when he realized he was to be impaled or shot - or both - and the worst of it was, he was breaking his promise to his baby.
When he thought the end had come, suddenly a body came in between him and the troops to the front. It was Polyp, dressed in silver armor from head to rib cage. Her lower torso and her blood-red tail undulated in the current, exposed and vulnerable.
"Don't shoot!" ordered one of the soldiers. "It's the princess!"
The mermen and mermaids lowered their weapons. Their faces looked shocked, as if they'd only just awakened to the brutality of their intended deeds.
The mer-king himself appeared. "What's going on here?" he boomed.
"Your daughter was willing to sacrifice herself to save this human, Your Majesty," answered an armored mermaid holding a cannon. "Her selflessness made us wonder whether we really need to kill every single one. Clearly, she loves this one."
Three Mermaid Tales Page 2
