by Sara Ella
It’s because the sheets had blood on them.
“Hey,” he said. “What’s going on? I thought you weren’t being discharged yet. I tried to call you.”
“Dad took my phone.” Maya rolled her eyes. “He said he decided ten wasn’t old enough to have my own device. Can you believe that?”
He could but refrained from saying so. Maya spent way too much time on the thing, especially for someone her age. Their father hated social media for anything other than marketing and business purposes, but Mom had convinced him to let Maya get an account on all the main platforms.
“My friends all have accounts!” Maya had argued. When that hadn’t worked, she’d taken an alternate route. “All my classes are in private groups. The teachers post extra credit and give a heads-up on due dates and when there’s going to be a quiz.”
That had done it. From then on Merrick’s sister had been glued to her phone, checking her likes and friends’ status updates every second of the day. She’d gotten tons of new followers as the daughter of a business tycoon. Their father had his money in so many businesses at this point, it was difficult to keep track of exactly what the man did and didn’t own.
“So he has your phone.” Merrick glanced around her pristine room. Not a thing stood out of place. The white furniture matched the white curtains. A single painting hung on the wall above Maya’s desk—a lighthouse that reminded him of childhood and made him wish for clearer answers. “Are you guys going on vacation or something?”
Maya moved to her closet and started pulling things off hangers. “Guess again, big brother. Your crazy sister’s being sent away.”
Something cold and sharp sliced through him. “Does Mom know?”
His sister emitted a dark laugh. “Her number’s been changed. All her social media accounts have been deleted.”
Merrick cursed under his breath. He’d checked his mom’s accounts yesterday. What could their father have said to make her abandon her own children? The more Merrick thought about it, the hotter his blood simmered. If Hiroshi didn’t want their mom found, that gave Merrick all the more reason to find her. He’d convince her they would be safe together. That man would never hurt her with his words, his power, again.
“Get what you need,” Merrick said. “Change of plans.”
Maya jumped up and down, then ran to him and threw her arms around his neck. “You mean it?”
“I do. But hurry before he gets back.”
He left her to finish packing and entered his own room. His duffel bag waited under his perfectly made bed, and his neatly folded clothes were stacked in color-coded order. This had not been the maid’s doing. They were not allowed to touch his room upon his father’s instructions.
“If I could keep my barracks shipshape, you can do the same with your own space,” Hiroshi had said.
It wasn’t that Merrick minded being tidy. But he wanted to do it on his own terms, in his own ways. His father’s constant military-style inspections were enough to make Merrick hate his room. It had never belonged to him. A mere holding place until freedom came.
He grabbed some shirts, pants, underwear, and socks from the drawers. A hoodie and jacket from the closet. A few necessities from the connecting bathroom he and Amaya shared. He knocked on her door from inside the bathroom and said, “Five minutes,” then headed downstairs.
The song had changed from classic rock to an upbeat dance tune. Mrs. H stood on a step stool in the family room, dusting the bookshelves and mantel. Her daughter was in the kitchen and the granddaughter must have been cleaning the bathroom for all the loud singing coming from that direction.
When Mrs. H spotted him, she climbed down and wiped her brow with the back of her hand. “Leaving so soon, Mr. Merrick?”
“Yeah. Don’t want to be in your way.”
“I thought Mr. Hiro was coming back for Miss Maya. He asked us to keep an eye—”
“I’ve got it from here, Mrs. H. No worries.” Merrick cringed. He didn’t want to lie to the kind old woman, but he also didn’t need her nosing around or calling his father. And Hiroshi wouldn’t have let Maya out of his sight unless he knew Mrs. H would watch out for her.
The last thing he wanted was for her to get fired. So Merrick grabbed a pen and pad of paper from the old rolltop desk drawer in the foyer and scrawled out a quick note. Then he handed it to Mrs. H. “Give this to him when he gets here, okay?”
“But, Mr. Merrick—”
“Ready!” Maya hauled her bag down the stairs. It clunk, clunk, clunked behind her. “Thanks, Mrs. H!” Maya hugged her as if the situation was perfectly normal and headed out the front door.
“I’m sorry,” Merrick said and followed his sister before he could change his mind.
He ran through the note he’d written in his head as Grim pulled out into traffic and Maya messed with the radio station.
“Doesn’t this car have Bluetooth?”
“Sorry, kiddo.” Grim roughed up her hair. “We do things old school where I’m from.”
Maya found the least static-filled station she could and began talking Grim’s ear off. Merrick wondered if his friend would be sick of them by the time they reached his beach house.
He stared out the window from his spot in the back seat, saying a silent good-bye to the life he had. Not that he’d miss it, but still. What else did he know? His phone vibrated in his pocket, but Merrick ignored it. It would be his father, furious with the note he had written.
His own self-satisfaction lifted his mood. The man’s face would have been priceless. He couldn’t stand to lose control.
To Whom It May Concern,
I’m taking Maya to find Mom. Wish us luck! And hey, don’t blame Mrs. H. It’s not her fault we never want to see you again.
—Your most disappointing son, Merrick
Nineteen
Coral
Coral thought she’d met darkness. She believed they were acquainted.
She was wrong.
Those long nights staring into deep blue while Jordan tossed in her sleep were nothing compared to this. And Duke’s hungry stare when the shadows threatened to steal life and sound from color? Mere shadows in contrast to this place.
The Abyss was a typhoon.
A numbing Coral couldn’t begin to explain encased her heart. No light. No sound. She couldn’t even tell if she had a body, a tail. Torture. Were her eyes open? Closed? Halfway between awake and asleep? She no longer sensed her grandmother’s—the Sorceress’s—presence. Had she abandoned Coral, deceived her into trusting her as the story said?
The Sorceress enjoys deception. She would have naive little mermaids believe she alone holds the power to provide a cure, an end to the curse.
Why would her grandmother keep this from her? How could Coral trust a mermaid who willingly swam in darkness?
I have chosen to swim through darkness too. Maybe she is more than the stories claim.
The colorless nothing around Coral left her mind to wander. To fill in the blanks of every conversation she never had.
The fight she and her father never shared. All the things Coral was certain he thought but never said.
“You’re cursed, Coral. Like your sister. Weak. Pathetic. Diseased. I never loved her and I never loved you.”
Then there were the unspoken thoughts of her sister Jordan.
“She looks nothing like me,” Jordan might say. “She can’t possibly be my sister.”
And Duke. He’d certainly have an opinion and he wouldn’t be afraid to share it.
“She will infect us all,” he’d jeer. “She deserves to drown in Red Tide.”
Coral would reach for her ears to shut out the voices that weren’t there, but she couldn’t feel her hands anymore.
Her oldest sister, her best friend, was gone.
Her family looked at her as they would a stranger.
“If I am nothing to no one,” she said to the black, “am I anyone at all?”
The silence that met her quest
ion encased her heart in ice.
The darkness of the Abyss seeped into her pores. Mixed with her blood. Flowed through her veins.
And.
Then.
It.
Awakened.
Coral opened her eyes. She released the bubbles she’d held in for far too long, then shielded her vision. But where she expected light, there were only shadows. Where she’d hoped to see color, only gray remained.
Ready to drown, Coral shook and shivered. She focused on the Sorceress—the human—before her.
“Welcome to the other side,” her grandmother—the Sorceress—said with a tip of her chin.
Coral narrowed her eyes and followed her grandmother’s gaze down the length of her own body. Her tail, scales, fins . . . vanished. She stood on two shaky legs, water dripping from the skin that now matched her torso.
“What have you done to me?”
“We all have a little human in us, dear. You just have to know where to find it.”
As Coral stepped forward on her newfound limbs, she stopped to look back at the sea, at the darkness that had consumed her.
It consumed her still.
“There is nothing left but death for you there,” her grandmother said.
Emotions more powerful than any Coral had ever experienced rose, and temptation pulled her toward the nothing. She’d forgotten about her sister and Red Tide, about Jordan’s rejection and her father’s hatred. In the Abyss, there was no Duke. No Disease.
She put her own longing for nothing aside and focused on a newfound desire. One that blossomed within her every new second she spent as a human. And her certainty on one matter grew.
The Abyss was not a place. It was the Disease.
Coral was sick. Her insides were as black as the revenge she sought.
“You tricked me,” Coral said. “You are a sorceress.”
“I have never liked the term sorceress. It is far too foreboding.” Her grandmother offered a mischievous grin followed by a wink. “Who comes up with these things, I’ll never know. The storytellers like to elaborate. Perhaps because what I am is not so interesting.”
“What are you, then? A witch?”
“Some call me guardian. But by others I have been referred to as friend.”
“You are no friend to me.” A war raged inside Coral. She couldn’t cope with any of it. Not without her sister. “How do I go back?” She didn’t care if her family didn’t want her. She only wished to return to the safety of the cold, dark sea. It was familiar. It was home.
“There is only one way back, though I don’t recommend it. It’s best you find a way on legs. Trust me on this.”
The little mermaid—no—girl. The girl had no idea what to do with her grandmother’s vague answers. Still, she’d decided. “I’ll stay.” There was so much her sister had kept from her. Coral wanted to know it all.
Her grandmother led her up the shore, toward a small cottage that looked out over a flower garden and the sea. None of the colors stood out to Coral. All were silent, their song left behind with Coral’s innocence.
She would remain human, for now.
The crown princess needn’t have worried about her baby sister’s heart, though. Once curious about humanity, now Coral sought only one thing. She stared at the pearl bracelet on her wrist with newfound resolve.
She would find the human who had brought Red Tide upon her sister.
Then Coral would make him drown.
Twenty
Brooke
After
The first light after a storm is the most beautiful.
When I open my eyes, free from the exhaustion that usually plagues me after a long night of tossing and turning, I don’t remember where I am. I haven’t slept so well in ages. I inhale and take in the scent of the ocean, the feel of something warm and solid wrapped around me. I lean into that feeling. The comfort of home.
“Mmmm,” I sigh aloud. Summer. Forever my favorite—
I stiffen. Inhale again. All at once the warmth I woke with flickers. Dies. I blink and look up. The cave. The storm. Winter.
Panic overwhelms every other emotion.
He’s gone.
And here I thought this would change nothing. That this wouldn’t have to hurt at all.
“Over here!” a voice calls in the distance, a mere faded echo beyond the cave’s walls.
I still feel his embrace around me. His summer scent remains. He’s taken everything. And nothing. He was never—
“Hurry!” A woman’s voice. “I found her!”
I try to move, but the feat proves impossible. Try to inhale again, but the task is more than I can bear.
I wish I hadn’t fallen for him. I wish we’d never met at all.
“Brooke,” Jake says. “Can you hear me?”
Yes, I think.
“She’s hypothermic. Get Search and Rescue up here now.” Static crackles.
A muffled male voice sounds through a speaker.
I don’t register his words or see what happens next. I don’t care. I’m so tired and cold and I suddenly feel everything and it hurts and he hurts and this hurts.
“Hold on, hon. We’ve got you.”
The bottle. What happened to my bottle?
I keep my eyes open long enough to glimpse the ocean once more. Her waves push and pull, playing a tug-o-war with my heart. “Let go,” she seems to say.
If I could spring to my feet and run into her arms, forget everything, I would. But a stiller, smaller voice sweeps across my heart. One I remember from before.
“True love makes life, even a broken one, worth fighting for.”
Do the words belong to me? Or were they spoken by another? Someone stronger. Braver.
“Hold on,” Jake says again as I’m lifted off the ground. “You’ve got this. Fight, Brooke. Fight.”
I’ve decided my ending, my mind tells the sea.
I don’t want to live anymore, my heart reminds the waves.
There’s nothing left for me here, my soul reminds my depths.
I don’t know why. It doesn’t make sense. But Jake’s voice is the one that rises above all else. When she grabs my hand, I feel her warmth. And something cracks deep inside.
No, not cracks. Fills in.
So I hold on.
Even if only for a season.
Spring
“When words fail, sounds can often speak.”
—Hans Christian Andersen, What the Moon Saw
Interstitial – Prince Letter
Twenty-One
Merrick
That was close. Too close. Extremely close.
Merrick stepped into the large meeting room at the library and peered through the window on the door. He’d become paranoid. For a split second, he believed he saw his father. In this measly little ocean-town-slash-tourist-trap where the man hadn’t set foot in years. Merrick’s head spun. They’d survived a few months without raising suspicion. If Hiroshi found them now, he’d ruin everything.
Merrick still hadn’t tracked down his mom.
A text chimed from the phone in his pocket as Merrick set up the metal chairs in a circle.
The librarian poked her head in the room and eyed the space. She looked up at the clock and said, “Five minutes.”
He nodded and went to check the refreshment table. Coffee and tea, check. Donuts, cookies, brownies, check, check, and check. The suicide survivors group that met every Wednesday evening would be here any minute. This was possibly his favorite thing about his part-time job at the library. Maybe it was that he got to listen in on the session. He never spoke up, but hearing the others’ stories made him feel a sense of belonging. They’d all been through something similar. Maya hadn’t died, but Merrick had been affected. It helped to know he wasn’t alone in that.
The phone pinged again. He’d left his smartphone on his bed at the house in San Francisco, bought a cheap prepaid one with a new number. He’d taken what was left of his cash stash at home too. The money
he made at the library wouldn’t provide for both him and Amaya. If not for Grim, he didn’t know what they’d do. Merrick had promised to pay him back.
“You’d do the same for me,” was all Grim had said.
Merrick frowned and flipped open his phone. He hoped that was true.
I’m kind of a jerk. I didn’t tell Nikki where I went. I didn’t even give her the decency of a good-bye.
He tried to set his guilt aside and focus. Nikki would have gotten over him by now, moved on.
He glanced at the clock. Two minutes. A few people started to file in. They mingled and grabbed snacks and drinks. The real stuff wouldn’t actually start for another ten minutes or so. He double-checked that everything was in place, slipped into the library, and hopped on the nearest computer.
Rarely a free minute passed that wasn’t dedicated to finding his mom. The fake online profiles he’d created had been of zero use in tracking her down. The few leads he’d found at the beginning of March sped toward dead ends. Now it was the last day of April and still nothing.
How does a person just vanish?
His phone lit up and Amaya’s name flashed in the blue window. Merrick flipped it open and whispered, “Hey, I’m at work. You can’t keep calling me at work unless it’s an emergency, Maya.”
“Oh really, Nigel?” He could hear the sarcasm in her voice. Amaya loved to tease him about the fact that he was working here under Grim’s name. Since it was a small town, he hadn’t even been asked to show a picture ID with the paper application he’d filled out. And since he had Grim’s permission, it wasn’t identity theft either.
“I’m bored,” Maya whined. “Grim keeps letting me win Scrabble.”
“I do not!” his friend shouted in the background. “This girl’s a cheater! Tell her quixotic isn’t a real word!”
“Why can’t I come hang out with you?” Maya said, ignoring Grim’s complaints.
Merrick gripped the phone so hard he thought it might break. He closed his eyes and swallowed his panic. How was he supposed to explain to his ten-year-old sister that he was probably wanted for kidnapping? That he could literally go to jail for what he’d done? He’d already seen their names on the government’s Amber Alert site. Yes, he’d checked. Not that anyone here paid much attention. Here, time stopped. Here, he could hide in plain sight and no one gave him a second glance.
