by Kelly, Holly
“Regardless of how complicated it is,” Sara said, “my fiancé loves me for who I am and I love him, too, more than my own life.”
Adelpha’s face softened and she shrugged. “How can I argue with that? But getting to the surface is not as easy as it seems. If anyone sees you… Well, it wouldn’t be good for you. I’m just glad my brothers aren’t here. I don’t want to scare you, but if either one of them were to find you, they’d arrest you and take you to the counsel. You could even get executed.
“You see, our kind has no tolerance for interbreeding with humans. My mom and I debated whether to keep helping you after we found out you were human. But ultimately, we decided we had no choice. We couldn’t just let you die. Besides, you looked so sweet and helpless.” She smiled, “To tell you the truth, I’m not sure my youngest brother would take you to be killed. You are such a pretty thing and he may seem tough on the outside, but inside he’s quite sweet.”
“I have question for you,” Sara said. “Where did you learn to speak English so well?”
Adelpha smiled, a sly glimmer in her eyes. “My brother is fascinated with humans. He knows many human languages—funny how humans need more than one. But he said that English is the most universal language, so he taught us. I took to it more quickly than my mother did. She still struggles with it.”
“Do many other Dagonians…”
“Adelpha, breakfast please.” Sara looked up and saw Adelpha’s mother, Chara. She didn’t look too pleased with their conversation.
“Yes, Mother,” Adelpha said. She swam through a nearby doorway.
“You feel well?” Chara spoke in chopped, halting words.
Sara hadn’t even thought about it. Her injury didn’t seem to be bothering her anymore. “I feel fine. How long have I been here?”
“Three days,” Chara said.
“What? How could I?”
“You sleep.”
“Did you drug me the whole time?” Sara asked, incensed.
“Drug?”
“The drink that makes me sleeps.”
“Oh no, only yesterday, First two days you sleep. You heal well. Nearly…” she couldn’t seem to find the word, “done healing.”
Three days. Sara was sick, thinking about how long she had been missing. Still, it wasn’t this Dagonian’s fault. “Thank you Chara, for your help. But I must be going. I have to get back to the surface.”
“You live with humans?”
Here we go again. “Yes, and I need to return.”
“Eat first.”
Sara’s stomach screamed for food, but still she hesitated. She desperately needed to get to Xanthus. However, she would need her strength for the journey ahead. “Okay,” she said. “But then I must go.”
Chara nodded. “Then you go.”
Chara led Sara to a room that she guessed served as the dining area. In the middle of a large, warmly lit room, there sat a very wide, cylinder aquarium with dozens of colorful fish swimming around inside. The top of the case shimmered like there was some sort of force field. When a little blue fish swam at it, it bulged for a moment, but the fish was deflected.
“Sara, I hope these fish are to your liking. I don’t know what kind you’re used to, so I brought in a wide variety.”
Oh my goodness. What was she supposed to do with them? Sara looked at Adelpha and Chara, expectantly. She’d reasoned that she could just watch them and do what they did. But they looked to her as if she needed to go first.
She guessed it would be easiest just to be honest. “I have to tell you that I have no idea how to catch and eat fish.”
They both gasped. Adelpha spoke, “Oh, my goodness. Do you eat land animals?” She looked a bit green as she considered the possibility.
“I do eat fish also, but only after someone else catches them for me.” Sara reached out to brush her fingers over the force field. It felt like soft Jell-O.
Adelpha sighed in relief. “Oh. Now that I can do. Which one would you like?”
Sara looked at the variety, but none of the fish looked anything like what she’d gotten in the grocer’s case. Sara didn’t want Adelpha to feel as if she’d worked for nothing, so she picked one.
Sara pointed to a small, rounded fish with blue stripes. “This one looks good.”
“Oh, yes. The blue ring angel fish is one of my favorite too.” As the fish swam near Adelpha, she snapped out her hand and snagged it. The fish squirmed in her hand just before she broke its neck, twisted off the head, and placed the severed head back in the tank. The other fish darted over to the floating head and began to nibble. Now she knew where Xanthus got his table manners.
Adelpha handed the headless body to Sara and smiled.
“Thank you,” Sara said. Okay, no fillets. She could deal with it. Not wanting to offend them, Sara took a bite into its side. The scales felt strange but as soon as her teeth reached flesh, the delicious flavor exploded in her mouth. This fish tasted much better than anything she’d ever eaten before. Maybe it was because she was so hungry, but Sara couldn’t imagine anything could taste so amazing. She had to force herself not to devour the thing like an animal, so she concentrated on chewing slowly.
“This is very good,” Sara said after she swallowed.
Adelpha smiled wide. “They are, aren’t they? I also love the hermit crabs,” she said as she reached deep in the tank and picked up a shell from the bottom, extracting a small crab and popping it whole into her mouth. She threw the empty shell back into the tank.
Sara looked over to Chara and saw her breaking off the head of a small moray eel. Wow, were all Dagonians super strong? Chara was not careful at all as she took large bites out of the side of the eel and chomped on the meat.
“Which one would you like next?” Adelpha took the flesh-stripped carcass from Sara’s hands and lowered it into the tank.
“Why don’t you let me try to catch one?” Sara asked.
Adelpha smiled. “Sure, but don’t be disappointed if you cannot. Our young take several years to master fish catching.”
Sara looked around the tank. Let’s see, what she needed was an extremely slow fish. Around the other side of the tank, she saw a jellyfish. It moved slowly enough for her. Sara saw Chara move to another side of the tank and snatch a tiny fish. She guessed she didn’t need to stay put, so she moved over to the jellyfish.
“Be careful…” Adelpha said.
Before she could finish her warning, Sara reached in and grabbed the slow moving jellyfish around its tentacles. It felt as if she’d grabbed a hot curling iron. She screeched and jerked her hand out of the tank. She held her burning hand close to her chest, careful not to touch the singed flesh.
“Oh, Sara, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have let you… Mom?”
Sara hadn’t even realized Chara had left, but as she turned toward her, she saw her swimming back into the room carrying a green blob of jelly in a sheer bag. She looked at Sara as Atlantian rolled off her tongue like an avalanche. Sara had a feeling Chara was saying something about what an idiot she was.
Even so, Chara took Sara’s hand and smeared the jelly across her palm. The relief was instantaneous. It felt cool and soothing. “Thank you,” she said.
A bump came from the front of the house. It sounded like a door opening. Chara and Adelpha looked at each other with eyes wide and then they looked at Sara.
Chara barked out orders in Atlantian to Adelpha. Adelpha grabbed Sara by the arm and led her toward a small door. She opened it and shoved Sara inside. “Don’t say a word,” Adelpha whispered. “Keep completely quiet.” She eased the door shut. Sara was left inside a small closet. She was only too willing to do as Adelpha asked. The last thing she needed was to end up in prison, or worse, dead.
Sara eased over to the door and pressed her ear against it. She heard another door closing, and then she couldn’t hear a thing. She sat in silence, listening to her own watery breaths. Something soft and slimy brushed against her arm. She jumped, knocking into who knows what
and making a loud clatter. Oh shoot.
She heard the door to the dining room slam open. “Why are you lying to me? Who are you hiding? I can smell her, Adelpha.” Xanthus. It sounded just like Xanthus.
“Come now, brother, it’s only a friend of mine who’s just left,” Adelpha said.
“And pray tell me why a female would be traveling around visiting friends during her time.” Could it really be Xanthus? Maybe all Dagonian men sounded like him.
“She didn’t know,” Adelpha said. “She must not have realized it was her time,” Adelpha remarked again, “and you know we couldn’t have told her. Only males can recognize when it’s a female’s time.”
The door to Sara’s closet swished opened and she found herself face to face with an angry, ferocious warrior.
Sara was so surprised to see Xanthus, that she sat frozen with her mouth agape. As surprised as she was, he looked a hundred times more shocked.
“Xanthus,” Sara said and swam straight toward him.
Xanthus enveloped her into his strong arms. “Sara,” he said. “Great gods of Olympus, you’re alive.”
Sara felt his trembling body surround her and she began to cry.
“Shh, Moro Mou.” His voice was low, tormented, and aching for her. “Don’t cry, Mou.”
As if she could stop. She hadn’t let herself truly embrace the reality of her situation until now. It had all been too frightening, too terrifying to face head on, but now that she was safe in his arms, she was overwhelmed with relief. Somewhere deep in the subconscious of her mind, she had believed she would never see him again. Now, tight in Xanthus’s embrace, breathing in his warm, masculine in scent, she couldn’t hold back the tears. A miracle had occurred and he was here.
Sara found her attention was turned a few minutes later when she couldn’t breathe. Xanthus was squeezing the breath out of her. “Xanthus, you’re holding me too tight,” she gasped. He lessened his grip, allowing her to breathe again.
When Sara was recovered enough to think, she pondered her great fortune. This was his family. She couldn’t believe she was here with his family. What were the odds of that?
His sister whispered in Atlantian and Xanthus jerked back. “What? You’re injured? Where? Show me.”
Sara looked down. There was a barely noticeable seam just below her belly button. She lifted up her shirt at the seam to show her belly and blanched at her own injury. It was long, red, and stitched with many stripes of black thread. “I guess any future of me being a bikini model is gone.”
Xanthus was not amused by her jest. He looked enraged. “He did this to you?” he asked. Sara guessed he was talking about Gael, but didn’t want to alert his family about his brother’s involvement.
“Yes, he was trying to get the sharks to attack me. But they didn’t.”
“No, they didn’t,” Adelpha whispered with wonder in her voice. “The sharks brought her to us.”
“What?” Xanthus and Sara said together.
Adelpha nodded as her eyes darted back and forth between them, “It’s true. It was the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen. What do you think it means, brother?”
Xanthus looked at Sara, narrowing his eyes as he studied her. Then his eyes flew open wide, as if he’d just had an epiphany. He paused a long time before speaking. “I think I know, but I can’t speak of it yet.”
Xanthus shook his head as if shaking himself back to reality. “We need to move. Adelpha, Mother, we need to get Sara to the tunnels. It can’t be a coincidence that she ended up in my home. Others will be coming.”
Xanthus towed Sara down the hall to a huge room. It looked to be sleeping quarters. Given the immense size of the room, it had to be the master bedroom. He swam over to a stone picture with a landscape scene of a tropical island. Just below it was a border of scrolled carvings. He pressed down on a raised swirl. Sara felt the soft compression in the water as a section of the wall collapsed in, and then slid open without a sound, revealing a dark tunnel.
“When was this tunnel constructed?” Adelpha asked, surprised. Obviously, she hadn’t known about it until just now.
“The same time as the others,” Xanthus said. “I just never told anyone about it. Lucky I didn’t. I never knew I’d need it to hide someone from my own family.”
“Gael?” Adelpha asked.
“He is a soldier. He would be duty-bound to bring her in.”
Adelpha nodded, satisfied with his answer.
Xanthus closed the door panel behind them. At first, the difference was so dramatic that Sara thought the tunnel had no light. But as her eyes adjusted, she saw a faint glow from the tunnel walls. It seemed to go on forever, twisting and turning. A door came into view along the way. Xanthus opened it and led the way inside to a chamber.
“Diamo,” Xanthus spoke low and the room was filled with light. There was sparse, strange furniture. Sara recognized a sleeping thing-a-ma-jig and there looked to be a wall of bookshelves filled with leathery books strapped inside. She seriously needed to learn Atlantian. Another wall was a giant aquarium. Fish of all shapes and colors swam in this fish tank and the wall shimmered like the surface of the tank in the dining room.
Xanthus turned to face Sara. He cradled her cheeks in his palms in a gentle demand to have her attention. “Now Sara, I’d hoped to prepare for this before bringing you home. But now that you’re here, I’ll have to make some minor changes in my plan.”
Xanthus turned toward Chara, who was looking around the secret room. “Mother, I’m going to need you to bring the priest. Don’t go back through my room. Just follow the tunnel through to the exit.”
Adelpha turned in surprise. “Why do we need a priest, brother? You can see Sara is not going to die.”
“No, but until the priest comes, she’s still at risk.”
Chara snarled as she rushed forward to Xanthus. He let Sara go and turned to confront his mother. Chara bellowed, shouting at her son, and then she turned a glaring eye at Sara.
What in the world had she done?
Xanthus responded with snarling, brutal words of his own. He also moved in close, towering over Chara as if he were trying to intimidate her.
“I was right,” Adelpha whispered in Sara’s ear. “My brother wouldn’t have turned you over to be executed.”
“What are they arguing about?”
“My brother is just reminding my mother that he is the master of this castle and she needs to respect his position.”
“But she’s his mother. Shouldn’t it be the other way around?”
Adelpha smiled. “Of course not. You humans have strange ways. In this case, I agree with Xanthus. Mother is trying to tell him not to marry you.”
“Wait. Is that what they are arguing about?”
“Oh yes.”
“But why is it so important for him to marry me now? And why is she so against it?”
“He needs to marry you now in order to protect you. You see, a husband is responsible for his wife. And that includes any crime she commits. If a wife commits a crime, the husband serves the sentence.”
“That’s crazy. So if I am caught, Xanthus would receive my punishment?”
“Yes.” Adelpha frowned.
“Well, shoot, if that’s the case, I’m never going to marry him.”
Adelpha raised an eyebrow. “You speak as if you have a choice.”
“I don’t?”
“Well, does your father approve of this marriage?”
“I don’t even know who my father is.” Sara shrugged.
“What about your grandfather or brother?”
“I don’t have a brother and I’ve never met my grandfather.” What was this, the middle ages? Didn’t women have a say in something as important as marriage?
“Well then, you don’t have any say in the matter,” Adelpha said, setting her straight.
Good grief. Dagonians could use some serious women’s liberation.
“Don’t worry, Sara. My brother is very kind. He’ll treat yo
u well.”
“It’s not me I’m worried about. If I’m caught, he’s going to end up in prison or dead. I couldn’t live with myself if anything bad happened to him because of me.”
“Sara, I think you’re worried over nothing. My brother is extremely clever. If anyone can figure out a solution to this problem, my brother can.”
Sara glanced back to the heated argument. Chara threw her hands out and shook her head as she looked toward the ceiling. Frustrated words tumbled out of her mouth. Then, with a swish of her tail, she left.
Xanthus swam toward Sara. “Sara, I’m sorry about my mother. She’ll come around.”
“Is it true that you intend to marry me now in order for you to take the punishment of my crime?”
“Sara…”
“I won’t let you do it!”
Xanthus turned to his sister. “Adelpha, would you let us speak in private?”
Adelpha cleared her throat. A smile tugged at her lips. “Sure, brother,” she said and left. Sara wondered for a moment where she’d go. To roam the tunnel maybe.
“Sara, we already talked about this. I will keep you safe.” Xanthus pulled her near and pressed his lips against her forehead.
“You never said that by being my husband that you would be the one executed. You could die because of me.”
“Sara, you need to trust me. We can make this work.”
“No, we can’t. I can’t gamble your life like that.”
“Yet, you thought I would gamble yours when I brought you here? Sara, it goes both ways. Your safety is my top priority, but I’ll also tell you this. I have no intention of going to prison. Now, I’m going to ask you again. Sara, will you please be my wife?”
Sara looked up into his handsome face. His dark eyes were filled with love and he was looking at her. It still amazed her that she had captured the heart of such an amazing man—or Dagonian. How could someone so wonderful love a human like her? Wait a minute. She hadn’t told him she probably wasn’t half-Dagonian after all. Sara didn’t want to tell him, but she couldn’t enter into a marriage with that kind of lie between them.
