Water

by Hardy, Natasha

  “Close your eyes and feel the story,” he encouraged me.

  I watched for a few moments, trying to gauge whether his suggestion was a good idea. He nodded, still smiling. “Go on, you’re safe with me.”

  I closed my eyes. Terror and anxiety rose in my throat as my senses came alive to the story. I could hear the rustle and mutter of frightened people mixed with the stench of sweat, sewage and fear. Their fear was my fear as I pictured the waiting.

  “They camped there for days and days hiding from the slave traders. Eventually, though, hunger drove a small party of men to leave the safety of the valley in search of food. Did you know that Injisuthi means the full dog?” he asked. I opened my eyes at his question and shook my head. “They say that this area was so full of eland and impala that even the stray dogs were always full from the scraps left over from the meals people had.”

  His expression grew sad as he continued.

  “The hunting party left to find food, and instead they found the slave traders who tortured them in the most disgusting and horrific ways until eventually in desperation one of them told them where the women and children were.”

  I shuddered, imagining what type of torture would break a man to the point where he would give up the most precious secret he held – the whereabouts of his family.

  “The slave traders waited another week until they were sure the remaining men would be weak and the women pliable from hunger, and then they attacked.” Merrick’s voice was bleak, his eyes on some faraway memory. “They slaughtered the men without mercy, leaving no one alive, and then attacked the braver women with sticks, beating them to submission.”

  I closed my eyes again. Panic rose sour and all-consuming as I heard the screams of the dying and felt the press of people desperately pushing back from the bloodshed. Tears prickled behind my eyelids as I remembered the tenderness of the paintings on the cave walls.

  “Sabine’s partner had been part of the hunting party,” Merrick continued, “and when he didn’t return she moved the women and children from her village right to the back of the valley as close to the waterfall as she could get, and started to look for a way out or at the very least a place to hide. She had been searching for a few days unsuccessfully when she finally decided to see if there was any room behind the waterfall. It was then that she found the cave.”

  Merrick paused, and the emotions changed to anger and frustration.

  “As you can imagine, with so many women in one place everyone was vying for authority, and old tribal rifts began to show under the strain of the wait. So Sabine didn’t tell anyone about the cave until the slave traders attack. When she heard the screams of the dying men, she quickly rallied her tribe and a few of the other women who had befriended them and led them into the cave. Some of the women from the other tribes refused to follow, and Sabine watched from the cave opening as they were brutalised, raped and led away to a life of slavery.”

  Merrick stretched and yawned, the vision fading as he let go of my hand. He crouched at the water’s edge to drink some water from the river. The picture he’d painted with his story twisted around in my head, demanding a conclusion.

  “What happened next?” I asked when he settled beside me again. “Why didn’t Sabine and the other women go home?”

  “You’re sharp,” he grinned at me. “Most people assume they did.” I thought about that for a moment and then shook my head. The last painting in the cave was evidence that something out of the ordinary had taken place.

  He took my hand again.

  “Well, the reason Sabine and her little tribe couldn’t leave was because the slave traders had been expecting more of a catch, and the reason they’d been expecting more of a catch was because the chief of Sabine’s village had ‘sold’ the women and children from his village for land, cattle and power.” I gasped, horrified, experiencing the betrayal as if they were my own emotions.

  “Sabine watched as the chief inspected every slave marched past him and then discussed with the slave traders the whereabouts of the women and children from his village. Sabine was a very beautiful woman, and the slave traders had promised the chief a high price for her in particular. He was a motivated man and set up sentries at the entrance to the valley, knowing she must still somehow be there. And so they hid for days on end growing weaker and weaker. Sabine realised that eventually they would have one of two choices: either die in the cave or be sold into slavery. One night one of the children became very ill. She was four years old and Sabine’s niece. She grew weaker and weaker.”

  I felt the burning skin of the child on the palm of the hand Merrick was holding. Grief and despair swept through me, knocking aside all motives except those that would save the little girl.

  “On that night the tribe decided that slavery was better than death. They had decided to give themselves up the next day. On that night, a massive storm shook Injisuthi, the pool you swam in flooded and forced them further and further back into the cave.” His eyes burned into mine. “Sabine was leading the way when she slipped and fell into a deep black pool at the very back of the cave, a pool they hadn’t known existed.”

  I felt once again the ice-cold waters close over my head and drew in a deep jagged breath.

  “She sank like a stone, deeper and deeper into the pool, the water closing over her,” he continued, “and then –”

  “Someone or something was pulling her back to the surface and breathing air into her lungs,” I whispered, finishing his sentence for him.

  He chuckled darkly and nodded, removing his hand from mine, releasing me from the intensity of the vision.

  “Sabine’s rescuer offered the ragged refugees a third option to death or slavery. His name was Pelagius. He was the leader and he invited them to become part of his ‘tribe’. Pelagius was an Oceanid, and he and his people lived deep in the mountains using the caves for shelter and pools for travel. Pelagius assured them of safety and plentiful food and most of all medicine for the dying child.”

  Merrick paused and looked at me intensely, his eyes locking on mine.

  “Pelagius took the sick child first, went to the pool and jumped into its centre. He returned with others from his tribe, and each of them took a woman or a child through the pool and into their Kingdom. Sabine was the last to leave, but not before she had drawn the last picture you saw in the cave. A record of what happened to her and the remnants of her tribe.”

  The stillness that followed the end of the story was uncanny. Even the insects seemed frozen for a few moments.

  “Would you like to hear the rest of the story?” Merrick asked, his expression gentle.

  I nodded, my mind still reeling with the discovery that Josh’s grandfather’s story was true, a tiny sparkle of excitement overriding the confusion and cautiousness I felt.

  “Sabine and her tribeswomen were treated very kindly by Pelagius and the Oceanids. They were given homes, and welcomed into the pod – that’s what we call a grouping of Oceanids, by the way.”

  I hadn’t missed his reference to “we”. I’d already made peace with the fact that something inexplicable by modern science had happened yesterday in the pool. There was no way I would still be alive any other way, but to be talking to one of Josh’s “fish-people” — even if he did look more like a demi-god than anything else — was incredible.

  “The pod was relatively small back then. Only a few Oceanids had made the journey upriver.”

  “May I ask why they were so far from the ocean?” I asked, cautiously curious.

  Almost immediately his open expression closed a little. “The industrial age, even in its infancy, had already had a profound effect on the ocean, and Pelagius and a few other Oceanids had moved inland to escape the difficulties they were having in the sea.”

  “How did they get there?” I asked, feeling more and more excited to be having my questions answered, and adapting far quicker than I thought possible to the idea that I was talking to someone who wasn’t human as I knew
humans.

  “They used the river system,” he replied, grinning at my enthusiasm. “May I continue with the story?” he asked politely.

  “Oh yes of course, sorry.” I blushed as he took my hand once more.

  “Over time Pelagius and Sabine fell in love.” The emotion that blossomed in my chest was so intense it was almost painful, a combination of the sweetest and most innocent happiness and richest desire, mingled with pride and excitement and joy. “Their marriage would have been completely forbidden if they were part of normal Oceanid culture, but up here in the mountains, everyone celebrated with them in great feasting and dancing. Sabine apparently went back to the cave where Pelagius had found her and drew their marriage feast in at a later date. She wanted it known, by whoever found the pictures, that she and her people were very happy.”

  I smiled, as an exquisite marriage ceremony played out behind my closed lids. I recognised the breathtaking valley and waterfall we’d been at yesterday as the backdrop to a radiantly beautiful woman, surrounded by people who obviously loved her deeply. She was smiling expectantly at the pool as an excited tension encapsulated the group. With a sudden burst of music a strong and handsome man rose from the centre of the pool. He carried himself with great majesty, his eyes focused only on her.

  Merrick released my hand, grinning at me as I opened my eyes, the fear of these unknown people fading into the background and leaving me hungry for more information.

  “Sabine began very important work here,” he continued. “As more and more Oceanids were driven from the sea to seek refuge in the cleaner water, she recognised that they may need to interface with humans in order to survive. At first she was that interface, going into the local town at times to purchase medical supplies or food, but as their numbers grew she realised that she must start teaching the Oceanids to do this for themselves. She’d been educated in a missionary school and so the first thing she brought to us was an understanding of a passionate and loving God. She taught them English, she bought books for them and taught them to read and write, but most valuable, she taught them how to appear human. The way you walk, the way you sit, hand gestures, facial expressions.”

  I jumped at Merrick’s abrupt movement as he leapt to his feet and held out his hand.

  “And now I’d like to show you something.” He turned his body slightly, gesturing behind him and into the bush. I stood with him, alarm bells ringing in every cell in my body. As much as I was indebted to him, and as excited and curious as I was about all he’d told me, I didn’t know him at all. Every horror story about kidnapping I’d ever heard flashed through my brain insisting I should be careful.

  There were two reasons I ignored the frightening thoughts, two reason why I followed him across the river. The first was because he’d saved my life the day before; the second, much more inexplicable one, was because his story made me feel alive for the first time in a very long time, and I wasn’t about to let that go.

  He leapt gracefully from boulder to boulder, leading me upstream. I stumbled after him, struggling to keep up with the manic pace he set, and arguing with myself the whole way about stupidity and poor choices and beautiful strangers being just as dangerous as ugly ones.

  The sheer excitement and adventure of the moment overwhelmed any sensible instincts I had, as Merrick’s lithe form flitted from rock to rock with ease.

  He led me across the river, and through a swathe of tall reeds. The enormous boulders beyond the reeds looked as though some giants had casually scattered a bag of house-sized marbles across the land, each massive boulder marooned in a sea of lush grass.

  He ran at the closest rock to us, using the curve of the rock and the force of his movement to angle himself up the side of the boulder. When he reached the top he motioned for me to follow him. I laughed.

  “You’ve got to be kidding,” I told him.

  His expression was curious. “Why?”

  “There is no way I can run up the rock like that,” I told him firmly.

  He reached down and grabbed my arms, hauling me up the side of the rock,being careful not to scrape my knees or shins as he did so.

  The top of the boulder was about the size of a tennis court and perfectly round, mottled with lichen and peeling in places in great rain-chipped sheets which created jagged edges that caught my toes as I tried to keep up with Merrick.

  He strode confidently around the perimeter of the boulder before leaping lightly across a fissure in the surface and then turning to face me.

  I followed him until I came to the fissure, standing opposite him, my fear of heights making my palms itch as I tried to gather the courage to leap across to his side.

  “Are you up for a bit of an adventure?” he asked playfully, holding his hand out across the chasm.

  I smiled a wobbly smile, my forehead creasing in concentration as I took his hand, holding onto it like it was a lifeline.

  He pulled my across the gap with a firm jerk and held onto my hand as he led me to the edge of a perfectly round rock pool. The water around the edge was the most brilliant shade of turquoise I’ve ever seen in nature. Like every pool I’d seen so far, the centre was as black as night.

  He turned to me smiling.

  “I’d like to show you something,” he said again.

  “OK, what is it?” In reply he pulled me slowly into his body until I was uncomfortably close to him. I could feel the warmth from his skin radiate along the length of my body and although I recognised the voice of reason and caution and all things sensible from a distance, my will to resist was a hazy and intangible thing that I couldn’t quite seem to access.

  I looked up at his face. He was grinning at me, his smile stretching just a little too tight across his face, his teeth white in the sun and his eyes, his eyes were feverishly excited.

  He lifted his other hand and tucked a stray tendril of hair behind my ear. I blushed at the intimate gesture.

  “Alexandra, do you trust me?” His voice was husky.

  “Um… I… I don’t know,” I stuttered, my heart racing.

  He gazed into my eyes a moment longer and then, wrapping his arms around me in an unbreakable grip, launched us into a perfect tandem dive into the very centre of the pool.

  Chapter 10

  Novice

  The icy water whipped past me stinging my eyes until I had no choice but to close them. I couldn’t work out where the surface was and the disorientation made me dizzy.

  We had moved so fast that I hadn’t had time to be afraid yet. Only when Merrick stopped suddenly and flipped us the right way around did a flicker of fear resurface. I opened my eyes as wide as they could go in the strange twilight. The light was too weak to fight its way through the water which stung my eyes. I looked up and could vaguely see a ring of wavering light far above me, the entrance of the pool the size of a beach ball above us. We were very deep.

  As if on cue, my lungs began to burn, the shallow breath I’d taken just before we dove into the pool was running out too quickly. I fought against Merrick’s iron grip, trying desperately to get to the surface I knew I’d never reach in time.

  He pulled me closer to him and put his mouth to my neck just below my jaw.

  “Calm down, Alexandra,” I heard him say with such startling clarity that for a moment I went completely limp with shock. Stretching my eyes as wide as they would go in the murky water I tried to make visual sense of what my brain had informed me was impossible.

  He was so close to me that even with the water distortion I could see that his eyes were very calm with just a hint of the excitement I’d seen in them earlier. He leaned forward again.

  “I need you to learn to breathe with me before we go any further.”

  I stared at him, my mouth clamped shut as I desperately tried to keep the meagre oxygen I had left trapped in my now starving lungs.

  “Breathe the oxygen you have left in your lungs out through your nose,” he instructed.

  How was he doing it? Every time he sp
oke bubbles escaped from his mouth, but it didn’t seem to bother him at all. An icy cold that had nothing to do with the water temperature crept through me as I noticed the slight rise and fall of his shoulders, as if he were breathing.

  I started to fight then.

  I kicked and hit and struggled with all of my strength. I didn’t know how he was able to speak to me without air, I didn’t know why his shoulders were moving slightly, as if he was breathing, or how he was going to breathe for both of us underwater. I didn’t trust him any more, and the fascination I’d felt earlier fled before the fear that crashed in on me, pressing me into a cowering, weak, pathetic version of myself.

  He held me for the few feeble seconds it took for me to realise that he was my only option, that I wouldn’t make it to the surface in time, and that regardless of how much I wanted that breath to stay in my lungs, I couldn’t will my body to keep it in.

  A stream of bubbles briefly danced in front of my eyes before drifting upward, growing larger as they raced for the surface. My body went limp with defeat.

  Merrick waited a few seconds more until black spots began to dance in front of my eyes, and then he clamped his warm lips over mine, forcing my mouth open, and breathed rich oxygen into my lungs.

  I slammed my mouth shut over the air. Hope surged through me as I struggled to get to the surface again, kicking desperately against him, using my new-found strength to try to break free.

  The air in my lungs lasted such an awfully short time. Merrick’s iron grip hadn’t faltered once before the strength seeped from my limbs.

  He waited until I was desperate and then breathed into my lungs again.

  After the third time of breath-struggle-black spots…

  “Alexandra!” Merrick’s voice was exasperated. “Even with the air I’ve given you, you wouldn’t make it to the surface in time.”

  I looked up. The circle of light was tiny. We’d been sinking the whole time I’d been fighting for air, and now we were so far from the surface, I’d never get to the top before I ran out of air.