by Lucia Ashta
I steeled myself and then looked downward. Surely I’d see where the water was carrying me as it slowly, yet steadily, pulled me down into its depths.
But I couldn’t.
I didn’t understand. I should have at least been able to see the surface of the water where I just entered it. But then, with a sinking feeling, I thought that I also should have been able to navigate the simple path from my bedroom to the entry hall. Shoulds and shouldn’ts didn’t seem to play the same role here at the castle as they did everywhere else.
I realized, too, that I wasn’t drowning. My lungs weren’t seizing, struggling for nourishing air. When I brought my attention to it, I noticed that I was breathing quite normally. At least, it felt normal, although there was obviously nothing normal about it.
I attempted to swim upward again, but the same thing happened as last time. My arms moved with confident strokes that I knew, under ordinary circumstances, would take me up toward the surface. But I didn’t make progress. My strokes did nothing but appear to keep me in place for a moment, delaying the inevitable downward pull of the water.
For a minute or two, I swam vigorously, detaining my sinking. But it was only temporary, and I knew it. I couldn’t sustain this hovering for very long before tiring.
The water was pleasant and I could breath, so I did the only thing I knew to do. I relaxed and let the water take me wherever it was determined to go.
Once I stopped resisting it, the water cradled me in its embrace. With it, I descended rapidly to an altogether different sort of place.
It seemed like the descent was very long, but perhaps it wasn’t. I can’t be sure. Those senses that I normally relied on to provide me with essential feedback of my surroundings gave me faulty readings.
I may have fallen for an hour, or a day, or a year. But what I do know is that when I hit bottom, it was the bottom of no place I’d ever imagined could exist, much less within the walls of the brothers’ fortress, at the very pinnacle of Irele.
The water remained clear, as it was above, and I could see everything that surrounded me with ease. Bright sunlight filtered in from somewhere above, with a strength that belied the depths I believed we must be at. The bright light made the temperate water feel cheery, and when friendly and colorful merpeople came to greet me, it didn’t surprise me, as if somehow all this would be expected of an illusory yellow-tiled world.
There were brilliantly colored fish swimming around me. None of them appeared menacing in the least. When a mergirl petted a fish, and it responded to her by wiggling its tail and swimming in circles around her, I did the same. An orange, pink, and purple fish the size of my hand rubbed up against me as if it were a pet.
I laughed, and the fish did it more. It circled my body at great speed, all the while looking back at me with animated expressions I didn’t know fish were capable of. As the fish made its laps around me, I ran my hand along its fin. The fish was delighted, and we continued with this game until I realized that the energy around me had shifted.
I expanded my point of view to take in a whole tribe of merpeople. They were of all ages, healthy and vibrant. Their tails were all different and composed of beautiful colors, like the fish that retreated to the background.
I must be a curiosity to them, I realized. They all stared at me, as if surprised to find me a sudden part of their underwater world. And a world of its own it was.
Although there were few simple structures built with shells and coral reefs to substantiate my conclusion, I knew that I landed in the middle of their community. Merpeople didn’t have much use for buildings; they were of the sea after all.
The same mergirl who inspired me to pet the fish approached me. She spoke to me, but all I heard was music. I couldn’t understand what she said. I shook my head.
She tried again, and again I was lulled by the sounds of soothing music. How marvelous, I thought, my eyes and mouth smiling. The mergirl spoke music.
Then a concerto arose. The merpeople seemed to be discussing me amongst themselves.
The music captivated me, and I did nothing but enjoy it. And as the crescendo burst forth with enthusiasm and bravado, I remained unaware that the merpeople were, in fact, arguing about me. When the minority was quashed and the piece came to a harmonious close, I was content to engage these wonderful people.
I watched the approach of the most beautiful and alluring woman of them all.
Her hair was the black of deep night, her eyes the same turquoise of this deep sea. Her tail matched her eyes. Luxurious, shiny turquoise reflected the sunlight—back and forth, back and forth—as her tail undulated hypnotically behind her.
I forgot to be surprised or shocked by this development at the bottom of the yellow-tiled room. Indeed, I almost forgot about the world above water. My life on land seemed so far away, as if it had taken place long ago.
The merpeople sounded and looked beautiful. They were happy and kind. The water already felt like home to me.
So when the most enticing of the merwomen reached her hand out to me, I was content to take it and follow her where she’d lead me: deeper into the yellow-tiled underwater world.
Chapter 5
A few days passed and, still, I couldn’t comprehend the merpeople’s speech. But that was not an impediment. Splendid melodies wafted around me, and I couldn’t remember ever being happier. I spent my days joining them in play and leisure, and I slept my nights curled up in a gargantuan oyster shell that closed with me in it, sheltering me from the continuous sunlight that streamed joyously from above.
At some point, a tail of my own replaced my dress. I hadn’t noticed this happening, and when I discovered it, I was overjoyed. Now I was one of them. I wouldn’t lag behind in their games of tag and hide-and-seek anymore.
The merwoman whose hand I’d first taken must have noticed my admiration for her tail, for the color of mine was an exact match of hers. A deep, rich glittering turquoise trailed behind me wherever I went. My auburn hair streamed behind me too as I swam, and, from above, when I swam very fast, I was a stunning streak of auburn, rich milk, and blue.
So many nights passed that even my dreams forgot the human world. The whispers of Gertrude, which previously hung around me like a lilting perfume, drifted away on the currents with the rest of them. Mother and Father, my other sisters, Margaret, even Marcelo, Albacus, and Mordecai disappeared—by now a lathering of sea foam on a distant shore.
Apart from my inability to speak with the merpeople, I was as much one of them as I could be. I acted as they did. I thought as they did. I enjoyed sea life as they did. I was content to live life as they did.
And I was distressed just as they were when a stranger entered our idyllic underwater oasis.
I didn’t realize that something out of the ordinary was happening until the merpeople began congregating around me. I could see that even those far away from me were swimming toward me at great speed.
I was their intended target.
Mermen and women, even children, formed a tight circle around me.
At first, I felt happy at the attention. It had been quite some time since I was the sole focus of the community. I couldn’t remember when I’d been, but the sensation of being encircled by them felt familiar, and I knew I must have experienced it before.
The merpeople linked arms and rose and fell as one, each coordinated flick of their tails allowing them to hover just above the ocean floor. A dusting of sand floated above the ground, giving the impression that the community of merpeople rose out of nothing, out of dust. The effect was enchanting.
Without realizing, I coordinated my movements with theirs. I rose a few inches when they rose, and I fell the same distance when they did. It made me happy to be one with them, as it always did.
The filtered sunlight reflected off my tail, sending turquoise rainbows skittering across any surface that met its path. My red hair floated around me, a miraculous halo of color.
A grating sound tore me from my reveri
e. I hadn’t heard it before. What could it be?
There it was again, a combination of sounds, like the hissing of a snake and a cat. Although I didn’t understand what I was hearing—so discordant to the melodies that lulled me almost incessantly—I knew what the sound meant. Anyone who heard that awful, menacing sound would know what it meant.
I wondered what might be approaching and why my people thought I needed protecting. I grew nervous and uncomfortable, a feeling foreign to me now.
And then it came again.
The nasty sound. Ssssth. Beware. Or else you’ll suffer the consequences.
My fear was impeded. Its growth stunted before it had a chance to fully well up within me.
Like the others, the wave of—something—stunned and disoriented me. The chain of merpeople broke, and from somewhere deep within me, Albacus’ words repeated: The chain’s only as strong as its weakest link.
But I didn’t realize that it was Albacus who’d broken through to me then, even if it was only through memory. I didn’t remember Albacus at all. But his words echoed through my mind, and something long dormant stretched in its sleep.
I no longer stood in a circle of coordinated, expert swimmers, but in a storm of discordance and confusion. Sand swirled thickly, kicked up by lashing fins and collisions. The peace I felt in the underwater world wavered.
When the merpeople began to scream, the unpleasantness of the previous hissing sound couldn’t compare to the grating and curdling effect their shrill screams had on me.
The vibration of their yells disrupted the proper functioning of my eardrums, and I began to tumble and fall, or perhaps none of that at all.
I couldn’t tell.
I didn’t know up from down, nor could I differentiate the ocean bottom from the surface of the water in the yellow-tiled room.
I forgot even who I was in the whirlwind of uncoordinated action that surrounded me on all sides.
Thankfully, someone else remembered. And it was he who reached his hand through the dense fog of horrid screams to pull me up, up, up, where I couldn’t go on my own.
I was vaguely aware of the warriors that pursued us as we rose. A quick, uncertain glance backward took in the faces I loved, contorted now in gruesome snarls and grimaces. The mermen’s mouths pulled back to reveal pointed teeth I didn’t notice before, and the woman whose turquoise tail and dark beauty I so much admired shifted into something different entirely. The look on her face scared me, and I averted my eyes, shielding my head in the man’s shoulder.
The man who carried me was at a disadvantage. He had two legs instead of a tail, and the swim upward was long and arduous, especially with me in tow.
The merwarriors kept gaining on us until I thought surely they’d reach us. A merman’s hand reached for my hair. He almost had me! I watched as the snarling monster I loved almost pulled me down with him into the abyss.
I watched as if it weren’t me he was reaching for. I watched apart from it all. I couldn’t think anymore, and I let myself be pulled upward as fast as the man could swim.
When the merpeople almost reached me, each time, the man blasted something at them. It was like a crashing wave hit our pursuers, forcefully knocking them back, and we were safe for a minute, until they composed themselves and pursued with a renewed vengeance.
The swim to freedom was a cycle of repetitive actions. The merpeople gained. The man blasted. The merpeople almost took me back, and the man shot them down again.
And just when I thought we’d never reach the top, when I thought the man swam for a lost cause, we finally did.
Chapter 6
I did nothing to help. I couldn’t. He pushed me until I slid along a blurred edge of yellow tile.
He pulled himself out of the water and drew himself up next to me. He was breathing hard, his chest heaving as he dragged me across a raised threshold.
I caught a glimpse of my turquoise tail. When it cleared the doorway completely, my rescuer collapsed next to me.
Despite his physical exertion, it took me longer to recover than it did my rescuer. I lay in a slop of water, blinking the fog away from my eyes, until I realized that the fog wasn’t in my eyes; it was in my mind. With this realization, I closed my eyes. I was disoriented. I was lost. And I suddenly realized I was cold. I’d forgotten what it felt like to be cold.
I remained flat on the frigid stone of the castle and not the temperate waters of the merworld. Goose bumps swept across my skin. My rescuer noticed, and though his breath was still heavy, he edged his body next to mine and draped his right arm and leg snugly against my body. The skin of his chest felt warm, but the water that soaked his pants was already becoming cold.
I turned my head toward him. My eyes still felt blurred, though they weren’t. And my mind still felt foggy, and it was.
I began to recognize the raven-dark hair and the dark-blue eyes. Wet hair plastered across his forehead, and full, wide lips waited for recognition. Without thinking, I reached my left arm across my body to touch his chest.
My fingers slid across lean muscle and a rugged pattern of crisscrossed scars. I brought my eyes up to meet his.
My amber eyes took in all that his offered me, and in that wealth of emotion I was too dazed to comprehend fully, I remembered him. I recalled more about him than I’d realized I knew.
I suddenly understood who he was and what coursed through him. I felt the beating of his heart and the consequent rushing of his blood. His warmth reached me, and the goose bumps that dotted my skin retreated.
More welled up within me than I was capable of processing then. Instead, I moved without thought. I turned onto my side and faced him. My arm rose from his chest to his face, and I kissed him.
It was a delicate kiss, no more than a fluttering of my lips against his. But it was more than enough. I looked searchingly into his eyes, finding all that I wanted to find. And then I said only one word. “Marcelo.”
Chapter 7
I was naked again. For someone as modest as I’d always been, it was surprising that circumstances would land me stark naked in front of Marcelo so many times.
Two human legs replaced my beautiful, shimmering blue tail, leaving me fully exposed before the magician. But this time, things were different. This time, I was different, although I didn’t yet understand how different I was.
The previous times, Marcelo respectfully averted his eyes from my body, ignoring my milky, rich skin with pink accents. But now, he didn’t. He didn’t overlook my nudity, for he sensed that I’d changed, and that shifted everything between us.
Even groggy as I was, I felt the heat of his gaze as it followed the curves of my body. It slipped across my skin with a sensuality I never experienced before.
I closed my eyes to his. I wasn’t prepared to meet the fire that burned against a background of black so dark that it rivaled the depths of a moonless sky.
His heat retreated, and I grew very, very cold. The cold of the stone beneath me, possessing the intensity of the long and harsh winter that was beginning to pass, seemed to penetrate even the depths of my soul. I started shivering uncontrollably. The abrupt change in temperature combined with the shock of the experience proved too much for my body.
My rescuer came to my aid again. Marcelo scooped me up and cradled my wet body close to his, hoping that his body heat would keep the worst of the chill at bay. Then he stepped across the shirt and thick sweater he’d discarded in haste when he discovered the yellow-tiled floor.
I continued to shake violently against him, my teeth rattling in my head, when he broke into a barefoot run.
Chapter 8
I woke in a room I hadn’t been in before, next to a roaring fire. Despite my unfamiliar surroundings, what first struck me was that sleep had swept away the cobwebs of disorientation. My mind felt crisp, though tired, and my memory came flooding back in a fluid gush.
I was on a handsome chaise lounge beneath a heap of blankets, though I was still nude under the layers of wool
and animal skin. Marcelo didn’t bother with the time-consuming task of locating clothing suitable for me. Instead, he worked to warm me immediately; my incessant tremors frightened him.
He ran with me through the castle, navigating the twisting, deceitful passages with experience, until he arrived at his room, where he knew the embers of last night’s fire could be readily stoked.
I turned my head slowly, taking in Marcelo’s quarters without moving the rest of my body. Instinctively, I’d curled my body into its tightest form to conserve what little body heat I had and I’d slept that way, in a compact fetal position. Now, even though I no longer shivered, I was reluctant to stretch my body out, the memory of painful cold too fresh.
From where I was, I identified a couple of oil impasto paintings. They were both landscapes of a similar place, with steep, slate gray mountains and a distant crashing sea; the dark colors contrasted highly to their ornate, gilt frames. The paintings sent a chill through me, but this time, it wasn’t because of cold. They were evocative and haunting, and I believed they were of Bundry, Marcelo’s birthplace. He’d tried to escape the tragic memories of his family life by running away from them, but kept these constant reminders of Bundry with him. I wondered why.
I also noticed a heavy wood, four-post bed rumpled from when Marcelo last slept in it, and a sliver of a window to the other side of it. From what I observed without getting up, the day was dreary. A light gray mist clung to the sky.
I clutched the blankets closer to me, grateful for their warmth on this overcast day, and turned back toward the fire. It burned eagerly. Orange flames, anxious to leave their own unique mark on the worn stones behind them, licked at a stone hearth that housed myriad fires over the centuries.
As always, the flames hypnotized me, and, just as my eyes were about to lose their focus and give themselves over to the mesmerizing dance, a sound caught my attention.
