by Sarah Porter
“Oh, Luce! Now I understand why you're looking so worried!” She smiled brilliantly and stretched out on the waves again. “No, if that girl is on the edge of changing into one of us I can help her. It's difficult. Very difficult. But I've done it before. And when you think that our only alternative is to leave that poor metaskaza with humans who are doing who knows what disgusting things to her, Luce, you can see we have to try.”
Luce understood Catarina's point of view. But she still had trouble believing that Tessa was unhappy enough to become a mermaid, and even if she did she'd be heartbroken at her mother's death. And then Luce stopped thinking about that, overcome by fascination with what Catarina had just said: help someone change?
“How do you do it?” Luce asked. She still didn't want all the people on that yacht to die, but she couldn't help feeling tempted, just a bit, by the prospect of Tessa joining the tribe.
“I told you, Luce. It isn't easy. You need to leave this to me.” Luce felt more impatient than she ever had with Catarina's habit of avoiding questions.
“Of course I'll leave it to you! I just want to know how. What do you have to do?” Catarina gave her a strange, almost angry look.
“What do you imagine, Luce? That someday I won't be around anymore”—Luce's stomach tightened as she thought of what those words might imply—"and you'll have to do it without me?” Catarina's tail was thrashing up foam now, and Samantha grinned maliciously. Luce ignored her, and spoke as calmly as she could.
"No, Cat. But think about it. What if someday there was a ship with two metaskazas? It's possible, right? Wouldn't it be good if I was able to help?” Catarina considered this, and her tail's swirling slowed.
"Two? I suppose it could happen. I hadn't thought of that.” She gave Luce another strained, sad stare. "You're certainly the only other singer here who might be able to pull it off. Dana's not bad at all, and Miriam, even if she doesn't have much confidence ... But I wouldn't want to see them try that. They'd hurt themselves for nothing, and the girl would just drown.”
Of course, Luce thought. Catarina was so touchy about it that she should have guessed. The method for changing human girls into mermaids involved singing.
"Oh, it's just a singing thing!” Samantha squealed. "Wow, I thought you meant something a lot harder than that!” Luce bit her lip at the irony of Samantha, of all people, calling singing easy, and Catarina glowered.
"Do you remember how you felt when you changed, Samantha?” Catarina hissed, and Luce watched Samantha's giddy face collapse into dismay. "Go on. Try to really remember. Feel it again, just the way you did when you were lying beside that road with all your bones broken, watching your mother drive away and leave you to die. Like you were no better than garbage.” Luce was shocked at how cruel Catarina was being. Samantha's behavior was obnoxious, but did she really deserve this? "Now tell me how easy it would be to go back into that feeling, as deeply as you could, and sing it! Knowing that if you couldn't bear the pain and stopped, even for an instant, the metaskaza would drown...”
Samantha looked as stunned as Luce felt. Her green eyes were goggling and her mouth hung open. Luce shivered as she thought about attempting the kind of singing Catarina had just described: reliving that horrible night on the cliff and somehow making her song contain all that suffering. She was relieved now that Catarina didn't want her to try it.
“Oh, Catarina,” Luce whispered. “You've done that before? It must be”—words failed her, and she gazed into Catarina's moon gray eyes. Catarina stared back at her, and Luce saw a dark, violent grief in Catarina's face. Luce imagined that she must have looked that way at the moment when she'd first felt her body melting into brilliant liquid, threatening to flow away. “That's an incredibly courageous thing to do, Cat,” Luce said softly. “I don't know if I could be brave enough.” Catarina visibly shook herself, and then Luce seemed to wake from a trance: she could see the warm golden sunlight streaming down all around them again, flecks of sun flashing on the waves.
“It's the only way,” Catarina said. Her voice was calm and hard now. “You have to sing the metaskaza into that feeling and hold her there until she changes. And the only way to do that is to feel it yourself. It's terrible, yes, but it's only temporary, and then when you think that if you don't do it you could be leaving the poor metaskaza with men like your uncle, Luce, or even worse...” Catarina was starting to get that faraway look again, the way she did when she was remembering her past. “When you think of it that way you really have no choice.”
They were quiet for a minute. Catarina was gazing off across the sea and Samantha looked like she was about to be sick. Luce watched both of them, and couldn't stop herself from remembering that night on the cliffs. Even in the brilliant sunlight she could still feel the sharp grass cutting her face, the icy wind rushing over her back. Then Catarina slid a hand through her gleaming hair and smiled at them, though her cheerfulness looked a bit forced.
“We can't go after the yacht while it's anchored, though. Samantha, do you want to keep a lookout? Come back and tell me as soon as the yacht starts to move, and we'll take it down. We'll get that metaskaza out of there.”
Luce wondered if Catarina could be right. Was it possible that Tessa needed them to rescue her? If somebody was doing horrible things to Tessa, Luce was sure it couldn't be her mother. The love between them had been so apparent, so immediate and vital.
But even if Tessa was fine where she was, Luce had already done everything she could to warn her. There was nothing to do now except wait.
The air was warm and sweet; the sea glowed green with sunshine. Even the last lingering blobs of sea ice were completely melted. But Luce couldn't keep from shivering.
***
Samantha was back an hour later.
“Cat, they're just starting to move now! Really slow! Oh, and I saw the girl again”—and here she shot Luce a nasty look—“and she was definitely sparkling like crazy. Maybe Luce is still so new she's just clueless about this stuff.”
Luce knew she couldn’t bear to sing that yacht into the rocks, but she couldn’t say that. On the other hand, she had much stronger control of her voice now, and she knew she could listen to the other mermaids without just breaking into song herself.
“Hey, Cat?” Luce said. “I’ve been thinking. Since it’s such a small boat? Maybe the two of us should kind of hang back and just watch, so Rachel and Dana can get some practice. And then you can concentrate on the metaskaza.”
Luce suddenly had a new worry. If Tessa changed, would she tell everyone that she’d already met Luce?
Catarina gazed tensely at Luce; maybe Luce had said the
“That might be a good idea,” Catarina said at last. “If we’re there, we can jump in if Rachel and Dana get into trouble. Doing a boat that small is pretty boring, anyway. Okay.” By now a circle of excited mermaids pressed in around them, waiting for orders. “We’re going to let the new girls practice this time. Dana, do you want to take the lead?” Dana looked anxious at the idea but also thrilled.
“Sure, Cat. As long as you and Luce are there if I need help?” Luce wasn’t happy with what they were doing, but she couldn’t help admiring Dana’s nerve; it was brave to try leading her first time out. Soon Catarina and Dana had moved off to the side, discussing the route Dana should take. Catarina thought it was still too soon to go back to the rock where the Coast Guard boat went down, and they were debating alternatives. They eventually decided on some particularly high, steep cliffs several miles back in the direction of Pittley. It would mean a fairly long chase and a lot of singing, but Catarina insisted they had to use a new location as a precaution against the humans noticing a pattern.
They spread out, racing along underwater in a V like flying geese, and in just a few minutes the yacht was surrounded. Dana darted out of sight and pulled ahead of the rest of them while Rachel took up the position Luce had been in with the last boat, right in the center of the wake.
Luce swam off to the s
ide, sad and worried. She had to stay underwater most of the time to avoid being seen by anyone on the yacht—a round, silver-haired man with a squashed red face was wandering around, glaring critically at the deck—but as often as she dared she peeked above the water line, scanning for Tessa. She didn’t see her anywhere. She pushed farther ahead and spotted, sprawled on deck chairs, three practically identical middle-aged women with stiff, frosted blond hair and what looked like expensive sunglasses. One was painting her toenails.
“Of course I didn’t want to come someplace so cold and depressing,” the toenail painter whined to the other two; Luce wondered if this was the person she’d heard being addressed as “kitten.” “But Harris—you know he has these delusions that he’s some sort of amateur marine biologist, and he said he wouldn’t replace my Jaguar if I didn’t come along. I don’t think he knows the difference between a seal and a whale!” Then Luce heard the first curling line of song and watched the bottle of polish slip from the woman’s hand and clatter onto the deck.
It was immediately obvious to Luce that Dana was nowhere near as gifted a singer as Catarina—but then, who was? The notes jumped in much too fast, without the coaxing subtlety of Catarina’s song. The people on board weren’t instantly enchanted in the way the Coast Guard sailors had been. They had time to be nonplussed, to gape at one another with disoriented expressions. Luce was a little surprised that Catarina could restrain herself from just taking over. After a minute, though, Dana seemed to become more confident, and the song smoothed out and warmed the air. One of the women Luce was watching suddenly stood up from her chair, then threw herself down on the deck again and embraced the complaining woman's knees, showering them with adoring kisses. No one seemed to think this was unusual behavior. Their eyes were wide, glazed, unfocused from so much bliss.
Luce dove down and shot across to the other side of the yacht, in case Tessa and her mother were over there somewhere. The yacht was speeding up now as the pilot strove to reach the source of that wonderful sound.
A few more people came out on deck, their mouths lax and round with wonder. They all seemed to be grizzled old sailors, probably hired from the local towns; Luce wasn't surprised that Catarina hadn't been able to work up much enthusiasm.
The yacht was going so fast now that Luce gave up on swimming with her head above water and just ripped along below the surface. She heard the eerie, volatile thrum of Rachel's song joining Dana's velvet tones and then other voices she recognized: Kayley and Violet, followed by Samantha's tinny soprano. She and Catarina were the only ones keeping quiet, Luce thought. It was overkill, far more enchantment than they needed to drive such a small boat to its doom, but she knew no one cared. They were all caught in the exaltation of their own voices, mad with the joy of power. She felt a rush of compassion for all the girls singing now: after all, they'd spent their human lives being so utterly helpless; how could they fail to be delighted by their ability to dominate anyone who heard them? When Luce shot above the water for another glimpse, the men she could see all looked drugged.
Ten minutes passed, the yacht driving so hard its engine squealed and began to smoke. Up ahead the cliffs stuck out in a hard jag, and Luce knew it must be the spot Catarina had chosen. Luce could see smoke pouring out of another place near her, too, maybe from the kitchen. It looked like something had caught fire in the yacht's center, but no one moved to go put it out. Luce braced herself for the crash.
There was a grinding, earsplitting crunch, a shudder, and the first body pitched into the water. Luce could tell from the limp way it flopped overboard that it was already dead from the blow, and when it hit the water she saw to her horror that it was wearing a white bandanna blotched crimson with blood...
How could we? Luce thought numbly. How could we? The yacht was still driving forward, its hull splitting wide like a skull hit with an ax, and human bodies tumbled from inside. All Luce wanted was to get away.
Then she thought of Tessa. Catarina must have her by now. Luce began to swim dizzily between hunks of debris, expecting to hear Catarina's voice swell with the wrenching song that would change Tessa forever. A second later it came faintly from far ahead: unmistakably Catarina's exquisite voice, but transfigured into a sound so cold and painful that Luce's chest was crossed by lines of cutting ache. Luce recoiled, and bumped into a warm, flailing body.
It was Tessa, submerged with her eyes closed, her lips oddly pinched. Her brown braids pitched rhythmically with the movements of the water. And Catarina was nowhere near them.
There was only one thing Luce could do. She caught Tessa in her arms, and willed herself as hard as she could into that icy night on the cliffs, into the broken heart of a girl whose uncle had almost raped her, whose mother was long dead, whose father was lost at sea. She felt the pain and darkness beating within her, until the whole cold ocean seemed to be trapped in her heart. And when the ache grew so fierce that she didn’t know how she could stand it for another moment, she sang.
It was a terrible, beautiful song, different from anything Luce had ever heard before or would ever want to hear again. The whole sea seemed frantic with grief. Tessa opened her lids and gazed at Luce. Her hazel eyes shone like blood and shattered crystals. And then, to Luce’s infinite relief, a cloud of dark shimmering winked around Tessa’s head. Luce’s song reached into the girl in her arms, bringing back all Tessa’s secrets, and in the sparkling Luce saw the beginning of a story: a man screaming at her mother, slamming the door, the sound of a car starting ... An ugly divorce...
It wasn’t all that bad, really. Not by mermaid standards. But it was all Luce had to work with. Her song gathered up the angry screams of Tessa’s parents and twisted them into bitter music. The screams became another strand of music, weaving through the dark melodic cries of the girl lost on a cliff above the sea.
Tessa squeezed her lips closer, and Luce watched a soft, watery trembling blur the lines of Tessa’s body. She was changing! Luce felt ice cold and weak from the pain of her own song, but she knew she had to keep on, just a little longer.
Tessa suddenly thrashed wildly in Luce’s arms, and a look of determination tightened her face. Another thrash and her body was solid again, kicking a pair of strong human legs. She glared at Luce, and then an awful realization almost made Luce choke.
Tessa was fighting the change. She was struggling against Luce’s enchantment with all the strength she had left. Luce looked around and realized they’d been sinking deeper and deeper into the sea as she sang. There was less sun down here, and spiny creatures propelled themselves through the deepening green on all sides.
“No,” Tessa said. Luce couldn’t hear her speak over the singing that still throbbed up from her chest, but the movement of Tessa’s lips was all too clear. A rush of bubbles escaped, and Luce moved to pull Tessa closer, to blow her own air into Tessa’s lungs the way she’d seen Catarina do with the young sailor. Tessa raised one hand and shoved Luce back. The dark shimmering around her was completely gone.
“No,” Tessa said again, more bubbles gushing out with every word. “I won’t let you.” Luce was still singing, but the song was much quieter, losing force, and she could hear what Tessa said with the last trace of air in her chest. “I want to die human.”
12. Anais
Luce barely knew what happened next. She swam uncertainly, still holding Tessa's heavy, unmoving body and feeling its warmth ebb away. It was only when she reached the surface that she really understood she was cradling a corpse, and abruptly let go. Her tail began to lash from rage. Why hadn't Tessa let Luce save her? She had been so close ...
From somewhere around a bend in the cliffs, Luce could hear a song that seemed to be made of metal claws, slashing knives, bright rivulets of mercury. Without thinking, she swam toward it. Even sinking into the cutting grief of Catarina's song was better than being alone with the image of Tessa's face.
The song stopped dead, and Luce could hear Samantha screaming hysterically. "Oh, Catarina, please let her
have more air! Just one more try! I can tell, she's about to change, she's about to...”
“Samantha, I can't keep on like this! I'm exhausted. We're going to have to let her drown.” It was Catarina speaking, but Luce was still too stricken to make sense of the words. What did it matter?
“Catarina, please!” Samantha was sobbing, and Luce felt a dull surprise. She hadn't known Samantha could care so deeply about anything besides herself. “She's not human, Cat, even if she does still have legs! She's really one of us! Please, please don't let her die.”
Oh, Luce thought vaguely. The metaskaza Samantha was so obsessed with hadn't been Tessa at all, then. There'd been a second girl on board that yacht. That made sense. It was meaningless, stupid, but it made sense. She heard Catarina release a deep sigh, and the cruel song started again. Luce turned the corner and saw a crowd of mermaids with faces contorted from pain, their hands pressed over their ears. They parted to let Luce through, and she saw Catarina and Samantha. On the water between them there was a face, tilted back so that each wave splashed over it. The face was surrounded by a cloud of golden hair, and it was so beautiful Luce could hardly believe it belonged to a human being. Dark sparkling surrounded the girl's closed eyes, and a liquid wobbling took over her limbs in sudden fits ... She was right on the verge of changing, Luce could see, but Catarina looked so tired that she seemed like she might faint. The song broke off again, and Catarina gasped. The golden-haired girl's body reverted to a distinct human form.
“Drown her,” Catarina snarled. “If she hasn't changed by now ...”
Samantha stared around, tears streaming down her swollen face—and spotte d Luce.
“Oh, Luce! Oh, please! You’ve got to help Catarina! I know if the two of you sing together ... Luce, I know I’ve been mean to you sometimes, but please help!”
Catarina stared wearily up at Luce. Luce was stunned. Now, when she was so utterly sick and empty, she was supposed to do for this girl what she hadn’t been able to do for Tessa?
