by Sarah Porter
She knew, of course, that she had to stay away from her small cave, at least until she'd proved to Catarina that she was faithful to her—that she didn't want any other queen, not even if that queen was herself, not even if she didn't agree with every single thing about how Cat ran the tribe ... But Catarina was still away, and if Luce went to the main cave she'd have to face Anais and Jenna much too soon, see them giddy with celebration over the downed ship. What would it hurt to steal a few hours alone, just this once?
***
"Luce!” The voice was Catarina's, and Luce pulled herself up from a well of darkness in her mind into the blue glow of her cave. Had she fallen asleep? "Luce, I'd like to talk to you if you could spare the time.” Luce winced at the brittleness and formality of Catarina's voice.
"I've never—tried not to talk to you!” The words tumbled out awkwardly, and Luce pulled herself through the lingering blur of sleep to see Catarina watching her critically, her shining head propped on her hand as she lay at Luce’s side. It was exactly the way she’d been positioned when Luce first saw her, and for a second the pain of that memory blindsided Luce. How had everything gone so wrong?
“You do know they sank a ship today.” Catarina’s voice was flat. Luce felt a tentative hopefulness at these unexpected words; maybe she was upset with Anais and not Luce; maybe she was even here to ask for Luce’s help?
“I know they did,” Luce said. She was still ashamed to think of how the others had acted, rushing out without even asking Catarina’s permission. “Cat, I really tried to stop them...” “You tried to stop them, Luce?” The voice was still bitter, but now there was a trace of stony amusement, a faint sneer. “So, I suppose you thought that was your decision to make? That everyone should simply obey you? Since the queen they have now is so obviously unworthy to rule?”
Luce’s mouth fell open with shock; she wanted to make so many different objections to this that for a second she was completely flummoxed. “No! Cat! What I meant was that they shouldn’t do anything like that unless they asked you first!” Catarina gave her a horrible smile, and Luce had the sinking sense that, no matter what she said, Catarina would just take it as a lie.
“I heard, of course, that that was what you told everyone. That you picked a fight with Anais about it. A perfect excuse, wasn’t it, not to go out and sing with them? Otherwise everyone would have insisted that you had a responsibility to help. I suppose you were so blinded by your selfish concerns that you didn’t even consider the risk of human survivors?” Luce was too taken aback to react to this. "But now that I think about it, you didn't actually want to sing to Anais's yacht either. You tried to hide it, but I knew! And when you realized that you couldn't prevent the rest of us from taking it on, you had a lovely excuse ready not to sing then, too, didn't you? 'Oh, we should let Dana and Rachel get some practice!' ” Catarina cooed the last sentence with mock helpfulness, in a squeaky parody of Luce's voice. "It's funny, isn't it, how you keep finding these—these pretexts not to really sing? I don't count these ridiculous lessons you've been giving, just singing one or two notes at a time...”
As hurt as Luce was, she wasn't sure what Catarina was getting at. Did she suspect that Luce didn't want to participate in killing humans? It was true, of course, that Luce had been looking for ways to avoid luring any more humans to die. Luce braced herself. She couldn't hide her real feelings from Catarina forever; she'd have to face her anger sometime...
"I don't want to kill anyone again.” Luce tried to say it as gently as possible. She didn't want Catarina to feel judged, and she waited for a blast of invective. Catarina would definitely give her another lecture on how evil humans were, how they didn't deserve any mercy.
To her surprise, Catarina laughed. The laugh was dull, sick, clanking, like something forged from iron. "I'd say that's hardly up to your usual standard, Luce. Your excuses are usually much cleverer than that. When I think of how you've had me fooled.. And now the best you can come up with is some childish prattle about not wanting to hurt humans?” Catarina's voice had been rising as she spoke; by the last word it was almost a shriek.
“It’s not an excuse!” Luce sputtered; she was getting angry now, and Catarina obviously wasn’t listening to her.
“You haven’t broken the timahk, Luce. Not as far as I know. I can’t rightfully expel you.” Catarina’s tone was calm again, in that sickening dull way. “Why don’t you simply tell me the truth? Tell me, Luce. I did save your life, you know. I’ve earned some—at least—some consideration from you. Tell me to my face that you’re careful to do your real singing where none of us can hear you because you don’t want anyone to realize what you’re up to until you’re positive you’re good enough to beat me!”
“I never wanted to beat you!” Luce was shouting, but even as she said it, doubt twisted inside her. It was true that she’d never wanted to take over as queen, but was it also true that she didn’t want to sing as wonderfully as Catarina did—or even better? “Cat, it’s true I’ve been singing sometimes—by myself—but it wasn’t anything to do with, with trying to hurt you!” I still love you, Luce thought. You should trust me.
“I don’t suppose you want to hurt me purely for entertainment, Luce. And it’s not as if I can’t understand why—why you might feel such an overwhelming urge to gain power. Oh, we’ve all been thrown away!” Catarina laughed, but it sounded worse than a howl. “What can ever make up for that? I can see how, with your gifts, the temptation might be overwhelming. But, Luce, all your deceit ... when you must know how I’ve cared for you...”
“I’m sorry, Cat. I just—I didn’t want to tell you I was practicing until I figured some things out—but it’s not about what you think, about trying to take over! I don’t want anybody but you to be queen.”
Catarina snorted. “I can see you’ve given a great deal of thought to the implications, though. If you did manage to surpass me. And you're perfectly correct, of course. If you could do it, you would have the right to depose me, take my place. But that might be more difficult than you realize. What makes you so sure you've heard my best singing?”
Luce couldn't suppress the sense that Catarina was only bluffing, and all at once she was so angry that a terrible impulse seized hold of her. If Catarina was so convinced of her disloyalty anyway, why shouldn't Luce go ahead and insist that they take turns singing in front of everyone? Catarina was obviously terrified that Luce would outdo her, and suddenly Luce began to believe that maybe she would. After all, even the waves obeyed Luce'svoic e!
Luce shuddered and closed her eyes. Don’t do it! she told herself. Lucette, stop it right now! But her voice was already sliding out of her, spreading out like a sky made of music, but a sky that curled into running clouds at its edges. Then the curling rose higher, vaster; it raced and lunged, and in the darkness of her sealed eyes Luce heard Catarina give a brief, startled scream. A wave taller than she was had come at her call—Luce knew that even without seeing it—and it was flying toward them in a sheet of upright silver...
Cool water like an icy palm smacked Luce's face and shattered around her shoulders. Her mouth stung with the sharp taste of salt, and as the music faded Luce opened her eyes to see Catarina gaping at her, seawater still trickling down her cheeks. All the tense strength in that lovely face had collapsed. Catarina's gray eyes were wide and frightened, and her mouth hung weakly open.
"I don't want to be queen, Cat,” Luce started to say. Catarina recoiled from her, though in the narrow cave there wasn’t really anywhere she could go. “I’m just trying to learn—how to do things besides kill people!” Catarina shook her head in disbelief, still gaping, and Luce began to understand the enormity of what she’d just done. For a minute they stared at each other in silence.
“I knew it the first time I heard you,” Catarina murmured at last, and even in the dusk of the cave Luce saw the tears brimming in her eyes. “I knew I should let you drown. I considered it, believe me. I had every right to simply leave you there to d
ie. I almost didn’t go after you, and I wouldn’t have, except...” Catarina stopped, staring wide-eyed as if she were seeing unspeakable visions. “You’ll be the queen of a tribe that hates you, Luce, don’t forget that!”
“Catarina!” Luce cried, but it was already too late. All she could see of her friend was the trail of bubbles foaming in her wake, and after a moment’s hesitation Luce dove after her. Catarina wouldn’t simply run away from the tribe, would she? There was no trace of Catarina once Luce reached the open sea, and she darted at random through rising swells of gray water, searching for the blaze of bright hair that must be out there somewhere. The water echoed with whale song; it entered Luce’s mind and made her dizzy. It wasn’t until she’d swum in confusion for an hour and the pallid dusk closed in on her that Luce had to accept it was pointless to keep looking. It seemed unlikely that Catarina would have gone back to the main cave when she was so upset, but Luce thought she might as well check there, just in case.
Even underwater Luce heard the babble of cheerful voices, and then, to her amazement, Catarina’s harsh laughter. A wave of silence flowed through the dim cave as soon as Luce's head broke the surface, and immediately Luce met Catarina's bleak gray stare. Then Catarina deliberately looked away with ornately faked casualness and began chatting brightly to Jenna. Anais, though, kept her blue starry eyes fixed on Luce's face. She was lying stretched out parallel to the shore wearing a long, blood-red dress, probably the same one she'd been coveting earlier; as distressed as Luce was, she still found herself thinking how ridiculous the dress looked with a tail sticking out at the bottom.
"Oh, Luce, there you are!” It was Dana, already swimming over to her with something gleaming in her raised hand; she was talking much too fast. Luce wondered what they'd all been saying about her. "Boy, I was worried you weren't going to get over being pissed off about that yacht! But see, it was totally fine. Catarina wasn't mad at us at all, and there were no survivors, and oh, you would have been so proud to hear me and Rachel! I've been telling everyone we only sang that well because of you, and it's true. We missed you tons, but I brought you back a present. I really hope you like it...” The pale thing was a necklace, Luce realized: a long strand of creamy pearls. Luce tried to smile as Dana slipped it over her head.
Anais was still staring at her; she almost leered as the pearls skimmed down around Luce's chest. An image of Dana lifting the pearls from a drowned woman's neck flashed through Luce's mind.
"That was really sweet of you, Dana,” Luce said, but she didn't manage to keep her agitation out of her voice. Anais's smirk tightened.
Catarina was looking at her again, too. Luce's heart froze for a second as she saw those gray eyes blazing from the shadows.
“Happy birthday, Luce,” Catarina hissed. Her tone was so sardonic that Samantha started tittering.
Luce just stared at her former friend, and tears flooded into her eyes as she finally grasped the words. Of course; it was still her fourteenth birthday; it always would be.
Still her fourteenth birthday, and yet she’d ruined everything.
15. Responsibility
“Challenge me,” Catarina snarled in her ear. She’d swum up behind Luce, deep underwater, as they sped toward the dining beach. Even though Catarina had done the same thing repeatedly for a week now, Luce’s chest still seized up with fear at the sound of that hissing voice. She forced herself to be strong.
“No.” Her voice warped and bubbled in the water, but the word was definite enough.
“Challenge me, Luce. In front of everyone. You have the right.” Luce tried to spin around to face Catarina, but the older mermaid was too fast, always slipping back so skillfully that Luce couldn’t look in her eyes. For a minute they just swirled in place, forming a kind of mermaid whirlpool, before Luce gave up trying. No one could swim as well as Catarina.
“I keep telling you, Cat! I don’t want to!” Her voice sounded more weary than angry now. She’d already tried yelling, and it hadn't stopped Catarina from gliding up behind her whenever she was at a safe distance from the others, someplace where no one else would hear, and hissing in her ear. Goading her...
"The best singer is the rightful queen, Luce. And even Queen Marina couldn't conjure the waves the way you can. She told me she'd heard stories about it, but she'd never succeeded in doing it herself. Marina! If you'd heard her, you'd understand what this means.” It sounded like praise, but Catarina's tone as she said it was so cruel that Luce felt nauseous. "Challenge me. I insist. What kind of coward are you?”
Suddenly Luce realized that Catarina had pivoted around in front of her. The gray eyes were so close that Luce reared back with the sense that she'd almost collided with a terrible mirror, one much worse than the makeup mirror the mermaids were always passing around these days. The water lifted Catarina's hair behind her so that it pitched in a wall of liquid fire, and webs of sunlight scrolled across her milky skin.
"You can't force me to sing, Cat,” Luce said; she was surprised by how calm she sounded. It seemed impossible when she felt so sick and afraid inside. "Not even by calling me names.”
"No.” Catarina seemed to be considering this. "No, Luce. Of course not. But I can make you suffer until you do.”
"Or you know?” Luce's voice was suddenly just as bitter as Catarina's; it didn't even seem to belong to her anymore. It felt like a stranger was speaking there in the water with them, a stranger who'd appeared inside Luce's head. "I could just show you how to do it, Cat. Call the waves that way, I mean. I could teach you. Then you'll still be our greatest singer, and maybe you'll stop believing these horrible things about me!” Maybe we’d be friends again, Luce thought with a spasm of grief and longing, but a second later she wasn’t sure about that. Did she still want to be friends with Cat now that she’d seen how hateful she could be?
A look of astonishment flurried over Catarina’s face, but she hid it almost instantly behind the same smirking mask she’d worn ever since Luce had given in to her pride and shown just what her voice could do now.
“And why would you want to do that?” This was an improvement in one way, Luce realized: it was the first time in days that Catarina seemed to be actually listening to anything Luce said at all.
“Because I’m your friend!” But Luce didn’t really mean it, not anymore, and the dishonesty of her tone was obvious. Catarina bit her lip and watched Luce in a way that was both nasty and quizzical. “And, I mean, you’re so much older than me, and you’re so good at—at keeping the tribe together and keeping everyone safe. You always know what to do...” Catarina’s look was still unyielding, and Luce stammered on with growing desperation. “And anyway, Cat, you are our best singer! Even if I can do that thing with the waves, I mean, I never sound as gorgeous as you do. I’m not even close...”
“Do you really believe that, Luce?” The tone was as slick and cold as ever; why was nothing she said ever enough? “Then challenge me. Sing your very best, in front of the whole tribe, and make them decide. What frightens you so much, little coward? The responsibility? Or—because you’ve decided, too late, to feel guilty ...”
Luce was in a bind. Now if she still refused it would sound either like she thought Catarina couldn’t actually defeat her or else like she really was too afraid. Luce felt a surge of resentment at being manipulated this way.
“No.” Catarina’s brows shot up, and Luce scrambled to come up with an excuse. “I don’t want anyone to go around saying that I even thought I could beat you. And I’d just embarrass myself...” Catarina’s strained smile ratcheted into a sudden grimace; she actually bared her teeth.
“We have no queen now, Luce. I know the truth, no matter what the others all think. Do you even realize—what that could mean?”
“You’re my queen, Catarina.” Luce heard that her tone sounded more resentful than loyal, though. “You always will be.” “I won’t pretend for you, Luce.” It came out in a dull hiss. Then there was a lashing of fins, a smear of silver light, and C
atarina was gone. Luce kept heading toward the dining beach, but slowly. Her movements were heavy, weighed down by sadness. She’d depleted her air supply by talking, and slipped up to breathe. She was in a blue bowl, ringed by soaring cliffs and even vaster distances.
***
Anais was talking, loudly, as Luce broke through the waves where they were all cracking mussels on the rocks. “Samantha and I went scouting this morning, and there’s a pretty nice little cruise ship heading our way! They’ve stopped at some island, but in a few hours ... Maybe the people on it aren’t all that classy, really, not like the last one we got, but there might be some stuff worth checking out. I say we snag it!”
Catarina whacked a mussel. She was staring off into the distance, toward the island where the Coast Guard boat had sunk. Luce waited for her to tell Anais not to do it. Anais and her followers had taken down another yacht just two days before. It was insanely dangerous; if they kept on this way they'd attract more and more human investigators to their area, and soon enough they'd all get killed.
Instead Catarina just shot Luce a razor-sharp look, daring her to say something, and suddenly Luce understood what Catarina was telling her, although without words. If you don’t like it, Luce, then challenge me. You think you can do better? Take over as queen, and you can stop them from doing this... Luce stared down at the wisps of sea foam curving out around her body. Was Catarina prepared to see her tribe destroyed simply to force Luce into a final confrontation?
