“I will miss you too,” Nerida replied in a soft voice, her hand coming up to rest on her cousin’s arm. “But don’t worry. I will be just fine. I make my future, but I will do it all the stronger knowing that I am in your hearts just as I will keep you in mine,” she said as her mother leaned back and released her, brushing away tears from her own eyes.
They remained like that for only a moment, but that would be all the time they had as Nerida’s father ducked through the opening into the family quarters. His eyes fell on her in her bridal attire and widened as a grin tugged at his heavily whiskered face. If there was a hint of tears in his eyes, he blinked them away at once. It was replaced by the pride that obviously filled him as he stretched his hand out to her.
“It is time, Neri. The sun is setting in the heavens and on your time with us. You’re a woman now, and you will bring us pride.”
He didn’t need to fill in just how she was expected to bring her family pride. It didn’t need to be said. She smiled weakly and dropped her eyes as she placed her hand in his.
“Thank you, Papa.”
She was aware of her mother and cousin following her out and the women of the pod standing just outside of the entrance, singing and clapping their hands together as they welcomed the bride. At the front of the line were women of her family, but at the end she could see the women of Erik’s family waiting. Just beyond them, her husband stood.
She would not get out of marrying him. That was the sacrifice she had to make for her freedom. She would have to live forever knowing that she participated in this ceremony, even without consummation, to give her the opening she needed for her escape.
Erik grinned confidently at her, and his hand extended just as her father relinquished her to him. At the touch of his hand, Nerida dropped her eyes, refusing to look at him or invest any more of herself in the ceremony. She didn’t hear the words of the head of their pod officiating, just the distant murmur of his voice. She barely felt the long band of cloth being wrapped over and around their hands, joining them together. It was nothing more than a whisper soft slide of cloth. She was certain that she made all the right sounds and responses, but she couldn’t have repeated anything that she had said or was said to her. Everything around her seemed distant and muted until the words penetrated through the fog she’d placed over her mind.
“You are bound, one heart to the other, one life, and one family. Bound together forever until death or the seas part you.”
Nerida pressed her lips together, holding back the smile that threatened to break out. The seas will part us sooner than anyone in the pod expects. She could almost imagine the cheer that broke out was for her plans and not for the pronunciation of husband and wife.
She stumbled as Erik turned her. He barely bothered to steady her when his mouth descended to hers, sealing their oaths before their families and pod. A roar of approval went up around them as she was torn away from him. She could feel his eyes following her as the women brought her among them, their happy voices surrounding her as they pressed food and drink on her.
Covertly, she lifted her gaze and watched as Erik was plied with the same. His eyes bore into her, but gradually as one cup turned to two, and then to three, his gaze finally slipped away from her as he joined in with the revelry among the men. Nerida allowed herself a triumphant little smile.
Unlike Erik, she didn’t take more than a taste of the seaweed wine, feigning to be too nervous to stomach more than a swallow. The women teased her mercilessly but brought her sweetened water with a diluted amount of preserved fruit nectar. They were happy to refill her cup as often as she asked while she ate the small sweets, fish, and rolls that were set out. For this one day, she was expected to do nothing but celebrate, and so she took full advantage of it to eat and drink her fill.
Torches were at the center of the conjoined decks when night fell, and instruments came out once more as the revelries began in earnest. Nerida ignored it; her attention was solely on the men as their voices became more boisterous. She couldn’t even see Erik anymore.
With slow movements, she set her cup and plate down. Her eyes slid over to the women, but those who weren’t gossiping in small groups were out dancing merrily to the music. No one seemed particularly concerned with her now that the party had started in earnest. They likely wouldn’t think of her again until it was time to see the bride to her marital room.
A shame that Nerida was going to beat them to it.
Stepping back into the shadows, she slipped farther from the light and merrymaking of the party, each footstep carrying her to her marital boat. With practiced ease, she untied the knots, tossing the lines anchoring the new boat to the pod onto its deck. All the same, she was slightly out of breath with how quickly she worked, her heart racing anxiously. She only had a couple of hours to get away before her absence would be noted.
She froze, alarm racing through her at a rustling behind her. Spinning around, her stomach dropped as she saw a familiar outline step out from the shadows. His footsteps unsteady, he approached, the faint light from the houseboats barely illuminating his features. His eyes ran over her as he lifted a flask and took a long drink.
“Going somewhere, wife?” he spat, his lips thinning with anger.
Nerida gaped. How had he seen her slip away? She scanned her surroundings, searching for anyone else who might have followed him, but his harsh laughter dragged her attention back to him.
“Do not worry. No one saw me leave. Did you really think that you would be able to slip away from me? Your father warned me that you might be difficult, and I see that it was with good reason.” He stretched leisurely as he glanced over at the boat, a cruel smile turning up the corners of his mouth. “As it happens, I like this plan. You and I will slip away for a few days. A bit of privacy where I don’t have to worry about my family hearing your screams as I break you. Don’t get me wrong—they will turn a deaf ear on any discipline you receive, but I like the idea of privacy for this. Don’t you?” he purred.
She stumbled back, her head shaking back and forth in denial. Her hands reached behind her, desperately searching for anything she could use as a weapon as she backed away. She didn’t have to feign the tremor of fear that raced through her at what he proposed.
“No. Erik… please…”
“Oh, you will please me,” he growled as he stepped forward.
Nerida swallowed a cry, her arms coming up in front of her defensively when he reached for her. A shadow darted forward at that moment, bringing down a large ceramic pitcher of seaweed wine against the back of Erik’s head. He stumbled, his mouth going slack. He stood there for what was less than a minute before dropping to the deck with a heavy thump.
Ioina stepped out of the shadows, her face pale as she looked over Erik’s prone body. Her shocked gaze slowly moved over to Nerida. With an oath, Ioina stepped over him as she drew rapidly to her side.
“Well, what are you still doing here? Hurry up and get on that boat and get the hell out of here,” her cousin hissed. “Don’t worry about Erik. I will get this mess cleaned up and rejoin the others and will make sure that no one thinks anything is amiss for some time yet. When he wakes, he will likely not remember a thing and stinking of seaweed wine everyone will guess that he had an accident in his drunken state. But you need to be far away from here.”
“Thank you, Ioina. I love you,” Nerida whispered in a choked voice as she hopped to the deck and picked up a large pole from the side with which she pushed away from the pod.
Her cousin pressed her hand to her chest and nodded. No other words needed to be said or could be as the boat drifted away from the others—not without alerting anyone. The darkness of the night swallowed her cousin, and eventually even the light from the pod grew fainter until the night claimed that too.
Nerida started the engines, her heart soaring as the boat began to silently pull away from the pod. She would not go beneath deck—not yet. Not until she was certain that she was far enough away
to be safe from immediate pursuit.
Chapter 3
For months, Nerida sailed, always anxiously looking toward the horizon as she put distance between herself and the familiar routes of her pod. As she stared out over the waters through her long-range scope as she had done day after day, a breath of relief fell from her lips.
They weren’t giving chase—or if they were, they were so off course from her that they had no hope of finding her. Without even so much as a hint of pursuit, she finally felt the tension that had been riding her so hard ease out of her muscles.
I’m finally free!
A smile lifted her lips at that realization, and Nerida let her head fall back as she laughed into the sky above. As her laughter faded, she stared up into the pale violet-blue skies. Tales of the homeworld spoke of pristine blue heavens, but she couldn’t imagine anything more beautiful that the skies of Terra II. Breathing in the salty air, she leaned against the mast and let her eyes close, allowing herself a moment to truly rest.
The midday sun was warming her skin uncomfortably when she finally opened her eyes and pushed upright. She couldn’t sit daydreaming forever. Now that she was certain she no longer had to worry about being followed, she needed to focus on her next steps. Chief among them was finding a semi-sheltered place to latch down through the winter storms. It would be coming soon. The moment she exited into the Greater Sea, beyond the charted territories sailed by the wavelanders and the anchorages of the floating cities, she knew it would be a matter of greatest importance.
That was over a month ago, and while she marked the location of every suitable temporary anchoring site, she had yet to find one suitable for wintering. That alone was concerning, but it wasn’t the only danger she faced sailing into the Greater Sea. Her distance from the floating cities and the goods brought in by the shuttles from the mainland meant she would have to make her supplies stretch further, and she would have to travel far to make her trades. Another concern was that the Greater Sea was said to be inhabited by the dathli sea serpents and roving pirates who sailed out from it into wavelander territories to attack boats.
Nerida worried her lip with her teeth.
The last thing she needed was to accidentally come upon a cove inhabited by a nest of pirates while searching for her own grounds. So far, she had been fortunate that she had seen no one at all, much less pirates, for weeks. Even the notoriously frightful dathli serpents had been absent, though she thought she had seen massive coils rising from the waters in the distance on one occasion. It had been enough to make her rest uneasy. She caught only a small handful of hours of sleep at a time before she was awake and inspecting the horizons through her scope for any sign of threat.
Walking to the steering cabin, Nerida slipped behind the wheel and activated the solar-powered propulsion system. The soft hum of the expensive new unit sang to her as the solar sail unfolded and the ship, which had been drifting at rest while she slept, glided forward over the water. Settling in her chair, she glanced down at the navigation system.
Like everything in the boat, it was the newest and best of what could be purchased, and far superior to anything that was installed in the boats of her family. The Quinns had spared no expense in outfitting the boat for the new family Erik was supposed to raise in it. But of course they would. They made sure he had everything he wanted—including her. Consequently, the boat and everything with it was now hers. She considered that fair.
Kicking her feet up, she squinted at the water stretching out ahead of her. The half-year storms had not yet started. Theoretically, she knew that on the mainland there were four main seasons, but not on the water. On the open water, there was only summer with its warm breezes and fair sailing weather, and winter with its rocky seas. The half-year storms that blew through in the transitions between the two heralded the changing of the year. Things were unusually calm, as the storms should have begun weeks ago, but she wasn’t one to complain. She wasn’t eager to try her hand at sailing through one alone.
The sonar on the screen just below navigation showed a large, angular shadow near her boat as it rose from the depths of the water. Nerida pursed her lips in a soft whistle. She recognized the whip shardon immediately. It was the largest she had ever seen, without a doubt.
A grin split her lips as she shoved to her feet. The shardon wasn’t her quarry. Although they were considered a delicacy, she wasn’t suicidal enough to attempt to snare one on her own. Especially not one so large. No, she was after the swarm of wide-mouthed feeder fish that were following it. The feeders were fat, tasty fish that scavenged the morsels that were abundant anywhere near a shardon’s kill. A few of those would stock her freezing unit full and keep her fed for a couple of weeks.
Whistling cheerfully to herself, she strode back out to the deck, baited several reinforced lines imbedded into the railing, and flung them overboard into the water. Nerida watched as the brilliant pink bait sank out of sight.
“Come on, little fishies, take a nibble for mama,” she murmured. She squinted down into the water impatiently, watching for the telltale shadows of the fish nearing. Swiping one hand against the back of her neck, she grimaced at the still surface. “Taking your time, are you? I don’t blame you. It’s hot as hell today,” she said to herself.
She frowned. Shouldn’t there be something by now?
Drumming her fingertips along the railing, she slowly walked along its side, staring into the deep violet-blue waters beneath her. The water lapped against the side of the boat with the gentle breeze.
Perhaps they had veered away…
A dark shape suddenly loomed out from beneath the boat. The ridge of its sail extending from its bulbous forebody was distinct—and very, very big. A gasp died on her lips as she wheeled away. That thing was larger, much larger than she thought from the sonar. At just over half the size of her fishing boat, it presented a very real danger.
“Oh, fuck!”
Nerida shouted an entire string of accompanying curses as she stumbled back just in time to avoid the enormous maw of a whip shardon breaking the surface alongside the boat. Jets of water streamed from between its numerous serrated teeth, the whips at either side of its mouth snapping before the creature crashed back into the water.
Saltwater sprayed over the sides of the ship, slicking the deck, but Nerida leaped to her feet, sliding over them as she rushed to the lines that were now tugging violently. The shardon was already continuing on its way, finding nothing edible immediately available, but now the feeder swarm had encountered her bait.
With a sharp kick to the release lever on the processing tank, the covering slid open as she passed. Excitement rushed through her with every half-sliding step across the deck. This was it! Her hands closed around the line’s hand-crank. She huffed to herself, her smile only slightly dropping as she tightened her grip. The Quinn men were notorious for declaring that no true wavelander man would use an automated crank. Most people ignored such boasting, but of course the boat they commissioned for their son would have only hand-cranks. She cursed the thing, but the crank turned as she worked it, her muscles straining against the weight of the fighting fish.
When the first fish emerged from the water, is dark, sleek body flopping against the side of the boat, Nerida let a whoop of victory, excitement sizzling in her blood. She hadn’t done more than let down her nets in hope of catching something worth eating while she fled. A thrill shot through her at her as she pulled in her first true catch.
One by one, she pulled the fish over the side, unhooking their large, rounded mouths as she tossed the fish into processing tank. They were ugly fuckers. Oil slick greenish-black, it had thick tinges of muddy green in places where heavy fins spurted out all over their bodies. The five pus-yellow eyes that bulged from its head and the peculiar flesh beak that slid over its mouth whenever it closed made it all the more hideous.
It was a good thing she didn’t have to look at all of that when she ate the flaky cooked fillets.
G
rinning wildly, Nerida hauled up six fish, all of them going into the processing tank except for the seventh, which was to be spared and returned to the sea. It was not only the smallest of the lot, but doing so would ensure good luck. Some might say her family was superstitious, but she was raised to believe that one should always return one among their catch to secure good fortune and blessings of the sea. She wasn’t going to shirk on that now that she was out in the hostile waters of the Greater Sea.
Lifting the ugly thing up until it was eye level, she spoke gravely to it.
“Listen, you, I send you back with a prayer. Take my goodwill and prayers with you to the sea so that the blessings favorably return. Got it?”
The fish wriggled and writhed aggressively against her hold, and she broke out into a smile. That was a very good sign. She tossed the fish back overboard, watching as it arched through the air until its dark body plopped loudly in the water. The fish floated for only a second, stunned. It bobbed and then vanished with a flick of its fins.
Still smiling down into the water, part of her wished she could have been there with her father, sharing this moment with him as he watched and cheered from his boat. He would have raised his hand in recognition of her offering back to the sea, his face filled with pride.
Something wet tracked down her cheek and slipped over the bridge of her nose. Nerida lifted her hand and caught the drop of liquid on her fingertips, staring down it. It was followed by another. This one dripped freely into the sea, mingling its essence with the water.
Taking a deep, steadying breath, she lifted her head and turned her attention to the distance. The enormous sail of the whip shardon broke through the water. The red fin was stark against the water and sky. Despite how terrifying the whip shardon was in-person, she could appreciate this beautiful part of it. She saluted the shardon, who provided her food, but flinched as a pale ropey coil slipped up out of the water near it.
Sirein: A Dystopian World Alien Romance Page 3
