He’ll treat me like the crown princess. Then at least we’ll be united. Maybe together we can sway him.
It didn’t matter.
Because Father never looked at her.
Coral was a reminder of all he’d lost. A torch carrying the weight of the deceased queen and the four merbabies who could have been but never were.
Emotions rose but she shut them down. At the point beyond the southern palace gate, Coral swam ever faster. Past the three pointed rocks with their constant foreboding. Beyond the reef comprised of colors so vivid, her tail faded in comparison. Over the sunken ship that arrived when she was three. And there, just there at the edge of the wood, waited a cliff. And in the heart of that cliff lurked a dark cave. An ominous cave. A cave into which no merman, maid, or child would dare venture.
Coral lifted her head and entered. She’d escaped here a hundred times before.
She held no fear of darkness.
Light always awaited her at the other end.
Black and cool for but a fleeting moment, the interior of the cave gave way to luminous moonlight. She swam upward, flipping and tumbling in momentary freedom. She wasn’t actually disobeying any rules. While she was forbidden to break the surface until the day she turned sixteen, this seemed different. No human would find her here, hidden among the jagged rocks far enough from shore it appeared blurred.
The evening air chilled her face. Coral pushed herself up onto the ledge of a low rock and wrung out her hair, a crazy mess of coarse tangles. Spear-like stones surrounded her as a circular fortress. Waves kissed the walls from the other side, spraying her face with salt and foam. She inhaled the fresh air that seemed to lift her higher. While the water weighted her when she breathed it in labor, the air seemed to relieve every ache brought by her sister’s sobs. By Father’s lack of concern.
Coral’s tail rested in the water below, swaying this way and that. The sea garden she’d tended sprang forth from the nooks and crevices of the rocks in every shade. Deep-green sea grass. Bright-pink hibiscus with its sun-yellow tongue. And purple sea hollies. Spiked and menacing, but a beautiful sight to behold. She grazed one with her fingertips, absorbing the song their rainbow produced.
A sound she didn’t recognize beckoned her from beyond the rocks.
She startled and slipped, splashing back into the deep pool.
The sound echoed.
The urge to peek over her stone fortress seeped into every hidden crevice within. The moon shone high above the ocean waters. Soon her sisters would make themselves known. She should go. She should . . .
The song resounded a third time. Gold, pure, and shimmering.
What would one glance harm? Even if the sound was human, they were far enough away. No one would see her. Her sisters would be preoccupied and Father would never know. Coral had been here before. No one had ever noticed the glances she’d stolen from her secret place.
Coral pulled herself up enough to peer over the closest rock. In the distance, stars twinkled, blowing her kisses from the heavens. The moonlight lit the coast, illuminating the land palaces beyond. They were smaller than her palace, but somehow so much more inviting. Entirely white with warm yellow windows that called “hello.” With stairs descending to the shore, the palaces stood nestled in so many shades of C-sharp green and lullaby periwinkle. The vision was glorious.
Beautiful.
And that song. It wasn’t grandiose like the concerts her sisters often gave.
It was lovely. Simple. And oh so warm.
But the beauty of that simple harmony was quickly destroyed by her sisters’ song.
Coral covered her ears and shut her eyes, diving beneath the surface to avoid the chilling sound. A sound so black it terrified her as much as the Abyss. Their call meant death, and she could not cope. The feeling inside grew hotter.
Mermaids. Cold. Death. Destruction.
Humans. Warmth and color and life.
Everything was backward.
Maybe the cure for the Disease was nowhere in the ocean.
Could humans hold the key to a cure the merfolk never imagined existed? Father might be in denial about his oldest daughter’s illness, but he couldn’t ignore her pleas forever.
Coral dove into darkness, swam toward home.
She must do whatever it took to stop the Disease from destroying her sister.
And she must do so before Red Tide came again.
Two
Brooke
After
This is not my home.
This is not my bed.
After all this time, it’s finally come to this. A facility. A treatment plan.
A nightmare lurking in the day.
Why did I agree to this?
Three blinks and a gulp of oxygen open my eyes to a shard of light slicing the puffy bedcovers. Vague snippets of memory piece together in a rough outline, reminding me how I got here. One word, maybe two, for each bullet point. The in-betweens remain intentionally blank. Too many triggers in those middle spaces. Glass half empty? No, but thanks. I’ll take it completely hollow if it means I can avoid drowning.
The heater shuts off, making way for new sounds. Water trickling. And steam? I crane my neck. A miniature stone fountain and a diffuser, spraying something smelling of citrus and lavender. The effect soothes but also stirs a familiar warning. One that says these are devices used to manipulate. To make me feel safe and comfortable so they can get whatever it is they want.
Nice try. Not gonna work, though. I’ve only agreed to come here out of desperation. At a loss for anywhere else to go. This is my cliff. My deserted island. My means to an end.
I sit and take in the room I have all to myself. I arrived late last night and immediately crashed. Exhausted from the good-bye I wasn’t quite ready to say. Now, in the light of day, this isn’t what I expected. No sterile hospital bed or cold linoleum floor. Instead, the room is homey, cozy even. Everything in me wants to sleep for days. The fatigue never falters. There have been times I’ve slept eighteen hours and still didn’t feel rested. Other times I’m awake all night, unable to calm my thoughts.
Now, my mind swims, sparking a manic energy that makes me want to move. Moving equals distraction. And distractions keep me from filling in those blanks. From thoughts that spiral out of control.
I force myself to stretch, to fully wake. My glazed eyes find a clock beside the full-size bed. The lit numbers blur, and I rub my eyes to focus.
5:53 a.m.
A knock sounds from the other side of the wall behind me. The creak of a bed frame. The opening of a door. Shuffling feet. Another door closing.
I’m not the only one here. Of course not. Somehow this does nothing to calm my nerves.
A yawn escapes, full and free as the sliver of sun widens, casting an earnest shadow across the room with walls that are probably blue but appear more gray through my lens. Everything is as gray as California fog these days. When was the last time I came across a color that stood out amid dull hues and their muted undertones? My life is a black-and-white film, one lost and forgotten, overlooked for more vibrant, exciting tales.
Pipes squeal and water runs. A girl’s muffled voice finds its way through the walls. Her concert for one is a strange sound, a disconcerting one. She belts a show tune and I wonder what meds she’s on.
Despite the pleasant feel of the room that pretends to be my friend, I can’t be fooled. This is a facility. I am here to be treated, psychoanalyzed, and sent on my way. At the year’s end I’ll be eighteen, with nowhere to go but a shelter, the streets, or—