He reached out and took my hand in his. He stared down at it for a moment, as if impressed at how slim and white it looked, fingers slender and well-shaped, so unlike his own. Then he bowed his head over it, as if he meant to kiss it, but he did not.
He straightened, but did not let go of my hand. Instead he raised his other hand and stroked my knuckles with caresses as gentle as he could manage.
"Don't worry about a thing. I gave up a lot for you. I gave up Vanity; I cut my own foot off for you.
Mother's not going to eat you. She likes you. I told you that's her dress."
"Dress… ?"
"Her wedding dress. My mom's wedding dress. She wore that dress when she was hitched up with Typhon. She saved it in a box for the Sphinx, but Sphinx got killt by Oedipus. That cap is hers, too, last one I got. That's why I could not keep you and Vanity both."
I reached up my hand to touch the web of pearls and lights around my hair.
"Don't touch that, I said! You don't want to die by drowning. It's a foul, foul death" he said in a matter-of-fact voice. "I know the word to break the charm on that there cap. You are thinking how far you can run? Not far enough. You try to run off, and I say the word. You stab me in my sleep, and Mother says the word.
"Now, come along! We tarried enough, jawing. Mother wants to talk to you and give her blessing. She keeps her blessings in ajar next to her high seat. She's going to say about how not to be afraid of having babies, and how you'll love the ones with two heads as much as the ones with three. It's a thing matrons say to virgins, you know? And she's going to say some stupid stuff about how it hurts the first time, so liquor up good after the ceremony, but after that you learn not to mind. The kind of garbage womenfolk think men don't know you talk about. Besides, I wouldn't hurt you for all the world."
I drew a deep not-breath. Suddenly, I was calm and unafraid. It was simple. It was like a math puzzle.
There were certain known factors I could control, and certain factors he controlled; some were known and some were unknown. I could solve for the known factors.
Actually, it was more like a chess puzzle. Math puzzles do not require one to sacrifice pieces.
I said, "No, Grendel."
He said, "What's that?"
"No. You shall not marry me. I will not stay here. You shall take me back up to the surface in the next five minutes."
He said, "You want me to go fetch the rod, is that it? It's an ill thing to beat a woman on her wedding day. I'd rather wait till after the preacher were done, to make it proper and legal-like."
I looked at him. I don't know what he saw in my face, but he quailed and stepped back, even though he was immensely stronger than me, and possessed of a power I could not oppose.
My words marched out of my mouth like soldiers: "Hear me, Grendel. I pity you, for you are wretched, but I will not be yours. You wish to possess me, and I do not wish to be possessed. My wishes will be granted, and yours will be thwarted."
He stepped forward again, beginning to smile. "I'll get my way."
"You will do what I wish you to do. You will take me to the surface."
"And why will I do that, little golden princess?"
"Because my will is stronger than yours, Grendel."
He may have had some intimation of what I was about to do, because he grabbed for my wrists. Too late.
The net I wore on my head, the mermaid's cap, came up easily off my hair, and tore in half very easily.
There was a flash of green sparks as the fabric parted.
The sounds grew rubbery and thick, and the icy water shocked every inch of my flesh, every cubic inch of my lungs. Oddly enough, there was no sensation of choking, because my lungs were already entirely filled with water.
And it was cold, so cold, that it felt, paradoxically, as if all the water around me had turned to lava. As if my arms and legs were burned to stubs immediately, I could not tell whether I could move them or not.
My vision went dark.
Pnigerophobia. That was the word. Fear of choking is called pnigerophobia.
1.
For a time, I lay between waking and not-waking, troubled by memories of dark nightmares of cold, endless cold, and of choking and vomiting black water. I remembered rough lips trying to breathe life back into my lungs, and being unable to breathe and unable to see or feel. And reality had somehow…
snapped into place… and in the new version of reality, the lips came again, and breathed into me, and I breathed in and out. In and out.
There is no sensation more wonderful. How pleasant, how wonderful life is, which allows us to enjoy this pleasure, life's best pleasure, ten or five times a minute, when we relax, fifteen when we are filled with excitement.
Except… why was I only breathing in through my nose? What was blocking my mouth?
I came fully awake. I opened my eyes.
There were two large campfires burning left and right. I was wrapped snugly in a bearskin rug, folded over me and under me like a sleeping bag. It might have been the same bearskin rug Grendel wore as a robe.
I was lying, rolled up in the rug, on snow. Around me were a few scraggly trees, naked and powdered with snow. Every twig bore a little icicle. Not twenty feet away was the rocky soil the Kissing Well stood on, its little witch-hat roof layered with a second hat of snow. Beyond it was the cliff. I could see and smell the sea.
Even with the bearskin and the fires, I was still cold, although, perhaps, I was not near death. Grendel had not removed the wedding dress, and I could feel its sopping wet fabric clinging tightly to me, freezing.
Little puddles had collected from the garments and gathered under my stomach.
Yes, I was lying on my stomach. And yes, I had a gag in my mouth, the second one today, if I hadn't lost count. And, yes, I was tied hand and foot, and from what I could tell from a little wiggling, probably elbows, knees, upper thighs, around the waist, etc., etc. You get the idea. Grendel had gone at least a week without seeing me trussed up like a turkey; his favorite spectator sport. I was surprised he hadn't roped me down like a landing zeppelin to tent stakes in the ground.
And there he was, Old Grendel was back, bald and crooked, dressed in a wet gray shirt and sagging patched trousers. His peg leg was made of wood again, not ivory.
He leaned close and whispered, "Sush! Sush! If you make any noise at all, Boggin might hear. The winds do his sneaking and eavesdropping for him. Got me?"
Have you ever had something really, really important to say, when a magic sea monster had you gagged, so that you could not even make very much noise out of your nose? Very frustrating. It helps to have expressive eyes.
Thunking a bit with your bound legs can help, if you do it regularly enough to make him think you've got a signal you are trying to send. If he just thinks you are struggling, it would just turn him on. Pervert.
He took the gag out. "No carrying on. You're already due for a licking when we get back home, scaring me like that. Don't add to the account."
I said through chattering teeth, "I am going to freeze. I am going to die. My clothes are still wet. It's turning to ice on me…"
He looked up, worry plain on his face. "Yeah," he muttered. "Weather always turns fierce cold when he gets mad…"
I said, more loudly, "You have to dry me off, get me someplace warm! Get me out of these things!"
Without getting up, he reached over and picked up a broken tree branch he was using as a crutch. He whispered, uncertainty in his voice: "I were going to get Mom, seeing if she wouldn't change her mind, get me another cap. I'll bring her up here…"