If human eyes should ever see her, while she was transfigured into a mermaid, she would have to remain a mermaid forever and stay with the catfish.
“You planned it all, you dirty, old catfish.”
Sirena agreed on the catfish’s terms, and soon she became the young bride of the Indian brave, and on every full moon, she would swim with the catfish as she promised. On the last full moon of the year, she was swimming when a fishing hook snagged her fin and forced her to the shoreline to remove it.
All the while, she pulled and tugged on the hook to remove it from her fin, her husband was watching her from a place amongst the trees. Their eyes met, her heart broke. And the catfish pulled her into the icy water, never to see her true love again. The legend claims the waters of the river flow from the Siren’s tears.
“I recognize you,” Nettle says, startling Rose.
“You recognize me?” What do you mean? Of course, you recognize me. I was across the corridor from you,” says Rose, kicking her feet in the cold water. She can feel the life force of the river seeping directly into her thirsty skin. It waters her and sates her craving for it. Nourishing her, rehydrating and replenishing her strength. She closes her eyes and looks up to the sun. The combination of the water and the sunlight are like a beautiful song playing and buzzing in her ears.
Nettle takes a spot on the boulder, besides Rose, dipping her small feet into the water too. They act like little girls, even best friends out for a peaceful summer afternoon swim. “That’s not what I mean,” says Nettle shaking her head and trailing the tip of her dainty finger across the surface of the water. Her finger makes delicate spirals in the frigid water. “Ivy suspected it. Hawthorne did too. Most of the others knew. We could all tell there was something much different about you than any of the rest of us... the color of your eyes gives it away. Lily was the one to smell it on you first.”
“Smell?” Rose sniffs her hands and then lifting her arm, sniffs at an armpit. This causes Nettle to laugh at her.
“No not like that. You’re not like any of the rest of us. Do you not know what…?”
Before Nettle can finish her thought, something from the other side of the river ripping across the surface of the water and grabs one of her thin legs. She screams and kicks against it. She feels for the creature below the water, but she can’t make it let go. It pulls at her, harder. She screams louder, slapping her hands against the surface of the river until her waterlogged bandages swell and fall heavily from her hands, like soggy party-streamers. Rose pulls at Nettle to keep her from being dragged deeper into the river.
Dr. Valentine, hearing the girls’ cries and screams runs to them. She’s entering the chilly water and wading thigh-deep to the point where Nettle is fighting with the unseen creature. Both girls are in the midst of a tug of war, for Nettle’s life. Dr. Valentine calls to Rose, but Rose is so frightened, she can’t make herself respond. She can only open her mouth, wide, and make pleading groans and screeches.
Major Connors follows closely behind Dr. Valentine, his sidearm is drawn, he’s holding it high in the air to keep it from getting wet.
Nettle’s head disappears under the surface. Rose has her arms wrapped beneath Nettle’s arms, and her hands latch around the girl’s chest, and so when the beast pulls Nettle further into the water, Rose is pulled right along with her.
Dr. Valentine has no choice, she swims out to them. The green men aim their weapons at the point where the thing should be under the flowing water. They can’t fire. There’s not a clear shot, without taking a chance of hitting Dr. Valentine or Rose and Nettle.
The futility of Rose’s attempt to rescue Nettle becomes apparent as the girl’s head disappears a final time beneath the water, but she still has her by one of her slippery hands. The other is flailing about searching for something or someone to grab on to, and that someone is Dr. Valentine.
Dr. Valentine dives for Nettle, and in the heat of the moment, thoughtlessly extends her arm to take hold of the child’s swinging hand. Instant shockwaves rip through her brain which presses and pounds against the interior of her brain case. The grey matter threatens to escape from her eye sockets and ear canals, as the pressure builds in her head. Screaming, intolerable pain. Blinding agony wrapping around and then grinding, every nerve-ending in her body to a pulp. She freezes as tetany seizes and locks her muscles, trapping them in a steely and fiery-grip.
She falls backward, stiff as a board, into Major Connors’s arms. He’s popping off rounds; two, four, six bullets, into the water. Nettle is launched from under the water, held high in a writhing, suction-covered tentacle. Another muscular appendage, and another, and another rise from the churning river like gargantuan earthworms. They fasten onto Nettle and wriggle tight around her ankles and arms and wrists. They tighten more and pull. Her small frame separates into bloody sections. Grabbing, winding, probing, the tentacles slap and part the surface. The major pulls Dr. Valentine towards the bank, and relative safety, Rose follows, and the green men unanimously declare open season on the river-demon.
It undulates in the deep water. Slow and ominous it reveals itself. Bullets are sinking into its pruney, once-human exterior. It howls and gurgles in pain as bullets sink into it rubbery hide. It scuttles toward the bank, and once out of the river, it moves with surprising speed, attacking the men on the shoreline, starting with the closest and working through the line. Those who find themselves caught up in its twirling arms are quickly drawn and quartered as if they were nothing more than cornhusk dolls.
The Major calls for a retreat, but besides Dr. Valentine, Dr. Shaw, Rose, and Sergeant Hollander, there’s no one left alive.
Once at a safe distance, Connors lobs a grenade at the monster, but it disappears back from where it came, leaving the grenade behind, to explode harmlessly on the shoreline.
Dr. Valentine’s in bad shape. She’s screaming. Consciousness slips from her, and she goes slack in the major’s arms. He lifts her limp body and carries her back to the inn. Sneering at Dr. Shaw as he passes. Dr. Shaw’s hiding behind a cottonwood tree.
Connors collapses on the front porch of the inn, falling on top of Dr. Valentine. She reaches for him deliriously, as he leaves her and runs into the building. Rose falls to her knees beside her, reaching out to her, causing Dr. Valentine to scream louder and pull away. She’s hallucinating and saying odd things, rambling incoherently.
Connors returns with a syringe in his hand, He pops the plastic top off the needle, with his teeth, spitting it out on the porch. He jabs the hypodermic needle into Dr. Valentine’s thigh, she doesn’t even flinch. The morphine does little to silence the finger-gnawing pain, tearing its way through her failing body. Nettle’s venom is eating her from the inside out. Prying her bones apart to dissolve the marrow within. The toxin overcomes her. She falls into a never-ending pit, spinning head over heels, over and over, until the world passes away, leaving her clinging to life.
Tonight will be a long night for everyone, especially Rose, who has come to love Dr. Valentine like the mother she can’t remember.
Chapter Sixteen
“All concerns of men go wrong when they wish to cure evil with evil.”
Thirteen days have passed since Salado and the death of Nettle and most of the green men. Dr. Valentine is well enough to travel, again. Rose never strays far from her side. They’re all cooped up in the Flying Fish, once again.