Vast and Brutal Sea
For Adrienne Rosado, my best friend and soul sister. All of this
is possible because you believed.
“Now put me into the barge,” said the king…
“for I will into the Vale of Avilion to heal me of my grievous
wound;
and if thou hear never more of me, pray for my soul.”
- from Le Morte d’Arthur by Sir Thomas Malory
The Daughter of the Sea would never be loved.
She was the first child of the Golden Queen and King Elanos of the
Erabos Kingdom. King Elanos, descendant of the first Kings of the sea,
watched his daughter tear free from the birthing sac without the help
of the midwife. She slithered between her mother’s split tails, silver
and pale as the face of the moon, haloed in blood and flesh.
They called her Nieve.
Her sisters needed help. For long, painful hours, six more
daughters followed, wailing and ripping their way into the sea. Nieve
grabbed one of her sisters’ hands, curious at the strange face that
shared her crib, and sunk pearly teeth into her golden flesh.
The midwife reeled Nieve into a crib of coral, separating her from
her sisters who bloomed like violet and turquoise jewels in the quiet
darkness of Glass Castle.
It was the Golden Queen’s first pod with the king. Her voice
echoed in the new, shining halls, not in pain like the queens before
her, but in happiness. She was his prize after the war with the rebel
tribes, and together they would birth a new reign in the deep,
ignoring the whispers of distant enemy shadows.
Merfolk came from all the oceans, bringing precious gifts for the
princesses. They stayed, wonder struck at how the little ones shone
with the queen’s golden skin and the king’s eyes, one turquoise, one
violet.
Then there was Nieve, with a paleness that radiated like
starlight. She brought awe, nestled in her mother’s warm arms like a
pearl.
And as she grew, fast and strong, she reached and reached for the
brilliant fissures inside the quartz scepter of her father’s trident.
The court smiled tightly at the brazenness of the tiny mermaid. Gasped
in awe at the silver princess swimming with wild white-bellied sharks,
taming them with the tender pads of her fingertips.
A thousand eyes trailed Nieve around the walls of Glass Castle. A
thousand whispers always present, yet always at a careful distance,
not knowing the extent of the curious sparks of her hands. It was
magic-so rare that it had never presented itself in the royal family.
Not since the legends of Eternity, when the children of Triton fought
the winged fey. With each battle, the Sea Court moved deeper into the
coldest breaches of the seas.
King Elanos recognized it. Magic, like the core of his trident,
the spark that could summon storms and tear into the rocky beds of the
ocean floors. But in a mermaid, the magic was uncontained and
unpredictable. The king watched as the spark grew in his silver
daughter’s eyes until, in a fit of anger, she killed.
It was an accident.
The palace guard would not let her swim to the surface. She
thought she was old enough to see the world alone. The guard grabbed
her and pulled her back down to court. She pressed her hands on his
chest for a moment, just a moment, and stopped his heart. His body
froze, eyes gaping at the princess, until a current carried him away.
An accident.
The court watched her, unsmiling, unnerving, unloving.
He watched her, the king, sleeping with eyes open, ears open, to
the murmurs of his daughter’s sleep talk, and he knew what he must do.
•••
His enemies came in the night.
But in the dark of the deep, it was always night-rebel tribes
against his door-the sea people of warmer oceans with copper scales
and onyx weapons. They sought retribution for the Golden Queen stolen
from them by King Elanos so long ago. But the queen had grown to love
her captor, her husband, her king, and she wouldn’t go-wouldn’t leave.
She was pregnant once more, and this time, she was certain it was a
son.
King Elanos had waited for this day. He knew their kind was
dwindling in numbers. The blood of war was no longer as appetizing as
in his youth. It was a queen they wanted and a queen the rebel tribes
would get.
And so King Elanos took his first daughter from her single chamber
and led her to the rebel Southern King.
Nieve screamed, as her mother had screamed when she was taken so
long ago, the sound echoing through the ocean, the current yielding to
her palms, and at once, King Elanos took Nieve’s face. He had never
held her, not as a child, not as a daughter. But she wasn’t a child
any longer, and he held her then, looking into her pale moon eyes, and
said, “Daughter, do this and you will save your kin.”
The kin who turned away, relieved that the silver princess would
no longer grace the court. The kin who peered between glass pillars as
she was taken away. Some crying. Some smiling.
And without looking at her weeping sisters or her mother, Nieve
took the hand of the Southern King.
She could hear the sigh of relief, like the last breath of a
tempest. She looked at her father, dark hatred slithering into her
heart and she promised, I will save my people, Father. But who will
save you?
NOW
Layla is gone.
Layla is gone and there’s a chance I may never get her back. That
she’s dead. That I’m two days away from losing her, the throne, and my
life because for a moment, I wasn’t strong enough and the silver
mermaid knew it.
She knows me in ways that I don’t even know myself, knows the
paralyzing fear that swelled in me when I thought I could lose the
girl I love.
The ship hits a wave and heaves. I grab on to the table in front
of me and drop the knife in my hand. I can hear Brendan and Kai on
deck moving weapons around. They’ll come checking on me any minute and
I know I have to hurry.
The pressure on my temples builds like tiny land mines going off
in my head. I press my palms and squeeze, but the image doesn’t go
away. I see Gwen. Gwen putting a pale hand over Layla’s mouth and
diving off the pier into the water.
Layla can’t breathe underwater.
I hold on to the basin in front of me, face myself in the scuffed
mirror, and examine the damage. My skin is peeling over my nose. Salt
water stings the thin cuts on my face, trickling down my neck and down
my chest. I can feel the ghost of an injury where Nieve’s fingernails
cut me the first time she found me. Was it only eighteen days ago?
Eighteen days ago that I washed up on Coney Island after the freak
storm created by the arrival of the Sea Court’s Toliss Island.
Now, despite everything I’ve been through, my journey is far from
over. Just a little bit more, just a little bit, I tell myself to keep
going. I have to wake the Sleeping Giants, powerful creatures that
once belonged to the first kings of the sea. They’re my best chance at
defeating my enemies. Their strength is legend and we’re heading to a
place that will help us find them.
I pick up the knife again and get to work. My body shakes like a
house during a hurricane every time I exhale.
I can do this.
I’m psyching myself out.
I jog in place like I’m warming up before a meet. But the
combination of jogging and the waves lapping around the ship knocks
over the jars of healing gunk the urchin brothers applied to all my
wounds, as well as the last of my fresh water.
I hear my buddy Angelo’s voice in the back of my head saying, “Get
your head out of your ass, T.”