Blood of a Mermaid (6 page)

Martha’s eyebrows shot up, surprised by his question. “Among other things,” she agreed. “Many times we posed as fisherman’s wives or daughters and sold cockles and mussels on the piers. An old merman named Angus ran a fish and chips stand that was popular with the sailors. It was one sunny day while I was helping at the stand that I met your Grandfather MacNamara. Such sapphire blue eyes he had, like the deepest ocean…” Her voice trailed off for moment, until she shook her head and continued her tale.

“Naval forces from Britain, Canada, France, Norway, and Holland all joined together with the United States for these war games – hundreds of warships and hundreds more merchant vessels. My friends and I heard all the men talking about it and decided to watch the maneuverings for ourselves. I wanted to spy on your grandfather some more, because I couldn’t get those few moments of flirting with him out of my head. We took a trip to the Norwegian Sea, almost into the Arctic Circle, to watch the events unfold. And it’s a good thing that we did.” She paused to take another sip of her tea.

“Why?” Shea had both elbows propped on the table, holding his face in his hands as he listened to her story, fascinated. There was a black and white photograph on the fireplace mantel of Martha at her wedding day, so he knew how beautiful she was in her youth. He could see her in his mind, a young thing wearing a long skirted apron, selling fish and chips and flirting with the foreign sailors. “Why was it a good thing you went to watch the war games? Did Grandpa fall overboard? Did you have to save him from drowning like a storybook mermaid would?”

Martha chuckled. “Your grandfather was far too good a sailor to simply fall into the ocean. No, the problem was not with the sailing men or their battleships, but more with the location they chose to hold their war games.” She paused and cocked her head to the side. “How much do you know about the Norwegian Sea?”

Shea thought for a moment. “It’s near Norway?”

“And?”

He frowned, scrunching his forehead in concentration. His exposure to coastal and world geography had been almost non-existent at his school back in Oklahoma. “It’s connected to the Atlantic Ocean?”

It was Martha’s turn to frown. “I’m glad you’re headed to University soon. There is so much the drylander schools haven’t taught you.”

“Forget about my limited education for the moment, Gramma. What happened during the war games?”

“The Nerine happened.” She stood suddenly, taking her mug with her to the stove and filling it from the kettle. As she selected another teabag from the canister, she asked, “Do you know the basics about the different clans of merfolk?”

Shea nodded, pulling up the information in his mind. The fact that he had a perfect photographic memory for everything he read and learned had puzzled him when he was younger, but now he understood the importance of a good memory. Mermaids don’t have reference books or internet service at the bottom of the ocean. The ability to retain information and retrieve it from memory is key to survival, although Shea still wondered about some of his other odd abilities.

“Kae told me there are mermaid clans in each of the five oceans, with villages scattered among practically every body of water on the planet. It sounds a little like medieval Europe, with the five kings – or queens like Mom – who rule the lesser lords of the various seas. And then the High Council in Atlantis rules over all. The Aequoreans are the largest clan, stretching across the whole of the Atlantic Ocean and all the Seas it touches, and the Adluos live in the cold Southern Ocean down around Antarctica.”

“The Nerine are the clan that resides under the polar icecaps of the Arctic Ocean,” Martha explained. “It’s the smallest of the oceans and also the shallowest, but the ice keeps them safe from discovery. It also serves to keep the mermaids there isolated from most human contact.” Martha moved back to the table with her fresh cup of tea. “You won’t find any examples of a Nerine falling in love with a human – such things are strictly forbidden in their culture. Their clan’s antagonism toward drylanders is legendary around the globe, as are some of their other strange customs. You can tell just by looking at them that they’re an unusual lot.”

Shea thought back on the Summer Solstice gathering at the castle of King Koios, and all the different colors of hair and skin on the mermaids from around the globe. If blue and green hair and multi-hued skin were run-of-the-mill, what did mermaids consider unusual? Something else bothered him. “What about all the stuff Aequoreans do, like cultivating pearls or selling fish? Don’t the Nerine need things they can’t get in the Arctic?”

Martha pursed her lips before answering. “I think this conversation is veering off track. There are many things you will learn at University, from teachers far more knowledgeable than I am. You may even learn about the NATO incident in the Norwegian Sea, when the Nerine almost succeeded in starting a war with the humans. The Aequoreans intervened, and most of the sailors were none the wiser. Several witnessed things not easily explained and had to have their memories altered. I was assigned to follow up with a group of sailors from the
U.S.S. Saratoga,
and so I came to the Americas.”

“Grandpa’s ship,” Shea whispered, remembering.

Martha smiled. “Even with his mind wiped, he remembered me from the docks in Portsmouth, and that I’d introduced myself to him as ‘Martha.’ We were married soon after he was released from his naval duties, and settled here, on his native Cape Cod.”

He interrupted. “What do you mean he remembered you as Martha? Isn’t that your name?”

She reached over and patted his arm. “It certainly is now, and has been for more than fifty years. ‘Tis a solid drylander name, and one I’ve worn proudly. But no, your grandfather never knew me by another name or another form. If your father and uncle had been born differently, there might have been explaining to do. But that is now water well under the keel, so to speak.” Tears filled her eyes. “In all our years together, your grandfather never questioned me, and never wavered in his love. I made my choices and have had no regrets. Until now.”

He sat up in his chair. “What do you mean?”

Martha slowly wiped her fingers below her eye, catching the first salty tear that trickled down her cheek. “If I’d been more honest with your grandfather, and with Tom, then perhaps they wouldn’t have succumbed to Demyan’s forces. They might have been able to avoid…death. Demyan has much to answer for, but I blame myself for not giving my family knowledge that could have saved them.”

Shea reached across the table and squeezed her hand. “Gramma, it’s not your fault. There was nothing anyone could have done to prevent what happened, and knowing you’re a mermaid wouldn’t have saved Grandpa from the sudden hurricane.” He shook his head, accepting for the first time that there was nothing he could have done to save his father, either. If he’d stayed home from school that fateful day, the freak tornado would have killed him as well as his dad. “From what I’ve seen and heard of Demyan, there is no way to stop him. He is pure evil.”

Martha nodded. “Evil he is. But you are wrong about the other.”

“The other what?”

“That he can’t be stopped.” Martha leaned across the table toward Shea. “Even evil has its limitations. We just need to discover Demyan’s weakness.”

He frowned. “We? Gramma, in case you forgot, you haven’t transformed for a gazillion years. And no one knows where Demyan is even hiding. What can we do to help when I’m not supposed to even go into the ocean?”

She sat back in her chair, a smile spreading across her face. “We hold the key to something Demyan desperately desires.”

“What key are you talking about?”

“You, Sheachnadh.” She reached out and placed her hand over his. “Demyan will blame you for foiling his scheme and he will want revenge. He will come to us. And we will be ready for him.”

Kae sat at a table in the corner of the castle’s kitchen, across from the green-haired stranger she now called friend. The customs of hospitality dictated that she offer him food and drink, but there was something about Xander that Kae actually liked. While he seemed all casual and confident on the outside, with that rakish scruff of beard and stories of Atlantis, she could sense the loneliness inside him, like a little boy who needed a hug.

It occurred to her briefly that Shea probably wouldn’t like it if he found her hanging around with this cute merman, sharing sushi and laughter in a quiet corner. She frowned, thinking of all the times she knew Hailey shared meals with Shea or took long walks with him. They seemed to share a lot of common knowledge of things that she didn’t understand, like
Xbox
and
comic books
and
wrapping paper
, although he always insisted the pair were no more than friends. Well, she could make friends too, and let Shea be the one to feel left on the strandline.

“Is something troubling you?”

She looked up to find concern in Xander’s dark eyes, and realized she was frowning as she pictured Hailey and Shea riding those stupid two-wheeled machines he called bicycles. She made an effort to lighten her expression. “Nothing’s wrong. Just remembering something silly.”

A smile stretched across his face and she noticed he had a dimple on his left cheek but not his right, just visible above the line of his beard. It gave him a bit of a lopsided appearance, and for some reason made her think again of a lonely little boy, despite the muscles that rippled across his arms and bare chest. “Tell me your silly story,” he pleaded, a devilish twinkle in his eye. “I’ve already told you too many from University. It must be your turn to embarrass yourself by now.”

She returned the smile. “Well, although I haven’t had nearly as many adventures as you have, Xander, there was one time I tried to master an evil drylander contraption called a bicycle. It proved most tricky to escape, and I must admit my elbows ended up worse for the experience.”

His eyes narrowed as his grin widened. “You? Mastering a bicycle? Hasn’t contact with drylanders been forbidden in recent years because of the war? And here I was thinking you were a total rule-follower, little miss sweetness and light!”

Kae frowned again, her tail twitching with frustration at his teasing tone. “I’m not totally bound by the rules. And even if I were, you make it sound like a bad thing to follow the law.”

He laughed, reaching across the table to lay his large hand on top of her smaller one. “It’s not a bad thing to be a good girl, Kae. I’m just having trouble picturing someone as sweet and beautiful as you sneaking out to play with drylanders.”

There it was again. She felt a pulse flow through her body as his fingers pressed against hers, almost like an electrical charge. She’d felt it before, outside in the garden when he’d taken her hand so she could lead him to the kitchens. It was almost like the tingling sensations she felt when she and Shea kissed, that lightening shock that coursed through her body, head to tail, and made her want more.

Xander’s touch was similar, but different. What passed between them felt familiar and intimate, like a warm Caribbean current flowing through her blood, heating her from the inside. But how? Why? She’d only just met him. She couldn’t have feelings for him.

Besides, she reminded herself sternly as she glanced at her new bracelet, she loved Shea. Just the thought of him made her stomach tighten into delicious knots of anticipation. All this despite the fact that he had awful taste in human friends.

“You’re frowning again,” Xander teased. Without letting go of her, he used his free hand to tuck a stray curl behind her ear, his fingers lingering to twirl themselves in her hair. “You have the most remarkable curls,” he said, his dark, penetrating eyes focused on hers. “It looks like a tangled mess of seaweed, but feels like the softest anemone tentacles.”

Kae felt a tremor of discomfort as his fingers pulled through her hair, followed by another pulse of warm feelings. Why was she drawn to him, when she knew her heart belonged only to Shea? Forcing herself to ignore the sudden attraction she felt, Kae pulled her hand away from his and snapped, “You’re the one with the seaweed for hair, Xander. And algae on your jaw, even if you claim it’s a beard!”

His eyes widened before he threw back his head to laugh out loud. “My, but you’re a feisty mermaid!”

“Don’t forget, anemone tentacles can be poisonous,” she said, softening her words with a mischievous grin. “Best be careful so you don’t get stung.”

Suddenly, Marietta was looming over their table. “What’s this talk of poison in my kitchen? I’ll have none of it, especially so soon after the unfortunate incidents of Solstice. There is no poison in my food now or ever, and I won’t have you accusing me of such.” Her right hand was planted firmly on her generous hip, while her butcher knife dangled menacingly from her left.

Kae held up both hands in protest. “My friend Xander and I spoke in jest, Marietta. He compared my hair to anemone tentacles!”

The older mermaid narrowed her gaze, lowering her bushy eyebrows until her eyes seemed to be mere slits. “Jest or no, there will be no more talk of poison. Now, finish your meal and be gone with you both.” She whirled around and swam off in a flurry of bubbles.

Xander leaned forward across the table, lowering his voice. “Is it just me, or is she a little oversensitive about the whole
poisoned food
thing?” He waggled his eyebrows in an attempt at imitating Marietta’s threatening stare and Kae had all she could do to stifle her giggles. “Come now,” he said, smiling as he rose from the carved rock bench. “Why don’t you show me some more of that wonderful garden outside?”

He held out his hand and she took it, feeling again that pulse of warmth flow between them as they swam out of the kitchens and back toward the courtyard and gardens. This time the feelings didn’t disconcert her, as she’d already decided she could trust Xander. Maybe not as completely as she trusted Shea, although her feelings for Shea were as complicated as their situation.

Shea was, after all, the heir to the throne while she was a mere servant. And she wasn’t going to be able to see him again until September, when they both arrived at University for their first semester in Atlantis. She wondered if Xander would be returning to Atlantis in the fall…