Fish Out of Water (17 page)

“So, lovely dance, Carragheen,” Lecanora started, clearing her throat.

Carragheen, Carragheen. The name was stirring some long-buried memory inside me. My poor brain, so overworked from the high drama of the last couple of days, was whirring and creaking into action. The name meant something to me.

“Rania, it seems you’ve already met Kraken’s son.”

Mother of Aegir, surely not.

I suddenly grabbed hold of the slippery edge of a memory. Carragheen. Son of Kraken and Shighsa. It pained me to admit it, but I could now see the resemblance to his overbearing father. The blonde hair so dark, almost red-gold. His smile with that carnivorous edge. More vampire than mermaid. He was like bad news you can’t help but want to read anyway.

This was some hot son-of-a-crazy-Priest.

Carragheen was looking like he wished Lecanora hadn’t mentioned his lineage.

“Ah, Lecanora,” he shook his head, dismissing her. “I am Shighsa’s son too.”

I was fascinated. Carragheen was trying to be polite but I could tell it was not his usual thing. He was holding my eyes like he was holding my hand. Intimate, private. Why was he here? He was out of place. A dark force among creatures of light. His discomfort crackled in front of us like an electrical storm at sea. He made Doug look as reliable as the boy next door.

I was surprised by both the tremor of guilt I feel at the thought of Doug, and by the fact that I suddenly couldn’t remember for the life of me why I had swum away from this guy so fast seven miles up. Because right now he might have looked badder than bad but he also looked good enough to eat.

“Princess, I understand I owe you a debt of gratitude. And I owe Rania some answers. I was wondering whether the two of you would both like to come by my pool later.”

I was about to fall all over myself to say
hell yes
and
what debt?
when Lecanora spoke first and saved me from breaking all the rules of acting too keen.

“Thank you, Carragheen, very kind. But we have some things to do.”

Before I could squeak a protest, something happened that made it all redundant.

The sacred place filled with blood.

At least, the water was suddenly a deep crimson. Like someone threw a switch to turn on some macabre night light. Within seconds, The Eye echoed with screams of scores of freaked-out members of the ocean tribes. And one word pressed into my head from all their brains.

Bloodtide
.

I remembered Mom’s words, about how Manos made the sea run red with Aegir’s blood.

Before the seekers could give instructions, the stampede was on. Hundreds of bodies swimming, spinning, sliding, pirouetting. All upwards, to leave The Eye as quickly as possible.

The fear was infectious. To creatures of the deep, the sight of blood in the water is the universal call-sign of the predator. Like the smell of burning flesh to humans on the land.

But Carragheen’s face barely moved. He simply grabbed one hand of mine and one of Lecanora’s.
Come. We must be far away from here
.

We didn’t argue. As he pulled us behind him like we were feather-light and kicked up towards the mouth of The Eye, I realized he was seriously strong. And fast. We were passing everyone. So I was surprised when he suddenly dropped our hands and barked a command into our brains.
Go. I’m right behind you
.

Again, we did as he said, but I couldn’t resist a peek behind, and then I saw why he had stopped. A young Leigon, with the face a cherub but the body of a small elephant, had become separated from its parents, and was swimming pitifully in circles, barking small cries of distress. Carragheen wrapped his arms around its middle and pulled it with him, murmuring as he went.

He saw me watching.
Swim
, he commanded.

Chapter Seven

Whirling And Silence

Carragheen’s Pool, Aegira

“They’re saying it was a biological event.” Carragheen turned back, throwing off the small shells which had rested at his temples as though they disgusted him. He was shirtless and a killer set of abs almost distracted me from the fact that I was so not buying it.

“All the channels?” Lecanora and Carragheen both frowned at me.

Ah, that’s right. This is Aegira. Only one channel. Eat your heart out, North Korea.

“Let me have a go.” I snatched the shells up, accidentally brushing against the hard calluses of his palms. His hands were warm, like on the surface. So strange, for a merman.

I brought the pads to my temples, where they affixed themselves like blood-seeking barnacles. I focused, deep. Mass telepathy is more personal than TV, because there’s still an element of interpretation, but the risk is small in such a homogenous population. This recording was voiced by a mermaid who looked like Martha Stewart. There was the briefest of visuals of the blood-red Eye, and the screaming, squirming life desperate to escape it. But no sound.

Pictures of chaos are one thing. But sound connects straight with the heart.

Anyway, the visual then switched to images of the rest of Aegira, the circles of golden structures looping gracefully around The Eye. It looked as tranquil and perfect as the first time I saw it, over twenty years ago, although the voice-over was telling me the images were captured just an hour ago, immediately after the incident in The Eye. No hint of crimson chaos, just the dark safety of the ocean floor, lit by the warm glow of Aegira.

I drank it in, even though I’d seen the real thing just moments before, as we swam over.

Aegira the Beautiful.

The city looked like something that should grace the roof of the Sistine Chapel. The buildings were built with rolling grace and flourish, to mimic the waves, in honor of the billow maiden queens. There are few sharp angles. Even those buildings that soar so high they seem to strain towards the surface, like The Palace, are still rounded and feminine.

The voice was bringing home the point made by the footage.

“While the anomaly was significant within The Eye, none of the red substance infiltrated the city. Scientists undertook immediate testing and confirmed the taint was indeed blood, of unknown origin. However, they have categorically concluded that the event was simply an unhappy coincidence. It seems that a flock of dead sea creatures may have become sucked into the walls of The Eye, where they bled out. The blood entered The Eye through the recent tear.”

Martha Mermaid’s voice became a little sterner.

“Aegiran experts are of the view that both the rip and the death of the creatures was the result of ocean warming, attributable to lack of care taken by humans in recent centuries which has resulted in severe mismanagement of the delicate ecosystem of earth and sea.”

She let up a little and I could tell she was about to boss me around.

Mermaids are so predictable.

“Aegiran citizens and friends are asked to stay away from The Eye, which is officially off limits until further notice. The Queen sends her prayers and asks you to be of good cheer.”

My crapometer started to whine at me. How on earth could any scientist know all that with any certainty, so quickly? I glanced over at the Leigon child, who was napping fretfully on the soft weed of Carragheen’s floor. “You know, you guys could really use a little freedom of the press.”

Carragheen laughed darkly, but Rania looked confused again.

“A sectarian press assumes different interests. In Aegira, we are all one mind.”

I raised an eyebrow at her, and pulled her far out of Carragheen’s hearing range. “Really? You sure about that? Even The Triad? Even whoever took Imogen?”

Carragheen looked at me curiously. Surely he couldn’t have heard? He looked watchful. “Did you hear what the people were saying, as we passed over?”

“Yes,” Lecanora conceded. “Manos.”

“It’s probably just people getting spooked,” I assured her. “Don’t forget Aegir threw that veil of secrecy over Aegira, so no-one who wished it harm could find it. Not even Manos.”

“That assumes, of course,” Carragheen drawled. “That no-one shows him the way.”

Interesting idea. “You think he has help?”

“I don’t believe in fairy tales.” Carragheen’s dark eyes were still hooded. “In my experience there are enough bad things in real life.” He pulled up short in front of me, standing too close, making too much eye contact, and picked up my arm, where the plasticy ugliness of my angry red scar was like some crazy bracelet. He ran his fingers over it. “I guess you know that too.”

I snatched my arm away. Normally I don’t like to be touched there but for some reason when he did it, I liked it too much. His touch was like some kind of balm.

He looked into me. “Does it hurt?”

“You know, where I come from, you offer a girl a drink before starting the foreplay.”

Carragheen found a place deep inside my head to plant a single, illicit thought:
If you think that’s foreplay, you’ve been dating the wrong fish
.

I had to fight to ensure my face didn’t reveal the deep, hot burn the comment set off somewhere below my stomach. “Okay, so yeah, it hurts. But not as much as the nightmares.”

Oh God, I am so bad at small talk.

“What do your dreams tell you of this?” He swept his arms in a wide arc.

“Fishing for compliments?” I knew he was referring to Aegira, and all that was happening, but I went for flattery because I didn’t know what to say. “Great place.”

The Princess snorted beside me. At least, it would have been a snort if she weren’t so delicate. And beautiful. And a princess.

We stood silently on the sandy floor, and for the first time since fleeing here, I took in Carragheen’s home. It was a low-roofed structure which looked as though it had been a storehouse for food in another life. It was decked out like a beautiful, mysterious reef, with seating made from enormous shells and the tangled fingers of mammoth pieces of driftwood. Huge, electronic, wave-screens cycled through pictures of all the species of the ocean, while hidden technology created an ever-renewing roof of bubbles, like a mesmerizing sky.

Every now and then one of the bubbles made it down, to settle on my nose or hair before exploding softly. The size and speed of the bubbles seemed to vary with the music. Large bubbles overlapped and popped slowly, like child’s playthings in time with the dark background mix. It was leesatra music – a kind of harp that messes with the vibrations of the water to make deep groans and sighs that sound like the love songs of sea mammals. Whale
song meets the blues. I knew I needed to get on and ask Carragheen about Dirtwater, and Blondie, now that the immediate danger of the blood in the Eye seemed to have passed.

But I was just too curious. “What is this place? Is this really where you live?” It seemed so grand for someone’s house, even in Aegira, where these things matter.

“Yes, I do. But it’s also where people come to prepare for The Pool.”

Uh oh. Sounded kinda kinky. Knew he was too good to be true. Okay, so what was it? Swinging? Weirder? Darker? I tried to be cool. “Ah, yes, you mentioned that, back at the wedding. What is it?”

He looked right into me.

Oh, Ran help me, don’t look at me like that. I don’t know you, and I sure as hell don’t trust you. Not yet. Maybe not ever. Don’t look at me like we’re accomplices.

Lecanora snorted again and looked put out. She planted words deep into my brain.
Rania, listen. Carragheen is Kraken’s shame. He is… intemperate. Some even say…
Even telepathing she lowered her voice. …
warm-blooded. He should have been a priest. It was expected. But he became a farmer. A farmer! A Gadulan boy whose perfect voice had shaken the very foundations of Aegira. The son of the High Priest. And that is just the beginning-

“Princess.” Carragheen said, slow and endlessly patient. “What are you afraid of?”

A third snort, this time accompanied by words. “It is a place to rouse people,” she hissed. “To make them stirred up, and afraid.”

“No.” His tone was sharp. “It’s neither of those things. It is simply a place to feel.”

Double uh oh. This does not sound good. This guy obviously fancies himself as some kind of sexually liberating Larry Flynt. “Okay.” Enough of the speculating and bickering. “How about some hard facts? What is the goddam Pool?”

Carragheen drew himself up, his face an inscrutable mask, and I had no idea what he was going to say. What could this Pool be, to get Lecanora so hot under the collar?

But just as he was about to explain, a rowdy press of bodies entered. I didn’t need my cop sense to tell me that what we had on our hands was a melee. I could smell the fear and anger coming from the group, comprised of twenty men and women, of several species. Aegirans, several of the higher fish species, a giant, menacing squid, and even a Treppalow.

The latter seemed to have been elected head of the lynch mob.

My fingers itched for my Glock.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?” Carragheen’s drawl was relaxed, but he moved slowly, deliberately, so that he was standing between the mob and the sleeping Leigon child.

“You need to stop what you are doing here. It is angering the Gods. This place is the reason for what happened, back there in The Eye. It is your fault.”

The Treppalow spoke slowly, as if each word was an effort. The creatures are known more for their brawn than their brains, and they only recently mastered speech. But this one was at least nine feet long and spelt trouble, from his block-like head to the end of his black tail.

Oh man. Triple uh oh. Worse than swinging, obviously.

Carragheen’s response was dry. “I didn’t think Treppalows believed in God. Unless you count the God of War.”

Not the right way to settle the horses, Carragheen. We needed that Martha Stewart babe.

In an instant, the Treppalow had slithered up to Carragheen, its speed belying its size. The creature flicked out its long, forked tongue and brought it close to Carragheen’s face. I gasped involuntarily at the proximity of the lethal poison, and Lecanora froze too.