Lord of the Deep (26 page)

Risa was sleeping in nearly the same position as she had been when he left her, curled on her side, her beautiful raven-colored hair fanned out on the eiderdown bolster like a lacy blue-black halo. He wouldn’t disturb her, though he couldn’t resist stroking a lock of her hair. She didn’t stir, and after a moment, he moved away and went to the teakwood chest, only to pull up short. The hasp on the latch was standing straight up. His heart tumbled in his breast. Where was the padlock?

One small rush candle lit the room. It flickered as he threw open the chest and groped inside. But his hands closed only on thin air. The chest was empty. Again and again in denial, he battered the insides of the chest in a frantic attempt to make the sealskin materialize. The racket he was making should have woken Risa, but she remained as she lay, asleep, unaware.

Vega reached her in two ragged strides, knelt beside her and shook her gently at first. When there was no response, he shook her harder, but still she did not wake.

“Risa!” he shouted, lifting her into his arms. “
Risa!
What has happened here? Who was in this chamber?”

There came no reply; she lay as limp in his arms as a rag poppet—so limp that he felt for the pulse at the base of her throat fearing her dead, but she was not. Warm breath still puffed from her nostrils, and her perfect round breasts still rose and fell, but not normally. Her breathing grew rapid and shallow. It was almost as if she were panting.

Rolling back her eyelids one at a time, he saw the mindless stare of one drugged or under a spell. Blood rushed to his scalp like a hundred stinging fingers. Blinding white pinpoints of light starred his always-impeccable vision. He held the young selkie’s sagging head to his breast and groaned. She was alive but dead to the world around them, and he laid her back against the bolster, tucked the quilt of woven sea grass about her nakedness, and ran back through his apartments to the sitting room, where he’d left Simeon.

There was only one explanation—only one who could have stolen the sealskin. The Waterwitch! He remembered her cryptic words when he took that other sealskin from her. Her augur on that occasion slithered across his mind like a stinging viper:
Keep it!
she had said.
I
will
get another, and you will rue the day you ever touched that sealskin, bastard of the sea! You mark my words!

Vega swayed as if he’d been struck, remembering. It nearly cost him his balance as he parted the aquatic vine curtain and burst into his sitting room only to pull up short. The room was empty. Simeon was gone.

V
ega paced the floor of his sitting room like a madman, raking his hair back from a sweaty brow. What was the protocol for this? There was no way of knowing. It had never happened before to his knowledge. When a selkie’s skin was taken, it was usually a mortal female who stole it, keeping him on land to do her bidding until the skin was returned to him by hook or by crook; it didn’t matter how. As soon as it was in his possession again, he would return to the deep, leaving all that occurred on land behind without a backward glance—even though he may have fathered children—even though he may have seemed content, even happy, on land with his mortal mate. That was the way of it: whoever steals a selkie’s sealskin commands him as long as she possesses it—even to the very thoughts he thinks—even to the very breath he breathes. He is a slave to his captor—a mindless, witless, willing slave to her every whim.

That Simeon was gone did not bode well, but where had he gone? Where was the old hag keeping him—on land or beneath the waves? He could not pull the answers out of the air. What was to be done about Risa? Should he tell Meg? His mind was racing. It felt ready to burst. Frantically, he hummed the mantra that should bring Pio, but he had no faith in it. The loyal summoner had gone missing, and unless he was very much mistaken, Pio could not answer. What he needed to petition the gods for now was that Pio was still alive, for Vega knew the swordfish would defend his lord and master with his dying breath.

There was nothing to be done about Risa and Meg then, not until he knew for certain what they were facing. He decided to let them stay as they lay. He summoned retainers to watch after the palace and plunged headlong into the sea, swimming straight for the Waterwitch’s cave.

Simeon had heard about the Waterwitch’s cages. He’d heard the horror tales of them at his mother’s knee, but he’d never seen them, much less ever expected to be held captive in one. He’d never gone past the sitting room and sanctuary in her cave…until now. This cubicle lay beyond the sanctuary, a darkened recess, long and winding, where many cages stood along the ledge and in the water of another subterranean pool that ran the length of it. Some were empty. Others contained the parched bones of men long dead. And then there were the ones in the water. Pio was contained in one of those close to the surface within sight. He should have known the faithful summoner had met with foul play not to have been at his beck and call. Simeon’s heart went out to the creature. He could hear the frantic hum of Vega’s mantra calling the swordfish. Poor Pio had scraped off scales and dented his sword on the bars of his cage, desperately trying to answer that call. Simeon tried with all his might to calm the creature, but to no avail. No longer in possession of his sealskin, he hadn’t the authority to be heard below the waves. That was the worst of it. The Waterwitch had hung the sealskin on the wall in plain sight, like a tapestry—like a trophy, for that is what it was. She had stolen the sealskin of the Lord of the Deep. She had made him her slave. How had this happened?

His cage was on the dry ledge. Without his sealskin, he was like any mortal, unable to sustain himself for long periods under water. He had been divested of his powers, and his mind reeled back to the time he’d nearly drowned for lack of them. That brief episode had drained some of the color from his hair at the temples. What would this episode bring? How much would he age this time? Without his sealskin, immortality was lost to him. He would age like any mortal ages, and eventually die.

There were bars on his cage, but it wasn’t locked, at least not by conventional means—no padlocks or chains. He had no doubt the Waterwitch’s magic was at work here. As her captive, he couldn’t leave the cage, locked or not, while she possessed his sealskin. It was a fairly well appointed prison, boasting among other things, a lounge and a few other pieces of furniture. He’d been given plenty of food and drink, but no lamp or candle, though a rush torch in its wall bracket outside cast enough light to see by. The Waterwitch had simply shut him inside, naked, and left him.

His heart went out to poor Pio. If ever a fish could be frantic, this fish was frantic now. Vega’s mantra reverberated off the rock and coral walls, resonating in the water, and the swordfish swam back and forth and in circles just below the surface, crashing headlong and sideways into the bars in a desperate attempt to answer the call. Simeon tried to reach the summoner with his mind, but Pio either couldn’t or wouldn’t listen. How was it Simeon could hear the mantra and not be able to answer it? It was unbearable.

Time passed. Simeon had no inkling how much had slipped by before the aquatic vine curtain at the threshold trembled then parted as Elna, the Waterwitch, entered. Simeon never knew how she would present herself. This time, she was in her sultry guise, voluptuous and seductive, her perfect body naked beneath a robe so sheer it seemed no denser than the air. Open in the front, it parted as she sauntered close, giving him a provocative glimpse of her perfect, round breasts and V-shaped mound, the only parts of her anatomy, except her face, devoid of shimmering green scales. Simeon wasn’t fooled. He’d seen her true incarnation—the hideous, bearded, whiskered fish-headed, scaled anatomy too grotesque to look upon. All else was sorceress glamour.

“Well, well, Lord of the Deep,” she said, entering the cage. “You have your brother Vega to thank for this…incarceration.”

“That you have taken my sealskin is no negligence of Vega’s,” Simeon said. “There is no fault in him.”

“Oh, but I am not speaking about lifting it from that chest in his rooms. Your brother stole a sealskin of mine and destroyed it. I’ve taken yours in exchange.”

“What sealskin? You are no selkie. What good is such a skin to you?”

“Ah, but my magic gives me the same properties it gives to you, my prince—length of days.”

Simeon wished his mind were clearer. He had lost many of his powers when he lost the skin. He had to fight more loss now with every breath. What was she saying…that she had the magic to reap the benefits of immortality from a selkie sealskin? If that were so, he was lost. Without his sealskin, he had no powers to match hers…except his wits, and he was leaning heavily upon those already.

“So…you have done this before,” he said.

“And will do again.”

Simeon glanced at his sealskin displayed on the wall. It was so near, and yet it may as well have been fathoms away. There was no way he could reach it. It was torture.

The Waterwitch smiled. It did not reflect in her beady fish eyes. “You’d like to, wouldn’t you?” she said. “Even if I let you out, you could not. I have cast an aura about it, just as I have about this chamber. You are mine, Simeon, Lord of the Deep.”

“Where is my eel skin suit?”

“What, a selkie modest in his nudity? I have never heard of it. You selkies go about naked more than you do clothed…Interesting.”

Selkies had no modesty when it came to their nakedness. Simeon was more at home naked than he was in his eel skin suits but not before the Waterwitch. Her eyes all too often settled on his cock.

“It is mine,” he said, his words clipped and edged. “You have taken all else. You might have left me that.”

“In due time it will be returned to you,” she said, circling him. She carried a scepter fashioned of sea flotsam, which she tapped against her open palm. It appeared to be braided vines crowned with a small pointed shell. Stopping abreast of him, she slid the shell tip under his cock, lifting it for a closer examination. “If I give your eel skin to you now,” she drawled, “I will deny myself sight of this magnificence between your thighs. If it is this large flaccid, how large could it be aroused? Let us wake it and see, eh?” She sidled closer. “Will you, or shall I?”

Simeon slapped the scepter away from his penis.

“So! You have spirit!” she said. “Good. I like that.”

“You have me,” Simeon said. “Let the swordfish go. He is naught to you, and he’s beating himself to death caged thus.”

“Good!” she said. “That will save me the trouble. I haven’t had a good swordfish steak in eons.”

“Let him go, I say!”

The Waterwitch’s posture clenched. “I give the orders here, Lord of the Deep,” she said.

“Very well then, as a favor to me, let Pio go.”

“It has a name, your spy, like a pet, eh?”

Simeon hesitated. If he wasn’t very careful, the faithful summoner would end his days on the witch’s dinner table. “He is no spy, and he is hardly a pet,” he said, avoiding her eyes. They had the power to penetrate the soul. “He runs errands…and assists the retainers in my home. Let him go…as a gesture of goodwill. He is needed now that I am…gone.”

The Waterwitch considered it. “Perhaps,” she said. “But first let us see how well that there wakes up for me, eh? Nothing comes without a price, Lord of the Deep.”

Simeon longed to reach out and strangle the woman, but he dared not. Kill her, and he might never be released from his cage. He had no magic to cancel the aura she’d cast about her dungeon.

She sidled closer, like a rippling sidewinder, and seized his cock. Her hands were cold and clammy, and he shuddered at their touch. She was well skilled in the sexual arts, knowing just how to pump him, twisting her hand around his shaft, only lightly grazing the head enough to tantalize.

“Now you,” she said, cramming his fingers around his shaft. “Take it. Make it hard for me. Ah! Where is the selkie prowess, eh? Can you do no better than that? It barely stands on its own.”

“What?” he said cleverly. “Did you think you could take my sealskin and still have my selkie drive to service you? They are one and the same, old hag; you cannot separate them. Go rub yourself off on my sealskin. That’s about as much of a come as you’ll get from me unless I possess it.”

“You will service me—and well—if you expect to live out normal mortal days, for that is what you have been reduced to, fool! Now pump that thing. I grow weary of this banter.” She stepped closer, shedding her robe, and ran her splayed hands over his shoulders, chest, and torso. Simeon stiffened under her touch. A plan was forming. If it worked even for the moment, it would be worth the consequences it might spawn.

“Touch yourself,” he murmured, twisting out of her reach.

She purred like a kitten, undulating closer as she ran her hands along her sides, her hips, and her belly.

“Your nipples,” he said. “Touch your nipples—make them hard for me.”

She cooed like a bird as she cupped her breasts and began strumming her nipples erect. She had chosen an exquisite body to shape-shift into in her sultry incarnation. Most men would easily succumb. But Simeon was no ordinary man. Even as he was, divested of his powers, a slave to her whims with no magic at his command but that which his sealskin afforded, he was
Lord of the Deep,
Prince of the Waves, and he was smarter than she. Besides, he knew what she really was. He had seen her hideous true self. For his plan to work, he would be all right as long as she didn’t touch him…or he didn’t touch her.

The animal sounds she made touching herself were obscene. He blocked them out, shut his eyes, clenched his thighs together and concentrated on coming as he continued to stroke himself to full hardness—envisioning Meg accomplished it. Seeing her with his mind’s eye lying naked in his arms—open to his caress, her moist sex quivering in anticipation of his thrusts, brought him to the brink. All went well until he opened his eyes and saw the Waterwitch masturbating, pulling at her nipples as she swayed before him. She pressed closer, reaching for his cock, and he reeled away from the webbed fingers snapping at his shaft.

“Not yet,” he said. “I…I told you, when you took my sealskin, you took my ability to perform at my most powerful. This is your fault. That being so, you will have to be patient.”

“Why can I not touch you?” she pouted. “I could just take you and have done, you know.”

“Because this excites me,” he said. “And since I am no longer possessed of selkie prowess, I need to work at pleasuring a woman, like the mortal you have made of me. Humor me, venerable one. Touching will come later…when I’m ready. Now see what you’ve done! It goes down. Show me your quim. Open your nether lips and rub yourself for me….”

Simeon waited, watching the witch sway to her own rhythm, watching her succumb to the fever of her desire. This had to be her fault for the plan to work, if it was to buy him some time. It would work only once.

“That’s right,” he crooned. “Lie down on the lounge and feel yourself inside…Ready yourself for me….”

She flopped down on the lounge, her pendulous breasts jiggling. “Why can’t you just come in me and get it over with?” she complained.

“Because, though you are beautiful as you appear to me now, I see you as you really are, and if I touch you before I’m on the verge of coming, my cock will wither and you’ll get none. You brought this about. You will just have to live with what you have wrought if you want this cock in you. Do as I say…Excite me….”

Rage flared in her, but then she began to undulate, touching herself, spreading her legs for him. Simeon waited until her eyes began to glaze over as she approached release, until her groans became guttural and spastic. She was watching him bring himself erect again. It was time, and he shut his eyes to conjure Meg’s image, imagining it was her lips doing the tugging on his throbbing cock instead of his hand. Release hit him hard, his seed coming in spurts, wasted on the cold cell floor. His groan caught the witch’s attention. Her eyes snapped open to the blur of his spent seed. Shrieking like a banshee, she vaulted off the lounge and began pummeling his chest with both her balled fists.

Simeon seized her wrists. “This is your fault!” he seethed. “You robbed me of my powers when you took my sealskin. This is all you will get. It may take years to work out the rhythm that will allow me to come in you. You must be patient, Elna.”

Wrenching free of his grip, she lowered the flat of her palm hard across his face. “You will rot in here, Lord of the Deep,” she shrilled, her harsh voice echoing over the water in the pool. “Humiliate me, will you?” She struck him again. “You will pay for this—never doubt it!”