Magical Mechanications (14 page)

My breath caught, as I observed a long slide at the rear and knew immediately what they were for. Depth charges were only aimed at the merfolk. They would kill our people and destroy our cities.

This sight somehow made me sick of the Above world, and I was about to turn tail to return to my father’s kingdom—but then my eye was caught by movement up on deck.

A young man stepped out from one of the cabins, with a pistol in one hand, and a spyglass in the other. He had long dark hair, and was dressed in the uniform of Above folk that my sisters had told me about. Most of all, he had legs. My eyes were riveted to those amazing appendages, and how they worked in tandem as he strode to the railing of the ship. I slid in closer to the hull so he might not see me, but I could observe him.

That was when one of the ships moving into the harbour opened its gun ports and began to fire. I had observed it, but hadn’t been able to tell it was any different from the ships already at anchor.

I ducked instinctively into the water, flicking my tail to take me deeper. The pressure of the explosion above me ran all along my body. Red light burned my eyes as debris began to impact on the water and slowly tumble towards me. The ship was now a tilting wreck entering my world.

I felt my heart leap into my throat, but it was moving in slow motion, and I was much faster beneath than above. I flicked, dived, ducked, and got out of the way. So many strange objects were falling, but there was one I recognised; a human shape in a dark.

I didn’t even notice that I was moving, until I had him in my arms. He was heavy, but I was strong. My tail flexed and bent, as I angled us towards the surface but some way from the destruction at the port.

We broke from the water abruptly, and the light of the burning ship was hard on my face as I swam him away from the danger. I didn’t know how hurt he was, and how much water he had swallowed. I had no idea just how much water one of his kind could take down and survive.

His head was draped against my shoulder, and I wrapped one hand against his cheek to hold him there. It was an awkward swim, but eventually together we flopped onto the soft sand of the far beach. I glanced up the cliff a little and saw a low structure there, but I wasn’t sure if I should call for help from there. Would they even be able to understand me?

As we rocked back and forward in the surf with the burning ships lighting up the sky, I turned him over. His eyes were closed, and his dark hair was plastered to his skin like seaweed. I leaned in close to him, and laid my head on his chest. For a moment I thought there was no sound there, but then very faintly I heard it—the thump thump of a human heart.

He was beautiful. I realised that as soon as I raised my head. It was the kind of beauty I had not ever seen in my father’s kingdom. Despite it being rather rude, I couldn’t help but stare at his legs. It took me awhile to notice that his eyes were open, and he was staring at me.

They were a dark blue—even in this light I could tell that. They were unfocused, darting around my face uncertainly. “You…you saved me…” he muttered, his voice low and delicious. His eyes darted back and forward before his eyelids fluttered close.

I panicked for an instant, but his heart still beat in his chest. I smoothed his hair back from his forehead, and wondered at what his life must be like; birds flying overhead, air in his chest rather than water, and legs to propel him. The idea of that lodged in my head, like a sharp, beautiful piece of coral.

That was the exact moment that I heard the women’s voices. Reflexively, I jerked back in the water as several cloaked figures came running along a path leading down from the cliffs. However, my fingers trailed reluctantly along the man’s arms. I didn’t want to let go—but there was nothing else to be done.

“Prince Roan,” they called, but I was not there to see their arrival. By the time they had reached the beach, I had already wriggled my tail, and slid back into the embrace of Mother Ocean.

I didn’t want to see any more of the Above world. I swam back to my father’s kingdom with a sharp sensation in my chest that I could not name. My sisters, who had been waiting for me below the waves, fell in behind me as I wordlessly passed them heading deeper. I knew what they were thinking; I was disappointed or scared by what I had seen. They loved me—but they didn’t really know me. I barely knew myself at that moment.

After the shock had worn off, and as I reached King Triton’s kingdom once more, what I was contemplating was something I could not share with them. I was thinking about what stood between me and seeing the man I’d rescued again. For the next few days I said very little, but everyone—even my grandmother—left me alone to sort out my feelings. They thought I was stunned by the horror of what I had seen. I was only seeing the beauty replayed over and over again in my head.

I knew what I needed to do on the very first day, but it took me much longer to work out how I was going to achieve it.

My grandmother and father I spotted talking to each other quietly in the corners of the palace—watching me as covertly as they could. When they did that I smiled and slapped on the appearance of happiness. It wouldn’t do to have them put guards on me—not when I had a person to visit. A person I knew they would most definitely forbid me from going to.

My mother had been a syrienne and like most of that kind beautiful and fierce. She had however wanted more than her kin could provide. That secretive tribe lived in the shadowy trenches from where monsters came, but they were also masters of making and creation. They would have the answers I sought, but I knew of only one syrienne who would not kill me on sight; my maternal grandmother—the one that was called the Sea Witch.

I told no one about my plan, because to do so would result in Father locking me up immediately. Instead, I waited until the darkest moonless night and stole away from my room like a thief. However, I took nothing with me: no gold, and no pearls. I was throwing myself on the mercy of the witch, and the frail hope that blood meant something to her. She had no interest in finery or fripperies from what I had heard.

Once beyond the walls of the palace, my tail powered me deeper and deeper, until sight was lost to me, and only my plaintive calls allowed me to keep following the trench.

Until, out of the darkness I saw a faint golden gleam and felt the hint of warmth on my skin. The Sea Witch’s fortress was perched like a malevolent barnacle on the final ledge of the cliff, before the long uninterrupted plunge down. I could feel rather than see it; like a faint tremble on my scales.

The door to the fortress was a hatch, and my fingers told me immediately this was neither coral nor rock. Somehow it was made of all metal. Smelting ore beneath the ocean was a difficult undertaking, and this much of it was more than my father could have dreamed of having.

I turned the hatchway, flinching slightly as it ground open with a low groan. It didn’t matter. I had no doubt that the Sea Witch, my darling grandmother, had known I was approaching long before I even touched her door.

Her glowing eyes were already fixed steadily on the entrance by the time I levered it open. No one knew her name—even I didn’t, and I was related to her. She was simply the Sea Witch and feared as such. I hovered there on the threshold and took her in with a pounding heart.

Her face was as white as all creatures of the deepest dark with eyes that burned yellow, while her tail was the kind of black that disappeared into the shadows. However, it was her curved and pointed teeth that were revealed in a terrifying smile that I could not keep my eyes from. Her voice came at me like an unexpected harpoon. “Granddaughter, I have been expecting you for days.”

I managed to repress a shiver, since I did not want to let her know how her use of the word terrified me. Suddenly my father’s mother seemed as welcoming as gentle seaweed. How this creature had produced a daughter lovely and kind enough to entrance my father was a mystery—one that I was not going to ask about.

I cleared my throat, painfully aware of how my gills were trembling more than usual against my skin. “I have come to ask a boon—”

“Do not waste my time using your father’s words.” Her eyes narrowed on me. “Tell me what you really want and quickly!”

“I want a man of the surface world,” I blurted out, completely caught unawares by my own boldness. Had she somehow forced those words out of me, from my own inner depths?

My other grandmother would have fainted, but this one merely inclined her head. “Still a better choice than your mother made.”

I managed to cram back a defence of my father, and watched as she swam up towards the ceiling of her strange iron home. It took me a moment to realize that she had a surface! Through the geometry of the building, she had managed to trap a portion of air in the top section. I followed her instinctively.

We surfaced together, and I heard a faint thumping noise, which momentarily distracted me from the curve of her workbench covered with all sorts of delights.

“A small pump keeps the air from going stale,” the Sea Witch commented, before gesturing me over to a section of her table.

Immediately nothing else mattered to me. My heart was racing as I looked at a pair of gleaming brass legs that lay there. I ran my eyes over the exquisite workmanship in them. The shape was made with hundreds, if not thousands of overlapping scales, that nonetheless formed the shape of the thing I desired most. I jerked my head to the right and peered down. Yes, indeed they were hollow in the middle, and thus meant to be worn.

When I stared up at the Sea Witch, I almost couldn’t choke out the words. “Are…are they for me?”

Her smile was, I thought, meant to be kind. “I felt it in the deep currents that my blood was looking beyond the water for its purpose. I have been working on these legs for many moons now, but I never imagined they would be for you in particular…just for one of my daughter’s girl.”

I didn’t even think why she would have made me such a thing. Instead, I darted forward, wrapping my fingers around them, but her freezing cold hand pulled me back by my shoulder. I sucked in a huge breath, as my syrienne grandmother grasped me under the chin and examined me. She turned my head from side to side, as if deciding how much of her own self was in me. It was hard to tell exactly what she thought because not once piece of her expression changed.

She produced a vial of black liquid that was contained in a clear whelk shell, and sealed with some kind of wax. “Before you put on the legs you must drink this.” When I made to reach for it, she snatched it back and waggled her finger. “You must understand several things, granddaughter. The clockwork legs will split your tail within their workings, so the pain will be constant and excruciating.”

I nodded but didn’t say anything. I did not fear pain, but I did fear days of never ending sameness and just being another daughter of Triton.

“And then there is the potion,” she said softly. “It will allow your tail to transform, and give you lungs instead of gills, but it will also steal your voice, forever.”

By the way she paused, I knew she was ready for me to turn tail and swim away. Instead, I looked her full in the eyes when I spoke. “What is the point of being able to sing, if there is no one who understands me to hear?”

A flicker of something that might have been sorrow passed over her face. “Sacrifices must be made to get what you want. The question is, do you have the will required?”

I stared down at my hands for a moment, at the webbing between my fingers, and thought of what I would be giving up. My family would still be my family, but it would be different, and I would never be able to visit my father’s kingdom again. Once I accepted that, I thought on deeper things; how I had never felt right at home like my sisters did. I’d always fought the feeling that I wasn’t in the right place. If I turned away now I would be condemning myself to a lifetime of that, while Above there was the man with the beautiful eyes. And hope.

On a surge of fear, I grabbed once more for the legs, ready to pull them into the water and do the thing right there. The Sea Witch stopped me again, but this time a little more gently. “Not here,” she said, “the legs cannot survive in water. I will wrap them for you and you must take them Above.” She placed her hands on the knee joint, and with a flick of her fingers released a pair of brass keys that were imbedded there. “One important thing; you must make sure to keep them wound, and they will give you the freedom of the Above.”

As she turned to wrap the legs, I stopped her by laying one hand on hers. “Why did you really do this?” I asked, determined that at least I should know my feared grandmother’s reasoning for making such a thing.

The Sea Witch had her back to me, her short, pale hair plastered to her skull, the dripping of water down her back was so strange, but somehow I kept my eyes fixed on it. “I did not know they would be for you, but I have had the idea for them for years. If your father is ever to keep the Underwave kingdom safe, then we may need soldiers that can go Above.”

It was a pretty—if disturbing story—and I wasn’t sure if I quite believed it. The syriennes and the Sea Witch in particular had never shown much interest in protecting our world. Instead I imagined conquest might be her real reasoning.

It should have stopped me, but I considered that if I took the prototype, it might stop her. That and I could warn my prince if it looked like my suspicions might be justified.