Tempest Revealed
Authors: Tracy Deebs
Contents
For Lisa and Elizabeth
“The sea is emotion incarnate. It loves, hates, and weeps. It defies all
attempts to capture it with words and rejects all shackles. No matter
what you say about it, there is always that which you can’t.”
—Christopher Paolini
“Tempest, watch me!” Moku yelled to me from the street. Turning just in time to see my youngest brother careen down the hill on his latest obsession, I couldn’t help wincing at the fall I knew was coming.
“You couldn’t just get him a surfboard like a normal person?” I demanded of my boyfriend, Mark, who was sitting behind me on the front porch, his knees on either side of my waist and his arms loosely clasped around my shoulders.
“He already has three. Where’s the fun in that?”
I watched anxiously as Moku crashed into the neighbors’ empty garbage cans for what had to be the twentieth time in the last hour. “Oh, I don’t know. In having a sane girlfriend, maybe?”
He snuggled closer, kissed my neck. “Sanity is highly overrated.”
“Obviously.” Turning my head to give him better access, I shivered a little as his lips brushed over my collarbone before sliding back to my jawline.
At the first touch of his breath against my ear, I relaxed into him; I couldn’t help it. I hadn’t seen Mark in weeks, and it felt so good to be held by him, to feel the steady beat of his heart under my ear. It had been four months since I’d promised Mark we’d try to work out a relationship, and I’d spent much of it swimming back and forth between Coral Straits and home. In fact, this visit had begun just three days ago—I’d barely arrived home in time for Moku’s birthday party. Hence Mark’s gift of the skateboard. If I’d been here, that
never
would have happened.
He could accuse me of being overprotective as much as he wanted, but after what Tiamat the evil sea bitch had done to Moku last year in an effort to get to me, I figured I was allowed.
“You tired, baby?”
“No,” I said with a shake of my head, even though I was. It was hard not to be when I was balancing two totally different lives. And since I couldn’t give up either way of life—at least, not if I ever planned on looking myself in the mirror again—there was no end in sight. But I tried to ignore that, to concentrate on the little things, like Mark’s warm pine and coconut scent.
“You sure? We don’t have to go out tonight.”
“I want to.” It had been months since I’d seen Logan and Bach or the other guys I’d spent most of high school surfing with, more than in passing. I was looking forward to spending the night hanging with them—especially since tomorrow was the homecoming dance, and I knew Mark wanted the night to be about just the two of us.
A shiver of unease worked its way down my spine at the thought of our weekend plan. Not at spending time with Mark
and my friends, but at falling back into that whole high school thing. If I’d stayed here in La Jolla, I would be a senior now. I’d be taking the SAT, submitting college applications, and racking up tardy slips because I spent too long surfing every morning. I’d be hanging with Brianne and Mickey between classes, surfing with the guys before and after school. I’d spend evenings in my room figuring out physics and calculus and reading
Hamlet
, just like Mark was currently doing.
In other words, I’d be normal.
Instead, I was anything but. Half human, half mermaid, caught between a world I couldn’t give up and one I couldn’t turn away from, my life these days was pretty much the definition of abnormal. Even worse, it seemed to be spinning a little more out of my control with every moment that passed. Lately it seemed the only thing I could count on was the fact that I couldn’t count on anything—or anyone. At least, not once I left Mark and my family behind and swam straight out into the ocean. Straight out into a destiny I’d never wanted but couldn’t ignore. Not now, when I knew how precarious the balance in the Pacific truly was.
But just because I’d accepted my role in the biggest battle the ocean had ever seen didn’t mean things were easy for me. Especially not when I was so desperate to hang on to my human life—and, maybe even more important, my humanity.
When I was in the ocean, I didn’t miss being human all that much. Everything seemed to blur, to get hazy. My friends, my painting, my regular life. Even my conscience—my desire to do what was right—grew dimmer when I’d been away from the La Jolla shores for too long.
Something about the water, about being mermaid, dulled my feelings and my desires until I was content to stay under. Content to turn my back on the only people who loved me, just to fulfill a destiny—a prophecy—that I didn’t want to believe in but couldn’t get away from. Sure, I had my best friend Mahina and her family while I was under, but spending time with them only made me feel worse when I resurfaced. Like I was betraying my dad and brothers by caring about another family.
Only Mark helped me keep my grip on humanity—Mark and Moku. Along with my dad, and my other brother, Rio (who currently hated me), the two of them kept me grounded and reminded me that there was a whole world out there that functioned without the cutthroat rules of the sea.
And now that I was home, now that I was close enough to watch the people I loved swim and surf and skateboard, my humanity was a bittersweet ache deep inside me. One I didn’t want to escape, no matter how much power and glory and responsibility were waiting for me when I dived back into the Pacific.
“Come on, Tempest! Watch me!” Moku’s insistent voice broke through my melancholy reverie, and I dutifully turned and watched him careen down the hill yet again. It had to be the fiftieth time he’d done it since I’d picked him up at school two hours before.
Only this time, he seemed to be going a little bit faster than he previously had. He was also wobbling a bit more than I was used to.
“Mark—” I said, uneasy with what I was seeing. But my boyfriend must have already registered what was going on
because he was pulling away from me before I could get out anything more than his name.
“Moku, slow down!” Mark shouted even as he leaped off the front porch. I followed him, barreling down the walkway in my effort to get to Moku before he crashed.
We didn’t make it. Instead, my brother completely bypassed the plastic trash cans he’d been crashing into over and over again and smashed into the back of my neighbor’s blue truck instead.
He hit hard, then bounced off. I sped up, passing Mark as panic raced through me. I’d nearly lost Moku last summer when Tiamat had used him to distract me from her bid for dominion over the Pacific. That memory—and the despair and helplessness I’d felt while he lay in a coma—was never far from my mind. Even knowing that it made me less than rational to imagine something happening to my baby brother couldn’t change the way I felt.
Skidding to a stop, I threw myself onto the ground beside him. His eyes were closed, his arms and legs splayed wide where he lay motionless on the ground.
“Moku!” I screamed, grabbing on to his shoulders, preparing to shake him awake.
“Don’t!” Mark’s voice was sharp in my ear. “We don’t know how badly he’s hurt. You shouldn’t move him.”
I knew Mark was right, but not pulling Moku into my arms was one of the hardest things I’d ever done. I’d practically raised him after my mother abandoned us for the ocean, would have done anything to keep him safe, and yet now, here he was, injured while I’d been sitting by watching him ride that stupid death trap.
“Moku,” I pleaded. “Please open your eyes.”
Long seconds passed as Mark checked his pulse and tried to determine whether or not he was breathing. While Moku’s heart
was
beating, his chest hadn’t risen in way too long. Just as I was about to completely freak out—and Mark was reaching for his cell phone to dial 911—Moku’s eyes popped open. Seconds later, his hand went to his chest and he sucked air noisily into his lungs.
“He just had the wind knocked out of him,” Mark said with a grin, his relief palpable.
I barely had time to register that Moku really was okay before my brother grabbed my hand and breathlessly demanded, “Did you see me, Tempe? I’ve never gone that fast before.”
Tears of relief sprang to my eyes, and I beat them back. The last thing I needed to do was start crying like the wimp I was—Moku would never forgive me. “You were awesome,” I told him. “Terrifying, but awesome.”
Mark crouched next to him on his other side. “Does anything hurt?”
“Just my hand.” Moku held out his scraped palm, and I winced in sympathy.
“Let’s go in and fix you up,” I told him, carefully helping him to his feet. As I did, Mark tapped him on the helmet. Never had I been so relieved that I’d insisted on the protection. Moku had thrown a fit when I’d dropped it onto his head, whining that it made him look like a baby. Thank God I hadn’t given in.
Moku trailed me into the kitchen, followed closely by Mark, who looked more sheepish than I had ever seen him. I knew he
was expecting me to yell at him about the skateboard, but I just didn’t have it in me. Not when simply being my brother had put Moku in more danger than that stupid skateboard ever could. Besides, if there was one thing I’d learned after being mermaid for nearly a year, it was that things happened—no matter how closely you safeguarded against them.
When we got to the kitchen, my dad was already there, cooking dinner. It smelled great, but as I glanced in the skillet to see what he was making, it was all I could do not to groan. Fish tacos. Again. He’d made them last night too and watched, oblivious, as I’d forced down every bite.