Authors: Tracy Deebs
“What’s going on?” my dad hissed. “What are you doing?”
“I don’t know.” I scanned the ocean in front of me, then turned—bit by bit—so that I could check out the rest of the nearby water as well. I felt itchy, unable to settle down as restless energy bounced around inside my body. Part of me wanted to send some of it out into the water, just to see what would happen, but my trainer in Coral Straits had spent too many hours pestering me about hanging back, about not striking first, for me to do something so stupid.
His advice ran through my head as I circled my father, moving him—slow inch by slow inch—closer to shore. I might have been paranoid, might have been spending precious minutes preparing for an attack that wasn’t going to come when I could have used those minutes to haul my father to safety. To shore. But I didn’t think so. Every instinct told me that if I dropped my guard, if I started swimming full-out toward shore, that we’d be done in.
“Tell me what to look for,” my dad said in a whisper that sounded exceptionally pissed off. But not at me.
I glanced behind me, saw that he’d slipped off the board and had put his back against mine so that we could cover more area. His board, dark now, was still clutched in his hand, but out in front of him like a shield. Or a weapon.
My blood ran cold at the thought. “Dad, if something happens, let me—”
I never got the chance to finish the sentence. Instead, a giant octopus tentacle wrapped around my waist and lifted me twenty feet into the air before slamming me back down toward the water at a speed guaranteed to knock me unconscious.
I hit the water hard, and though I wasn’t knocked out as I’d originally feared, I was definitely knocked stupid for long, inexorable moments. My ears were ringing, and the stars I was suddenly seeing had nothing to do with the night sky above us. I could hear my father screaming my name but I couldn’t answer him—it was like my brain had short-circuited and any sound I tried to make came out like gibberish.
Finally I managed, “I’m okay!” but before I could say any more, the damn octopus lifted me into the air again. Then slammed me down. Then lifted me up and slammed me down. Up, down. Up, down. Again and again it went.
Each time I tried to brace myself for impact and each time I lost a little more of my faculties, until I could basically only drool on myself and whimper. So much for me defending my father. At the moment it felt more like I was defending the stupid octopus. I certainly wasn’t causing it any damage.
In a rare moment of clarity, I found myself wondering how many damn monsters Tiamat had at her beck and call. It seemed
like every time I defeated one, five more rose up to take its place. I suddenly had a lot more sympathy for Odysseus. All he’d wanted was to go home, while creatures bent on his destruction kept getting in his way. No wonder he was always in a foul mood.
Deciding enough was enough, I braced my hands on the octopus’s tentacle and sent every ounce of power I could straight into it. I knew it worked because I could feel the vibrations from the electricity as it flowed through the slimy flesh. And because it screamed. And dropped me.
When I hit the water this time—without the force of a hundred-pound tentacle behind me—it was much softer than what I’d experienced before. Immediately, I dove deep, trying to see just what it was I was dealing with. It was difficult because of the darkness, but at least the algae was all lit up—pissed at being disturbed, no doubt—and I could get a somewhat decent look at the monster. And what I saw scared the crap out of me.
The thing was huge, which I’d already known because of the size of its tentacle, but seeing it up close was still a shock to me. If I’d thought the Lusca was bad, this thing was like the Lusca’s big brother on steroids, speed, and PCP all at the same time.
Shaped like a giant octopus, it had eight tentacles—all of which were busy whirring around its body trying to grab on to me. I dodged between two, then dove deeper to avoid a third. As I went under, I realized that the thing also had long, powerful legs—legs that it was using to propel itself over to my father, who had somehow managed to scoot a few yards away in all the confusion.
Or maybe it was the sea monster from hell and me who had moved—at this point I didn’t know and I didn’t care. All that mattered was finding a way to stop him before he got to my dad. My bones were stronger, less breakable than the average human, thanks to my mermaid blood, but my father had no such defense. If this monster grabbed him and slammed him down the way he’d done to me, it would be game over.
I didn’t make it in time.
In front of my horrified eyes, the sea creature clutched my dad in one of its disgusting tentacles, spun him upside down, and started to squeeze. I sent a pulse of energy through the water at the monster, enough to disturb it but not so much that it would be distracted into dropping my father headfirst into the water.
I swam closer, trying to formulate a plan to get my father away from the thing. But as another tentacle came up, wrapping itself around his neck while the first remained wrapped around his waist, terror consumed me. I couldn’t plan, couldn’t think, could barely breathe as I watched history about to repeat itself in front of me.
This moment, though in a different place, different time, was a replica of the moment that still haunted my thoughts and nightmares. Nearly one year ago, I’d been in the same spot—looking up as the Lusca threatened to kill my mother. I’d lost that fight, had made a wrong decision that had cost my mother her life. Here, now, I had no such decision to make. There was no choice between my dad and the boy I loved, no attempt at second-guessing what this monster would do. Unless I found a way to stop him, he was going to rip my father in half. And I
was so shell-shocked, so terrified, that I was just staring up at him, waiting for it to happen.
The thought snapped me out of my horrified lethargy, had me swimming toward my dad and the sea monster. As I got closer, I lashed out with the strongest surge of energy I could manage. It turned the very waves around us into weapons that struck the creature like bludgeons, one after the other.
It roared, screamed, and I knew I had hurt it. Now was the time to follow up with a blast of electricity that would set its every nerve ending on fire, but I couldn’t do it. Not while he was holding my father. The last thing I wanted was to electrocute him when I was doing my best to save him.
So instead of lighting the thing up, I sent another blast of power straight at it. This one was strong enough to knock the creature off balance, and it almost went down. I pulled up my hands, started to send one more shock of power its way, when I saw my father twist into an impossible position, his torso turned in one direction while his legs went in the other.
I started to scream, thinking the monster was killing him, when I saw him lash out toward its face. Something silver glinted in my father’s hand—the knife he always carried with him in case he grew tangled in his surfing line—as he brought it down, straight into the creature’s eye.
Blood spurted everywhere, and the thing bellowed in pain as it tried to tear my father away from its face. But he was hanging on, and every twist and turn of the tentacles that held him only caused more injury to the monster itself.
Finally, in self-defense, it dropped him, and I had the chance I’d been waiting for. I sent a blast of energy straight at the
already-wild waves, sent the water careening upward to meet my father and cushion his fall. Then, seconds later, I sent every volt of electricity I could gather straight into the screaming, thrashing monster.
It didn’t stand a chance. Already half-blind from the knife my father had plunged into its eye, the monster was lit up by the electricity and it burst into flames. With a roar of rage and pain, it ducked beneath the surface in an effort to put out the flames.
I didn’t stick around to see what would happen to it. The second it disappeared beneath the surface, I dove for my father—who was still covered in the monster’s sticky blood—and made a beeline for the shore.
As I swam hell-for-leather toward land, I was terrified that the creature would somehow find a way to pursue us. Or worse, that it was just the opening act and Tiamat was, even now, closing in for the kill.
I kept looking behind us, trying to see if we were being pursued, until my dad—who was also pumping his arms and legs in an effort to help us go faster—shouted, “Don’t worry about what’s behind us. Just get to shallow water.”
I knew he was right, but it was easier said than done when every stroke had me imagining Tiamat or Sabyn right on my tail. But finally we made it to shore, where we collapsed on the sand.
We lay there for long minutes, not speaking, not thinking, not doing anything but taking in huge gulps of air. Finally, as the multicolored fingers of dawn started streaking their way across the sky, my father asked, “What the hell was that? Tiamat?”
I shook my head until I realized he was still looking up at the sky and couldn’t see me. “Not Tiamat,” I told him. “But definitely one of her minions.”
“If that was a minion,” he said, pushing himself into a sitting position, “then I definitely don’t want to see her.”
“She’s disgusting. She drinks mermaid blood. It’s what keeps her young and beautiful and powerful. It’s why …” I trailed off, because some things a father didn’t need to know.
But my dad was nobody’s dummy. “It’s why she wants you. Because you have your own power and she wants to take it.”
“Yes. She thinks my blood will make her immortal.”
“Will it?”
“I have no idea. But I know things are getting worse, that she’s rallied all kinds of creatures to help her and that we’re gearing up for the biggest, most deadly war the Pacific has ever seen.”
As soon as the truth was out, I wanted to take it back. In most things, I’ve made it a policy not to lie to my dad because that’s been the policy he’s followed with me. No matter how painful, he’s told me the truth and I’ve always appreciated it.
But this, this was different. I’d just admitted to him that I was throwing myself into a war that I’m sure he felt I was ill equipped for. Hell, I was the first to admit that I was terrified, ill equipped, and unprepared for it. But it was coming all the same—tonight’s events paid proof to that—so I had better get ready. Too bad I wasn’t sure exactly how to do that.
My dad didn’t say anything for a while, just stared up at the rose-and red-streaked sky above us. I had just about given up on him responding when he said, “That’s why you have to go back? To fight in this war?”
“Yes.” I had to be one of the
leaders
of the war, but I figured I’d been honest enough tonight. No need to rub his nose in the horror of it all.
“What if I asked you to stay?”
My stomach sank. “Dad—”
“I’ve never asked you for anything, Tempest. I’ve always told you that, mermaid or human, it was your decision. And it has been. And I’ve supported you all along—”
“I know you have—”
He held up a hand. “Let me finish.” He looked out at the ocean that he had loved his entire life, and I could see the tension in him. I could see the fear, new and all-encompassing. “After what I saw out there tonight, after what I know is waiting for you … I don’t want you to go.”
“I have to.” The words felt like broken glass scratching against my throat.
“No, you don’t. It’s not your fight!”
“It is! It was Mom’s fight and now it’s mine.”
“Why? Just give me one good reason why you have to go out there.”
“Because people will die if I don’t.”
He shook his head. “People will die anyway.
You
may die.”
“I know. But people have
already
died. Thousands of them. I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t at least try to end this thing.”
“Even if it kills you?”
It was my turn to look away, my turn to gaze out over the water that I both craved and despised. “Yes. Even if I have to die. If I somehow manage to stop Tiamat, then it will be worth it.”
My dad grabbed my shoulders, shook me. He was weaker than usual, thanks to his near-drowning experience, but he still made an impact. “To whom? To whom will it be worth it? Not me. Not Moku or Rio or Mark or even Kona, I bet. I saw him when he was here, saw how he looked at you. He can’t want you to sacrifice yourself any more than I do.”
My heart collapsed in my chest, as much from the torment on his face as from the painful truth in his words. “Daddy, please. Don’t do this.” Tears leaked down my face, but I dashed them away as quickly as they fell.
He saw them anyway and pulled me into a huge hug. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, baby. I had no right to ask that of you.”
But he did. Of course he did. I knew how much my mother’s leaving had devastated him and Rio, knew what a huge impact it had had on our family. It was one of the main reasons I’d had such a hard time committing to being one hundred percent mermaid, one hundred percent of the time. What would happen to my family if I did disappear just like Mom had? What if I died out there in the middle of the ocean and they never knew about it? What if Moku spent days, months, years waiting for me to come back, as I’d waited for my mother, only to realize that it was never going to happen?
All my fear, all my guilt, all my anger welled up inside of me—along with a million other emotions that weren’t as easy to identify—and I told him, “If there were any other way, don’t you think I would take it? I never wanted to be mermaid, never wanted any of this. But there’s no one else, and whining about how being mermaid interfered with my ‘plans’ isn’t going to work very well after Tiamat destroys everyone I’ve ever cared
about. I would stay if I could, Daddy, but I can’t. Not when there’s a chance I can help.”
“Why you? Why not somebody else?”
“This isn’t an either-or situation. Why not me and anyone else who can help? You saw that thing. That’s just a little bit of what Kona and I and the rest of the Pacific are up against.”
My dad opened his mouth, looked like he wanted to argue, but something over my shoulder had the words freezing on his lips. I turned, half expecting another one of Tiamat’s monsters to be on the attack, but all I saw was the beginning of the dawn patrol at the end of the street. I was about to ask my dad what had him so spooked, but then it hit me. Who knew if that thing was still lurking around out there? Or if something worse was—I thought of the hammerhead that had come straight at me.