Vicious Deep (14 page)

My grandfather.

The Sea King.

White hair curls around his shoulders. He has a short beard, like General Grant and George Clooney, and I wonder if that is how I'll look when I'm his age. If I ever get to be a couple of thousand years old.

“You brought us something?” His turquoise eyes, framed by a strong brow and bushy gray eyebrows, look to Layla and then back at me.

“Uhh—” I bow awkwardly before taking a step forward. “No, no. She's a friend.”

Kurt stands and walks over us. “It is my fault, sire. She—”

“No, it's
my
fault—” Layla says.

“Lord Tristan, I take responsibility—” Kurt tries again.

“I say they blame it on the urchin brothers,” Marty chimes in.

To the right of my grandfather, a little green boy with webbed feet and a raw redness around his gills, like acne for merkids, blows on the golden conch strapped around his chest.

“Now,” the king says. “You, girl, state your name and purpose.”

Layla stands with her hands shaking at her sides, like the time her dad caught us drinking his imported Ecuadorian beer in their basement. My heart skips with the fear that she might not say anything. Or the completely wrong thing.

“My name is Layla Santos. I am—”

“She's my friend,” I say. Kurt presses his hand on my chest, because I'm standing. He pushes me back down to sit and shakes his head. With his face all serious and the sun hitting right in his eyes, I can almost picture what he'll look like when he gets older. Kind of like my grandfather. He whispers to me, “Let her speak.”

“Am—Tristan's best friend.”

The court breaks into cafeteria-style jeering and cackling, only broken up by another honk from the little green boy.

“And how did you get on my ship?”

“I didn't mean to. Tristan and I were fighting at school, and he was all vague and
I
can't tell you
. I thought he was in trouble. So when the—they—the urchin men?—were pulling up the ladder to set sail, I just jumped on and hid below the deck. It was busy, too many people moving around. No one noticed me.”

“You thought my grandson was in danger, so you stowed away on a ship despite your own safety?”

She nods. I'm ready for him to laugh, to tell her she's a tiny human and squish her between his giant fingers.

He bends forward and down to her so that he can get a closer look at her face. Something passes over his turquoise eyes—amusement. I recognize the way he goes from serious to smiles in seconds like my mom does. “You are a most brave girl.”

Layla smiles at him, and the effect is the same that she has on anyone: it warms him. I can see it in his face. It looks like it's going to be all right, but someone in the crowd yells, “Intruder!”

And that's followed by “Land-dweller!”

“Skin-sack!”

“Trespasser!”

“Punish her!”

I turn around, but the taunts come from everywhere at once, so I can't point out the source. I shut my eyes against a sudden ache that goes away as quickly as it came. I can recognize the hunger in their gem-colored eyes. It's the same hunger as the silver mermaid in my dreams—empty, expecting.

The king taps his lips with a finger, thinking. “My dear, do you know where you are?”

She hooks her thumbs on the loops of her shorts. “Apparently, an island with mer—maids?”

“Merfolk, if you wish,” he says shortly. “What you are seeing is not something we allow humans to walk away from. Not alive, anyway. It is how things have always been.”

“What about him?” I point at Marty.

“He is not exactly—human—as she is,” my grandfather says.

Not human? He looks human enough. Marty shrugs, standing there with his cardboard box.

“I would offer you a chance to stay and live with us, as you don't seem much of a threat. However, I do not think that is an option for you.”

She shakes her head slowly, panicked eyes searching my face. I'd like to try to explain to Mr. Santos—
Sorry, sir, but I had to leave Layla on a mystical island with my other half of the family because she just doesn't listen. Please don't take out that machete you have from your time in the Ecuadorian army.

“Very well.” He nods, and I get ready for him to trace his finger across his neck and a guard to take her away. Instead he says, “You will have to make an offering. As you were all late, you will be the last ones to offer your tithes.”

I breathe a little easier. We sit to the right of the throne on a row of boulders and watch as one by one, everyone who was on the ship with us steps up to my grandfather's throne, bows, and presents a gift on a giant shell held on either side by boys who look like miniature versions of the gladiator guards, tattoos and all. The offerings are anything from jewelry trinkets to crayons to Pillow Pets to hammers to what look like pieces of bicycles.

I lean closer to Kurt, “What happens to all that stuff?”

“It gets distributed among everyone.”

The turtle boy reaches up to the shell and drops in a toy, probably his favorite one by the pout on his face and the way he pulls away when his mom tries to put her arm around him.

It's our turn.

Marty, the human-looking non-human, hands the cardboard box to the king directly.

“Representing the Thorne Hill Betwixt Alliance, I, Marty McKay, present your Sea Lordiness with a gift.”

One of the guards moves as though to take the box, but the curiosity on my grandfather's face radiates. He holds up his palm, and the guard returns to his post.

“May I?” Marty pulls off the red-and-white MTA tape and reaches inside the box. He pulls out a long, rectangular glass box. Inside is a cluster of neon flowers that glow in whites and pinks and purples, their stems twisting on themselves, alive.

“Orchids. They grow in salt water, best in the shade,” Marty says.

The king's laughter is booming, wondrous. “This is most acceptable.” A girl, a slightly bluer version of Thalia, walks up and carries the flowers away. Marty bows and steps to the side, which leaves just me and Layla.

I do as my mother said and unzip the backpack. I empty out the front pocket onto the shell tray. It's all computer parts and mismatched pieces of earrings and bracelets that my mom keeps in one of her treasure trunks. I unzip the small front pocket and pull out a captain's eyepiece. It's made of a bronzed heavy metal. I pull it to its full length and hand it to my grandfather.

He holds it to his eye on the wrong end, and I hold back a laugh, because I don't want to be the one to tell the old man that he's holding the glass by the wrong end. But he corrects it himself and jumps a bit when he holds it right at my face. He laughs, a rumble like thunder, and claps his thigh. “Tell my daughter she still knows me well.”

Sure. Good. Glad you like it. I wonder what kind of grandfather he would have been if he were in my life. Would he have broken the fifty-year rule and come to see me sooner? Would he have dressed up for Christmas and been a wet Santa with treasures from the bottom of the sea? Would he have taught me whatever mermen teach each other? I absently run my hand along my smooth chin. He wouldn't have to teach me how to shave. But maybe how to catch a mermaid?

“And now,” he says as he looks down at Layla. “For you.”

The whispering and giggling starts again. How am I supposed to be their king when they clearly don't even like humans?

Layla digs into her pockets. She's got on these shorts that show off her golden, powerful legs. She pulls out a pack of gum. She pulls off a sliver and puts it in her mouth. She chews and chews and nothing is happening, so the laughter continues.

She blows a bubble between her lips until it gets as big as a basketball, and then it pops. Some of the court mermaids jump at the echo of the pop; they touch their coiled hair and fix their pearls as though they're appalled that she would dare frighten them so. Behind us the mermaids watching the spectacle from the fringes of the lake smile with approval, and part of my nervousness washes away.

Layla hands the pack to my grandfather, who takes it almost greedily. He does as she did, and soon all the wrappers are scattered around his feet. I think about when Layla and I had contests to see who could fit the most gum into our mouths, and our jaws would hurt from chewing so much. She smiles with her mouth full of gum now, the same way she did then.

My grandfather chews and chews. “Masticating food that never ends. Wonderful. It reminds me of eating various fruits all at once.”

Marty leans into my ear and whispers, “I haven't the heart to tell him that there are zero fruit servings in that pack of gum.”

When the king frowns, my heart sinks. “The flavor is all gone.”

The mer-court jeers. My grandfather, the Sea King, swallows his gum and sits back, pleased with himself.

It's strange, almost painfully funny, how I have never known him, and suddenly, unexplainably, out of thin air, I love him. I see my mother in him, and I wonder if I'm in there too.

He bows his head to Layla, the lines around his eyes spread with a smile. “I accept your gift. And you are welcome as a guest of Tristan Hart.”

She bows her head to him and links her fingers with mine. Everything about her is buzzing, and that makes me drunk and happy and dizzy. Since we're both alive, I guess this means
she
loves
me
.

An orchestra plays cellos and violins that look like they were made from the mast of a ship and strung with gold, and trumpets and horns made out of endlessly coiled shells.

My eyes are everywhere at once—the girls jumping off rocks, the women holding merbabies, the princesses mingling in their private but open tents. I try to picture my mother sitting by the throne under one of those canopies with her hair done up in shells and pearls, watching as purple girls play the harp for her. I can't see her there trying to be a good and proper princess. I know she'd be in the middle of the lake, dancing, mingling, being the life of the party.

We pick food off opulent trays passed around by more pretty pink girls who might actually be boys. It's hard to tell. Layla elbows me because I'm not eating enough. She says it's rude to not eat everything they give you. Like the time her dad made some Ecuadorian delicacy, which was really just guinea pig, which, no matter how you cut it up and put it on the grill, is just a big fat rat. But I ate it then, just like I'm eating whatever this delightfully green chewy stuff is now. For Layla.

Marty sucks on the inside of a clam, which makes Layla wrinkle her nose.

“Unlike other fey,” he says, “merpeople are the only ones whose food you can eat. Land fairies can keep you in their courts if you so much as lick honey from their spoons—or various other parts—”

Layla snorts, taking a sip from a fizzy pink liquid. Her eyes squint when she smiles so hard. I never noticed how long her eyelashes are, how black against the smooth honey of her eyes.

Marty hits me in the shoulder to get my attention. “Hey, Tristan, check this. What do you call a thirteen-year-old mermaid?”

I shake my head and Layla shrugs. “What?”

“A
mer
teenie!” He slaps his knee and wipes a fake tear from the corner of his eye.

Layla rolls her eyes but laughs as well. “Lame.”

For the first time, I notice Kurt's scowl is missing. I spot him over by the tents shaking hands with some older men. “Who are those guys Kurt's talking to?” I ask Thalia.

Her yellow-green eyes narrow. “Ugh, that's Elias. He's the son of Ellion, herald of the East. They're nasty folk. Nasty, nasty.”

“Tell me how you really feel,” Marty coos at her, wrapping an arm around her shoulder.

I've never heard Thalia dislike anything, so in my book they're not good news. Elias is the grizzly guy I noticed before, bordering on steroid-big with hair and eyes as black as tar. At first it looks like he's wearing silver arm plates, but when he crosses his arms over his chest, I can see it's just his scales.

I scratch at my wrists where my own scales want to come out. I let them. One by one, they surface, starting at my wrist and ending in a splatter around my elbow. My grandfather glances over at me, a smile tugging at his severe mouth.

Layla is staring at my arms. She doesn't say anything. I can feel her amazement.

Elias is joined by the girl with the white-blond hair in a conch shell. She plays with the black pearls around her neck. Her skin is the white of clean snow. The pink of her lips form a tight smile. She bows at the men he parades her in front of, and then returns to the shade of her tent.

“That's Elias's
betrothed
.” Thalia notices me staring too long. “I forget her name. She's the daughter of the North herald, but to settle her father's debt she agreed to marry Elias. It was a thing.”

“Better watch out there, little mermaid, you're starting to talk like me.”

“Look what I got,” Layla says, holding up a small silver tray of what look like pink Jell-O squares. She and Thalia toss them into their mouths like they're catching grapes. I let Layla feed one to me just to be polite. My lips catch the tip of her finger, which tastes a bit salty. Her smile is happy, lazy. I think she might even be drunk.

The pink square is slightly sweet with the texture of gummy bears. “What is it?”

“The guy who handed it to me said it was jellyfish brains,” Layla says, collapsing into a fit of laughter with Thalia.

“I thought we were friends.
Jerks
,” I add under my breath.

“That's why I couldn't resist,” she says. She and Thalia tiptoe dance along the hot ground, then finally sit at the edge of the pool with their feet dangling over the water. Thalia shifts into her tail so that it peeks out from her puffy tulle skirts, and her tail fins lick the water. She's the green of new grass. Layla asks her something and Thalia nods. Slowly, Layla traces her finger along Thalia's scales where her thigh would be. I can smell Layla's wonder, her own blend of blooming flowers.

“Pretty hot action over there.” I forgot Marty was sitting beside me.

“Huh?”

“Don't act like you're not seeing what I'm seeing.”

“Dude, what
are
you?”

“Oh, you remember that.” He leans back on his elbows, his baseball cap shielding his face from the sun. “Tell you what. If we see each other again on land, I'll tell you.” He puts out his fist and I bump his with mine. “There's a lot you don't know, dude. This is just the beginning.”

“You ever been to one of these before?”

“Nah. But I'm neutral, and the alliance means keeping all the courts happy. It's a fairly new thing with a treaty signed in magical blood, fairy tears, unicorn horns—you know, that kind of stuff. Didn't really work for Versailles, but it's a wait-and-see.”

I nod, like I know what he's talking about.

“I've seen things. Nothing like this before, though. Pretty cool, huh? It's like waking up one day and taking the blindfold off.” He stands and dusts sand off his jeans, even though I'm sure he's got sand in places he won't be able to dust off for days. Trust me. “Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go let the mermaids seduce me.”

It goes on for what seems like hours. The sun stays at a high point, like perpetual noon. Layla and Marty are welcome, and I guess I am too. The kids sure think I'm something special. The ones who can walk come up and poke me, and then run away. Girls walk up to me and bow their pretty little heads. It's like the mermaid version of the Lifeguard Catwalk. They walk past with their glittering scales beneath flowing skirts that look more like sheer scarves wrapped around their bodies.

My grandfather sits beside me. “I'm glad you are enjoying your people.” He's been standing around just watching for hours, and I almost forgot he was there.

“What happens next?”

“Are you in a hurry?”

“No, I'm just—wondering.”

“How is your father?”

“He's good.”

“And my daughter?”

“She's, you know, good?”

He chuckles. “How very…
good.
”

“Grandf—Sea King?”

He nods but doesn't correct me as to what I should call him. He waits for me to talk.

“I have about a million questions to ask you.”

He smiles like my mom, all cheeks, even with his beard. “How about we start with one.”

That's totally unfair. How about we start with how the hell is this island moving on its own? Or how come I can't turn into a whole fish like Thalia and Kurt, not that I actually want to? Or what happens if no one likes me? That grizzly Elias guy looked like he wanted to kick my ass, and I've never even seen him before. It's like starting high school all over again.

Finally I settle on, “Why didn't you come sooner?”

The blue of his eyes get dark like dusk. “Believe me, I wanted to.”

“Don't get me wrong. I love my mom and dad, and my dad's sisters are okay. But it would've been nice to know that I at least
had
a grandfather. I don't know.” I shake my head. I'm being stupid and sentimental in front of the king. I'm never like this. I take a deep breath to loosen the tightness in my chest.

He sets a firm hand on my shoulder. “Let me show you something.”

“What?”

“Something you should've known much, much sooner.”