Vicious Deep (22 page)

Neptune's Diner is buzzing with families and early bird couples. Old Ukrainian waitresses with graying buns and faces that would scare you out of changing your order bus their tables as quickly as they serve them. We've got pancakes, French toast, eggs and sausage, and about ten side orders of bacon.

We skipped dinner the night before, everyone staying in their own section of the apartment. I sat in front of my Command Central wall, staring at maps that didn't tell me anything useful. Thalia went right to my room to call Ryan and convince him he didn't see exactly what he saw.

Dad slaps his newspaper with the back of his hand. “Who even took this picture?”

Under the caption “Local Heroes Fight for Fellow Students” is a crude picture of us fighting the sea creatures. We don't look like we're winning. I stuff my mouth so I'll have something to do.

Dad shuts the newspaper, stopping short of crumpling it into a ball and throwing it across the diner. “I can't believe they would keep the school open today.”

“We have to go. We have to find Maddy.” And I have to see Layla. She was dead in my arms, and then she wasn't. If anyone knows what it's like to think you've died and come back, it's me.

Kurt clears his throat. “How do you know your previous paramour will be there? She wasn't there yesterday.”

“It's okay to just say
ex-girlfriend
, you know.”

A different waitress rounds our table. But when I look at her again, I see she's not a waitress. She's wearing an apron with the picture of a cupcake haloed by stars with the logo “Erica's Cupcakes” in neon pink. She glances behind her nervously. There's something familiar about her, only I can't sift through my mind fast enough. She bows lightly at me. Kurt looks up at her, wearing the same expression I am.

“Have we met?” he goes, Mr. Smooth Criminal.

She smiles, tucking her long brown curls behind her ear. That's when I notice a tiny suction cup protrude from the side of her wrist and then sink right back. I jump back, rocking our booth, which alarms the early bird couple behind us.

“I didn't mean to frighten you, Lord Sea.”

“Will you guys stop calling me that,” I hiss.

“Pardon again.” She looks back and waves at the cook visible behind the line of yellow order tickets. He winks at her and flips a pancake. “I've been looking for you. Your whereabouts are more secret than the Glass Castle.”

“Who are you?” Mom asks, pushing herself erect.

The lady shrinks back a bit. “My friends call me Penny. I wish to speak to Lor—”

I hold up my hand. “Call me Tristan.”

Everyone scoots over a seat to make room for her.

“You were on Arion's ship,” I say. “You were with the turtle boy.”

She nods happily. “He's my son, Timmy.”

Timmy the turtle. No wonder merpeople are known for their cruelty.

“I remember you,” Thalia says matter-of-factly.

“My son is rooting for you as champion.”

“How did you find him?” Dad says, staring at the spot on her wrist where the suction cup rises again. His eyes are full of wonder, and I suddenly wish there were more people like my dad out there. “Is there a mer-tracking device on you we should check for?” He reaches over to me and digs through my hair until I pull away.

“My boyfriend,” she nods toward the kitchen at the cook. “Timmy got your picture from the papers and put it on our refrigerator. Right next to his Batman and Superman magnets.”

“That's real—neat?” I say, wishing I could find that part of me that's funny and quick and always ready to make girls laugh. But it's like that half of my brain is asleep, and all I can think about is Layla almost dying because of me. “Why were you looking for me, Penny?”

“I'm technically not supposed to do this,” she says.

“Because you're landlocked, and the landlocked have no say in who becomes champion,” Kurt says.

I try to kick him under the table, but I miss and hit the metal pole. Anger flashes over Penny's delicate face. “Yes, I'm landlocked. Which means I'm powerless against the merrows attacking our shores. Killing on land. The longer there is no Sea King, the longer those on these shores will be subject to the creatures who wish there were no Sea King at all. Believe me, just because we pay tithes for protection doesn't mean there aren't those who would rather have no king at all.” She leans closer to Kurt, practically yelling in his face. I don't exactly blame her.

Mom and Kurt start talking over each other, but he lets her go first, always the gentleman. “What do you mean, the merrows? They're not allowed to grow past their infancy.”

“What's a merrow?”

Penny takes the crumpled newspaper from the table and opens it to the pictures of the attack at our school. “These are merrows. This is the first time I've seen them, but I've heard stories of those that grow to full size and live in swamps and small lakes. When they came on shore, they had no fear of being caught. They tore through cars. Some got lost in the subway and got run over by trains. Can't say they're very smart, but in numbers they would be a challenge. The alliance isn't happy.”

“Guys, what
are
they?”

“Wait a minute,” Thalia says, eating the last bit of French toast. “Merrows are tiny, and they're disfigured. Those creatures were fully grown.”

“Which would mean that those responsible for disposing of the merrows aren't doing what they're supposed to,” Kurt's says gravely.

I smack my hand on the table. “Hi, champion here. Would someone mind telling me what you're all talking about?”

Penny takes a deep breath. “Sometimes a mermaid gives birth to a deformed child, not fully human or mer-kin. It has no reason, no sense of speech. There was a time when they tried to acclimate them into families. But they were too wild, and it often ended very bloodily. Before King Karanos—your grandfather—King Erebos decreed that the merrows born at court would be killed instantly. King Karanos thought it was too cruel, so instead he had a prison built for them where they would be left alone.

“What about the ones
not
born at court?” I find that the question leaves me slowly. Mostly because I already know the answer, but also because I don't want to hear it.

Penny looks down that the table. She picks up the salt shaker and holds it. “Sometimes the families would not want to travel that far and would simply leave the creature at the edge of a precipice. It is considered a curse to raise a merrow.”

“I see,” Dad says quietly.

No one touches their food anymore.

“So these creatures,” I say, “these
merrows
that are supposed to be dead, are now fully grown and attacking people.”

Penny shakes her head. “Not people. They're after you. Whatever gets in their way is just collateral damage.”

“They've never attacked before?” Dad asks.

“They're not equipped to survive on their own,” Thalia says. “If they're living to that size, then someone is raising them. I've never seen one before—”

“Nor have I,” Kurt adds.

“The Sea King does not want to be like his father. From what my grandparents told me, King Elanos had the wrath of the eye of a storm. Your father,” Penny turns to my mom, “wanted to be loved by his people, and now it's going to haunt him.”

“Nieve is raising them,” Kurt says. I can feel his mind turning. He's coming up with a plan. I have no plan. I'm just trying to take this all in. “I'm sure of it.”

“What else do you know, Penny?” I ask.

“I'm not connected to the underground as such. This was my first tithe to the king. I was born on land, but my mother taught me the basic rules to keep my family protected.”

I chew on a piece of bacon, just for the taste of salt in my mouth. “Why are you doing this? I mean, if you have no connection to the court, why would you even care about the championship?”

“Because unlike other merpeople, you know what it's truly like to be part of both worlds. You could change things. Change things for real. Like I said, my boy is rooting for you.” She stands and presses her hands on her apron. “I have to get back to work. Remember, Tristan, it's not just my boy and I rooting for you. You'll find our kind is all behind you, not just in the seas.” With that and a small wave she's gone.

I try to give her the best smile I can. I don't want to disappoint her by letting her know I'm no closer to piecing the trident back together than I am to graduating from high school.

The minute I step into school, I remember being on that field. I remember Kurt pointing his arrow past Ryan's head at the creature. I remember standing there waiting for its poisonous needles to hit me and then feeling Layla jump in the way. The way her body stiffened around me as the poison worked through her body. I shut my eyes against it. I decide nothing like that is ever going to happen again, because I'm going to find Maddy. I'm going to get the pearl, and I'm going to find the oracles.

I try to replay what Penny said at Neptune's Diner, but I collide into someone. Someone who is really pissed off.

“What's your problem, man? Can't you see where you're walking?” Angelo shoves me into the locker. It doesn't hurt, but the dagger in my backpack hums. “What's up, pretty boy? Need me to teach you how to talk?”

I wave Kurt off, because he's ready to jump right in there. We're gathering a crowd, people snapping pictures and running videos with their phones.

“Relax, man.” I put my free hand on his shoulder. This is Angelo—pervy, wassa-matta-wit-you Angelo. Angelo who was born with a head of hair full of industrial-strength hair gel and a gold Italian chain, who always has your back unless
he's
the one messing with you. He's the asshole of your friends, but he's
your
asshole friend.

He grabs my hand and puts me into an
I'm-not-kidding
headlock.

I can feel it in my spine, the magic that's tattooed in my blood, in the ancient-as-hell dagger sheathed on my back. I elbow him and flip his arm around. I push him against the lockers, but not enough that it'll hurt him too badly. Just to show him that I can. “What's the matter with you, bro?”

His eyes are glassy. I wonder who else has suffered his wrath, and it's not even first period. I let him go, and he shakes his head as if he's been sleepwalking. “I don't know, man. I feel, like, jittery, you know?”

I let the tips of our foreheads touch like we're in a huddle before a meet. “Nothing you could've done.”

“Yeah, but you're my boy. We're a team. My team needed me yesterday when you were getting attacked by some punks.”

“We took care of it,” I say. I don't know if I'm saying this for his comfort or for mine. It's even worse because beneath his trademark dude-scented body spray is the smell of his guilt, like wet dirt being turned in a grave.

“All right, you vultures. Get out of here!” Layla's voice breaks up the crowd. She doesn't always wear makeup, but she's wearing it now. It looks pretty on her, but I can tell that she's trying to cover up the puffiness from crying too long.

“Thanks,” I say. I feel stupid standing and waiting for her to say something else. To tell me it's good to see me. Maybe this was what it felt like when she thought I was gone. Like I'm freaking thirsty and no amount of water will fix it. Only her. Only Layla can fix me.

She shuts her eyes and shifts the weight of her bag. “I don't know about you losers, but I'm grounded till I'm married and popping out babies. In that order.”

“I'm free third period.” Angelo raises his hand. Normally, Layla would punch him in the gut, but today she's going to let it slide. The bell rings, and everyone scatters except for us.

“Are you okay?” I ask, taking one step toward her.

She nods once but doesn't look at me. “Maddy's in the fourth-floor bathroom with her friends. She invited me to hang. I just don't like smelling like smoke.”

“You need to go get her,” Thalia tells me. She links arms with Layla and gives me a reassuring smile. I want to stay with Layla, but I want to go get the pearl. I leave them at the entrance of homeroom and keep walking straight ahead to the next stairwell. I look back once to see if Layla is looking too, and she isn't. She's pulling farther and farther away, and I don't know how to get her back.

•••

The fourth floor is the ghost floor.

It's the only part of school, other than part of the basement, that never got renovated. You instantly know where the bathroom is, because all you have to do is follow the thin trail of smoke. The thick wooden door has a little W tacked on like an afterthought. I press my ear against it, but all I can make out is mumbling, some laughter, more mumbling.

“Knock, knock.” I push open the door slowly.

There's a sudden rustle of kids gathering their things together and putting out their cigarettes.

“Chill. I'm not Quinn.”

“Sorry, we thought you were Umberto,” one of Maddy's friends says. She relights the end of her cigarette, and the little red light flares with every pull. “He came by before to clean the bathroom and gave us a five-minute warning.”

Umberto is pretty easy to bribe as long as he knows he won't get caught.

Maddy sits between two other girls. One girl has a short black bob and wears tons of pearls around her neck. The girl on the other side is less dramatic, with long chestnut hair and rectangular glasses. She digs her hand into a bag of neon sour worms. I can smell the sour sugar from here.

Maddy stands, clearly uncomfortable that I'm in her space. “Are you lost, Tristan?”

“I was looking for you.”

“Why?”

“Because I need to speak with you.”

The girls scoff and snicker and grin at each other.
Am
I
really
that
bad?

She looks like a blond Wednesday Addams with that dress and those stockings. She shoves me with her shoulder on the way out.

“Guess I deserve that,” I grumble.

We stand just down the hallway, where the cigarette smoke only lingers.

“So talk.” She cocks her head to the side, so her braids look like uneven weight balances. I wish I had practiced. I wish I knew what to say that would make her hate me a little less. I came to school to find her, and now here she is.

“How long have we been friends?” I start.

“Since we started high school.” She doesn't even hesitate. “Why?”

“I know what I did was stupid. It was wrong. It proves that I'm an asshole.”

There's a tug of a smile at her lips. “Keep going.”

“And I'm sorry I'm the reason—”

“Trist, don't flatter yourself. I know it looks like I changed drastically after we broke up when you kissed that skank at the beach, but that wasn't why. Not entirely. I'm tired of being the
Amish
lady's daughter, the girl no one can believe you'd ever date.”

My stomach turns into nuts and bolts. “I wish I could change what I did, but I can't. The truth is that you deserve better than me. I was so caught up in how sweet you are, and how honest and different from other girls. I thought, why not? Maddy's pretty, thoughtful—”

“Plus, I blew you.”

My voice cracks, “Yes, you did. And, thank you. It was nice. Great, I mean. But, you know—”

She sighs. “Spit it out, Tristan. Do you want to be with me again? Is that it?”

Fine, now or never. “The necklace I gave you. It wasn't mine to give. It was my mom's. A real important family heirloom, and she asked me about it yesterday. So I kind of need it back.”

She stares at her Converses. They're all drawn on with black Sharpie. The laces on her right side are untied. I bend down and tie them for her but keep my eyes on her face. She has no idea how much I have riding on this. How much I actually need her to help me now. How I really wish I'd never hurt her.

“Tell your mom I'm real sorry,” she says. “I'll pay for it. I lost it. I—” She doesn't finish. She walks away.

It feels like the hallway gets longer and she'll never reach the bathroom door again. When she does, she glances over her shoulder to make sure I'm still crouched here.

I am.