Seascape Read online

  “What are they saying?”

  “No one knows. They sing the old language, forgotten by us in our quest for growth and development. We have forgotten the old ways, and our sacrifice will not go unpunished.”

  “Sacrifice?”

  “Yes, sacrifice. We gave up all that we were to follow the new ways, the ways of progress, and in doing that, lost the core source of our beliefs.”

  “And that would be?” Elanna turned to study the Mermaid closer. Amadala had not been the best of friends to her, but she was honest.

  “Love, human. Respect for ourselves. Honesty, integrity, faith, selflessness. These are the things we gave up to be what we are now.”

  “But…”

  “I am not saying that we have become a brutal bunch of savages, Elanna. But we have managed to overcomplicate what should be something quite simple. We overburdened our lives, human. With power and greed, we have created our own trap. And when they ask us why we strive, why we fight for progress, we say so we can relax and have time for ourselves and the ones we love in the future. When in actuality, if we had stuck to the old ways, taken care of ourselves without our vices, would we not have that time to relax and love?”

  “Prophetic words, Amadala,” Elanna breathed. “But what do they have to do with you or me?”

  “Nothing and everything, human. I don’t know what I’m saying. I babble.”

  “Amadala…”

  “What are your plans, human?”

  “My plans?”

  “What will you do? Will you let the vices of the old world, wrapped in hypocrisy and selfish acts, taint the new world you now have?”

  Did Amadala consider her going back and sharing her knowledge with humankind her bid for glory?

  “I have to go back.”

  “Then the whales cry for you!”

  Amadala began to turn in a flood of pink hair, but was startled when a warm hand gripped her arm. “I am going, Amadala, but only to drop off my information, and then I am coming back.”

  Amadala slowly looked from the hand gripping her arm to the intent face staring up at her.

  “You would give up your research, your findings, your glory?”

  “What is glory without the one I love?”

  There was a pregnant pause, filled with the sounds of the whales and their mournful cries. Both women shared a silent moment of understanding, and then Amadala turned fully towards Elanna.

  “Well said, human.”

  “And the sooner I start, the sooner I get back.”

  “But…”

  “No buts, Amadala. I refuse to let them cry for me! I will do what I have to do and return as quickly as possible.”

  “But Storm…”

  “Tell him where I have gone, and tell him I will return! How can I exist without the other half of my soul?”

  “Human! Elanna! Wait! Let me…”

  “No time!” Elanna called as she turned towards the east, and land she instinctively knew. “I have to go so that I may return! Tell my love I will be coming back to him!”

  “The humans will not accept this, Elanna!” Amadala cried out desperately. “They will hurt you, study you, destroy you!”

  “They are my people, Amadala! Just give Storm my message! I shall return!”

  “Elanna!”

  Amadala screamed out in panic as she watched the dark figure of the human who had changed so many lives disappear towards the land and the humans she knew would harm her.

  Sting! she screamed through her mind, turning quickly.

  There was no time to bring her back! Elanna would not listen to her! She needed to find Sting and Storm! They would bring her back! Her place was here, beneath the waters of the sea with Storm!

  She needed to get help!

  Turning in a flash of bubbling water and pink scales, Amadala raced to find the man who has so scored her!

  She needed his help now, for her intuition told her that nothing but trouble lay ahead.

  And as she quickly swam away in search of the one she had caused so much pain, the one she had sacrificed for vanity and stubbornness, the whales sang songs of mourning and loneliness. They sang for her and never before had she felt so alone.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  “I just don’t understand women!” Sting moaned, finishing up his diatribe about the fairer sex. “I mean, I expect them to act one way and then they turn around and do something completely…” he struggled for a moment, searching for the correct word, “odd!”

  “You are requesting my aid in understanding women?”

  Storm and Sting sat on the rocks near the island where he had taken his human to recover.

  The day was hot, but both men used their fins to splash water on each other, offsetting the painful burn that could develop if they were overexposed to heat and sun.

  Both men wore long faces, their depressed looks matching as they stared off into the sea, trying to do something men had been contemplating doing for eons, discovering what women want.

  “You have a human! Humans have to be different!”

  “Female is female!” Storm sighed. “No wonder human males are casting them off into the sea! They would drive them insane if they didn’t do otherwise!”

  “You don’t mean that,” Sting argued. “Humans aren’t casting them away for sanity’s sake! They are doing it to drive us into extinction!”

  “How do you figure that?”

  “Well, first the women move in and drive us mad, then they infect the other women!”

  “What?”

  “Think about it! The other women start acting unpredictably and they drive us to kill ourselves! With the men gone, there is no reproduction and then our entire race is gone!”

  “You are calling my Elanna an infection? A disease?”

  “Well, look at yourself!” Sting swore hotly. “You are sitting here, face longer than a seal’s, and moping!”

  “A seal?” Storm’s blue eyes began to glitter as he stared at the one-eyed, black-haired man.

  “A seal! And…and…look at you! Sitting here complaining because some woman is acting crazy!” Sting spoke in desperation, frightened, because he saw himself in Storm’s depressed face.

  “And look at you, Sting, sitting there like a wounded carp, pining because Amadala turned out to be a bigger bitch that you realized!”

  “Bitch?”

  “B-I-T-C-H!” he spelled out. “Big bitch! Whale-sized bitch!”

  “She is not!”

  “Yes, she is!”

  “Is not!”

  “Is too!”

  “She may be a bit…odd, but she is no…not a big…well, she is just a little bitchy, but so what? No one is perfect!”

  Both Mermen glared at each other, the light of battle heating their eyes.

  Both refused to give ground, both refused to look away. Neither knew what they were arguing about, but neither would back down.

  Storm!

  Both men jumped and turned to the waters as a ringing cry and an explosion of water and pink heralded the approach of Amadala.

  “Where have you been?” she screeched as she practically flew on water to his side. “Elanna needs you!”

  “Elanna is going home to the humans, to be the savior of the legged species, and has no time for me!” he replied bitterly.

  “No! She is going…”

  “I thought I told you to leave them alone?” Sting snarled, finding a target for his anger, but stopping before he went too far. “My apologies, lady.”

  “Whatever,” Amadala said, ignoring him completely, focusing on Storm. “Elanna is going, but she is coming back!”

  “She will have to stay and see to her patients, Amadala.” Storm sighed as he calmed himself and shook his head sadly at her. “I am a healer, and I know this to be true.”

  “No, Storm!” she whispered desperately. “She could not give you up! She is going to tell her people what she knows and then she is returning!”

  “When did
she decide this?” Storm asked, hope growing in his eyes and he stared at his friend of many years.

  “She always knew, Storm! How could she leave her heart and soul behind?”

  Storm gave the impression of leaping in the air, even though he moved not a muscle.

  “Infection,” he sneered at Sting, who stood there gazing at Amadala as if he was waiting for the punch line.

  “But there is a problem!” she added,

  “There!” Sting snorted to Storm. “There is always a problem.”

  “Sting, control yourself,” Amadala stated with the decorum shown by true queens.

  “My lady.” Instantly, he fell onto protocol, remembering who Amadala was and what power she held.

  “What problem?” Storm asked, already his heart racing in fear. What had happened to his human before they had a chance to make up?

  “I feel that there is danger surrounding her!”

  Storm reached out, his hands gripping her upper arms as he stared deeply into her pink eyes.

  “I know that you are of the Power, Amadala. I will not discount any advice that you have to give.”

  Amadala was born from blood that had been immersed in power. Her family, her line, everything about her spoke of power. Just because it didn’t manifest itself in her body didn’t mean it was not there.

  “I may not be a true Child of Triton, Storm,” she began, “but heed my words carefully. Danger surrounds Elanna! Danger she does not expect. You have to go to her!”

  “Where?”

  “To the east! The volcano the humans call Hawaii! And Storm, please be careful! I have lost so much, and I refuse to lose more!”

  Storm glanced over at Sting for a moment, before nodding.

  “Some things were not meant to be, Amadala,” he said as he pulled her into his embrace. “Your discovery is still out there. And so is his.”

  Releasing her, he smiled tenderly at her, before turning to face Sting.

  “Maybe not a big bitch, but a small annoyance,” Storm said as he leapt clear of the rocks and disappeared into the sea.

  “Perhaps you are right,” Sting mused as he stared at Amadala.

  “Did he call me…?”

  “Nothing that I haven’t called you before,” he replied as he returned to business again. “Now tell me, what is the nature of this danger, Amadala?”

  “Immediately, to your male reproductive organs,” she hissed, eyes glaring, but trying to find a comfortable place to be with him. “But I feel danger around Elanna, Sting. I am worried.”

  “Let us wait, then,” he replied, letting go of regrets and trying to develop some sort of relationship with Amadala. He realized they could never be lovers. There was too much…incompatibility between the two of them. But maybe they could be friends. “We shall intervene if we are needed.”

  “Then we shall wait,” she decided. “But I can’t be around you right now. I’ll find you if I sense something further.”

  “I…I understand,” Sting said quietly, watching her disappear beneath the blue water.

  Full of regrets, but knowing that it was not meant to be, Sting focused his one eye on the horizon as he waited.

  He knew something big was about to happen. He just didn’t know what.

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Confidently, Elanna stroked through the waters, reveling in what her body could do.

  She didn’t seem to feel the miles pass as she doggedly made her way towards land. In fact, all she felt was a burning need to finish her task and hurry back to her love.

  Her resolve was set. She had never wanted to unburden herself more.

  The whale song, the lonely mournful cry of times past and things lost would not be sung for her. She would do what she had to do, then return quickly.

  Her diplomas, her name in the scientific community, all the letters printed on her office door were meaningless if her heart did not lay in that direction. And her heart lay with Storm.

  As she raced along, she paid no heed to anything but her need to end this business. She gave her surroundings no second thought until she felt a weird creeping in her spine.

  She paused, turning about as she scanned the surrounding area for the source of her unease.

  The memory of Storm’s story, of his past love and her demise, flashed across her mind. Were there man-eaters, hungry sharks that were out for her blood?

  She shivered as images of every shark attack she had ever seen, coupled with a few frames of the movie Jaws, flashed through her mind.

  She could even hear the eerie theme music, the low bass chords, as she fearfully continued to swim, trying to make as little motion or sound as possible.

  Sharks were drawn to movement, right? Movement and blood?

  She looked down at her body, all at once conscious of its nude state, something she had begun to ignore while she was with Storm. Now, she has never felt more vulnerable in her life, even though in her mind she knew a suit and a pair of pumps would offer no protection from a shark’s toothy bite.

  Swallowing deeply, eyes wide, she continued, again turning her head every few seconds. The feeling of being alone, isolated and hunted filled her being.

  It was too much!

  Facing forward, she began to swim swiftly, damning her earlier notions about movement in her very real fright. She swam faster than she had ever been able to, faster than she thought was possible, then the first body brushed against her.

  “Shark!” she wailed as she turned to bat at the thick-skinned body that lay against her.

  It was a good thing that the epimorph had done its transformation, because as wide as she opened her mouth, she surely would have drowned if she had been totally human.

  But as it was, all her scream did was bring an echo of laughter.

  Shark, she said, a chipper voice laughed.

  Shark!

  Shark! Human cried shark!

  Then there was a lilting laugher, the sound she believed only mischievous fairies could make.

  Calming herself mid-scream, she turned again and saw what was teasing her.

  It was a pod! A small family of dolphins swam around her, their gray bodies twisting like joyful puppies as they circled her.

  She counted three happy dolphins, their bottlenoses dipping and raising in the water as if scenting her.

  Human, not the kindred, one dolphin said clearly.

  Elanna was startled that she could understand it.

  Smells like human and kindred, another voice added.

  Human! a third confirmed. No flippers. Human in the sea! Humans belong on land!

  “Hello?” Elanna tried, breaking into this conversation.

  Human speaks! dolphin one clicked. Human is kindred!

  Human is human! number three argued, her distinct clicking sound identifying her.

  Is both! the second voice argued. Both human and kindred.

  Impossible! the first and third crowed together.

  “Excuse me?” Elanna tried again, this time putting a bit more force behind the sound that emerged from her mouth.

  Take to shore! the first said finally, ignoring her.

  Take to shore, the third agreed and turned to look at the second.

  Take to shore, he sighed. But I would like to play first.

  Play later, the first and obviously the leader of this pod said. Take to white-coated humans first.

  “That’s it!” Elanna cried, all of her tension melting away. “Take me to the white-coated humans.”

  There was a beat of silence, as all of the dolphins turned to look at her.

  Pushy human, the second declared, though his humor could be heard in his…voice.

  Playful human! the first insisted, as he brushed against her side, making Elanna smile. More fun than the white-coated humans with their noise boxes, he decided as Elanna laughed at the contact.

  She had always wanted to swim with the dolphins.

  Let’s play! the second dolphin, the one she mentally named Chipper, de
clared before he dove beneath her body and hooked her on his back.

  “Let’s play!” Elanna laughed, not wanting to give up this opportunity.

  Then her breath whooshed from her chest as Chipper took off, an explosion of movement that propelled her to the surface of the water.

  Everything rushed by. The shapes of the other two dolphins blurred as they raced past. The water, churned white and foamy by their movement, seemed to be so many soft pearls that filled her field of vision, surrounding her like the tickling bubbles of champagne, streamed over her body like a million teasing hands.

  Elanna threw back her head and laughed as she held tightly to Chipper’s dorsal fin, held on to his thick warm skin and went on the ride of her life.

  Surfacing long enough to take a breath, Chipper and Elanna dove again into the warm waters, spinning and dancing as they passed the others, leaving them in their wake.

  We greet the sun! Chipper called out, and not knowing what this meant, Elanna tightened her grip on Chipper.

  With a sudden burst of speed, Chipper dove deeply into the water, then suddenly reversed his course.

  “We are going to jump!” Elanna gasped, fear and excitement in her voice as they sped past the others, gaining speed, playing in water, leaving every thought and notion behind.

  Then she felt it—the barrier of the water parting from her, the sudden shock of warm air as the sea expelled them from its womb. She felt a jerk as if gravity refused to give up its hold on her, then they were flying!

  Up and up, higher and higher they rose! The sun, the bright yellow sun greeted them, kissed her flesh for a moment, warmed the world around them, spun her vision into a delightfully twisted kaleidoscope of shape and color, before they were descending, saying good-bye, slamming with a welcome scream back into the body of the sea.

  The shock of the water, cool after being kissed by the sun, made her gasp, but then she was laughing! Tossing her head back, she roared with laughter, delighting in the freedom that she had felt.

  Human is fun! Chipper chattered as he pulled out of his dive and began to surface.

  Elanna laughed, cried, and shrieked her joy for the undersea world to hear! Never had she been so…so…euphoric! Except, maybe, while exploding with Storm in his arms, sharing the rapture of release.