Page 48 of Curse the Fae

The female attempts to guide me off the rocks. I insist I can swim, then descend into the pool and follow her out of The Bask of Crocodiles. As she leads me away, I recall how stumped Elixir had been when I tended to his wounds, how it had sidetracked him. I think of his reaction when I’d explained why I helped him. I reflect upon his haggard expression, the low murmur of his voice, the way he had touched the abrasions on my skin, and the words he’d spoken.

This was not your fault.

I fret over how it had made me feel, the solace it had offered. It couldn’t have been an easy thing to say, not from a Fae to a human, not regarding the death of sacred fauna.

A crucial fact burns into my head: Elixir’s capable of feeling something other than darkness. He can feel more than hate and cruelty. I had witnessed momentary empathy in him, pure and unconditional. If I can achieve that sort of reaction from him once, I can do it again. If that’s possible, what other susceptible emotions lurk inside him?

If I find out…

If I tap into that…

If I can get close to him…

If I can win his friendship and penetrate the impenetrable parts of him, I might earn his trust, and he might slip. At my coaxing, he might accidentally expose his greatest weakness, or he might reveal how to break the curse.

If I do this right, I might win. And if I maneuver him into the right vulnerable position, Elixir might simply let me win. He might let me go and let it be.

The first step to any of these outcomes is endearing myself to the water lord. I need to find that crawlspace in his soul where I can burrow in and poison him with compassion. Because who knew kindness could become a weapon? Who better to wield it than me?

I struggle to tamp down the remorse. I’ve spent my life treating others with tenderness, not using their fragility against them. Yet this is different. If I want to outlast this world, kindness must become a tactic, an advantage over someone who’s never experienced it.

Besides, nothing happened between us, and whatever transpired against that outcropping had been a mistake. It was a moment of lunacy. There may have been a flicker of mutual comfort, and we may have exchanged reassuring touches, and the result may have shimmied across my flesh. Nonetheless, the truce had been fleeting, an isolated episode wrought from the need to survive.

Coral swims several paces away, lost in her own assumptions and thoughts. I puff and pump beside her while the river’s current ferries my spear, doubtless at Elixir’s behest. Several times, the female casts the weapon a curious glance but makes no attempt to confiscate it. Since Elixir had issued an order to get me cleaned up, she must conclude the spear is forbidden booty.

With my energy renewed, my pace accelerates. As I swim, I think about Elixir’s potential vulnerabilities and conjure a plan.

I’m not going to play his game. He’s going to play mine.

14

Instead of returning to my chamber where there’s a perfectly functional tub, Coral leads me to a place called The Mer Cascades. According to her, those waters contain special healing nutrients, their potency warding off aches instantaneously.

The enclave is a haven tucked amidst interconnected caves. In showering alcoves, condensation rains from the ceilings. Steaming whirlpools are chiseled into various levels, with water spilling from the rims. Torrents splash down brackets of rock into more tubs. Each area glistens a different hue of blue, green, or gold, the vibrant shades illuminating the darkness.

But that’s not what causes me to halt at the threshold. It’s the merfolk.

There are figures with ultramarine curls and tiny gemstones embedded into their temples, the skin of their waists merging with scales that narrow into fins or tips. Others have long limbs with webbed feet and hands, and their stringy hair hangs like seaweed, and they flash honed canines.

Mermaids, mermen, and sirens. The dwellers range from curvy and fleshy to lithe and toned, from beautifully intimidating to frightfully enchanting. Although they gather here, each of the Solitaries keeps their personal distance, enjoying their own pockets of space. They float in the pools or hum to themselves, their voices clear and fluid, producing melodies one could float upon.

Their scales glimmer like kaleidoscopes, changing color as the Solitaries move. Most of the females bare their breasts or wear bandeaus. The males don no such adornments, their flesh either splotchy or blazing with ink markings down their abdomens.

It must be nighttime by now, because they’re all awake. I stand at the threshold, absorbing the scene until Coral nudges me forward. Despite my jellied muscles, my limbs carry me into the enclave.

The merfolk sweep their gazes my way. Their features pinch with hostility. The water sprites slink from the raining alcoves, shiver off droplets of water, and move sinuously toward me. The mermaids, mermen, and sirens swim nearer and grasp the pool ledges.

“What’s this?” a mermaid inquires, bubbles spitting from the surface around her. “A treat from Elixir? Has she lost the game already?”

“I saw her first,” a merman says.

“I really wouldn’t try it, if I were you,” Coral warns in a deep, sultry tone that sounds like a prediction.

“Then it’s fortunate you’re not me,” the male dismisses.

I recognize this one. The swamp-colored hair and tar-black ink markings resurrect that incident in The Twisted Canals, when Elixir used a waterfall to lash this male to the ground.

So, he can shift from land to water like Elixir. That accounts for why he wasn’t in mer form the first time I saw him.

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