Page 36 of A Merman's Tail
“Lyric, you can’t run from me,” my father shouted.
I stiffened and glanced at Ethan. The smirk he sent me gave me a confidence boost I didn’t realize I’d needed until now. How had this human made me feel this way?
“Lyric, answer me! You are my child, and I will not let this human control you.”
I snuck closer to the hole and peeked through it, not expecting my father to beright there. A fist landed in my eye, and I tumbled backward. There was shouting and noises around me, but stars danced in front of my eyes, so I didn’t know what was happening until a few minutes later when my vision cleared.
Wily, Taya, and Pru were fighting with guards, kicking their tails and using them as weapons. One guard aimed a spear at Pru, and it narrowly missed him by inches. There was a roar, and my father thrust his tail in Ethan’s direction. Before I could shout a warning, Ethan aimed the speargun at him, shooting. A bolt shot from the gun and straight at my father, piercing through his chest.
My father’s yells of pain made everyone else stop and turn toward him, shock making their jaws fall open. Father’s body convulsed and he gasped, letting out a gurgle. The spear had hit him right in the heart.
“Oh, fuck,” Ethan mumbled. The spear still had some kind of black stringy looking rope attached, but it wasn’t made from the same material. I didn’t know what the string was for sure, but it made sense why it was there. If the gun was used for fish, that’s what humans used to pull their prey to them.
“Your highness?” One of the guards, a man with wide shoulders and long black hair, swam closer.
Father gasped again and blood drifted from his mouth as his eyes rolled into the back of his head. The spear was still firmly planted in his chest, but it was too late. It didn’t matter what they did, my father was going to die.
Wily spun to us. “You need to leave. Now.”
“What about you?” I asked, fear becoming a knot inside my chest as I thought about what would happen to my brothers and Taya for being a part of the king’s murder.
“I’m the Crown Prince,” Wily said, but he didn’t look happy about it because he winced, as though the thought made him sick. “Go while you can.”
The guards glanced around at each other, and I supposed it made sense. Wily would be king now that my father was in his last moments of life. Technically, Wily hadn’t killed him. Ethan had.
“Now!” Wily’s face turned monstrous, and it was a new look on him. I didn’t like it, but I knew it was for my wellbeing.
Grabbing Ethan’s hand, I tugged him, and we kicked out legs to begin swimming up. Something hit our feet, and I felt the familiar swirling of magic breathing a different feeling inside us. When we reached the surface, we’d be fully human again, unable to breathe and speak underwater. I wished I could thank my brothers and Taya, but Wily was right. We needed to go. If the guards chose to, they could drag us back again for father’s murder. Though, technically, he wasn’t dead yet; he would be by the time we got back to the boat.
The swim to the surface felt like it took forever, and the longer that time went on, the harder it began to be to breathe. When finally we broke thorough the water, my chest hurt as much as my legs did. I shivered as I inhaled fresh air. Ethan’s breaths were deep, and he panted in exhaustion from where he floated beside me.
“Come on,” he said, pointing at the boat that wasn’t far away. I could barely move, however, and it was a struggle to shift my arms. Ethan must have seen my fight with my own body because he hooked his arm around me, and together we swam toward the boat that rocked with the waves. It felt too far away, but it didn’t take as long as I thought it would to get there. He grabbed me around the waist and helped me climb the ladder, and when I reached the deck, I collapsed on it.
Ethan wasn’t far behind me, and he fell onto his knees, his hands resting on his thighs as his chest rose and fell quickly. “Fuck. Never doing that again.”
“Are you okay?” I asked, sitting up and touching his face, neck, and chest, searching for injuries I couldn’t see.
“Your magic friend fixed me, remember?” He quirked a smile and then stopped, reaching up to press his fingers to his face. “Well, almost fixed me. I need to check the mirror.”
He was up before I could stop him, and I watched him limp toward the stairs that led down to the cabin. I didn’t have the energy to follow him. My body hurt too much. My gaze traveled to Zolo and Aza’s bodies, still dead where we’d left them. Their lifeless eyes stared back, and I waited for the guilt, but nothing came. If anything, it was anger swirling deep inside me, and the urge to go back down to Atlantia and destroy it. Father might have been dying when we left, but he wasn’t the only one who had a role in this.
Wind whooshed across the deck, and I trembled as the coldness of my wet clothes reminded me I was above water again. Pushing myself to my feet, I stumbled down the stairs and toward the bathroom.
Ethan was already there, sitting against the wall of the shower stall with water hot enough to create steam bashing down on his naked body. I rid myself of my clothes and joined him, happy that the shower was big enough that I could sit beside him. Leaning my head on his shoulder, I sighed.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you who I was. After you told me about your hunt for mermen, I was scared. I didn’t want you to hate me because I wanted you to like me.”
Ethan chuckled. “Yeah, I wouldn’t have liked you very much if I knew who you were.” He curled his arm around me, and dragged me closer.
The hot cascading stream felt good on my sore limbs, and I exhaled in relief.
“So does that mean you get to keep your voice then?”
“I don’t know…. Taya didn’t say, did he?” I hoped I did, though. While I’d enjoyed what Ethan and I had before, I loved it even more now that I could talk to him.
We sat there in silence for a long time. I didn’t know how many human minutes passed before he finally spoke again.
“Why did you give it all up? You were a prince, right?”
