Chapter Text
They are always so pretty.
Ethereal young girls, chosen for some reason or another, beautiful in more ways than one always. Their souls are in despair, terrorized hope against all reason fluttering around in their minds.
I can almost hear them in my mind, the whispers as they clothe them in red, carefully make up the girl’s hair and nails. “He will marry you. You’ll see. He will be calmed by your beauty. He is a God after all. He likes beautiful things. He demands them. It is a powerful gift you give us. You will be honored, always.”
Honored until the next one is sent out.
I wished I could actually do as they want, but the sea is as it is and not to be tamed.
Black hair, floating in between the sheer red of their shawls and skirts, almost glowing against the turbulent surface as some thunderstorm or other capsizes their boats. Black pieces of wet wood floating around her, the broken mast she is tied to dragging her down, unerringly.
Fighting, they are always fighting for air, their faces contorted in the horror of their impending doom. Limbs kicking, pulling at their restraints, trembling and sanity gone, the primal animal fighting for its life.
It is a short fight and I did not cherish it, though it had become part of my existence.
I watched them drown, the air leaving their lungs traveling up swiftly, and I imagined the glittering bubbles carry a piece of the soul each, trying to reach the heavens, trying to maintain a sense of self. It was fascinating.
They always came alone, always sent to their deaths alone.
I frown suddenly, remembering and reprimanding myself silently for having forgotten.
No, not always alone.
Once, there was another, keeping close to the terrified girl, his hands still trying to free her from her restraints, even as the depth swallowed them.
He had been ethereal as well, his soul a beacon in the fathomless depths, burning so very brightly. Raging against fate. Fruitlessly, of course.
I hadn’t been able to look away, watching them tumble down.
I had drifted closer, watching their movements slow, grow sluggish. The girl’s head had sunken onto her chest and it had prompted him to roar indistinctly, pulling one last time, large bubbles leaving him and making room for the indomitable water.
I felt sorrow for their fate, the gray shapes of the predatory species already circling them, waiting.
Only keeping away for now because I was there.
I had been very close when he suddenly saw me, his pupils dilating and then his gaze had turned accusatory, a blue flame, burning into me. Blue eyes, with a touch of seaweed and sun.
Thinking it was my fault that they were drowning.
I had touched his cheek as his gaze broke, soft stubble tickling lightly under my fingertips.
And I had felt anger.
Unspeakable anger. And on a whim I had caught the last bubble of air leaving his body in my own mouth, hindering its ascendance. It had been such a spur of a moment decision, wanting to keep something of a being that had managed to touch me, to make me feel something.
Because it is cold beneath the sunshine warmed surface and coldness is what defines me. A coldness both harsh and soothing. Equilibrium. I am the raging storms and glassy smoothness, gentle embrace and crushing pressure. But there had been something in his gaze, his deed that had touched me and, without scrutinizing too deeply why, I had recreated myself in his image just as the ocean and its predators removed his very likeness, all traces of them gone within minutes.
I watch with his eyes now and I have reopened those very eyes to mesmerizing awareness. An abyss of feeling, of longing and self-sacrifice. Of love, unfulfilled.
I do not watch them drown anymore. I cannot.
I feel anger instead, keeping from where they send them out to the sea, staying in the shallow water for weeks until it is over.
Already I sense the whispers, feel the despair, like the taste of bile in the air.
I sigh and reach back to scratch at my fins, my antennae shivering slightly.
I know the time is soon.
The sun turns the shallow water a relaxing turquoise, streaked with yellow.
Such a shame to paint it black with death so soon.