“I need to know what’s going on. What the plan is.”
Sure enough, Syleen stopped swimming at my words. In response, the rest of the mers came to rest just behind us. I saw Therin give me a warning glare over Zef’s shoulder.
“We have no time for dalliances. We need to continue on our quest.”Uncharacteristically, Syleen didn’t look away after she addressed me, but continued to stare.
Part of me wanted to stick up my arm and shout “Heil, Hitler!” However, I knew the effort would be lost, and I couldn’t spare any excess energy. Plus, she’d have no clue that she should be insulted. Even though it grated my last nerve, I forced my tone to be respectful.“I just have some questions. When are we going to ea—”
She turned back around.“No. We must keep going. We can spare no more time.”With a flick of her onyx fins, she shot forward.
“Syleen, wait.”Zef once again came to my defense. Why couldn’t he be my father?“It might be in everyone’s best interest if we fill the boy in on our process.”
Syleen turned once more, eyes narrowed at Zef. Again, it was obvious a silent conversation was transpiring.
I turned away to give them some semblance of privacy. When had I become such a doormat? The rest of the mers were facing me, having not left their places in formation. The twins and Braid stared at me openly, whether in judgment or curiosity, I couldn’t tell. Only Tattoo kept his eyes averted. Unlike my gaze, he didn’t seem more submissive for it, only aloof and detached. The others’ eyes on me were too much. I turned back to Syleen and Zef.
“I understand not what affinity Zef has developed for you. It may be he sees you as the spoiled child you are. Though why he chooses to indulge you, I cannot fathom.”Syleen ran her fingers through her ebony hair, pulling the tendrils from her face and twisting the long mass into a loose rope in an uncharacteristically feminine gesture.“You may have three questions, and then we must be off.”
“Seriously?”What was she, a genie?
“Is that your first question?”
I ignored her retort.“Where are we going, and how long are we going to travel?”
She gave me a tilted smile. Bitchily enjoying herself. “Two questions in one. I do appreciate your expediency. We are going to where the sharks are, and we will travel until we find them.”
God, I hated her. I looked over at Zef. Before responding, he cocked an eyebrow in Syleen’s direction. She didn’t respond.“As patronizing as it may sound, Syleen is being direct, if not evasively so. We travel west until we intersect with the White Spirit’s migration.”
White spirit. Shark. Great white. Makes sense.
Syleen made a hurry-up gesture with her hands.“One more inquiry, demon.”Back to demon now, it seemed.
I didn’t have to consider what question I wanted to ask.“When do we stop to eat?”
“We don’t.”With that, she turned back around and departed once more. Zef gave me a final look and fell in behind her. Therin didn’t even offer that much and took his place beside Zef.
After they’d passed, I took my place behind Braid. He turned to face me for the briefest second and then turned back around. A soft tenor voice entered my thoughts.“Do not reply. There is no need. It will only cause more tension. We do not eat during a hunt for the Spirit. We seek it with what we had in our bellies when we left. If our paths cross in a short amount of time or if we travel for an extended period, that is up to the Creator. The same is true for the Spirit. It may have eaten briefly before our arrival, or it may be ravenous and enraged. It is a matter of honor. A matter of strength.”
Silence returned. I couldn’t help but wonder at Braid’s motivation for offering explanation. Maybe he was just being nice. Maybe he thought the hunt wouldn’t be as honorable if we all weren’t equally as informed. If so, it was a little late for that.
His intonations returned, interrupting my thoughts.“They call me Greylin.”
I waited for more. More explanations. More anything. However, there was nothing more than the occasional flick of his green tail.
A hunt to meet up with migrating great white sharks, who may or may not be ravenously hungry. Who may be a few miles away or a few hundred. Traveling to fight them with caveman-like weaponry—if you were important enough to even have that. A fight that we show up for either mildly hungry or ravenous and weak. Immortal or not, no wonder the mer population seemed to need a slot on the endangered species list. Screw Lelas’s concern of inhumanity toward the sharks! Was there any mystery to why there was a growing number of mers who didn’t want to partake in this hunt?
And what was that stuff about it all being up to the will of the Creator? I hadn’t heard anything about a Creator or any other type of gods. Or does he just show up for suicidal quests? It was bad enough to think about hunting a great white for the fun of it. The thought of doing so for the whims of some bored deity made it so much worse.
Fifteen
BRETT WRIGHT
By thethird night, I was falling asleep instantly, no longer caring that my legs were exposed to the ominous darkness. I grasped onto whatever damn weed I could find and lost myself to my exhaustion.
My hunger became so constant it ceased to register to my senses. That was a blessing until we would pass through the occasional school of fish. At those times, the hunger became a great white of its own. It wasn’t until the fourth day that, without my consent, my hand struck out and grasped a fish, instantly breaking its spine.
In a motion swift enough that it stopped my hand before it reached my mouth, fingers encircled my wrist and stopped its trajectory. The heat began before I could register my anger. Steam rose off my skin in tiny bubbles. The fingers instantly released my arm. I followed their movement back to their owner. Tattoo stared at me wide-eyed, looking back and forth between my already lessening broil and his hand, which I was willing to bet had gotten burned.
He looked up at my face. I started to apologize, but before I could even think clearly enough to know how to begin, he shook his head. Both of us glanced up to Syleen. She seemed to not have noticed. Only Braid… Greylin, watched us out of the corner of his eye. He motioned toward the now-cooked fish in my hand and shook his head.
