Priddylifted his tail.It rose at his command, a single entity,infinitely flexible, rippling with power.He was clad from waist tofluke in green-gold scales, his skin merging seamlessly into theirneat, scalloped rows.They were big as cup-rims across his bellyand hips, diminishing as his body tapered to overlapping disks nobigger than a fingernail.He raised his great fin for Merou’sinspection, and Merou took hold of it reverently, spreading out theflukes, showing Priddy the fine-made fan-like bones of theirconstruction.Everything was finished now, finished and complete.Asecond gap had opened painlessly in Priddy’s neck, and he wasbreathing water over the blue-green fronds of his gills.He touchedthe gap, touched his chest, held up one hand to see the perfectliving web between his fingers.Ran both those new-webbed handsdown his stomach, then lower.
Oh Christ.Where’s it gone?
Laughter like an underwater earthquake.Such laughter couldcause tsunamis.Priddy flipped his tail away, coiled it roundMerou’s in a deliciously scratchy clench.It’s not funny.Where’s my cock?
Tucked away behind your muscle walls, just where it shouldbe.
Show me.
Ah, you’ll learn to control it, like you’ll learn to keepyour gill-covers closed when you’re on land.You’ll learn how toswim faster than dolphins, so fast it feels like flying.You’lllearn to sing so loud and fine that whales in the Pacific will singback to you, and tell you when the whalers are coming, and we’llgather up all the mermen and maids from here to Wakayama and go andsmash holes in their boats.But I still didn’t mean to change you,my landling!I never meant to change Francis.I didn’tknow.
You didn’t change me.I was more than halfway there.I chosethis for myself, and I bet Francis did, too.Anything to be withyou.
Oh, God, I hope so.
Yes, anything.Apart from not having a cock.Showme!
Merou shook his head.Tenderly he reached down, made his handsinto fists and rubbed the knuckles up and down Priddy’s belly, justinside the hipbones.These muscles here.Pull them back, like curtains.
The sensation was awkward, a finesse of control like openinghis middle and ring fingers.Then it worked, and he grabbed forMerou’s shoulders in elation.Yes!
Yes.There you are.Here we are.
Priddy raised his mouth to meet his kiss.Merou gave him abreath, even though his blood was sparking with oxygen from hispulsating gills, and Priddy gave one back, understanding in thatmoment the ceremonial intimacy of the exchange, the ritual.I give you my body’s life.Merou drew them hip to hip, his belly opening, blossoming asPriddy’s had done.He wrapped a big, warm grip around Priddy’sbackside.
Theyspun through the shifting light, slow rotations about a sharedcentre, orbiting their own galactic heart.Priddy’s eyes wereclosed, his hair floating.His whole world was here and now, in thepress and push of Merou’s shaft against his own, his topside lifedrifting away.He was perfect and pure, and the sounds of a noisyplanet—an enormous splash, then a percussion, frantic, like a bigdog dropped in water and desperately trying to swim—meant nothingto him.
Shouldhave meant nothing.The throbbing sound faltered and stopped.Priddy drew Merou to a halt in the water, unaware of his own grace,how he balanced them both and held them motionless in the currentwith strong, sweeping beats of his tail.He opened his eyes.Abovethem, so small from this distance he could raise his hand and blotout the sight, a silver shape had breached the water.Colour workeddifferently down here: it was hard to make out the crimson of hercabin and nose.Nearer to hand, flashing closer every second,spinning with the leftover force of its momentum, a ripped-offrotor blade.
Landling in the water!Priddy couldmake out five of them, five orange-clad tadpoles way above.The SeaKing’s complement for a rescue like this—full-size vessel, crewunknown, not minor crises and social calls to Priddy in hislighthouse—was five plus the pilot.He waited, but couldn’t countsix.The rotor blade whirled past him, close enough to touch, andthe helicopter started to dive.
Merou seized his shoulders.Priddy!
Yes.What do I do?
Remember what I said—some lives and deaths are fixed pointsin time.You can’t save everyone.
How will I know?
Those ones will live or die in spite of you.And we’re notimmortal, or if we are, none of us has lived long enough to findout.We can drown in air.We’re not harpoon-proof.We get caught intuna nets and ships’ propellers, and it’s a rare landling who’llhave the courage and wit to carry us to water when we’re caught ina dry-land change.He cupped Priddy’sskull, drew him in and up for a kiss.His eyes were full ofpromises, all the ways he’d find to mend this broken moment overtime.Remember.
I will.You remember too.
***
Trewin,that good man, had gone down with his ship.He was still strappedinto the cockpit, his hand clenched round the joystick.Priddy knewnothing about how the Sea Kings worked, but he was willing to betthat hauled-back position was the best chance for a decent crashlanding—good enough, anyway, to keep the chopper wallowing untilthe crew escaped.His face was serene beneath his helmet, and hewas out cold.Priddy hung onto the framework of the torn-outcopilot’s door, then wriggled boldly inside.
Now thatthe craft had taken her plunge, she was heading down fast.Thatscared Priddy half to death, but he welcomed it too.The pressureon his lungs was altering something inside them, creating somethinghe needed, a kind of bright readiness, stars dancing round in hischest.He unfastened Trewin’s safety belt, pushed his strange,too-strong hands into his armpits, careful not to crush the fragilehuman bones.The front of the cabin was intact.Trewin’s legsweren’t caught.Priddy lifted him free, and the crippled aircraftdropped away beneath them, a toy and then a speck and then a memoryonly, gone.
Trewin was a family man, and not the kind who sprayed seedover an egg-clutch and left it at that.Priddy cradled him.Ifthere was life in the jumpsuit-clad body, it was guttering,flickering out.No, Priddy decided, and the stars in his chest danced faster.Hehad to get him to surface, but that wouldn’t be enough, no matterhow hard he flicked his magnificent tail.God, it was good, though,to slam down his fluke against the current!Priddy unleashed allhis power and shot towards topside, holding Trewin close.He pushedback Trewin’s helmet, which was in the way, and he pressed hismouth to the poor cold one.Priddybreathed.
Chapter Fourteen
“Stars,” Trewin said faintly, doing his best to swim.“Thatfelt like stars.”
“Didn’t hurt you, did I?”
“No, not at all.Just felt like stars.Did you kiss me?Sorry,I’m rambling.”Trewin got his head up long enough to look around.“Bloody hell, Jem Priddy—is that you?”
