She rushes past us, darting down the path towards the beach.
“Kill her, and I’ll take you home,” Delia shouts. Why does her voice have an echo?
Now, there’s an offer we can’t ignore. The command snaps into the magic and the curse, and suddenly, I know that whatever chance Mei had, it’s gone.
We will hunt her dead, even if we fight our own natures the whole way. We have no choice.
We rush down to the beach where she evades us at every turn. She is too quick, too agile. She’s used to trying to survive. Her desperate, angry snarls get louder and more pissed off the more we try to trap her.
Ronit steps back into the water.
“No, don’t!” I shout at him. “Please. We don’t have to do this!”
“We do!” Ronit says calmly. “It’s who we are.”
“What do you want?” Mei screams.
Ronit starts to sing. Brio’s song gets quieter, which is just as threatening. Reed and Canto join in.
A spray of salty water hits her in the face, but she holds her ground, refusing to back down. This doesn’t feel right. This feels wrong. Why was she so hurt to be called an animal? Why doesn’t any of this make sense?
“What do you want?” she whispers again. I suddenly realise that she’s not speaking our language. Only I can understand her, and I don’t know how I can.
Come,he sings.Come to me.
“So you can drown me?” she barks a laugh. “No.”
He demands it louder, and we join him. I join in. Our voices in the ocean’s waves, in the spray, in the very air. I’m caught by one of the hundred foot waves and lifted high into the sky.
She stands on the beach, tiny, resisting us, fighting our call. Impossible.
“I want to live!” she screams, and the world gets hot and blistering.
I lift, flicking my tail, driving myself through the water, throwing myself back towards the beach as I see Delia racing towards Mei. She’s got a long knife in her hands. I don’t know which of them I’m trying to stop, only that I need to get to them.
My song shrieks a warning.
Mei doesn’t hear; she’s screaming. Like something is ripping her apart inside. I want to cry the tears that she can’t. I want to fix it.
What is happening to me?
Why does it hurt?
Why am I hurting?
She saved me.
Delia is our mate. She can save us.
No, I need to save Mei.
I watch as the Fae grabs Mei by the hair, yanking her head back. It’s too quick, too practiced. Wait, why is Delia flickering? What is that? A chalk-white face with a smile too large flickers, there and gone.
The knife slides into Mei, piercing through her body and coming out the other side. Not a knife, talons.
Or is it a knife?
The world stands still; the waves seem to freeze, and then everything ignites with a fiery blast that hits my face, burning my skin.
