Chapter Text
Dennis had a favorite rock that he liked to hide behind while he watched the human man row his little boat. It allowed him the best view while remaining out of sight.
Sometimes, the human man rowed leisurely, more motivated to take in the horizon and float aimlessly. Other times he rowed like a man possessed, a monster on his tail that only he could see, grunting and hissing with the effort. He’d row disrobed of his upper garments, the sun gleaming over sweat-slicked skin and gently browning his shoulders as the weeks passed.
Dennis wondered what sweat felt like on the skin.
He wondered if his skin would be warm to the touch, like the sun-bleached rocks he clung to.
When the man deemed his crazed exercise completed, he’d lean over his knees, chest heaving with deep gulps of air. He’d pass a hand across his beard, rake it through his hair.
Dennis glanced at his webbed hands, wondering what it felt like to feel the strands of hair between fingers.
Then, the man sometimes lay back in the little boat, a cap covering his face from the relentless sun as he dozed quietly. Dennis had watched him remain motionless for lengths of time. Other times, he would row back to the dock right away.
On this day, he lay back in the boat. The sun was already headed toward the horizon, so the light was not as strong. That meant the man would doze longer, remain longer.
On this day, Dennis grew brave.
He pushed away from his rock and swam beneath the surface toward the boat. His hands followed the curved side of the wood as he surfaced. His heart pounded. This was the closest he’d ever been to the human.
Dennis gripped the edge of the boat, wanting to pull himself up to get a better view of him. When he hoisted himself, the boat tipped under the unevenly distributed weight. Dennis’s pulse raced as he scrambled, unbalanced, on the edge. He bit down on the yelp of surprise, hoping he hadn’t woken the man.
Despite the jostling, the man only moaned sleepily. Dennis got his elbows on the edge of the boat, and he studied the man before him.
The cap covered his face, but he had a full view of his body. Broad shoulders, sun-kissed, led down to muscled arms. The rowing exercises were to thank for that. Big hands, wide palms, resting together on his abdomen.
His chest, his abdomen, were just as well muscled, and dusted with dark hair, collecting into a thin trail beneath the low-slung edge of his trousers. Dennis cocked his head, wondering where the hair went.
He reached out one of his webbed hands, hovering above the man’s hand, studying the differences.
Big hand, formidable knuckles, blunt nails. Dennis’s looked fragile and delicate in comparison. Made to carve and glide through the water, his own arms lithe and lean-muscled.
Dennis glanced at the cap again. Very carefully, very slowly, he pinched the fabric, lifting it away from his face.
The man’s beard covered his jaw from ear to ear. And up close–Dennis grinned–grey streaked through the black.
His gaze moved over a strong nose, a lightly weathered face, neatly cropped hair mussed slightly from the exercise. Lines in his forehead, sprouting like sun rays from the corners of his eyes. This was a man of wizened years.
The man’s brows twitched together, and he made a low sound. Dennis froze, part in fear, part in wonder, as the man blinked open dark eyes, staring first at the sky, growing more orange with the sunset. Then those eyes shifted and met Dennis’s.
Dennis gasped and belatedly realized his hand was still stretched over his face. He jerked his hand back and ducked below the edge of the boat, dropping into the water.
Dennis smoothed back his hair that had billowed around him.
The boat shifted and he could hear the man scrambling upright.
“Hello?” He called.
Dennis didn’t know why he was holding his breath, he couldn’t hear him under the water.
“Hello?” He called again. “Are you still there?”
Dennis, and all merfolk, were taught since they were younglings not to engage with humans. But he had been watching this human for some time. He always came out onto the water alone. Rarely, another human man accompanied him to the shore, only to watch him push the boat onto the water, then he would shake his head and climb the sand dunes back up to the stone fortress that rose high along the border of the beach.
The man never fished, swam, or talked aloud to himself. When he stared at the horizon, he seemed elsewhere in his mind. He seemed lonely.
So Dennis gathered all his courage once more and slowly broke the surface, breaching just enough that the water lapped against his lips.
The man stopped, staring down at him. Was he shocked by what he saw? Dennis’s wide, large eyes and pale skin tinged seawater blue were very different from humans.
The man pushed his fingers through his hair, his mouth falling open.
“Hello,” he said. That big hand reached toward Dennis and he flinched. The man pulled his hand back, “It’s alright. I won’t hurt you.”
Dennis had never heard his voice before. It was low, deep, and rumbled with a gravel that reverberated through Dennis’s chest and made his tail flicker.
He sat back on the boat’s bench, hands on his thighs. “See? I won’t touch.”
For a moment neither said anything more. There was only the sound of the water lapping against the hull.
Then he placed his hand on his chest and said, “Robby.”
Dennis lifted himself a little higher out of the water. He was finally learning the human’s name after all this time. The man must have thought he didn’t understand him. He repeated, patting his chest, “Robby.”
Dennis echoed, “Ro-bee.”
He laughed, his smile making those sun rays deepen by his eyes. “Yes, that’s right. My name is Robby.” He pointed his hand at Dennis. “You?”
Dennis grinned, “Robby!”
“No,” he said, smiling still. “Me, Robby. You…?”
Dennis felt like laughing from embarrassment. Of course he didn’t mean for him to repeat his name. He was looking for Dennis to tell him his name.
Dennis did the same thing, he put his webbed hand to his chest and said, “Oh, my name is Dennis.” He blinked a little in surprise at what his name sounded like above water.
Robby’s mouth hung open, and he scratched the back of his head. “Wow, you can… speak well. I feel a little foolish now.”
Dennis furrowed his brow. “Why foolish?”
“Because I guess I assumed–” he stopped and shook his head. “This is surreal. You shouldn’t exist.”
Dennis pouted, confused. “I exist.”
“I know… I know that now. But merfolk have been a legend for centuries. No human has met one.”
Shyly, Dennis told him, “We are told not to come to the surface. We are told that humans will harm us.”
Now Robby furrowed his brow. “I won’t pretend that there are humans who wouldn’t take advantage of your species. But I won’t harm you. I give you my word.”
Dennis perked up. “You will give me a word?”
He chuckled. “I give you a promise, I mean. I promise I will never mistreat you.”
“Like… friends?”
Robby smiled. “We can be friends.” He looked to the setting sun and pulled his loose, white shirt over his head. Dennis watched the way the fabric billowed and settled over his chest, the open placket framing the dip between his collarbones and the brief glint of gold hung around his neck. “I have to go back.”
Dennis knew he would have to at some point. He shouldn’t feel disappointed. “You come here often,” he said, more to reassure himself. “I will see you again.”
“I would like that, Dennis.”
Dennis hid a giddy smile under the water. He liked the way his name sounded from Robby’s mouth.
“Would you like me to bring you anything?”
His curiosity piqued, Dennis said, “Bring me something you love. I want to know about Robby.”
Robby watched him, his smile sobered slightly like he was trying to puzzle him out. “Okay. I will.”
Robby took the oars in hand but did not row. Dennis smiled and waved, diving back down with a flourish to the depths, where the luminescence of his brother’s kingdom was tucked in the trench below the coral reef.
He sought out Trinity. There was much to tell her.
.
.
Robby climbed the dune back to the castle with an urgency, sparks leaping under his skin. He couldn’t stop himself from glancing back to the water every few steps, wondering if that had really happened. A merman. They were real, not fiction.
But as he approached the outer bailey and Jack fell into step beside him, as was their routine, he had to shake off the shock and wonder and assume a mask of calm control again.
“My king,” Jack said under his breath. Nobody else dared talk to him so caustically. A result of them having grown up together. “You spent longer than usual.”
Robby grunted. “So I did.”
“Any revelations?”
None that he would share. “Just that the sunset is beautiful.”
“Can’t fault you there.”
Robby turned to him. “Something you’d like to tell me, Captain?”
A smirk wormed at the corner of his mouth. “There’s a laundry list of things I’d like to tell you. But nothing that would be particularly productive at this moment.”
Robby stared at him, trying not to laugh back. “Alright then.”
Guards trailed them through the bailey into the central keep where Robby met the second thorn in his side.
“Robinavitch,” Dana, his Lady Chamberlain, greeted with an unamused glint to her eye. The only other person who could address him so casually by name without reprimand. “You’re late.”
“Whatever it is, I’ll deal with it,” he said.
“It is the Al-Hashimi delegation.”
Robby paused, having forgotten all about them.
Dana huffed. “You’ll have to review the correspondence during dinner. No complaints, it’s your own fault.”
He scrubbed a hand over his face. “I know. Fine.”
The Al-Hashimis were the last thing on his mind at the moment, though it really should have been closer to the front. It was a month before the delegation arrived. Three months until his betrothal would be arranged to Emira Baran.
A marriage he had no interest in, only pressed upon him by his royal council.
“Send the documents with my meal,” he told Dana. “I’ve got something I need to do.”
He didn’t wait for her response. Robby left them in the entrance hall, taking the stairs two and a time toward his quarters.
He had to think of something to bring Dennis. Something he loved.
.
.
Dana slanted Jack a look. Jack shrugged back at her.
“What’s with him?” She asked.
“Don’t know. It’s like there’s a fire under his ass.”
She chuckled. “Not that I’m complaining. Better than watching him haunt this place like a sad ghost.”
Jack glared after him as Robby bounded the stairs. He was distracted. Jumpy. Only in the way that Jack could tell. Robby’s eyes darted, like he was waiting for everyone to shut up so he could go do his secret little errand.
Jack hummed. “I’m not so sure this is a good thing.”
She cocked an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”
Carefully, he said, “I’ve seen this before, in soldiers. One moment, they’re weighed down with the heaviness of death and destruction, and then the next day… it’s like they’re suddenly happy, lighter, fixed. And that’s when life is snatched from them.”
Dana’s glare softened. “Captain Abbot…”
“It’s come for me, too. That’s why I recognize it.” His leg throbbed at the point of amputation. “Keep an eye on him, Dana.”
“You do the same, then.”
Despite the fact that he and Robby grew up together, Robby was king. There was no way around that. Jack worked his ass off, and lost a leg, to become his Captain of the Guard. He was Robby’s closest confidante but that didn’t mean Robby told him everything. Far from it. But Jack had known him so long that sometimes he was at a loss for how to approach him. It was the only thing in his life he was hesitant about, and now that Robby was starting to really worry him the discomfort with it churned his stomach.
He just hoped sincerely that he was wrong.
.
.
Robby laughed as he counterbalanced the faering. The merman hoisted himself from the water and landed with an inelegant sprawl inside the boat. He made a soft oof and scrambled for purchase against the smooth, curved walls.
Finally, he flipped himself around, laying back against the wall, casting Robby an embarrassed smile, hidden behind the long, stringy strands of wet hair, the color of wet sand. He wanted to comb his hair back, but Robby was careful not to touch him yet. He still shied from physical contact.
“This boat moves a lot,” he said.
“You learn balance,” Robby told him, smiling.
The merman’s long tail hung over the edge of the boat, diaphanous fins swirling in the water.
“Did you bring me something, Robby?” He asked with big, bright eyes. Those eyes were almost inhuman. Big and blue and puppy-like.
Robby cleared his throat.
“I did,” he said, reaching into his satchel.
Dennis straightened and his smile widened, pointed incisors flashing, when Robby showed him the wood-carved horse. His delicate hands reached out for it and Robby let him hold it.
When Dennis assigned him to bring him something he loved, he hadn’t really thought about it until he was in his chambers, standing in the middle of the room, at a loss as to what to bring.
Something you love.
His quarters were full of things. Things he inherited. Things he kept out of necessity. But Robby looked around and he frowned at the realization that he didn’t have any objects that meant love.
How did one bring the concept of kingship? Or the intangible feeling of purpose?
But then it made him wonder if being king meant something like love. He had a complicated relationship with himself and his own purpose.
He spent the rest of the evening thinking about his assignment.
Had anyone in his life asked him what he loved? What he even liked? How was he to distill it into a physical manifestation?
The next day, he kept the thought in the back of his mind as he worked, business as usual. And when he stopped by the stables to visit his mare, it came to him as he stroked her snout.
He smiled, returning to the castle to find the wooden carving he kept in his private bedchamber. Resting on a shelf was the carving he’d whittled himself some years ago. This was easy enough.
He watched Dennis turn the horse around in his webbed hands, stroking it like it was the most precious gold.
“My horse,” he told him. “Her name is Bonnie.”
Dennis looked at him. “What is a horse?”
Robby didn’t think he’d ever get used to having to explain simple concepts. “They’re animals. We use them as transportation.”
Dennis frowned. “They are servants?”
He scratched his temple. “Ah, in a way. They’re well taken care of. My Bonnie, she has been mine for many years. She’s the steadiest thing in my life.”
Dennis’s big eyes blinked at him. “You do not have steady humans?”
Robby swallowed. He could hear his voice going neutral. The calm he spoke with when someone was digging where they shouldn’t. But Dennis wasn’t at fault for prying. There was no ulterior motive. At least, he was sure there wasn’t. “I have people I care for, and people that are in my care. But people also come and go, whether we like it or not.”
“It’s the same for us,” he said, his voice soft. “Folk come and go, but it’s not for us to lament their departure. The waters reunite us in the end.”
Robby’s chest tightened at his gentle conviction. This young merman he knew nothing about had a stronger philosophy on life than Robby did in all his fifty years.
“Who are you?” He found himself asking. “Where do you come from?”
Dennis stared hard at the horse, avoiding his gaze. “I am merfolk. That is all.”
Easy, Robby, he told himself. All in time.
He tried another angle. “Alright, then what do you do?”
Dennis looked at him again, tilting his head. “What I do?”
Robby shrugged. “Do you have a role in your community? Are you an important person?”
Dennis froze again, but he didn’t retreat. “Important? No. Not that. I… I have some experience with healing.”
Robby’s chest inflated with a delighted eagerness. “Healing? I have knowledge of medical practices too.”
Dennis’s eyes shone. “You are a healer?”
He chuckled nervously. “Not by trade. I– well, I have an interest in it. My– this kingdom invests in expanding medical services and research.”
“I would love to learn human medicine!”
Robby’s brain swirled with ideas. “Studying your techniques alongside ours would be an invaluable resource. Imagine what we could learn about the species, compare biology, eventually create new medicines…”
Dennis shifted, and when Robby came back to himself he saw a worried look on the merman’s face.
“What’s wrong?” He asked him.
“Robby, how would this happen? Humans cannot know of merfolk. It’s dangerous.”
He took a deep lungful of salty air. “I’m sorry. I got carried away. Of course, it’s a complicated thing.”
“I won’t have my people hunted.”
“Dennis.” He spoke softly. Big, round eyes met his. “I have promised you that no harm will come to you. I give you my word that nothing will happen to your people either.” He held out his hand. “Can you trust me?”
He had known this merman two days. His question sounded ludicrous even to himself. Why should this merman trust him, a human man? Robby knew perfectly well how harmful humans could be. Evidently, so did the merfolk.
But the merman giving him assessing looks slowly put his hand in Robby’s, palm to palm. Robby quietly marveled at the cool temperature, the smooth skin and silky webbing.
“I trust Robby.”
He laughed incredulously. “I’m glad that you do.”
“I have to go now.”
He prepared to dive back into the water. Robby jolted up. “Wait!”
Dennis watched him.
“How do you know when I come out to the water?”
Was Robby imagining things or did his blue-tinged cheeks deepen in color?
“I just do,” he said, waving awkwardly and sending the boat rocking as he disappeared under the water with a flash of sparkling tail.
Robby sat by himself in the boat as it evened out. He laughed to the cloudless sky.
.
.
Days turned into weeks. Dennis swam to the surface to see Robby two or three times a week.
He had asked him how he knew when Robby was on the water. He’d been too embarrassed to tell him that ever since he first discovered him months ago, Dennis came to the surface every day at midday, when Robby normally took his boat out, hoping to see him.
Dennis was keeping many secrets from him. Mostly about his family and his kingdom. Robby always tried asking about who Dennis was, and Dennis found that distracting him with a question about medicine usually worked.
Sometimes Robby wouldn’t say much, but he would bring a pad of paper and sticks of graphite and charcoal to sketch. He remembered holding the stick of charcoal for the first time, asking about it.
“Burnt?”
Robby nodded. “From fire.”
Dennis examined his blackened fingertips. “What is fire?”
Robby chuckled. “I guess you wouldn’t know…”
The next time Dennis saw him, Robby had set up a whole tray of wood shavings and spongey kindling. Dennis watched, rapt, as Robby used flint to make fire. When it caught on the kindling and grew into a ball of orange flame lashing into the air, Dennis sucked in a breath and reached out to touch it.
“Dennis, no!–”
A brief searing pain, like the steaming hot deep sea vents, singed his fingertips.
He jerked his hand back on a hiss.
Robby smothered the small flame and set the tray aside. “I figured this would happen. I came prepared.”
Dennis watched Robby procure a jar of slime from his satchel.
“What is that?”
“It’s a healing ointment for burns.”
Dennis leaned over the jar to sniff it. The horrid smell made him scrunch his face. He said, “I don’t need that. Watch.”
He scooped seawater into his cupped palm, and activated it. It glowed, like it was crystalline. Then he poured the water over his burned fingertips. The burns faded, and he smiled at Robby.
Robby’s jaw hung open. “You did that.”
He nodded, happy.
“You… heal with magic?”
Dennis bit his lip. “I suppose you could say that. We don’t call it magic. Magic is something else. This is… just the innate ability of my clan.”
Robby was staring at him, and for a moment he was elsewhere. Then he said, “Dennis. You must not do that in front of any other humans.”
“I don’t know other humans. Only Robby.”
He shook his head. “I know. But just in case I’m not the only human you ever meet. Many people are kind, but many are also greedy and selfish. If they were to discover you and what you can do… you could be hurt.”
Dennis held his hand out, trying to understand. “But you promised no one would hurt me.”
Robby’s palm slid against his, his warm, calloused fingers wrapping around Dennis’s hand. “Yes, I did. And I always will to the best of my ability. That doesn’t mean other people are trustworthy.”
Dennis understood him. Humans were similar to merfolk, then. Dennis knew countless good folk. His clan especially was always a peaceful clan, being healers. But there were other clans spread over the sea floor who were more selfish, or isolated, or warlike. He knew what they were like, after all Trinity had come from one of those clans.
In any case, Dennis was ready to trust Robby and only Robby. He brought Dennis medical texts and taught him about human bodies. He taught him about human medicine, herbs and remedies and surgical procedures that human doctors were developing. He also brought other books to teach him other aspects of human life. Plants and animals and laws and customs. Dennis absorbed it all.
He thought these days with Robby would go on indefinitely. He didn’t think of them ending. Not until the day Robby sat quietly in the boat while Dennis drew pictures with the stick of charcoal. He glanced up at Robby and his gaze was unfocused, staring at the water. Robby’s skin, normally tan and a little pink where the sun touched it, was dark under his eyes. He looked tired, and his silence was not his usual kind of silence. It sent Dennis’s stomach churning.
“Robby?”
He didn’t seem to hear him at first. Robby stared, unblinking.
Dennis wanted to touch those dark circles under his eyes and heal them somehow. But his position at the other end of the boat made it hard to move without disturbing the boat.
Finally, Robby blinked and looked at him. He smiled, sadly. “I have a gift for you,” he said, his voice rough.
Dennis usually loved his gifts. But he wasn’t so sure now.
Robby reached to the back of his neck and unclasped a chain. He wore the necklace under his shirts, and when he would sunbathe shirtless, Dennis would watch it glint and catch the light.
“Here,” he said. “I want you to have this.”
Robby moved in the boat to crouch in front of him. Dennis would have been ecstatic that Robby was so close, but his happiness was dampened.
Robby slid his hands behind Dennis’s neck and clasped the chain. Dennis held the pendant in his palm, small and star-like, the edges pointy.
Robby’s face was level with his. “I’m sorry you cannot experience life on land. You’ve taught yourself so many new things. If you were human, you’d make an exceptional doctor.”
Dennis searched his eyes for the deeper meaning he wasn’t grasping. “You taught me.”
”I suppose so,” he murmured. And then he smiled wider and shuffled back to his side of the boat. “And, well, if I don’t come back, you can keep this boat. Use it, even if I’m not here.”
Dennis’s mouth dropped open, but he had no idea what to say.
So he panicked.
“Thank you,” he mumbled, pushing the paper and charcoal back to Robby. “I… have to go now.”
”Take care,” Robby said, giving him a gentle smile as Dennis slid over the edge of the boat.
That smile was imprinted in his memory as he swam, fast, back down to the palace. The guard nodded at him as he passed, but he was too focused on finding Trinity to acknowledge them.
If she wasn’t in her quarters she would be doing her daily training exercises. Dennis found her in the training hall.
She had an anchor tied to her tail, and she was counting off chin-ups at the bar.
He moved in close so that the few other soldiers wouldn’t hear him.
“Trinity, can we talk?”
”Talk,” she commanded.
“I mean, in private?”
She narrowed her eyes, but she had been his trusted friend too long not to take him seriously. It was why, even though he may have resented their predicament, he appreciated that Trinity would be with him through it all.
She unhooked the anchor and followed him back to his quarters. Trinity’s quarters were in the adjacent wing of the palace, reserved for guests. She technically was more than a guest, but her position was too precarious at the moment to warrant rooms in the family wing.
When they were alone, she crossed her arms. Her forearms were covered in vambraces bearing the symbols of her clan. On the insides she wore two shark-tooth knives.
Her eyes scanned him, and then she said, “Did he give you that necklace?”
His hand closed around it, his thumb pressing into one of the points. He swallowed. “Yes.”
”Then why do you look afraid?”
Maybe he was imagining things. Maybe it wasn’t so serious. But Dennis’s hunches always turned out to be something.
He said, “It feels weird. Something doesn’t feel right.”
She rolled her eyes. “What? Is he catching onto your little crush?”
He ignored the way his face heated. “Trinity, no. He gave me his necklace. And then he said that if he doesn’t come back, I can have his boat.”
She stared at him, silently urging him to say more.
“He looked so sad today. Like he really wouldn’t come back.”
She shrugged. “So what? He’s a human. Did you think he was going to meet you on the water forever? I told you that seeing him was a bad idea. Now he’s going to hurt your feelings because–”
”If he couldn’t come back to the water, he’d tell me,” he snapped. Trinity raised her brows but didn’t bite back at him. Instantly, he felt bad, but lowered his voice to continue, “I believe that. He’d tell me. This was like… a permanent goodbye. It doesn’t feel right.”
Trinity sighed. In a rare moment of compassion, she put her hands on his shoulders, squeezing lightly. “Dennis. This isn’t like your normal hunches. He’s a human. It’s a miracle he hasn’t harmed you yet.”
He glared. “Robby would never hurt me. He promised.”
”I’m sorry if I don’t take the word of a human I’ve never met very seriously.”
Dennis’s blood thrummed. Maybe this idea would change Robby’s fate that he was afraid of voicing out loud, lest it bring itself to fruition. “Then come meet him, the next time. You’ll see.”
”Take this as a sign, Dennis. It’s time to stop these secret meetings. I can only lie to your brothers so many times before they stop trusting me.”
”I never asked you to lie to them for me.”
“I would rather lie to them than watch them use you.”
He blinked, watching discomfort roll across her face as she admitted to feelings–only the second time she had done so in their lifelong friendship.
”They’re not using me,” he whispered, hating how unsure he sounded.
”Because they’re your brothers? Because they love you? Trust me, Dennis. Those who claim they love you are the first to use you. I know you’re not as blind as that.”
”You’ve never used me.”
She snapped her jaw shut, sending him a warning glare. He couldn’t help the small smile that broke on his face. “Of course I’m using you, dummy,” she muttered. “I’m marrying you, aren’t I?”
They were both well aware that it wasn’t the same thing, so he didn’t need to say anything aloud. Trinity may have agreed to marry him for her own purposes, but she had also always stood up for him all their lives. She was the first to protect him, lie for him, especially from his own family. Was she using him? Or was Dennis using her?
”Forget about the human,” she said, her voice strong once again. “You should be focused on saving yourself. Not him.”
As usual, Trinity’s advice was sound. He should stop seeing the human. Nothing could come of it. He could never be human, and Robby could never be merfolk. Dennis wouldn’t be able to go to the surface so often forever. His brothers had pressed upon him the importance of his rare powers since he was a youngling. His role was set in stone, no matter how much Dennis wished otherwise.
But the tingles down his spine told him that something bad would happen. He liked Robby. He didn’t want anything to happen to him. So Dennis slept fitfully that night. In his dreams he saw Robby’s face, bloodless and cold. And no matter how much Dennis tried to heal him he wouldn’t come back.
When he woke, Dennis knew Robby wouldn’t take his boat out again until the next day, or the day after that. But the unease swirling in his gut never abated. He needed to go to the surface. Even if Robby wasn’t there, he needed to see the boat tied to the small dock. He needed to see the sheer face of the castle that rose up from the beach, knowing that Robby was somewhere safe inside it. He still didn’t even know what Robby did in the castle.
Dennis made up his mind. He would go to the surface. Just to see.
His brothers wouldn’t be looking for him yet. He had time to go up.
“Dennis?” Trinity called as he swam out of the private wing. He grit his teeth and ignored her. He should have known she would follow him. “Dennis!”
She’d always been the faster swimmer.
She caught his arm. “Where are you going?”
”Nowhere.”
”You’re going to see him.”
He dragged her out of the courtyard. “Not where the guards can hear.”
”I told you to stop–”
”Trinity, I have to see. I’ve had a bad feeling about this since yesterday and I had nightmares that he was–”
”That he was what?”
He pulled his arm out of her grasp. “Just let me do this. You can even tell my brothers. I don’t care.”
She grabbed him again. Her eyes big and uncertain.
He changed tactics. “Or, you can come with me. See that there’s no danger. And if he’s there, you can meet him.”
Trinity worked her jaw, her mind processing the choices. “Fine. I will go with you. Not for your human. But because I worry about you.”
He gripped her hand and tugged her along. They swam through the palace, taking turns through the village to avoid the guard. They swam past the gates, up toward the reef, and surfaced by his favorite spying rock.
“I don’t see anything,” Trinity said, looking around.
Dennis peered between rocks, finding the little dock. And movement.
“Look,” he said, pointing, “There’s Robby.”
He smiled, his body sagging with relief that Robby was okay. He was taking the boat out. Maybe he wanted to talk to him.
But then Robby crouched and hauled a huge rock into his arms. It was half as big as his torso. And it looked heavy. Robby dropped it into the boat and unmoored, rowing toward open water.
“What is he doing with the rock?” Dennis asked aloud.
”How am I supposed to know?” Trinity retorted.
They watched Robby row. Normally, Dennis would hail him and swim to the boat. But he was frozen to the rock, watching with the uncomfortable tingling in his spine again.
Robby stopped rowing and bent over to do something below the edge of the boat that Dennis couldn’t see. Then, he stood, the rock balanced in his arms.
Even Trinity’s voice was incredulous when she said, “What is he…?”
Robby stepped over the edge of the boat, landing in the water. With the rock. And Dennis had seen the rope that was tied to his ankle.
For a moment, Dennis stared at the boat as it resettled, his mouth open, his brain stalling out.
”Dennis!” Trinity snapped him out of it. She jerked him down under the water. In the distance they saw the rock dragging Robby down. His air burst out of him in a riot of bubbles.
Dennis and Trinity raced to him. He wore only trousers and his billowing white shirt. Dennis knew Robby couldn’t see them in the water, he had told him once that humans couldn’t see underwater. But he grabbed him anyway, looped his arms around his chest from behind and tried to swim upward with him. The rock was too heavy, it was dragging Dennis with him. Trinity tried to help by pulling on Robby’s arm.
“It’s too heavy,” she grunted.
“We need to get the rope off him!”
“There’s a metal lock. Secured too tightly to loosen him from it.” Trinity tried prying at the metal, but then she gasped, “Wait!”
She pulled one of the knives from her vambrace and sawed at the rope connected to the rock. When it finally snapped, Robby stopped sinking, but pulling him to the surface wasn’t easy.
“He’s stopped moving,” Dennis said, panic lacing his voice. “He needs air to breathe!”
”This cloth is dragging,” Trinity said, and took her knife to the shirt, tearing it up the middle. They wrangled Robby out of the shirt, leaving it behind as they pulled him to the surface.
The waves splashed at Robby’s face as Dennis tried to see if he would open his eyes. He held him in his arms, his face up to the sky.
”Robby!” He cried.
”What’s supposed to happen?” Trinity asked.
”I don’t know.” They needed to get him out of the water. “Help me bring him to shore.”
Trinity grumbled but with both their arms hooked around him, they let the waves push them to shore.
When it was too shallow to swim anymore, they rolled onto the sand, working together to pull him up to a safer distance from the lapping water.
”Why is he so big?” Trinity complained.
They were out of their element here. Dennis lay on the sand, braced on his forearms, staring down into Robby’s face. Bloodless and cold.
He touched his cheek, his beard. “Robby.”
”He swallowed a lot of water,” Trinity said. “Can you remove it?”
Yes, he could heal him.
Dennis held his palm over the center of his chest and found the pulse of the water in his body. He activated it and guided it out. It dribbled out of his mouth, but he still didn’t wake.
“Robby,” he said again, wishing he could heal him with willpower alone.
And as if his wish came true, Robby gasped. His chest jerking, filling with air. His face slowly regained color. His eyes still closed, too weak to open.
“Dennis!” Trinity’s voice was now bright with fear. He glanced to her and she was already dragging herself to the water, her eyes up the bank.
He looked to the dirt road that led to the castle. A single man in brown leather clothes stood in the road, staring at them on the beach.
”Hey!” He yelled, his voice carried on the wind.
”Dennis, we have to go, now!”
The man broke into a run toward them, and as he neared them Dennis saw something like despair in his eyes. It was why Dennis didn’t retreat right away.
“Dennis!”
Trinity was already enveloped in the water. Dennis finally found the strength to follow. He pulled the water up around his body, let it carry him back to the ocean.
“Wait!” The man yelled. He dropped to his knees at Robby’s side, his hands cradling him with care. He stared after Dennis, the wind tearing at his silvering hair. ”Did you save him?”
Dennis should have ignored him and gone. Just swam away. Robby was safe now. But his eyes locked with the man, a merman and a human who both cared about Robby, and he nodded his head.
His chest heaved with panting breaths. He held Dennis’s gaze, and his flicked down to the necklace Dennis wore. Robby’s necklace. “Thank you.”
Dennis nodded once more, and then he turned and dove back into the water. Trinity met him at the edge of the reef.
”Dennis, you are a reckless idiot! We got him to the beach, that was enough, but you almost got caught by the other human! He probably thought we hurt him!”
”He didn’t,” Dennis said, his mind still reeling from what happened. “He thanked me.”
Trinity grasped her hair by the roots. “Why do you have to believe the best in people all the time? We don’t know them. We shouldn’t have interfered.”
Dennis turned on her, his rare anger bursting like the belch of a volcanic vent. “Robby would be dead otherwise. We saved his life. And I would do it again, with or without you.”
She glared, but her voice was soft. Deceptively so. “You love him.”
He wasn’t entirely sure what he felt, but he wouldn’t lie. So he said nothing.
”You cannot see him anymore,” she said, her eyes big, pleading.
The uncomfortable tingle in his spine dissipated as Dennis made up his mind. It was the first thing in years that he was certain of.
He calmed his voice and told her, “He needs me. And I am going to go to him.”
She scoffed. “Go to him? How?”
Trinity would hate him for what he was about to say. Really, he shouldn’t have told her at all. He should have kept his plan to himself. Trinity had no obligation to Robby.
He said, “The Shark.”
At first, she only blinked at him. Slowly, he watched the disbelief and horror darken her eyes.
She grabbed his wrist, as if he were at risk of going there right at that moment. “You can’t go to The Shark.”
”I have to.”
”Dennis. He always takes something. Your brother is king. You are in line for the throne. What he wants may be too much.”
”I don’t know what he’ll want. I’ll find out when he tells me.”
She shook her head. “I can’t let you go.”
Did she hear her own voice shaking? Trinity did not admit to feelings ever in her life. Dennis had learned to read her over their years of friendship. He knew when she was stubborn, and he knew when she was afraid.
Dennis took both of her hands in his. “Trinity. Come with me.”
Her eyes widened. “What?”
”You agreed to marry me to protect me from my family–”
She shook her head.
”You did,” he said, firmly. “And I agreed to marry you to save you from going back to your clan.”
She scoffed and rolled her eyes, but there was no resentment in it.
“But you don’t want to marry me. We both know if things were different, we’d be out there living on our own terms. So let’s do it. On land. We’d be away from my family and yours. Nobody can stop us up there. And…” he offered her a small smile. “I would like it if you came with me.”
”Dennis…” she whispered.
”Besides. You’re the smart one between us.” He chuckled. “Someone’s got to keep me out of trouble.”
Her big eyes darted between his for a few silent moments. And then she yanked him forward into an embrace. A tight squeeze that was over almost as soon as it began.
“If I don’t like The Shark’s deal, we are leaving,” she said.
Dennis smiled.
They had a sea witch to find.