The Adventure in Repaying a Debt

Chapter Seven

"The only way to get out of the cave is underwater. The hole in the wall letting in light is to small to climb through. Grab around my neck and hold your breath. It's about a 30 second swim," he said.

I reluctantly looked at the black liquid below, shuddering at the memory of the cold water soaking me to my bones and the slimy sand under my back when I was drowning. "Fine. But I need to be dry as soon as possible. Freezing water and humans don't mix well," I reminded him.

He nodded, and turned around. I slipped into the water and gasped at the cold, and reached my stiff arms up around his neck. He swam to the edge of the cave, "Ready?"

"Yes." I replied, taking in a huge breath. And with that, he ducked under the water and we shot through the tunnel like a bullet. It was hard to hold on, considering I could barely feel my arms and the drag of the water was pulling on my nightdress. This was decidedly taking longer than thirty seconds. Finally, when I thought I was about to succumb the cold and the lack of oxygen, we burst through the surface.

I immediately began to cough, "That was way longer than thirty seconds!"

"You slowed my down more than I expected, and I could tell you were about to let go. If I had swam at full speed you would have fallen off," he explained to me.

"Just get us somewhere dry, please." I coughed again, "I'm literally going to freeze to death."

He nodded, and began swimming towards some land I could see in the distance.

. . .

When we arrived at the small island, I pulled myself ashore and collapsed onto the dry sand. After lying there and breathing for a minute or two (and thanking God that I had made it safely) I stood up, and began wringing out my soaked nightdress. I was shivering uncontrollably, and began to purposefully shake my hands and feet, trying to bring some feeling back into them.

"What are you doing?"

"I told you," I huffed, "Humans and cold do not mix. I'm trying not to lose a finger due to frostbite." I continued to rub my hands. I could see the first glimpses of sunrise on the horizon, and thanked my lucky stars that the sun would be up soon. I decided that I should probably figure out what he wanted, so I could get back to my ship as soon as possible.

"So, tell me more about this predicament you're in. Why do you need to become human?" I inquired.

He was reclining on the sand, but now he sat up and turned to face me. He waited a couple moments before he began.

"I need to find my wife and daughter."

I froze at this. I had never considered the possibility that there were other merfolk. Of course, now that I had thought about it, it made sense, but at the time this baffled me.

He continued on with his tale, "We were captured, about half a year ago. It was my fault, I had warned her about the surface- I told her never to go near the top if she could see anything up there, but she was always a curious child. I- I wasn't paying attention one day, and she got too close. Ivanna and I managed to get to her, but not before she was already in their nets. We tried to free her! But we- we couldn't get her out of the ropes. Rather than let her be taken alone, we went with her," he paused for a short while, I could see the outline of his form shaking with grief.

"When they pulled us up onto deck, I immediately started fighting. So did Ivanna, but they restrained us. They separated us, keeping Ivanna and Coventine together, and dragging me to the opposite side of the ship. . . I could hear my little baby crying out for me, but I couldn't do anything to save her-" he said hopelessly. "I haven't seen them since."

"About a week or so later, they moved me to a different ship, just me. I managed to escape about a month later, but they didn't. There was no sign of them when I went back to any of our normal spots, and I haven't heard from them, neither has anyone else." he finished.

I waited a couple moments before responding. "Do you have any clue where they are? Or where they might have been heading?"

"They were from somewhere called Spain, and they weren't speaking this language, they were speaking something that was more flowing, less boxy than this." he said, "they rarely spoke this way on the ship."

"Could you say something in that language for me?"

He nodded, and proceeded to ask if I could understand him in rough Spanish. I told him yes (I was by no means fluent, but I could hold my own in a few different languages).

"Yes that is definitely Spanish. Though that doesn't necessarily mean they were from Spain. How do you know where they were headed?" I asked.

"They talked about it openly, I don't think they realized that I could somewhat understand them," he said.

"Fair enough," I stopped to think. "So they are headed to Spain, and that's all we know?"

"Pretty much. When I escaped, I accidentally ripped off part of a guards uniform, would that be helpful?" he suggested.

"Possibly. Where is it? could you bring it to me?"

He said he could, but he's have to go get it from wherever he stashed it, and it would be couple hours I told him that was fine and he swam off while I continued to explore the small island on which he had left me.

There proved to be nothing significant on this tiny oasis. It took me all of ten minutes to walk around it. There were beautiful palms and other foliage, none of which I noticed as edible, which was quite disappointing because I was beginning to get hungry. There was a small stream near the center, and I traced it's origin to a quaint spring. The water was cool to the touch, and I took a couple drinks from it to quench my thirst. I debated bathing in it, but decided against it considering that it was still quite cold as the sun was just starting to warm me up. I did end up washing out my wounds though, and since I was alone, I washed my nightdress as well and left it to dry on a branch.

I spent most of the morning reclining on a pleasantly warm rock, a bit like a lizard sunning itself I suppose, and thinking about the least trouble-inducing way we could get back to the ship. I also spent a considerable amount of time worrying about Rex, and hoping that he didn't encounter the vile men that attacked me.

Eventually I threw my slightly damp dress back on, and meandered my way back to the beach. While I was waiting for Damien to get back, I made a feeble attempt to untangle and braid my unruly hair. After several minutes I succeeded, and tied it back with a strip of cloth I ripped from the hem of my dress.

Around noon, I think, he returned and pulled himself up to the water's edge. I noticed he was holding several things, but the item he held out to me was the aforementioned piece of clothing from the guard. While I examined the piece of cloth, he placed the rest of his collection on the sand.

The piece he had given me was a crest of some kind, and after a few moments of contemplation, the realization hit me suddenly.

"This belongs to the royal guard of Spain."

"Is that a good thing or a bad thing?" he questioned.

"Well, it's bad because infiltrating the royal guard would be extremely difficult," I paused, "But good, because now we have an almost definite location."

"Which is?" he prompted.

"The Royal Palace." I scoffed, "You know I've always wanted to go to Madrid. I guess I'm finally getting the chance."

I'm back, surprise! Ya know my profile says updates every 6-7 days, and I have decided that is unrealistic. Sorry guys, not gonna update that often, but I swear I will keep updating. Slowly. Lot's of stuff has happened. Life has been a whirlwind lately, and I have no excuse. 

Sorry again. Please feel free to correct any spelling or grammar mistakes.

Till next time my chickadees

~M.