Cursing the Punished

Kalani

As I slipped backwards off the cliff, time seemed to slow down to a crawl. My life flashed before my eyes. I saw myself, cowering in front of a hideous monster, every day for 3 years. Blinking back to reality, I clutched my necklace given to me by Serein. When she saved me from those monsters in my past.

It was a beautiful piece of work, a silver chain with a moonstone on the end, shaped like a teardrop. Rubbing it with my fingers, I braced myself to hit the water, and break every bone in my body. 3...2....1...

I felt such immense pain that I passed out. Or maybe I died, I'll never know. My broken body sank towards the bottom of the river. Faintly, though I was unconscious, I could hear my friends screaming hundreds of feet above me.

Groaning, I opened my eyes a bit. Everything was blurry. Suddenly, I felt choked as something tightened around my neck and began to pull me through the dark waters, down and down, deeper than any river should go. I clawed weakly at my throat, but my fingers caught on not a hand, but a silver chain.

My necklace? I opened my eyes all the way but couldn't make out anything. How was I still alive? I should be dead after that fall. Slowly, I began to move my hand towards my throat, but screamed in pain. Underwater it just caused more bubbles to escape from my mouth.

Trying again, ever so slowly, I successfully reached my neck, and pulled the chain away from my neck, gasping in relief. With my hand blocking the chain from choking me, I could try to focus on things around me as they whizzed by. My attention caught on not fish, as I was pulled up over a hill, but a huge glowing tree.

Underwater? How is that possible? The necklace pulled me to it, until I was almost touching it. Suddenly, a voice broke through the silence of the dark waters, silky and beautiful. "We have a newcomer!" Then I was swarmed with white glowing figures and I felt self conscious about my skin.

An annoying girly voice called through the crowd "She's black? *giggles* Oh never mind that, we'll fix it soon enough!" My face morphed into a scowl at this. I opened my mouth to defend myself, but another glowing hand covered it.

I looked up to see the face if belonged to. She was gorgeous. "I'm sorry about the rudeness, *shoots a glare at the crowd* we don't really have new victi-Uh-people- here anymore." "Speaking of here," I said softly, "where am I?"

"That doesn't matter, what does is that you choose to stay here,"

"I don't think I wil-"

"as it will help you. Broken bones and injuries, yes?" She nodded to me floating helplessly in the water, unable to move my limbs properly.
I didn't answer, and she laughed. "My name is Nixie. Now if you want to stay here, you have to give up an object that is very special. From your human life."

She, or Nixie said 'human' like it was a disgusting animal. Which I guess it was. "What if I don't want to stay here?" I questioned. Her face darkened at this. "If you go back to the human world, you will die. Because that's how you showed up here, death in our waters."

"I'm not human though." I said loud enough for all of them to hear. I don't want them picking on me if I'm going to stay here. "You're not?" She said slowly, "Then what are you?" I took a big breath, and it burned my lungs. "I'm an Aytigin."

Her mouth dropped open and she spun around,  speaking something in an odd language to a girl behind her. The girl nodded and swam off. Then I noticed that none of this...people....have legs. They all had tails.

"Mermaids," I breathed, then had a huge fit of coughing. Nixie looked at me worriedly. "The Queen will kill me if she sees you in this condition, but the only way to fix you is if you give up your human life, which doesn't mean much now." She seemed to be pleading with me to stay here. I scrunched my face,  "I don't have anything to give up."

Her face immediately filled with relief and she pointed to my necklace, "This will work perfectly!" A hole seemed to open in my chest. "It means a lot to me," I mumbled sadly, "I don't think I can give it away." "No! That is even better! You will have much more power!!" She said happily.

I reluctantly unhooked it from around my neck, and held it out to the glowing tree. A tendril of blue vapor shot out from the tree and wrapped around the chain, then pulled it to its branches. A smaller branch broke into five, making it look like a small wooden hand. The hand clutched the necklace tightly, then became still once more.

Suddenly, a pain shot through me worse than hitting the water. It ripped at my insides, making me scream. It broke out through my hand where the necklace last touched, and I could see it was the blue vapor from the tree. It's magic was inside me, and seemed to be pulling me apart, both mentally and physically.

It was testing me, but what if I wasn't worthy? Would I be left to die in the human world? Every bone in my body broken? My dark skin began to glow, brighter and brighter as the pain grew stronger and stronger until all I could see was white. Then the light disappeared and all that was left was me. Examine myself, I looked for the horrid injuries that should be all over my body.

But there were none. My skin was as white as the moon, so much that it glowed. I tried to move but just struggled aimlessly in the water, my legs unmoving. Glancing down, I shrieked. I had a mermaid tail.

I pinched myself, and it stung. This was real? So preoccupied with my new self, I didn't notice the woman elegantly moving through the water, rapidly approaching me, with a shining silver crown on her head. When she reached me, Nixie nudged me with her elbow, motioning to the woman. "Let me introduce you to the ruler of this world, Queen Fliora!"

I looked up and gasped. She looked exactly like the lady from my nightmares I would have so long ago, attacking me with magic, slowly taking away my ability to breath, changing me to stone. But this wasn't a dream, so that had to be my wild imagination.

The Queen smiled a little too sweetly. "Welcome to your new life, Kalani."