The Kraken

The ship

This book is for the howling wolf awards hosted by mxdnight_owl /OwlWolf22091 word count (not counting this part): 2202
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         The world is full of beings that can change their form at will. The ones on then call them shifters and they can change into any animal ranging from a mouse to a dragon. We under the sea have similar beings we call morphers. Morphers have as wide a variety as shifters do. The major difference between a shifter in a morpher is their original form. Shifters are humans that can turn into animals, while morphers are merpeople who can turn into different animals. There are some who change between human and merfolk from either side, but those are rare.

      I am a morpher. I can change into the Kraken. I am not the first Kraken morpher and hopefully I won't be the last, my whole family has been able to change into a Kraken.

       Every Kraken is different from the last in looks and in philosophy. Some of my family traded safe passage for favors from sailors, some destroyed every ship that came into their area, some sunk only the ships of enemies to the pirate lovers. Some controlled the merpeople with fear while others were allies with them.

       I protect the kingdom of the merpeople from threats, fishers, and poachers alike.

       The merpeople do have an army, but they can only fight threats that come from the ocean itself. I can defend against threats to come from land or sea.

       Today the queen of the merpeople called me for a meeting.

      "Your Majesty," I greet with a bow as I enter.

       "Ezili, we've known each other since we were kids, please stop with the formalities," chastises me.

        "Sorry Cordelia, but you are the queen and I am despite my high-ranking one of your subjects," I counter.

       "Ezi, you were my friend long before I was the queen, my only true friend, because even when we were young everyone was intimidated by what we would become," she sighs.

      "Well, I think they feared me because they feared my father and they were intimidated by you because you were the princess," I say as she gestures for me to take a seat.

       I sit on one of the rock chairs she has around the room my purple tail only slightly bent and my back straight only letting my shoulders slump slightly. Cordelia sits across from me on one of the rock chairs with a seaweed throw, her gold tail curled on the chair as she leans on the armrest. Very few got to see her this relaxed.

       Cordelia sighs, "You're probably right about that. Now the reason I called you was, unfortunately, not to chit chat. There's been reports of pirates heading towards us looking for mermaid treasure. They even have a map."

       If they have a map it probably originated from a previous Kraken. It seems like half my life is undoing what my family did.

      "Well, it sounds like I'll be getting a new shirt then," I declare.

      I'm the only mermaid to wear clothing made out human materials, most merpeople wear clothing made of kelp or other materials found under the sea or what humans think is normal mermaid wear, shell bras. Even Cordelia wears a shirt made of kelp with pearls laced in it. I, on the other hand, wear shirts made from the sails of ships I've sunk.

       "Hopefully, just be careful human technology is getting more advanced by the day, I don't want to lose you, my friend, " Cordelia replies.