Midnight Pearls (8 page)

Faye was the first to break the silence. “What could have turned Adriana into a human.?”

Kale grimaced.’I have my suspicions.”

She nodded slowly. “It would have to be, wouldn’t it? There’s no other way this could have happened.”

“None that I know of.”

“So, can she be changed back?”

“I wish I knew,” he told her, his heart heavy with doubt. Just as big a problem as changing her back would be telling her what she really was. Having watched her swim, he was convinced she could have no memory of who she really was. Then, provided he could convince her of the truth and find a way to change her back, would she even want to return?

“Who do you think he was?”

Startled, he looked at Faye. “What?”

“The man, who do you think he was?”

Kale shook his head.“I have no idea.”

She sighed heavily.“He was so beautiful.”

Kale threw her a sharp glance. The tone in her voice made him nervous. “Best to forget about him, Faye. Merkin and humans are not meant to interact. What happened today was an accident, and we must try and forget it even happened”

He recognized the fire that flashed in her eyes. He had seen it there before and it had always meant trouble. He was going to have to keep an eye on his little sister.

Kale was worried. Faye had disappeared after dinner, and now with the morning it was apparent that she had never returned home. He never should have let her out of his sight, not with what she had said about the human and the look of defiance she had given him.

There is but one person who could have changed Adriana into a human
, he thought. Faye knew that as well, and he feared that she might have done something foolish in her desire to see the human male again. There was only one way to find out.

He had to visit the Sea Witch.

The Sea Witch lived outside the borders of the world of merkin, and though all knew how to reach her caves, all merkin were forbidden to have any contact with her. Violation of that law could result in banishment for the merkin foolish enough to speak with her. Years before she had ruled over the kingdom of the dryads and had waged war against the merkin. Dryads were distant cousins to merkin; indeed, the two were often mistaken for one another by humans. Instead of tales, though, the dryads had bodies that more closely resembled sea serpents, long and slender. The Witch had risen to power among the dryads and eventually claimed that throne, killing many of her own kind in the process. During the great war that ensued, Kale and Adriana’s ancestors had been instrumental in defeating the Witch and sending her into exile.

The Witch couldn’t be killed—at least, that was the legend. The best their forefathers had been able to do was help her own people depose her. She lived in exile from her kind. No one knew how strong her magic was or from where it came.

Since he had seen Adriana as a human there had been little doubt in his mind as to how she had gotten that way. The Sea Witch, an ancient, evil crone, was the only one capable of performing that kind of magic.

He shuddered as he thought about all the stories he had heard as a young merchild. Some said that the reason no one had been able to kill the Witch was because she was immortal and that she was actually thousands of years old and had been partly responsible for the destruction of ancient islands and civilizations. A cousin of one of his friends had wandered too near the Sea Witch’s caves, and she had cursed him so that he died excruciatingly, his scales peeling off slowly and his internal organs shifting about on their own. They said, in the end, that he had coughed up his own heart.

Mother and Father will kill me if they hear I’ve come here, risking my life, breaking the law, disgracing my family … if the Witch doesn’t kill me first….

As he neared the sea caves he felt a change in the water; there was a chill that wasn’t present elsewhere. All he could think about was the boy choking on his own heart. He pressed on, though everything in him was screaming to turn back.

At the entrance to the largest cave he stopped. “Hello?” he called.

“Come in,” a silky voice whispered.

He floated in slowly, eyes adjusting to a dark that was greater than any he had ever known. The blackness was caused by more than the depth of the sea or a lack of light; it was a darkness that seemed to emanate from the very walls of the cave. At last he came into a sort of room and saw her.

The Witch was hideous in appearance. Her upper body was like a mermaid’s, only twisted and disfigured. The rest of her body was that of a sea serpent. Coils lay draped over the bare stone and disappeared into the darkness, so that he had no idea of her true length. Hair like seaweed seemed to have a life of its own as it hung around her. The only thing of beauty was a string of pearls she wore around her neck. Each pearl was huge and dark in color, glowing with a luster all its own.

The only light in the room came from a cage at one end, where a host of iridescent fish swam, trapped and helpless. He gulped, hoping that she wasn’t using the fish for anything other than a light source.
I heard she eats her own kind
, the thought popped into his head. Aside from them, the room was empty and barren. He looked back at her and realized the blackness he had earlier thought had been coming from the very walls of the cave were instead coming from her, like ink being sprayed by an octopus; her very skin seemed to give off some sort of black oil.
Dark as her soul …

“What do you seek of the Sea Witch?” she hissed, her forked tongue flicking out between her fangs.

Faced with her, he knew that he had been foolish to think that she would give him answers, foolish to think that he could come here demanding things from her and even manage to escape with his life. Even if he did manage to ask her about Adriana and Fays, she would never tell him—there was no gain in it for her. No, I’ll just have to be clever.
There must be some other way to find out if she changed them and how she did it.

Suddenly he was speaking, and he was astonished at the words coming out of his mouth. “I wish to be human.”

She cackled, and the sound sent chills up his spine. “And why would a prince of the merkin want that?”

He gasped, “You know who I am.”

She laughed, and the sound frightened him more than any he had ever heard. “Of course I know. I am, after all,
me.”
She paused just long enough to let that sink in and to let him wonder what else she might know.“You are Kale, and you are one of the royal princes of the merkin, descended from Glandria, are you not?”

He refused to answer her, though she was right.

She smiled coyly. “No need to answer, for I know the truth. Now tell me, Kale of the merkin, why do you want to be human?”

“I have fallen in love with a human,” he blurted.

“Yes, there seems to be a lot of that going around,” she said with amusement.

Faye had been to see her, just as he’d feared.
Faye, what have you done?
The only way he could help her now, and speak with Adriana, was to follow. He took a deep breath.“Can you change me?”

“Well, it isn’t that easy, my young one. Nothing comes without a price. You say you would do this for love?”

He nodded, not trusting himself to speak.

“And the young lady, does she love you?”

“I do not know, I hope so,” he answered truthfully.

“Loving is always a risk, you know,” she told him in a conversational tone. “You open up to someone and you risk rejection and ridicule. That’s the risk everyone who loves takes. You, though, you seem to be willing to risk a bit more. You are willing to risk leaving your home and your family to travel to a strange world where you might have to live out your days alone. Is that true?”

He nodded, his anxiety increasing with every word she spoke.

“My, my, that certainly is a lot to risk,” she said as she circled him slowly. “Well, if you are willing to risk that much, then surely you will be willing to risk just a little bit more.”

“What?” he whispered.

She was behind him now and she put her lips close to his ear. Her tongue flicked out, tickling him. “Your life.”

“No!” he shouted, spinning around.

She pressed her finger against his lips. “Ssshh. Wait until you hear the deal”

“I will turn you into a human. You will then have seven days to convince the young lady to fall in love with you. By sunset on the seventh day, she must agree to marry you. If she does, you will then live out your life with her, happily ever after”

“And if she doesn’t?”

“Then you will die and your soul will die with you.”

He reeled back, aghast. Merkin believed that the soul lived on even after the body had died and that it went to a better place. They also believed that the souls of the dead watched out for their living descendants.
Could the Witch actually kill the soul as well as the body?
Looking into her eyes, he had no choice but to believe it, for he could see no soul within her.

“No, the price is too high” He shook his head, hoping the movement would shake him free of the hypnotic spell her voice was weaving around him.

“Suit yourself,” the Witch said, and started to slither away. She glanced back over her shoulder.“You must not love her very much, though, if you’re not willing to take the risk. Maybe the women of your species have all the courage. A young mermaid was in here just this morning, and
she
did not think the price too high.”

Faye!
She would be dead within a week if she could not win the love of the man she had saved. Kale had to help her, to save her. He wouldn’t be able to help her down here, though. “I… accept the risk.”

The Witch slithered back toward him, an evil smile dancing across her face.“Let us get started, then.”

He allowed her to lead him into the darkest recesses of the cave. At her bidding, he sat in the center of a huge clamshell. She slithered around him and whispered words that he could not understand. She finally stopped before him, and he noticed the pearls around her neck were glowing. They grew brighter by the moment, and the Witch began rubbing the strand between her thumb and forefinger.

“Will I look like them?” he asked, hating the tremor in his voice.

“Yes.”

“What about their garments?”

“I can provide you with something, if you wish, if you’ll answer a question.”

“Wh—what?”

“Your lady—has she seen you, heard your voice?”

“No.”

“Have you heard hers?”

“No,” he replied, panicking now. “Will I be able to understand her, and will she understand me?”

“Yes,” the Witch said with a casual wave of her hand. “So, how will you know her?”

“I have seen her.”

“Ah. Is she beautiful?”

“Very beautiful.”

“Do you know where to find her or what name she is called by?”

“No, I do not,” he said, realizing for the first time that she might not even go by the name Adriana.

“So, the only way you can find her is by
seeing
her?”

“Yes.”

The Witch cackled with satisfaction. “Good luck in finding her, then … without your
eyes!”

Kale opened his mouth to ask what she meant, but blinding pain ripped through him and only a scream came out. His body felt as though it were being split in two. His vision began to fade, and the last things he saw before everything went black were the glowing pearls.

“You didn’t think it would be that easy, did you?” Her voice pierced the haze of his pain. “You didn’t think I would extract some price for my services? You might be willing to gamble everything, but I am not.”

“How am I to find her?” he shouted, raising his hands before him and groping for the wall.

“That is your problem, not mine,” she said, the voice fading as though she were moving away from him.

“What could you possibly gain from my death?”

“Let’s just say that the suffering of your kind is the prize I am seeking. I’m sure the death of one of their princes would bring quite a lot of suffering. Speaking of which, you have about five minutes before the transformation is complete and you can no longer breathe water.

“If I were you, I’d start swimming.”

“Help me!” he shouted.

There was no answer. The Sea Witch was gone.

His lungs were starting to ache, and it was getting harder to breathe. He tried to push off from the clamshell, but his disintegrating tail failed him. Desperately he flailed out with his arms as he had seen Adriana do when she was swimming for the shore.

He could feel himself moving forward through the water, but at an agonizingly slow rate. He bumped into the wall and, disoriented, he felt for the passage through which he had come. At last he found it and made his way back out of the cave.

He swam as fast as he could, heading for the surface, and eventually the water grew warmer around him, the cold of the Witch’s lair fading behind him. His body was still changing, he could feel it, and the pain was unbearable. He was having a harder time with each breath he tried to draw, and desperation lent him strength. He kicked and splashed, swimming as fast as he could.