Diary of a Radical Mermaid (8 page)

I could wait for their father to find them, if he dared.

And I would fight him to the death, when he did.

Ahoy, Rhymer! The psychic greeting filled my head. Rhymer McEvers. Come about. Hello. Welcome to America. A man’s voice.

Welcome, Rhymer. Welcome. Let us aboard. A woman’s.

I brought the sailboat to a halt and dropped anchor. Surprised, I hung out a ladder then stepped back, watching. A darling brunette climbed aboard, long hair streaming to her hips, sweet breasts and butt outlined nicely in a black maillot. She smiled gently and held out a hand. “I’m Ali Bonavendier. Soon to be Ali Randolph.”

“Ah. Cousin Ali. It’s nice to meet you. You’re a kind of legend. Lilith’s long-lost half-sister.”

She smiled wider but shook her head. “I’m just one of Lilith’s many projects. Rescued from a life of dry futility. Set on the right course by the enchantment of Sainte’s Point.” She looked up at me solemnly. “It’s a safe place. A sacred place.”

I laid a hand on the pistol belted to my waist. “I don’t need magic. I just need one clear shot.”

She frowned, and I felt her concern for my attitude. Before she could counsel me about it, a big lean bruiser hoisted himself up the ladder and bounded onto the deck. He scooped dark hair back with a thick hand. Bit of a rough looker for a Mer, not that I was much prettier. Scars, large and small, pockmarked his bare chest and arms. A wide nylon belt was snugged to the waist of his black trunks; its sheathed knife was long enough to gut a whale. Even his feet were scarred, their webbing gone, snipped out when he was a babe and his mother wanted to hide his Mer heritage. I’d heard plenty about Griffin Randolph on the oceans of the world. The treasure hunter. His father had been a rich, prideful Lander, his mother, a distant cousin to my own. There was a tragic story there — and I sensed the scars inside him. But I also sensed the happiness. It radiated from Ali to him, and back again. My gut twisted. It’d been years since I’d felt any such bond between me and a woman. I was good at sex, bad at the rest.

“Cousin Rhymer,” he said, and we clasped hands.

“Cousin Griffin. Should you not be on the island, dressin’ yourself up for a wedding to this beautiful woman tomorrow?”

“What can I say?” He nodded at Ali. “On the eve of our wedding she challenged me to a five-mile race from Sainte’s Point to your sloop here. It took all my willpower to let her beat me.”

Ali clucked her tongue. “You go on believing you let me beat you.” To me she said, “Lilith asked us to welcome you and your nieces personally. The island’s full of guests, so she couldn’t get away herself. It’s our honor to be her emissaries. We’ll lead you to a quiet cove along the mainland for now. We wish you’d come to the mansion, but Lilith says you’d rather wait until the wedding’s over and the island’s empty.”

I nodded. “The fewer who know about me being here, the better. Orion’s listening for hints, keeping his mind open for information. I can’t risk him hearing any chatter about me and the girls.”

Griffin frowned. “I have a ship off the coast of Costa Rica. My crew is exploring the ruins of Timaupica, one of the hidden Mer cities. You could take the girls there. And Riyad bin Mahadeen says he can hide you off the coast of Arabia — he never calls it Saudi Arabia, because his loyalties are a helluva lot older than the modern regimes.”

“Or you can bring the girls and come with us,” Ali said gently, “on our wedding cruise around the world.”

“Thank you both, but no. We’re as safe here as anywhere. And I don’t want to endanger more people than I can help. Orion may look on my allies as his enemies.”

Griffin laid a hand on the hilt of his knife and scanned the waters, scowling. “I’ve learned to believe in a lot of things I can’t explain. But I’m not sure I believe Orion is a Swimmer. I assume you do? You don’t doubt he’s . . . different . . . from the rest of us?”

“I don’t know what he is. My sister guarded his secrets, even from me. All I know is, I intend to kill him.”

Both Ali and Griffin looked at me with worry in their eyes. In my mind there was no room for debate about Orion’s guilt, innocence, motives or intent; the issue was settled. He’d had years to present himself with honor, years to come to me, Tara’s brother, and make a show of fellowship. Now I’d tried and convicted him without his testimony, but it was his own doing. I’m not a brutal bastard, I started to tell Ali and Griffin. I just prize good manners, that’s all.

“Hello, sweetie!” Ali said suddenly and knelt down with a hand out.

Venus, the five-year old, peered, wide-eyed, around the corner of the cabin. I groaned inwardly. So much for the girls staying out of sight.

“Are you an angel?” Venus asked Ali, her Scottish brogue lilting like an Inverness butterfly. “Have you talked to me mum, in heaven? Will you tell her we miss her so; tell her to come home?”

Oh, God.

Ali’s face convulsed. She put a hand to her heart. I recalled hearing from Lilith that Ali had lost her own mother, a Lander, when Ali was just a babe. A tide of sympathy poured from Ali. Venus gave a little cry and rushed to her. Sobbing, Venus threw her arms around Ali’s neck, and Ali held her tight.

Griffin and I, being no more comfortable than Lander men when it came to female tears, harummphed and looked the other way. Suddenly Venus noticed Griffin. She pulled back from Ali’s hug and stared up at him, at his scars. One small hand shot out. She laid just her fingertips on a thick scar that crossed the back of his hand.

“Venus, no,” I ordered sharply. I scooped her up. “You promised. You promised. You must keep that promise all the time.”

She stared at me tearfully. “I couldn’t help it, Uncle Rhymer. I couldn’t. I’m sorry.” She hid her face in her hands and sobbed again. I felt like a monster. I was no good with children. “Uncle Rhymer, I’ll take her back in the cabin,” Stella said, behind me. “She moves so fast. She got away from me. Sorry.”

She and Isis stood there at attention. Isis looked stern as a teacher; Stella looked teary but resolved.

“You’ll have to do better,” I said. What a beast I was. Not capable of tenderness. But tenderness bred mistakes, and mistakes bred disaster. “You’re my lieutenant. I depend on you. Do your job.”

“Yes, sir.” I handed Venus to her. The three girls hurried back into the cabin.

I turned back to Griffin and Ali. They were staring at his hand.

The scar had disappeared.

When their awed gazes rose to me, I said quietly, “It’s true, what you’ve heard. The girls are Healers.”

Healers. The word hung in the salt air like a bolt of lightning. Most Mers were of the Singer class; only a tiny minority had powers so special they deserved a higher designation. Most Mers had never met a Healer. Some swore the Healers were just entertainers and attention-seekers, concocting elaborate tricks to elevate their social status.

Venus had just knocked that idea to hell and back.

Ali touched Griffin’s healed hand. He raised it slowly, then laid the smooth, perfect skin against her cheek. “I’ve always wanted to touch you without a scar between us,” he said gruffly.

She gave a mewl of joy.

I hung my head. Healers. All three of the girls. The instinct ran through every vein of their bodies. They could hardly resist the joy it gave to others. I’d told them they had to control it. When they laid hands on someone, they sang. They sang out like a beacon. And if they did that, Orion would hear them across even the widest sea.

Ali kissed Griffin, cuddled his hand in hers, then looked at me tearfully. “There are miracles in the world. We’ve just seen one. Rhymer, you have to consider the possibility that there’s goodness inside a father who can give the gift of healing to his daughters.”

After a long, quiet moment, I said as politely as I could, “He gave them nothing but a dead mother.”

And I went, without another word, to set the course toward Sainte’s Point again.

Juna Lee’s Prisoner
Chapter
9

Trapped. Trapped upstairs, in the dark, in a big, vintage cottage somewhere on the Georgia coast. Imprisoned like a noble heroine in the 1900s dime novels I collected as a hobby. No, no, she cried, you villain! You’ll never keep me here against my will! Tom the Ranger will save me! I loved the simplicity of good versus bad in those books; the unerring sense of fragile virtue and courageous sacrifice. Oh, all right. I mainly loved the idea of good girls getting tied up, leered at, and rescued. Maybe I had a secret S & M fetish. At any rate, no Tom the Ranger had ever shown up in my life.

“Molly,” Juna Lee Poinfax hissed outside the door to my room. “Stop moping around in there. All you have to do is agree to stay in Bellemeade a few weeks and get to know your own kind. Swear you’ll stay, and then I’ll let you out.”

“My own kind?” I said loudly, through solid oak. “My kind don’t tell elaborate lies about being descended from mermaids. They don’t kidnap famous authors, haul them more than one thousand miles in a bus, then lock them in a strange house in the dark.”

“Well, turn on a light, you idiot.”

I steamed. I’d like to put Juna Lee in a dime novel. I’d play the part of the villain. I’d tie her to the proverbial railroad tracks. And I’d make sure Tom the Ranger got there too late to do more than scrape some of her DNA off a rail for the coroner’s office.

She did have one good point: My noble virtue wouldn’t be compromised if I turned on a lamp. I made my way to a table, fumbled with a cord beneath a glass shade, and pulled it. Soft light lifted the shadows. I looked around, stunned.

My prison was lovely.

The room made me think of a romantic cabin on an eighteenth century pirate ship. Heavy, curving beams formed the ribs of the ceiling. All the furniture was ornate, handsome, and antique. In an alcove, a pretty four-postered bedstead was plumped up with lacy white pillows and a marshmallow-like comforter. Beneath my sandaled feet, fishtailed mermaids, mermen , and other mythological beings cavorted in the design of a beautiful rug. I turned slowly, pirouetting around my cane, studying that woven world.

The lamp I’d turned on? Tiffany. And I’d bet it wasn’t a reproduction. Jasmine and vanilla scented the air, along with the aroma of maritime oak, fine brocades, and silk.

An unhappy meow came from the carrier by the door. Big, apologetic Charley had deposited my cat and my luggage inside the room right after he deposited me there.

“Heathcliff,” I moaned. “I didn’t mean to ignore you. I know you’ve been traumatized.” I rushed to the carrier, opened the door, and gently lifted Heathcliff into my arms. The old tabby purred. His fur felt even drier and more scruffy than usual. “I’ll give you your medicine in just a minute,” I whispered, stroking his head. “And then I’ll unpack your tuna and we’ll have dinner. I hope you don’t mind sharing.”

I set Heathcliff on the plush bed. He lay down gratefully, easing his bony bottom into the luxurious comforter. I reached for another Tiffany lamp on a bedside table. I listened to a low purr of sound outside. The tide. The ocean.

I hurried to a huge bay window. I loved being near the ocean, any ocean. My skin tingled. I’d grown up on Cape Cod, right on the beach. How many times my father had scooped me up in his arms and plunged into the tide with me, laughing as I laughed, burrowing into the ocean as if tunneling into a beloved nest.

I felt the magnetic pull. I believed I could see underwater; maybe I had a compass in my head, like the fish and the whales. As I grew older, alone, after my parents died in a land-bound car crash, I started to worry that I was deranged, that losing them, particularly losing my father, who lived in the water as if he preferred it to land, had damaged some rational part of me. So I submerged all those wild ideas about the water, and let them surface only in my books.

I remembered giant bluefin tuna, slipping up almost to the shallows like huge pets when my father whistled; seabirds gliding overhead not in raucous greed but to cluck lightly, sweetly at friends; the iridescent sheen where the surf licks the outreaches of wet sand. The world, my father said, is a beautiful woman. The ocean is her necklace. There, on that edge between water and earth, I could see it shine.

My father. My father was descended from Paul Revere and a mermaid. A mermaid. That meant I was descended from Paul Revere and a mermaid. Holy Nonsense, Batman.  If I believed a word Juna Lee Poinfax said. I didn’t.

“Agggh,” I said aloud. But I looked out the window and gasped.

I saw the island. Out there in the moonlight, a golden island shielded the bay of this Georgia hideaway. Sainte’s Point. Juna Lee had prattled on about it endlessly during the drive from Memphis. Home of the Bonavendier Mer clan since the 1700s. A beacon for Mers in this part of the world ever since. Not that I took any of her delusions seriously.

Despite myself, I trembled. Sainte’s Point was majestic. Magical. Ethereal. Lights winked among the moon-tinged outline of the forest. The island was like some great ship anchored to the heart of the ocean floor, beckoning me with the glitter of its lanterns.

Your metaphors are as overwrought as your books, Juna Lee snarked.

I swung around, stared at the door, and raised my cane like a sword.

No, she hadn’t slipped into the room. I was still alone. She’d spoken to me inside my mind.

I reeled. Just my imagination. Just like that strange moment in Memphis, when the mysterious Lilith had “spoken” to me psychically. I was overwrought, yes. The dime-novel heroine needed a Zanax, that was all.

Juna Lee rapped on the door. “You’re a Mer. Tranquilizers don’t work for you. Drink a cola. Eat some fish and a bowl of high-fat chowder. Now, that’s comfort food.”

She was reading my mind. Just like in Memphis. “You should work as a lounge act in Las Vegas. Do card tricks and tell fortunes.”

“And you should drink a couple of stiff colas out of the miniature fridge in your room. It’s in the armoire in the corner. A couple of colas will loosen up those sissy nerves of yours.”

“I’m allergic to cola drinks. I get dizzy and disoriented.”