#rip if you're on moble

[godseyegalaxy]

Candle and the Wax Flower 3

From afar the massive bodies looked just like caped sized boats. Maybe discolored in the twilight blue, but it was a risk the pirate captain was willing to take. Summer storms were common, and a capsized boat could bring in treasures, information, or occasionally, people. Icora wasn’t in the business of selling lives, but, as she learned early on, people were good for other things too. When the ship moved closer rocking steadily in the placid water, and found the sea a deep ink color, the crew were glad of the little detour.

Mermen and women lay floating, shifting along with the waves and current underneath. Icora watched as their whale-like bodies bobbed up and down. It was a tragedy, the death of such a long-lived creature, but, as the captain said, with tragedy comes trove. Just one semi-preserved body could gain a small fortune, depending on the buyer.

She ordered her crew to try and grapple one of the bodies—that’s all that they would need—and bring in onto the boat. She didn’t want to say a small one, a child, but the crew understood. They went to work immediately, setting up a pulley system and gathering nets.

Brinkley stood and watched from above, watched the waters as if he was counting all the bodies. His black features showing no emotion. Icora let her crew work and joined her first mate as he stared off into the horizon.

“They’ll sink to the bottom.” He said, slowly pulling away from his trance to look at her. His captain, worn by the sea storm wind and pelting rain, but not by age itself.      

“Hail and well met to you too.” Was all she said.

He stared at her, black eyes reflecting the gold lamp light and blinked once, twice. “I… I’m sorry, Captain, please forgive me. Its just…” His eyes glazed over again. “I have the strange feeling that something is not right.”

“There are bodies the size of ships scattered in the hundreds here, Brinkley I know something is wrong.”

“It’s… not just that.” He turned his gaze back out to the waters. The light was gone now. “The merpeople should be sinking. Bodies sink.”

Icora didn’t have the energy to ask just how well Brinkley knew that fact. She already knew that he’d swam with enough dead and debris by his side to speak the truth. But still, his discomfort was off putting. Brinkley would worry about the smallest of things, yes, but when it came to dangers, a rising storm, a pissed off business dealer, Brinkley never showed traces of secondary thoughts. What was he really thinking?

Just as she was about to reply, Denokin, a workmen and a skilled wood carver, shouted the captain’s name from below.

Both Icora and Brinkley looked down and the scrambling men and women. Half of them pulled on ropes and levers, while the other half switched from staring down into the water to readying their weapon.

“Captain Icora, there’s something thrashing in the waters coming closer to the ship!” Denokin yelled. “We think another group of merfolk.”

“Naturally.” Icora said to no one in particular, then, “Work to get the body on board, everyone!” Her voice booming in the night-nipped air. Icora grabbed Brinkley’s arm and lead him to the main deck, half readied weapons leaning against the wooden wall. With her people on one side of the deck, the other lay free for just the two of them.

“Do you want me to help pull up the body?” Brinkley’s voice was still far off, like he was still trying to solve the puzzle.

“No. I need you to tell me what you see. What you hear. Quickly.”

Icora knew what she saw; blue black waves reaching out to make what she had the unfortunate habit of calling home, dark islands appearing like tumors on the horizon, carcasses floating face down and, if she strained her eyes against the orange glow emanating behind her, she could see bursts of water exploding from the surface, meters above the highest sail.

“Screams.” Brinkley said. Then, as if hit in the chest, he woke and looked around frantically. “Screams, Icora, there are two still alive and they fight under the water, something- something to do with a gang.”

“Is it something that needs interfering?”

“I don’t know. The little one won’t survive against him. There is more than we dont understand.”

“I know.” Icora said as she shed off her heavy coat and outer accessories.

“What are you doing.” He didn’t wait to start shedding his own coat, holding onto a sleek dagger with his teeth as he did.

“If ‘He’ wins and finds out we’re taking one of his own aboard then we might be next on his kill list. I’d rather pass on that.”

Brinkley nodded and turned to watch the encroaching geyser. Like a clockwork machine, Icora issued command after command, grabbing rope and tying it securely around herself and the end of the deck. Teket and Salem joined them, fashioning Brinkley a harness like Icora’s and quickly equipped them both, captain and first mate, with more daggers.

“Icora!” Brinkley shouted, now finally seeing individual scales on the mermaid’s tail, how some of them were torn off and bloodied.

Without another word, Icora dove into the water.

-

Tio screamed in fury as another cut appeared on his face-- A high pitched scream that made the water shake in his fury. More blood seeped into the warm, blackened waters as his tail, thick and rattled with scars, pinned Cere in the rush of water.

As small as Cere was compared to the gang leader, she spit and clawed at his eyes like she was equal in size. Her hair whipped around them, blurring the lines between herself and her soon to be murderer and her screams of rage matched his in intensity. Cere wanted to bite out his throat. There was once a time where she was trained to defend herself. To fight. But with every one dead in the water, there wasn’t a point to keep appearances up.

Killed them. Killed them all. This bastard kill all her brothers and sisters and threated to lay waist to The Mother. Cere felt the brush of cold, dead flesh against her forearm and struggled to move beyond it. No one ever took them seriously, no one would ever dare hurt the mother of the deep. But these bastards.

White hot anger clouded her vision as she screamed again. She pulled her arm free from his grasp and, ignoring the pain, shot forward, clawing his eyes again.

They poisoned their bodies-- sick fucks—and cried out for war. Cere and her siblings only knew something was wrong when they died smiling, viscous and animal. They figured out soon enough, however.

And now their bodies float. Never to see the bottom of the ocean and thus, rest. Not like her siblings. Not like her.

She pushed out of his range, Tio barely missing her torn and ruined fin. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered. He mattered. His death mattered.

There was a moment of silence. Her long hair swirled through the water as she spun circles in the water. They looked at each other, the last of each tribe as far as Cere knew, and she the only one standing between him and The Mother.

A low growl emanated from her chest. Now was not the time to think. Another dagger found its way into her hand, one of his martyrs. She surged forward, aiming for his chest.

But just before she could, a column of loud, white bubbles appeared to their side. A flash of metal flew through the water and caught on Tio’s arm. The bubbles cleared to show two creatures, swimming with unbelievable speed towards her and Tio.

Cere’s vision flashed white as Tio’s hands raked across her face, pulling her hair down. It seemed that the dagger didn’t bother him, nor the other beings. Cere screamed again, reaching up and pulling at his own hair, pulling and pulling until chunks started to pull off his skull. She wondered briefly why he didn’t pull hers.

Maybe he was more a gentleman than her.

Cere ripped and clawed at his face, adrenaline bursting through her veins once again. She had to do it now. Kill him now. And then deal with the intruders.

Except, she didn’t have time.

A surprisingly strong arm wrapped around her torso and pulled her away from Tio. She saw through her tendrils of hair an arm pull down on rope before she was being pulled through the water again.

Pulled and pulled and pulled and-

Cere felt her whole body grow heavy the water was stripped from her side. Hot moist air hit her lungs as she automatically switched. She coughed and flailed and tried to see what had a hold on her. Tried to see period. Her hair clung to her skin making it impossible to tell what was hers and what was her captor.

She tried to scream but just coughed up more water.

-

The pulsing thing in her arms wasn’t easy to pull out of the water, much less hauling her up to the ship deck. Icora’s hands grew numb from holding onto the rope and the slippery mermaid’s body as tightly as she could, there were even a few moments where she thought she would drop the struggling mermaid back into the waters.

Icora thought that it would prefer that.  It clicked and gasped against her and only flailed more as the crew grabbed them both and pulled them over the rail. It was like an actual fish, and she some crazed buffoon without tools. The difference between the creature in her arms and a fish was the hair and the black and half broken talons that threatened to slice through her skin.

As gracefully as she could muster, Icora untangled herself from the maid’s slimy and tangled hair. A thick piece of cloth landed on the wood beside her and she picked it up to dry herself, thanking someone in some direction. Icora wasn’t one to be surprised by a great many things, but how deeply the cloth turned red shocked her. If this was the blood on her, how much was the thing…

It gasped again, blood and water oozing out of its mouth. The gathered crowd around them shifted on their feet, unsure of what to make of living, breathing creature. Then, it braced as if about to scream, but no sounds escaped. It was the mermaid’s turn to be shocked. She raked her hair out of her face and growled as the yellow light met her eyes. Her movements were clumsy, but the scowl on her face proved that she was a predator. A predator out of its habitat.

Icora couldn’t help but laugh.  

That laugh did two things, it made the crew relax, all of them breathing a collective sigh of relief as they realized their captain was in no way worried about the legendary creature before them. And, it put a target on her back, given the way the mermaids head wiped to her and black, soulless eyes close to slits. It tried to move back, but the sudden heaviness of her own body meant she could only go a few inches before giving up. Truly a fish out of water.

Icora heard a gasp as the rope behind her pulled twice. Brinkley. Still in the water?

The crew jumped into action, moving to help pull the rope with, hopefully, the first mate in tow. The mermaid hissed as unfiltered light hit her and she made to cover her face.

Icora wondered if the mermaid saw her roll her eyes and grab her coat where it lay on the deck, if she saw or sensed her coming up behind her to through the jacket over her head, shielding her from the harsh light, only because of the look of calm beauty that slackened her face as the mermaid looked up at her. She was an animal, a fierce predator. But she was still a being. Person, debatable. But a thing with feelings and needs, absolutely.  

The maid stopped making sounds of protest or anger. Or, whatever it was feeling. But after that quick moment of peace, a loud thump sounded behind them and the mermaid hissed.

Icora turned to see her first mate, breathing heavily but breathing all the same, with a mass slumped next to him; the merman.

Unlike the maid, who’s skin was silvery blue and covered in scales, slim with hair longer than Icora was tall, the male creature had thick gray skin riddled with scars, a flat head and a wide mouth with large, triangular teeth. A shark. Icora glanced back at the maid, now staring intently at the male. That little fish was fending off a shark. On the other hand, a man killed a creature double his size and then pulled them both out of the water. Icora knew she shouldn’t be impressed, but, she was.

The crew stood clear of the captain and first mate, some of them going back to their previous tasks, as Icora walked over. He didn’t even look harmed.

“Dead?” She asked, nudging the merman’s face with her boot.

“Ey, took a while to take him down though.”

“You were in his territory.”

“It didn’t give him much an advantage.”

She let out a heavy laugh, pulling Brinkley to his feet. He winced as he steadied himself, but Icora could tell it was more an act then actuality.

“That just leaves us with this one.” She nodded towards the crumbled mass of fish behind her and, was surprised to see it had moved closer to them. Perhaps its loud thrashing before was only to throw them off, or it was finally used to the different environment.

The creature pulled itself forward with her talons, hair sometimes snagging on the wood and, Icora let her. Let her crawl towards the dead merman, even moved out of the maid’s path. Even will all her knowledge of the sea, Icora knew little of the mermaids that dwelled under the surface, that is to say, barely no one knew about them. Their customs, language, even their appearance was documented poorly. So, Icora let the mermaid get closer, just incase if there was something she didn’t understand.

-

Cere watched out of the corners of her eyes, watched her captor and the other one-- the other, dirty and foul and revolting one who killed Tio and infected the air with its … miasma -- as she inched closer to the dead body. She found the killing blow, the foreign knife sticking out of his neck, and felt a tangible net of anger over her. This was her kill. This was her vengeance. And that… Thing standing above the two of them stole it from her.

Faster than they could stop her, Cere pulled out the dagger from his neck and plunged it into his eye socket. It was easier than she had expected, since there was no eye in it. Blood still pooled out though, caking her hand again with his blood. She felt the net wither away then, her anger dissipating into the wood like the blood and seawater. The Pirate’s laugh a distant, weak sound.

She looked up at them, the pirates, and thought about all the stories her people would whisper about them. How stupid but deadly and persistent they were. Their greed and how it would drive them to the ends of the earth to find the things they wanted. How mermaids were treated by them, and how it was common for mermaid to treat them.

She ran her eyes down her two captors. Wet and clothes sticking to them, watching her and speaking without regard to her very presence, the gold adorning their dark, sun damaged skin. She should kill them. Kill them all and let the ghost ship float along. Or let the Mother take care of them.

But she couldn’t- couldn’t get the Mother at least, not with the bodies, poisoned and rotted, floating out there. She needed to… she needed…

Cere heaved her chest, trying to make a noise other than clicks and growls, but only breathy moans escaped past her lips. It did the job though, capturing their attention again. They needed to watch this. To figure out what it meant if words wasn’t enough.

She carefully pulled the knife back out of Tio’s corpse and wiped it on his skin. The Thing stepped back a moment, but the one she was interested in stayed put. Cere made eye contact with the woman, grabbed a chunk of her hair and started to cut it, right by her scalp. There was a flash of surprise, but then, amazingly, recognition flashed though the woman’s face. A pit of almost regret grew from the bottom of her chest. There was something more to this pirate woman.

It took time. More time that Cere liked, but it gave her the opportunity to formulate a real plan. To think things through. All the while the Pirate never deviating from her gaze.

When she finished, she gathered her hair into one bundle and held it out towards the pirate. There was a moment of silence where she felt more than just the Things eyes on her, but she waited, her eye fixed on the other’s, the Captain.

-

Icora knew what the mermaid was asking. No, telling her what to do. To take the hair, yes, and to probably sell it for huge amounts of money or keep it as a trophy. But it was more than that. Icora hardly believed her eyes as the creature sawed off her long, inky black hair, yet here it was; the offer.

Icora knelt down and untiled the ribbon she used to tie her own hair back from her wrist and carefully, deliberately, tied the mermaid’s hair together. This close again she could see the iridescence of the mermaid’s skin, hear her heaving unused lungs, realize that black blood flowed from her scalp and not some trick of the light. Icora stepped back and waited for the mermaid to make the next move.

But instead of pushing herself back towards the railing. The mermaid held the hilt of the dagger and placed it gently, but meaningfully, on her chest.

Icora smirked. “A trade? Your hair, worth more than this entire ship, for that little dagger?” the captain spoke, knowing full well that the mermaid could not understand her, however, the creature took the tone and just thumped her chest again. Icora raised an eyebrow.

“She can keep it.” Brinkley said, with more venom than Icora had ever heard from him. Icora waited for an explanation, but none came.

The creature hit the floor to get their attention again. She then tilted her head towards the other merman’s body. The small one they’d pick out of the sea and was lying on the ground much like the shark; torn and bloodied. Instead of being pissy, the mermaid pointed out into the black sea and made a grasping motion, lifted her fist above her head, and then laid it down on the ship deck. Her eyes already gleamed with irritation, as if expecting them to not understand.

And just for kicks, Icora turned towards Brinkley. He didn’t even want to speak in the mermaid’s presence, much less try to understand its meaning, but the first mate sighed and said through his teeth.

“Collect the floating bodies. Then take them away.”

“Do you know why they’re floating? And not sinking to the sea floor?” Icora smiled and crossed her arms. There was, after all, a reason he was her first.

He didn’t answer right away, as per usual, instead her stared out into the black. Icora did too, spotting dots of bioluminescence amidst black masses.

“They poisoned their own bodies. With red algae, I think, but then, something more… I can’t tell. They wanted their corpse to sink.”

“Then there’s something down there? Something that likes to eat? Interesting.” Icora glanced down at the mermaid again, smiled, and stuck out her palm. It was a beautiful night to make a deal.

“My name is Icora. Proud Captain of this fine ship and, let’s say, an adventurer by trade. I understand your wishes, and I think I can get the results. I also believe… that we’ll be great partners if you should accept.”

Brinkley swore under his breath and turned from them. “Captain, it doesn’t even understand us. It can’t be work the safety of our crew, we know nothing about-”

“Brinkley, don’t be rude. We don’t know what we don’t know. So let’s find out.”

He wiped is face down, the late hours and no sleep finally showing on his frame. “I knew you would say that.”

Icora smiled, though she doubted he could see her in the low light. She glanced down at her own hand, a silent but persistent ask to take it and, after spitting in the first mate’s direction, the mermaid carefully laid her palm flat against hers, understanding of her own glowing in her black eyes. There was a framiliar prickling sensation, like needles poking her palm.

“It’s done then, part-“

The mermaid’s voice silenced everything, everyone, on the ship deck. Icora even felt Brinkley tense all muscles, poised to either attack or run. Out of the corner of her eyes, she saw her crew halted in whatever they were doing, just to hear the accent of the deep ocean.

“What did you say?” Icora hummed, her heart beating faster than she could remember. She tried to keep the excitement from her voice.

“Cere.” The mermaid’s mouth parted and closed again, still trying to use parts of her body that were never needed before. Her forehead crinkled in concentration, trying to sound out works she’d never spoken, but somehow knew to say. “Na-mes. Cere.” She indicated their still touching hands. “Paretnarus.”

Icora savored the moment, from being the first person to ever, successfully, make a pact with a mermaid right down to the slimy cool touch of her skin. She was sure she’d remember this for a long time, sure that soon enough she’d grow friendly toward the mermaid and framiliar with its touch.

“Yes. Partners.”