Page 12 of Alien Triton's Prize

I continued to follow her around as she showed me the elaborately planted estate grounds. Maybe this setup wasn’t so bad after all. A hot merman husband, a gorgeous home, and all the plants I could ever hope to study.

What could possibly go wrong?

Chapter 6

Cetius

My contact conch sent out another alert. The vibrations were slight but still enough for me to detect them through the water. I turned the shell around to see a reminder from Lago to read up on the information he’d sent me about humans and their transition to deep-sea living.

They were not like our kind. None of the species compatible with us was. The prevailing scientific wisdom said that our kind had lived on land millions of years ago. Back then, land covered most of our planet. Then over time the ocean grew, until only the very highest points were above water.

As the eons progressed, the waves eroded the portions still underwater, disconnecting the islands from the ocean floors and leaving them floating at sea. There were still a few islands attached by a narrow column, but they were slowly disappearing too. Just a few years ago, the column holding one of the largest islands on the planet broke, and now that island was forever adrift too, its course dictated by the currents like everything else on the planet.

I quickly shot back a message, thanking him and letting him know that I’d given it a look. That was only partly true. The document was ridiculously long, and while I’d given it a cursory glance, enough to know that for her safety I had to take it slow when returning her back to the surface, I hadn’t read it top to bottom. But I was sure Vera would be fine.

Aside from her shock at losing her voice underwater, we’d made it to my home without incident, and she was now safely ensconced in the air-filled room I’d made for her.

Humans were not nearly as rare as they once were here, and the company I’d hired to build the room was knowledgeable and well-reviewed. With so many surface dwellers living in our city now, building dry areas where they could rest and live comfortably was important. The gift of our gills alone wasn’t enough most of the time.

A knock on my office door had me looking up. My door was open, and Iravan looked surprised to see me at the office.

“Why are you here, Cetius?” he asked. “I thought you were welcoming your new female.”

Iravan was a childhood friend turned employee who worked with me at my grandsire’s business, Ebb Tide Trading. We supplied one-of-a-kind décor pieces and rare finds for only the most distinguished of collectors. It was born out of my grandsire’s love of travel and great need to see the open ocean and all the islands floating in the great unknown.

I had the need to explore as well, fueled by all the wonderful stories my grandsire had told me ever since I’d been a young spawn, and indeed I’d spent some time out in the open ocean when I was younger, but that was all behind me now. My job these days was to run the family business from the safetyof Coral’s Deep. It wasn’t ideal, but I understood why my grandfather was leaving it to me and not to my older brother.

Algrim had…issues. I don’t know when it all started: we assumed it was not long after the attack on our females. Maybe it was losing first our mother and then our father in rapid succession. He became unstable and prone to fits of violence. He was still intelligent, but unpredictable. It made for a dangerous combination.

That was one of the reasons I had moved out and invited Cetia to live with me. I didn’t want him anywhere near her. It wasn’t that I thought our brother would actually hurt her, but…well, I couldn’t really tell anymore. Regardless, it worked out well for everyone, since Cetia wanted to be closer to the city center.

Thinking about Algrim made me sad. He hadn’t always been like that. He wasn’t the same brother I’d grown up with. But at least I still had Cetia.

“My bride is safe in my home. I sent Cetia to keep her company.”

“That’s nice, but not the same. She’s here to be your bride, not your sister’s.”

“I know.”

The plan had been to come into the office, find the information I needed, send it off to the vendor, and swiftly return home. But once I got here, I’d gotten another call. Then one thing led to another, as it always did, and somehow, I was still here.

“Give me your work contact conch. I’ll take over for the next few days. You should be with your new wife. She’s come a long way, and she must be terrified. Those who live on land usuallyhave a hard time adjusting to being underwater. What type is she, anyway?” He held out his hand for my conch.

I handed it over very reluctantly. I was terrible at delegating.

“Human.”

“You are lucky. Humans resemble our kind closely enough. They don’t have tails or fins, but their upper bodies are attractive. Very attractive, with full teats that show off their fertility. My cousin was not so lucky. He was matched with a Gargii.”

I grimaced. Gargiis were round and shapeless and an off-putting shade of gray. They had tails, but they didn’t help them in the water at all. All in all, they were the least aerodynamic species our kind could be matched with. The only thing they had going for them was that they floated. But that too was a hindrance in an underwater city, and they had to have weights attached to keep them from floating away.

“My condolences to him.”

“Not necessary. He’s completely in love with her. He thinks she’s better than the tides themselves.”

“In that case, may the tides bless their union.”

What did I know about other species? Before meeting Vera, I’d thought humans strange looking, like deformed versions of our own species, missing all the parts that made us strong. They didn’t have tails to help them slice through the water. No fins to help them steer. They had neither scales nor spines to protect them from the dangers in the open waters and lacked the claws to help them hold on to the rocks when the currents were wild.

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