Page 36 of Enslaved

I’ve done it. I’ve drowned but not died.

The Prince, sensing the calm come over me, pushes me back to arm’s length and looks me in the eye. I nod. I cannot smile for fear of losing the flower stem gripped in my teeth, but I try to make my brow relax, to let him know I’m all right. He holds up three fingers.Three hours,he’s reminding me. Which means we’d better get swimming.

I look down between my bare feet, down into the dark beneath us. I hope the Prince is right and Ulakrana is truly down there. Some part of me had believed I would see it as soon as I was underwater. But there’s nothing. Only darkness so big, so consuming. Like the very maw of madness itself, waiting to swallow me whole.

I draw a long, watery breath through my nostrils, through the filtering stamens. Then, angling my body, I begin to swim down, pulling myself with my arms, kicking with my legs. I’m not much of a swimmer. Oscar and I used to play in the lake at the country house our family visited each summer when there was money for such luxury. But that was nothing like this.

The Prince, however, takes my hand. Nimble and strong, he pulls me along after him, as though he goes deep diving every day of his life. I try to mimic what I see him doing with his arms and get along a little better than before. As we progress, the pressure on my bones increases, but the Prince’s glamour seems to offer some protection on that score as well.

All is strangely quiet and very dark. The little light from the sky overhead fades the deeper we go. Soon we are in complete darkness save for the glamour magic. A flash of silvery fin catches the tail of my eye. I stop, maneuvering my arms and legs to stay in place. I’m disoriented, unable to tell up from down anymore. I don’t even know if we’re swimming in the right direction.

Another flash of fin, just within reach of the glamour light. My water-filled lungs tighten. The Prince squeezes my hand, and I turn to look at him. He nods, his expression . . . encouraging? It’s difficult to say through the half-mask of that flower. He juts his chin, indicating that we should continue. I allow him to pull me a little deeper.

Then, like enormous rippling curtains, the darkness below us parts. Light fills my view, sudden and blinding, pure white. I put up an arm to shield my vision. It’s several long heartbeats before I dare peer out again.

Six women appear before us. Two of them carry strange globes that dangle from the end of long poles like lures. Bobbing gently in the currents, they cast pulsing glows of white light, shimmering across the iridescent hides of the giant seahorses they ride. The women themselves are half naked save for the blue, green, and purple scales they wear across their breasts and down their arms like armor. Their bare flesh is a silvery green, and gills flutter from their necks, and fins flare from the sides of their faces. Their long hair is caught in intricate braids, adorned with shells and bits of bone and teeth. The most terrible thing about them, however, is their eyes. They are large and very white, with pinpoint pupils at their centers. They fix upon the Prince and me, the intensity of their stares enough to congeal living blood.

The foremost of their number rides a seahorse so brilliantly red, it almost looks as though it’s on fire. Its rider is more formidable than the rest. She wears a spined headdress that frames her beautiful, battle-scarred face. She studies us, her gaze both aggressive and bemused, as though she cannot believe we have purposefully ventured this far down into her world.

Then she opens her mouth and begins to sing. Her voice ripples through the water, tickles my ear. I remember when Oscar and I would play in the lake, we would take turns trying to make sounds underwater, trying to guess what the other had said. It was always so distorted, impossible to understand. This is different. This sound, this song, was meant to be heard underwater. The distortion is part of the melody, a strange, beautiful, haunting melody, unlike anything I’ve ever before heard. It’s deep, wild. Alluring.

Her mouth opens wider, revealing sharp fangs. I see them without fear. Her song is too lovely to feel anything but a need to draw closer to her. When she stretches out her hand, I move to take it, ready to let her guide me down to darker depths, down to some secret lair where I will drown in the delights she offers.

A sharp tug on my arm. I start and turn to the Prince, the song-spell broken. He pulls me closer to him, puts himself between me and the merfolk as though somehow his physical body can block out their enchantments. Then, to my horror, he takes the stem from his mouth and speaks. His voice is distorted, but by some magic I can just discern the words: “I am Castien Lodírith, Prince of Vespre, son of King Lodírhal of Aurelis. My companion is a mortal mage of the first order. She has traveled far to confer with Queen Seraphine.”

The foremost merwoman flashes her teeth, visibly annoyed at having her song interrupted. She begins to brandish the trident in her hand, but one of the others urges her seahorse up close and seems to say something. The first one snarls again and shakes her head, but the second persists in whatever argument she is making. All this while, I feel the seconds slipping away, feel the deep, impenetrable cold of the water all around me, ready to press through the glamour.

Finally, the leader utters a strange, ululating bark and makes a sharp motion with her trident. At once, two of the riders urge their mounts up to me and the Prince. One holds out her hand to me. I turn frightened eyes to the Prince, who has popped the stem of his flower back into his mouth. He nods, indicating that I should go. I don’t like to be parted from him, but there doesn’t seem to be any choice.

Summoning all my courage, I place my hand in the merwoman’s. Her grip is strong as she yanks me through the water and behind her onto her seahorse’s back. I wrap my arms around her muscular, sensual, scale-covered body and my legs around the barrel of the seahorse. I’ve ridden very little in my life, certainly never astride a steed like this. A little desperate, I turn to catch a glimpse of the Prince mounted behind another of the merwomen. I have just time enough to think how positively dwarfed he looks in comparison to her broad, muscular frame.

Then we’re off. Streaking through the water at tremendous speed. Now and then by the gleam of the merfolk’s pale lamps, I glimpse strange bodies of movement—schools of fish darting by in glittering formations, or larger, slower beings, shy of the light, keeping just out of view. Once I swear I saw a shark, all cold dead eyes and savage teeth. But the merwomen ride on without pause, carrying us deeper and deeper. The pressure down here would surely crush me were it not for the Prince’s spell. I can only pray we reach the palace soon.

We come to a gorge at the ocean floor, alight with more of the globe lanterns like the merwomen carry. These seem to mark a passage through a bewildering labyrinth of stone. The merwomen drive their mounts into the gorge, following those lights. Here and there, I glimpse what look like giant eels darting in and out of crevices. One of these shoots out suddenly, snapping at a seahorse. Its rider, however, deftly flips her trident about and spears the eel through the eye. A ripple, almost like a shriek, bursts from the eel as it retreats into its den.

I scarcely have time to process what I’ve seen before we’ve left it far behind. I close my eyes, unable to bear much more of this, and press my face into the scaly shoulder of the merwoman. We ride for what feels like hours but may have been mere minutes. I don’t look up again until a sudden intense glow of light presses against my eyelids. It’s so unexpected, I cannot resist looking up just as we emerge from the gorge into a world of color.

A vast city stands before us, a dizzying array of towers and tiers through which submarine traffic moves in dizzying patterns. All is illuminated by hundreds of giant globes, the size of hot air balloons, hovering above the city at various intervals. I cannot tell if these are animal, vegetable, or pure magic. It doesn’t matter—they cast rippling, rainbow-hued brilliance across the twisted spires and graceful arches, making the city shine like a dream come true.

I’d had no idea it would be so beautiful. No idea how, despite the terror of this descent and the darkness and the cold through which we traveled, my heart would leap with pure joy at the sight. No wonder the ancient tales told of men and women willing to risk their lives just for a glimpse of Ulakrana. Now I’ve seen it, and I would not alter any one of the decisions that led me step by step to this place.

I turn my head, trying to catch sight of the Prince, to gauge his reaction. Is he glad now too? Will the sheer beauty of the view be enough to earn his forgiveness? His face is suffused in the overhead glow but turned so that I can only see the line of his cheek and jaw. I lift a hand, thinking to wave down his attention.

But then our escort sets off again faster than before. I’m obliged to catch hold of the merwoman rider and channel all my concentration on clinging in place. The path to the city leads along the edge of a great trench. An endless abyss yawns below me in which marine creatures with trailing tentacles reflect the light from the city globes, dancing and undulating like living nebulas of the deep. It’s so strange, so far beyond my limited scope of experience, I can’t decide if it’s wonderful or horrible. Maybe both.

We ride into the city, weaving in and out of the sea traffic, which follows no laws I can comprehend. It doesn’t take long before we catch the attention of its denizens. Merwomen—but no men, at least none that I see—crowd the windows of their twisted, tower dwellings, staring at us as we pass. It’s probably been centuries since any of these folk saw a living human. I cannot read their cold, fixed stares well enough to guess if they hate me for defying their queen’s laws or if they are merely curious.

The palace rises from the center of the city—a vast structure situated directly beneath the largest of the glowing orbs. Its towers, turrets, and high, dizzying arches have been overlayed with the most beautiful abalone shell, swirling with color that plays tricks on my eyes and makes the whole structure seem to wave and dance. Our escorts drive their mounts to a great platform before a large, round door. There they come to a stop. The woman with whom I ride points imperiously for me to dismount. I let go and swim away from her and the seahorse. To my great relief, the Prince hastens to join me. I resist the urge to reach out and take his hand.

The leader of the party looks down at us, her face inscrutable. She speaks a single word in a language I do not understand, and the door behind us opens. The Prince catches my eye. I follow his lead, swimming awkwardly through the door into the chamber beyond, leaving our escort behind. The Prince pulls the door shut behind us, then beckons me to swim with him to the center of the tall chamber. There are no windows, so none of the brilliant light from the globe makes its way in to illuminate the space. I can see only by the light of the Prince’s glamour-glow.

Suddenly, there’s a rushing around me. I nearly scream, but the Prince grabs my hands. Slowly, we begin to sink. Before I know it, my feet are planted on the floor of the chamber, and the water is only up to our chins, then our shoulders, our chests, our waists. I should be glad; instead, panic surges in my veins.

“Easy now, Darling,” the Prince says around the stem in his mouth. “Queen Seraphine keeps certain chambers of her palace prepared for receiving guests from the surface worlds. But you’ve taken a lot of water into your lungs, and you still need the flower to filter it.”

I wish I could tear the flower from my face, and cough up all the water even now sloshing in my chest. It feels strange to stand here, still drowning, kept alive by magic while surrounded by breathable air. I move the stem around in my mouth experimentally.

The door opens. I let out a cry of surprise as a wave of foam spills in, unfurling almost like a carpet. Then a magnificent woman appears, splashing water in her wake.

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