The image of Qinn struggling helplessly in the net sent a sliver of ice down my spine. I hadn’t been able to wrench the net apart. As hard as I’d tried, as much as I’d focused on trying to get him out, nothing had happened.
I lifted my hands, running my net-encased fingers over my arms.
They had figured it out far faster than I had. I was powerless within the net.
I drifted to the floor in despair, the soft current of the water wavering my hair around me.
I was powerless to rescue Merrick like this, just an ordinary teenager. The irony of my horror at being “just an ordinary teenager” swept over me. Only a few days ago I’d been insisting, to anyone who’d listen, that there was nothing special about me.
Now, when I needed to be strong, when I needed to be extra-ordinary, Neith had found a way to neutralise me. He’d found a way to bend me to his will.
A murmur of voices outside my door made my stomach drop in fear.
The wall behind me slid away and another gossamer-fine net similar to the one I was dressed in was hurled across the space, settling over me in a confusion of drapes and folds.
Four Miengu crowded into the room, one of them hauling me to my feet roughly while the others formed a defensive cocoon around me.
I was pushed out of the cell and into a curving passageway that ran in a thin gloomy streak bordered with cells on each side.
I wondered, as we swam in a tightly crowded group, which cell Merrick was being held in as I tried, unsuccessfully, to orientate myself.
They moved me fluidly through a grand doorway, ornately decorated with gems that sparkled faintly in the gloom. The door opened into a cavernous underwater room eerily lit in the pale blue fluorescence of the plankton I’d watched well up out of the volcano, as they clung to the walls in a fine irregular net of living light.
We swam over a room that was packed with Oceanids, some of whom I recognised, others I didn’t. The eerie silence that filled the space was made more threatening by the regimented style in which they were arranged.
Unlike at the cave in the mountains, where the Oceanids had interacted as a village of neighbours, these Oceanids were neatly divided into groups of varying sizes, all of them fanning out from a bare patch of rock in the centre of the gathering.
It was obvious that each group consisted of Oceanids of the same talent or type. I recognised the perfectly proportioned but diminutive form of the Merrow, although I didn’t recognise any of the faces within the group.
The Miengu were easy to identify; their intimidating bulk strangely contrasted by some of the smaller ones. I recognised two of them as the ones who had been tracking Qinn and me. They were standing beside each other, the smaller one looking smug and grinning and nudging the larger as I swam past.
Some of the other groupings I’d never seen before and while all of them were exquisite some of them held a far more alien quality than I’d been exposed to until now.
One group in particular, placed close to the centre of the gathering, had pronounced frightening features. There were a few with unnaturally long fingernails that ended in needle-sharp points, others with mouths full of pointed teeth, and still others covered from head to toe in sharply pointed barbs and spikes.
The Miengu led me into the centre of the gathering, pushing my netted feet onto the rock before forming a tight circle around me.
The silence boomed in the space as every eye focussed on me.
Without warning every Oceanid bent double at the waist making me jump in surprise.
Neith laughed dryly as he descended from above me, placing his hand firmly on the back of my neck and forcing me into the same position of deference as every other Oceanid.
“You will be showing me the proper respect from now on,” he hissed.
I squirmed away from his touch, pulling myself upright and glaring into his beautiful blue eyes.
“Alexandra, I am surprised to see you here, such a brave move to come alone, and really quite out of character for you.”
I glared at him.
“You are not what I would call a heroine, so afraid of what everyone else is thinking of you, so eager to do what everyone thinks you should be doing, and yet here you are, clearly in search of your beloved Merrick.” His voice sneered around Merrick’s name.
“I am pleased that you came though.” Neith rubbed his chin thoughtfully as he circled me. “It has saved me having to assign valuable resources to ensure your capture. You see I know how ridiculously weak you are on your own …” He snickered, swirling around me, his eyes scudding over my body as he did so.
“On your own you have no hope of rescuing the Oceanids and no hope of convincing the humans to protect the ocean, after all why would they protect something if it is of no gain to them? You hope to convince them that by reducing fishing and stopping pollution they will save something beautiful, but you do not see that they do not care about beauty if it doesn’t profit them financially” He shook his head in pity.
“You are so young, so naïve, you haven’t suffered enough at their hands to realise that they will never change. I on the other hand…no…we.” He swept his hand over the mass of Oceanids as they watched the exchange. “We have suffered.
“I can see that you think I am forcing these Oceanids to be part of my army, but you are wrong, every one of them has lost a great deal to human greed. Loved ones, beloved homes, and many, many grow weaker every day. They are not here because I have forced them to come, they have each chosen to fight for their right to life…in their own way they have each chosen me, for I am the leader of the fight for life.”
As I listened to him speak I watched the Oceanids behind him, their faces peering around each other as they stood in unnatural lines. Many responded with nods of firm agreement to what he was saying, but there were some whose eyes were dull, their faces strained as they refused to look at me. It was these Oceanids that gave me hope, because it was obvious that not all of them were in agreement with Neith. What I couldn’t quite work out though was why they stayed. If they were so unhappy to be part of Neith’s plan, surely they could find a way to escape?
“You really can’t be blamed for your naïvety,” Neith continued. “You were raised as a human and lied to for so long about our existence, I was surprised you were able to access your talents so quickly. Honestly, when you first came to the cave I was among the first to express my doubt about you to Talita…not that my opinion of you has changed very much mind.” He tsk’d, his expression mocking. “Your father had similar idealistic and noble goals for the Oceanids, Alexandra, but like him before you your plan will fail if you try to attempt it on your own…but with me…” He paused, swimming in front of me and placing both hands on my shoulders, his eyes alight. “Together we could do what is necessary to save the Oceanids and convince humanity once and for all to leave the ocean alone.”
“You don’t want to save the Oceanids, you want to rule them,” I hissed at him
The amicable expression in his eyes immediately cooled into glittering ambition, before he flicked away from me, indicating the Miengu should pull me up to where he floated above the ranks of Oceanids.
“Alexandra, you see me as a monster, this much is clear, but you need to understand that I am no more a monster than the humans, whose blood runs through your veins.”
He seemed to be waiting for me to reply, but I had nothing to say.
“Do you see these Oceanids?” He waited until I nodded. “Their ancestors ruled earth, Alexandra. We always have been the stronger species and in our greatest day we chose the sea because it was the more beautiful of the two environments, the more bountiful.”
He paused, gazing at the Oceanids below him.
“These Oceanids