Ambassador to the Freaks

(5) Mercenaries Return to Joten

Hot summer had given way to a very pleasant evening with a little breeze, a little chill, and cloudless skies full of little stars. The first meeting went on for as long as it could, but the machinery of the clock tower moved along endlessly until it was time to chime out the princess’s curfew. Terra finished the sentence she was reading and closed the book just as the final chime sounded. “Let’s go, Highness.”

Elocyne raised up her head and pretended that she hadn’t fallen asleep. The handmaiden set the book on the arboreal shelf and stood. She took the princess’s hand and helped her up. The ladies bade their friends goodnight and returned to the castle, the light of their lantern disappearing into the dark greenery of the garden until it was only a bright point in the distance.

Lewin stood and stretched. Monsta tried to move, but found that her tail had fallen asleep. She thrashed it a little to get the feeling back. The human took up the remains of their meal, but decided to deal with it later and placed it on the shelf. “Good night, Monsta.”

“Good night.” She dragged herself to the lip of the stream and flopped over into the water.

As Lewin returned to his rooms, he could faintly hear a kind of chirping noise. Monsta was heading back to her bed, navigating by sound using a high-pitched tone. None of his books mentioned mermaids being able to use sound to navigate, though some of the more fanciful texts speak of nereids with magical voices that can deafen or kill a human. When his journey as Ob-Enon was over, he would probably re-write some of those books.

The waterways beneath Castle Joten were extensive. The great river flowed directly through the castle and surrounding city, so floodgates had to be set up to avoid a sudden deluge. There were also cisterns beneath the castle for storing drinkable water, and different channels for the kitchen and for sewage. Most of the inhabitants of the castle did not know about all the different courses for water beneath their floors, but Monsta knew. The waterways were her home.

Near the north side of the castle was the best place to get fish and edible plants. The south side of the castle was dirty water that emptied into the moat, but the river kept moving so none of it became stagnant. Also, there were gratings keeping anyone from entering or exiting the castle through the water. When she was much younger, Monsta would squeeze through the bars to hunt for food. Now she was trapped inside.

Every tiny chirp she emitted echoed back to her, bringing with it a colorless image of her surroundings. She was exiting the gardens now, getting close to where the water was funneled into different paths. Suddenly she hit the rip current and was swept downward.

Solid bricks of stone were on every side of her. The water pushed against her until she was moving too quickly to echolocate. A sharp turn. Monsta navigated it with a subtle twist of her tail. Before her now was an opening. For another moment she was still in the water, and then she felt her body flung into a pitch-black room. She hung in the air for a heartbeat, then splashed into the cold water beneath her.

She was in a cistern. Great stone walls crossed the room, each holding enough water to sustain the castle for weeks in the event of a siege. The tops of the walls also served as walkways, leading to the passageways on either side.

At least, that was what this room once was. Now, the water had flooded up over the walls and into the corridors. One corridor led to a staircase that had once gone up into the castle, but was now blocked. The other was probably emergency food storage. Water was escaping the room through an overflow system. The humans had forgotten about this place altogether.

Lewin had told stories about lakes and ponds, where there was nothing but water all around. No walls, no grates, just water and more water. He even spoke of something called an ocean, a place where the water met the sky, and there was nothing in between. This cistern was the closest thing Monsta knew to the waterways of the outside world.

But it was a cold and dark place. It was where all the unwanted debris in the water ended up. It was her home.

Monsta swam into the corridor that she thought was probably an old storage room. It went down into a pit with earthen walls all around. This room was decorated with assemblages of fish bones and a few other shiny objects. It was the best ‘art’ she had been able to create with the materials available. Against the wall was an old storage barrel, half of it now lost to rot and time. This was Monsta’s bed, which she padded with whatever weeds and grasses she could gather. Behind the barrel were two of her only possessions.

One was a teardrop earring set with a brilliant red gemstone. She had found it in the garden waterways almost ten years ago. It was truly beautiful. Since then she had figured out that it had belonged to the late queen. Every year, on Elocyne’s birthday, she had been tempted to return it, but couldn’t bear to part with it. So it remained here inside a grimy old bottle, except for when Monsta took it up out of the darkness to admire it.

The second item was a dagger. There was no telling how far it had traveled down the river to reach the castle. Monsta had discovered it pinned against the grating by the current. It looked like steel, but reflected light only dimly. Also, after years in the water, it had not rusted. The mermaid had re-wrapped the rotten hilt with part of her shirt.

Monsta curled up in her barrel and slowly sank into the grass bedding.

A scent woke her. It was something faint that had traveled far, growing weaker as the water diluted it. It woke Monsta nonetheless. Something about the scent was… familiar. She left her bed and entered the waterways again. Where was the scent coming from? And what was it?

She chirped out her little sounds to navigate back up to ground level. Whatever it was, it was coming from the north. Monsta traveled parallel to the pipes that fed into the baths. Suddenly the smell hit her with renewed strength. She felt memories flooding back to her, but they were all foggy memories without any details. Monsta swam faster, past the kitchen and under the library. She was fighting the current as she grew closer to the north end of the intake. The smell was coming from the moat, just under the northern bridge into the castle.

The north side of the moat was out of her territory. Unlike the rest of the moat, this area had been dammed up to form a small pond. Lilies were grown here to make the castle’s entrance a little nicer. It was blocked by a grating. Everyone in the castle thought she couldn’t get out there.

The scent was driving her crazy. It was worth the risk.

Monsta swam back through the routes she knew so well. It put strain on her to reach this place, but her tail was up to the task. Here she was: one of the gratings that kept the castle safe from invasion. It had a loose bar. Monsta turned her body to tense her muscles, and then struck the bar with her tail. It popped out of place. The gap was just big enough. The mermaid left the safety of the castle, taking the bar with her.

Temptation started to build in the water-born nereid. This moat-lake was huge. So much room to swim and play and caper! But someone might see her, might learn that she had escaped. She kept to the muddy bottom, heading toward the source of her curiosity. Once under the bridge she approached the surface. As she neared, a single drop fell into the water. That small drop carried a hammer blow of smell. Monsta recoiled and held her nose. Well, this was the source. She surfaced beneath the bridge’s shadow.

Someone was above her. Whoever it was made very little sound. Then the sound of a plucked string, followed by another, and then the strings were arranged together to make music. It wasn’t very good; Monsta had heard the castle performers before. It was also pretty strange that someone was playing music on the castle bridge at night. The mermaid risked getting closer.

Whoever it was had a cloak and hood. The only visible part of them was the hand gripping the lute that protruded from the cloak as they played. Monsta stayed at the water’s surface and watched, her curiosity mounting with every moment.

Minutes passed. The stranger practiced the same song a few times before trying a different one. A few more minutes passed. Then the lute stopped. The stranger took something out and held it over the moat. It was a small jar. The jar tipped slightly and a single drop fell out. Again the scent spread throughout the water. Monsta closed her eyes and tried to remember. Why did she know this smell? Why did it smell like far-off places and memories?

“Hello, little fry.”

Her fins flared with fright. Up on the bridge, a woman’s face was looking down at her. Monsta retreated into the water, burying herself into the mud at the bottom of the moat.

She had been seen. What if the king found out? What would he do to her? Could she get back without being seen again?

The scent hit the water again.

Monsta made up her mind. She would be brave. She was already in trouble, so a little more wouldn’t hurt. With a thrash of her tail she shook off the mud and returned to the surface. The human woman was lying on the bridge, looking down at her. She did not say anything. She just smiled.

“Who are you?”

“My name is Auren.”

“What is that smell?”

“That’s my perfume, though I haven’t worn it in years. Not since the last time I was here. I was hoping you would remember it. I wanted to talk to you first.”

Monsta did not know this woman. Why was she acting like they knew each other? “Who are you?”

“Auren, of the Chaser Company, at your service. I’m here to train the Ambassador. The queen hired me because I was the one who brought him here.” The mermaid had no response. The human continued. “I’ve heard all about how well he’s doing. But, I wanted to know about you. It looks like you’re healthy. A little fat, but so was I at your age.”

“What?”

Auren smiled. “You probably recognize my perfume because I carried you for so long. You see, I didn’t only bring the boy. I brought you here, too.”

Monsta’s green eyes grew wide. This woman knew where she was from! In a single instant, she felt a little less abandoned, a little less orphaned. This woman had answers!

Then Monsta’s face grew angry. This human had left her here, here in the castle of Mellius III. Every kick, every shout, every hateful gaze by the humans was because of her! She was in this prison because of this human!

Monsta turned in the water and beat her tail so hard that the human was splashed. When the water cleared, the mermaid was gone.

Auren sat up and took out her heavy silver coin. She gave it a good flick and watched it flip in the moonlight. It landed on the stones with the queen’s side up. The mercenary removed her cloak, her badge, and her jacket, took off her boots, and pulled off the scraps that used to be socks. She piled all this on the bridge, along with her lute, the perfume, and her coin. Wearing only her blouse and trousers, she dived into the moat.

There was movement from nearby. Auren followed as quickly as her clumsy human limbs could swim. By the moonlight she could barely make out a bar of the grating being pushed back into place. She swam up close, grabbed hold of the grate, and kicked the bar lose. From within, Monsta could be seen fleeing into the darkness. Auren surfaced for another breath. She then squeezed her way through the grate (cursing how wide her hips had grown) and began searching.

A strong current of water grabbed her, and she was pulled down into the darkness.