The Enchantress of the sea

CHAPTER 8

We went home just for lunch and finished the cod that had left over for breakfast: each time my father managed to collect industrial quantities. On the other hand, with his power, it was enough to lay his hands on him and he was able to control every marine creature. Then the fish jumped out of the water and fell at his feet. He had educated my sister and me by teaching us to defend ourselves and to control our powers and, above all, he had taught us that, despite our nature, we could make the rational part of us prevail and overcome what destiny placed us as an obstacle. And he had been good, an excellent father, rough but good. And I adored him, for this I suffered while sitting freezing in his silence. Nothing had changed since the day before and he didn't intend to be nice to Bryan.

"From now until the clash, your mother and I will watch over the bay at night, I also told my colleagues at the police station and therefore, so now we will go to rest" he informed us seriously. "You have to practice with your powers." Having said that, they withdrew.

"I want to get some rest first." Melody mumbled, frowning and left the kitchen. Bryan and I were alone again, although this time, the night did not hide us.

"We anticipated our night meeting." He said, smiling.

"Yeah, so we have more time." I changed my chair, sitting next to him. As soon as I was near him, he put his hands under my arms, pulling me slightly towards him.

"You are tired?" He asked in a whisper.

"A little'".

He touched my neck with the warm back of his hand, then turned it, brushing my hair away and placed a kiss behind his left ear. I felt flare up like every time he touched me.

"Unfortunately I have to confess one thing ..." He muttered. I stiffened and turned to look at him. Then he returned to widen his lips in his splendid smile.

“I am still very curious about your powers. Would you show me something else? "

I let out a slight chuckle and got up, headed for the sink. I turned the cold water knob and as soon as the shower came out of the tap, I held out my hand and stared at the water, erasing any thoughts that crossed my mind. It had to be free, empty. I narrowed my eyes to two slits, trying to see only the white of the jet and bringing my thoughts to cross it, as if to look at what was beyond. I felt my thought penetrate the liquid and break its molecules which were then attracted to me. The jet tilted and rose towards my hand like a tentacle of water that was completely under my control and that I could send wherever I wanted. Chuckling, I pushed him towards Bryan, throwing a spray in his face.

"Very funny". He said, wiping his face with the back of his hand.

"I had a lot of fun". I retorted, making fun of him.

"Easy to blame someone who is still struggling to walk ..." He joked.

I directed the tentacle into the sink and broke it into three waves. I felt his amazed gaze on me and I could not help but find the thing "fun".

"But how do you do it?"

I raised an eyebrow. It was difficult to answer, because it was something that came naturally to me. I tried to explain to him what I felt inside when I did it.

"Well, to tell the truth I don't know exactly how it works, but it's like a current of electricity that connects my gaze and my mind to the water, grasping its particles with invisible hands."

"Cool!" He exclaimed, pleased.

"Doesn't this scare you?" I asked, appalled by her enthusiasm. Her calm before such a spectacle was almost cloying. Yet I loved it for this.

"No. It should?"

"It's not an everyday thing," I pointed out.

“No, but oddities are part of you, special creature which you are."

I felt my knees tremble. What had I done to deserve a human who accepted me completely? I'd even confessed to him about that loathsome memory of the past, but he kept looking at me like I was the person he loved most. I had the distinct feeling that by now, the only thing that could have hurt me was him, whether I disappointed him, in the first person, or that he, somehow, disappeared from my life.

I turned off the tap and went back to sit next to him. He took my head in his arms and carried it to his chest. I wish that moment would never end. I was stronger and more resistant than him, but at that moment I felt totally his, as well as my heart and soul (if my species had one). Never as in those days, had I felt the fracture between the two natures that belonged to me, become weak. I had always lived that passage like an amphibian that could live in both places, but that of the mainland, was only a guest. After a while, the water became a call that made it boil in and the sea became "thirst quenching". Yet, never as in those days, I felt privileged to be able to stay on the mainland.

"I love you". He whispered in my ear. For a moment I thought my heart was about to give way.

"And you're all for me." He kissed me again and was as ardent as the first time.

"Can I ask you more questions?" He asked me while we were embracing each other.

"Go ahead."

“What does your family do? I mean, with the powers ... "

" Well, my sister manages to heat the water until it boils.

My father knows how to speak to the creatures of the sea and my mother has omens, she sees misfortunes. "

"And did she see me as a bearer of misfortune?" He asked, with subtle sarcasm.

"No, but she saw the storm and death, but his accounts did not return and, in fact, you were destined to be saved... well, although I too could have been equally the cause of your death".

"Were you there for that, then?"

“Unfortunately, we arrived too late. The time between vision and the event is short and the ship was already destroyed and you were the only one still alive."

"Have you also seen the sirens that are causing this?"

"Yes and they are not like us." Bryan looked at me quizzically. He was waiting for you to continue.

"Yesterday I didn't tell you everything ..." Before he could say anything, I asked him: "Do you believe in the immortality of the soul, Bryan?"

"Well, I'm not a regular practitioner but I believe, even for a better earthly life, that there must be something after death."

"One of the many legends about us claims that not all mermaids are creatures with this original nature, but some would be souls damned and renegade from the afterlife, especially if they are guilty of violent death, and they can in this form."

Bryan looked at me stunned and shook his head. "I thought that such things could not exist in reality, but only in the fairy tale of the Little Mermaid".

"It's not a fairy tale, my dear" I admonished him, placing a palm on his cheek. "You stumbled upon a world that can cost you your life." My contrite and serious expression did not discourage him.

"Not by your side, because I feel I live with you." I blushed. "Your words always take my breath away."

He squeezed me again, remaining silent for a few moments. "What are these demonic sirens different from you?" He returned to

to ask.

“Over the years we have trained ourselves to manage the curse, albeit with difficulty; reason prevails over us, while they, well ... they are rebels, real indomitable beasts and we run into them from time to time. They chose evil and they won’t change that. "

I felt him clench his jaws from the tension that was growing in hearing those stories.

"Not that I believe in the image of hell represented in the devil with the gallows, but I have always thought of it as the death of the soul, the impossibility of having an afterlife."

"Of course and, in fact, for them, being like us is a punishment, a condemnation to a burning thirst, without peace and our curse consists precisely in this point in common with them". Here, now I had really revealed everything to him, even the reason why I felt like a monster: our nature, once pure, had always been stained with a real sacrilege that made us similar to demons, also labeling us as "ancestors of vampires. "

Almost telepathically, Bryan sensed my thoughts. He took my right hand and touched it with his lips, first the back and then, placing his face on the palm.

"You're not like that, you don't have to think about it." He added, giving me, in a glance, the liquid blue of his eyes. I don't know how he did it, but he always managed to make me feel better and at peace with myself. Then, while playing with a lock of my hair, he asked me if I would ever have the possibility of being definitively human and if I could have chosen, which of the two lives I would have preferred.

"It has not yet happened that a creature like us has become human in all respects and if they had asked me a week ago, I would have said that my only real life was in the abyss, while now ..." I blushed while looking for the best way to finish the sentence. "Now I have no reason to desire the sea as before."

He kissed my forehead, then his lips touched my nose, lips, chin. But they didn't stop and when they touched the hollow of the neck, I felt my brain cloud. The hands lifted the sweatshirt, rummaging until it touched the skin. The frenzy took hold of me.

"Bryan, I have never ..."

"You’re scared?" He whispered to me.

"Yes, but you know why."

"I trust you. Let me love you, Ari. "

He kissed my neck again, driving me crazy. I was no longer able to refuse. I took him by the hand and we went to my room.

He took off my clothes, caressing me tenderly. Being touched like that for the first time made me inflamed, but with a warmth I could never have had enough. I was so hungry for his touch. I did not want him to stop. I did not imagine there could be such a powerful feeling, a kind of incontrollable excitement, which commands all the body.

That was how I discovered true love.