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I opened my eyes as the tears became too hard to hold in, my face still pressed to Bellamy’s shoulder. The waters around us crashed against the boat, relentless and fierce. The scene around me was a blur, with the white of the yacht blending fuzzily into the heavy storm grey of the sky above and the midnight blue of the water below. Like blending colors into a painting…like watercolors.
Watercolors.
An absurd thought took hold, reminding me of a power I didn’t expect to call on. But as my tears flowed fast, I realized they just might prove to be my greatest strength. With a brief burst of hopefulness, I pulled back, looking into Bellamy’s face.
“Get that trident away from her. Whatever you have to do,” I uttered.
“Resurrected five minutes and you’re already throwing me into trouble.” Bellamy’s voice came through a gentle teasing smile, and I pulled him in for a reaffirming embrace once more.
“You never needed any help finding trouble.” I smirked weakly.
We motioned for McKenzie and Noah to come near, leaving Cordelia performing her ritual with the trident. When they joined us, I quickly relayed to them the only excuse of a plan I had left.
“She doesn’t have the full power of her siren song anymore without the scale. So, without the trident she’s powerless. I don’t know if this will work, and if it doesn’t, none of you come after me, understand?” The words burned in my throat, knowing what I asked of them would be far from easy.
“We’re gonna die either way. Or be forced to take sides with the sea witch over there. If you need us, we’re coming after you.” Noah objected with his usual stubbornness, but secretly I was glad to hear it. It was nice to have him on my side for once.
“First and foremost, you have to focus on separating the trident from Cordelia. And get her into the water. I don’t care how you do it.”
“We’ll try, but we can’t get near it without getting zapped,” McKenzie said.
“Then think of something. You can do it.” I encouraged her with a nudge in my voice.
“So, what are you going to do once we get it away from her, exactly?” Bellamy asked me.
“I’m going to cry,” I said.
Ignoring the three sets of confused eyes on me, I stepped away without further explanation, turning to face the stern. It’d be easier to dive into the sea from the back of the boat to keep Cordelia from noticing. I tugged on Bellamy’s arm and led him with me halfway.
“Keep a watch on her crew. Most of them seem to be too terrified to do anything and they’ve locked themselves in the cabin, but I don’t know how loyal to her they are. Keep McKenzie and Noah safe,” I said hurriedly, noticing the waves rising higher and taller. There was no telling how much land had already begun to flood with seawater spilling into the coasts. We couldn’t waste much more time.
I started off toward the stern but turned around to look back before I’d gone two steps. “Thank you for everything, Bellamy.”
He nodded with a smirk. “Thank you, love. You’re the one who’s always jumping overboard for me.”
I shook my head, thinking how right he was. Just once it’d be nice if doing the right thing didn’t involve leaping headfirst into a raging sea. Yet here we were again.
I kicked off my shoes and climbed over the railing of the ship as it lifted and dropped with the motion of the waves. I looked down, dreading the fall into these treacherous waters. But this time, I took consolation in knowing this was the one place Cordelia couldn’t reach me. She couldn’t swim the depths like I could. Not anymore. Without her tail, she was forever just as helpless against the sea as any ordinary human.
But I would have to be a helpless, ordinary human, too, at least for a few painful moments. I let the tears come, because I’d need all of them. I would need every painful feeling, every heartbreaking thought, every crushing memory. As I harbored each one, I dove headfirst in, letting the rioting water push me underneath. My eyelids puckered from the sting of salt. I resisted every instinct to fight the undertow, and instead let it pull me so far under I couldn’t swim back up, prompting my change the moment everything went dark.
My eyes flew open, as I resurrected in my own strange way, awakening in my transformed mermaid body. I still wasn’t used to it. The muscles in my tail ached from soreness just as much as the rest of me. But I ignored the pain and swam to the surface, pressing myself to the side of the yacht so as not to get separated, and to be able to hear when the perfect time to strike presented itself.
It was difficult to hear and see, especially as lightning crackled overhead and wind continued whipping the water up higher and higher, siphoning it upward like a slowly spinning cyclone. I was grateful for the dim lights of the yacht, because without them, my surroundings would have been nearly pitch black.
I could make out the sound of voices struggling, and the spark of the trident followed by forceful thuds. I wished I could pull myself up over the railing to see what was happening, but my tail was too heavy, and I lacked the arm strength to lift myself no matter how hard I tried. I would have to trust my friends to pull through, and then I’d have to trust myself to do what I knew must be done.
After a few torturous minutes, there was silence except for the whistling wind and wild waves and the yacht's hull slapping against them. I feared that I might not be able to come back to them if I couldn’t get out of this water. I would be stuck this way.
A deafening gunshot suddenly pierced the air, making me jump. Within seconds, a bright red light illuminated the air above me, orange-gold sparks raining down like fireworks over the sides of the yacht. A flare gun. Someone found the flare gun. Genius.
The splash that followed drew my attention to the front of the yacht, where against the fading of the orange flash I saw the silhouette of a woman hit the water. When McKenzie leaned over the railing above, waving the flare gun, I breathed a sigh of relief that it wasn’t her I’d seen drop off the side of the boat.
“I thought of something!” She yelled proudly.
I launched forward, swimming to where Cordelia had fallen, and caught sight of the trident following, dangling for a moment by its prongs that caught on the railing before sliding off the boat’s edge. I knew I had to reach it before she regained her senses and took hold of it again.
Pulsing my fins up and down fast as I could, I jetted through the water at a speed I’d never swum before. Like a dart, I ripped past the swirling currents around me and soared through the water. I dashed forward, placing myself between the trident and Cordelia as they drifted downward through the water.
