past

Shapes had lost their definition. Light was blinding, a hot white she had never seen brighter, yet the only color or shape she could define was the deepest shadows contrasting in the light. Air struck her lungs in painful bursts, and her hand shot to her mouth, unbelieving of the passage of air through her mouth. The salt on her fingertips burned her cracked lips. Jumping from her mouth to her neck, she whimpered at the smooth skin she felt along the length of her neck. The damp sand underneath her back was cold enough to send chills deep into her bones, yet her sun stung skin burned where it kissed the sun.

Only remnants of remained of her last hours, or for all she knew, last few days. How long she had been beached was a mystery. But, one thing was evident-- she had been banished.

“Arlenis, show traitorous compassion for the land dwellers, the result of your actions has been the loss of one of your kin at their hands,” the eldest of her clan spat. “You fight against your nature to lure, to slay, so perhaps, your place is among us, but them.”

Struggling against the hold of the two Abyssal that held her down, twisting and slapping at her captors with her fin, she managed to break loose of one by knocking his tail out from under him. Fingernails raked across her arm in a frantic swipe to pull her back into their grasp. Chanting was resonating around her, and a vibration seemed to ripple throughout her entire body. At once, she felt the mental connection all of her kind shared snap like a frayed rope. Her breath was strained, every breath choking her as each became harder to take. The flesh of her tail flayed across the surface, shedding like the serpents she had seen close to the surface. Blood in the water would surely attack predators, and in her heart, she thought maybe that was their plan all along.

She shook this thought from her mind now, finding herself remarkably alive, despite her wish to be otherwise. Her Abyssal instinct may have been flawed, not as strong as her kin, but she was still one among them more than any…

As her eyes settled, finally able to decipher the shape and color of her surroundings, a partially strangled scream escaped, crushed by her stolen breath. Disbelief and panic paralyzed her mind as her hands ran along the length of two pale limbs where once a single shimmering tail had been.

Angry, she clawed at these foreign limbs, dragging her long nails so forcefully that long red streaks appeared. She hissed in pain, pulling her hand back to fall into her lap. Tears welled in her eyes at the sight of her Deryn features.

Banished... and cursed.

Cursed to live among her Deryn cousin, as one.

Searching the length of the beach for the sight of any of her kin, hoping this twisted punishment was merely a lesson of warning to her, she found no trace of any Abyssals, neither perched on the nearby rocks, or afloat in the safety of the shallows. Focusing, she reached out through her mind for the mental embrace of her kin, only to be met with dark, empty silence.

Pulling herself to her knees, she attempted to rise, but her clumsy limbs betrayed her, landing her face first back into the damp sand. Not even bothering to brush the grit from her cheeks and lips, the sand crushing between her teeth as she clenched them in frustration, she tried again. But, there was no strength in these useless limbs.

An idea struck her, and she scrambled towards the water, hoping that if she could only return to the water, her true form would be restored. Desperately dragging her limp body into the oscillating waves, she water submerged her head, and she found herself suffocating under their cover. Choking, sputtering water as she emerged from beneath the skin of the water, she found herself unable to do much more than tread the water. Kicking her new limbs synchronistically as had been so natural with her fin, did little but bob her up and down more dangerously. Panicked, a new instinct took hold, and her new limbs bucked and kicked separately, allowing her the momentum to thrash back to the land.

The land. Her new, likely permanent home.

Clutching an embankment of rocks she had managed to reach, barely out of the surf, it crashed into her face, and she inhaled the brine. Sputtering again, she spat and choked to clear her breathing passages. Climbing up out of the water, dragging herself across the rocks, she crawled back onto the sand, safe from the newfound danger of the water that had once been her sanctuary.

A safe distance from the crashing waves, she caught her reflection in the stagnant water of a tide pool. Her hand dragged down her face, newly formed with features of the Deryn, strange protrusions where once graceful, smoothness had been. The bright amber hues of her hair had remained behind-- the vibrant, exotic colored hair of the Deryn was one of the few traits they had retained from their abyssal ancestors. Every part of her skin felt stripped, dry and brittle. Her throat felt as parched. Never before had she felt dehydrated, and a sharp ache was piercing her head.

To this, she preferred death. Why had the predators not taken her, saved her from this plight?

Despite the fatigue in her limbs, and the anger brewing in her chest, she had to do something other than lay on this beach in a miserable heap. The sun would fall behind the horizon soon. She had to find shelter, sate this raging hunger before it consumed her insides first.

She was stronger than this. After all, hadn’t been that stubborn sense of pride and determination that had cursed her in the first place? Gritting her teeth, she pushed herself up again, and managed to stand on her wobbling legs. Knees ready to buckle with every tentative step she took further inland, she forced herself forward in search of a means of survival.

By the rise of the moons, she had managed to find a small community nestled against a set of docks. Nothing much more than a port of call for merchants and sailors, but there would be food, and hopefully, something to wear. The temperature was beginning to dip, and her burn sensitive skin was deeply absorbing the chill. Using the weatherbeaten railing of the boardwalk, she ambled down the uneven boards, creaking under her steps, towards the only building in the row with lights casting out from the windows.

A shrill whistle bit at her ears, much more sensitive to sounds without water to distort the waves. Twisting around, preparing to defend herself, despite barely able to stand, she saw a shadow shift between the dark gap of two buildings. Pulling himself out of a pile of ripped canvas sail cloth and mangled fishing nets encased in broken crates, what looked like it might have once been a sailor stumbled towards her.

“Evening, my lovely,” he slurred, as he stumbled towards her.

Tangled dirty hair fell in dirty strands into his face, and he grinned a black toothed smile. The only part of him that was not bedraggled was the leather coat hanging off his emaciated frame-- probably freshly nicked off another one of his victims. The urge to fight him swelled inside Arlenis, but she did not know how to fight on land, with limbs, without a finn. She did not trust these weak spirited limbs. Lamely, she shuffled backwards, jumping when she hit the railing with her back, trapping herself between his groping hands and the rail.

“Come here, and I’ll keep you plenty warm.”

He licked his lips as if he was salivating, and the lust in his eyes sent a unnerving pulse down her spine through to the tips of her newly acquired toes. It resonated, and it triggered a sensation at the base of her skull, and another pulse consumed her body. One she knew by instinct. An instinct she could not suppress.

Clasping his hands, she pinned them down against his legs, and locked her eyes with his, and his pupils swelled like black coins. Under her gaze, he wilted, and his mouth fell slack jawed, utterly stupefied.

She had to catch her breath in disbelief. No longer an Abyssal, yet she retained her manipulative gifts. She might just survive after all.

“I’ll take the coat instead.”

Despite never speaking a word of his language, the words came out of her mouth as if they were her mother tongue. Her voice ragged and dry, but it still her her mesmerizing power over him. Releasing his wrists, she grabbed his sleeve, spinning him out of his coat. He wobbled around, and came back to face her, still dumbstruck.

“Empty your pockets,” she demanded, her tone becoming more stern, more confident.

Shoving his hands into his pants, he turned out his pocket linings, depositing his meager possessions at their feet. It was nothing much to be expected from a vagrant-- a few small coins and a pocket knife whose blade swung loosely, sorely in need of a tightening.

Guiding him back to his cobbled together nest, she ordered, “As far as you remember you disgusting miscreant, you’re impotent. You could no longer pleasure a women, and thus have no reason to bother them. Understood?”

Empty, glazed eyes stared blankly, but he nodded, drool pooling at the corner of his mouth.

“Now, sleep.”

She drug her fingers over his eyes, and he slunk down into his nest, unconscious as the dead.

Quickly wrapping herself inside the warmth of the leather coat she was overwhelmed by the smell. The fabric was infused with an array of scents-- dirt, musk, salt, whiskey-- and it took her back for a moment, bringing water to her eyes. Scent was a sense heretofore unnecessary ( life under water held little use for olfactory glands) and, the experience was taking som adjustment.

Swiping the water out of her eyes, she wrapped the coat tighter and dropped the few coins and broken knife into an interior pocket of the coat and headed towards the light bleeding out boardwalk from the windows up ahead.