past

The sounds of conversation and music were bursting out into the quiet night with every swing of the dry, creaking door. Lured by the smell of food, Arlenis felt as if the scent had wrapped a rope around her stomach, dragging her toward the source. It growled in anticipation, instinctively salivating. Pushing through the door to the brine soaked inn was an assault to every one of her still reeling senses.

The bright electrical glare of the lights made her eyes dilate instantly, destroying her night vision. She squinted at the glare as she moved between the full tables, too many patrons stuffed into the the small space. Squeezing her way to the bar, she pulled the newly acquired coins from her pocket, slapping them onto the counter with a dull clink lost in the din of the crowd.

Turning at the sound, the bar matron abandoned her task of replacing the used bottled back to their designated space on the self behind the bar.

“What can I get you?”

Pausing, the thought struck her that she had no idea what she wanted. The constrictions in her stomach made it evident that she was starving, but for what? Her people were hunters and gatherers, so she was used to a varied diet, but not like these mortals.

“Fish…” she managed, knowing that these ocean traversing people would have that food in common with hers. It was the easiest and most recognizable meal she could get. “...and, some…” her eyes flashed over the bottles on the shelf behind, trying to find something to soothe her parched throat, but she couldn’t read any of the writing.

“Special on Cider tonight— last of the season’s apples,” the matron offered, lifting a bottle of honey colored liquid.

“Cider then.”

“Good choice.”

Slipping the coin from under Arlenis’ hand, she stepped away to make change. Opening a strange contraption that dinged when the matron pressed a few buttons, mouth opened and she pulled a few different coins out, setting them back onto the counter top. Then she disappeared through a set of double doors.

Land dwellers had such strange and beguiling items, and the materials they used were so foreign. Brushing her fingers along the odd texture of the bar, examining it intently, it was smooth, worn down from decades of touch. She had seen drifting wood before, floating along the surface and tangled in abandoned nets, but never in such quantities. The whole city seemed to be made of it— walkways, structures, furniture.

The solid thunk of an object in front of her averted her eyes away from the time stained wood. Deposited in front of her was a thick vessel made from the clearest ice she had ever scene. Reaching for it, it was strangely un-cold as she lifted it to her nose to sniff the contents. At first she wasn’t quite sure what to do with the substance inside. She had never experienced dehydration like this before. As part of her natural biological systems, she took in all the water she needed. Even during periods of long term exposure out of the water, she had been able to take frequent dips back in to hydrate by submerging her gills beneath the water. With little more to go on besides her previous experience, Arlenis dipped a tentative finger into the golden liquid.

Nothing happened. She didn’t feel refreshed. Pulling her finger out, she swiped it across the fabric of the mangy, pilfered coat, but a sticky residue remained, whether from the grime imbedded into the coat or the liquid, she didn’t know. Casting side glances to those sitting at the bar and nearby tables, she watched, taking note of their actions. They seemed to be imbibing it. The thought made her wince, reminded of the few times she had accidentally inhaled water, and the frightening results.

While she had both lungs and gills, they functioned separately, one taking over for the other when she entered or left the water. Normally, liquid could not enter her lungs while she was submerged thanks to an evolved bypass system that would prevent her from inhaling through her lungs while under water. But, the memory of a fight while trying to take down a sailor fleeing in a lifeboat brought back the terror of drowning fresh to her mind.

Her hunting pod had lured him off his ship, the only one awake at the early morning hour, left to keep watch. He was easy prey without the other sailors to distract him. When he realized he was in danger, he had momentarily been able to break their trance, and in his flailing panic, knocked her off the edge of the boat. Gasping in surprise, she inhaled the water as she crashed backwards, before her gills could properly take over. What was only seconds felt like an eternity of dread as she fought to expel the salty water burning her lungs. It was not an experience she was eager to relive, but the land dwellers did not seem to be having as much trouble as they casually lifted their vessels to their lips, letting the various liquids cascade back down their throats without incident or death.

Hesitant, she brought the rim to her lips, closing her eyes with resistance, before she parted her lips and let the liquid spill over her tongue, hitting the back of her aching throat. The resulting coughing and sputtering was half from lack of practice with the mechanics of swallowing, an action the land dwellers made seem so natural, and half from the sickly, sweet and yet somehow bitter taste. Sugar and alcohol. Never once had she consumed them, her palate wholly unprepared for the tastes and sensations they produced.

Partially spitting the drink onto the bar, the rest dribbling down her chin onto her neck and chest, she slammed the vessel down much harder than she intended, earning looks of concern from the closest patrons. A hand struck her back, hard, directly between her shoulder blades, nearly eliciting a return strike in her heightened state, had the result not been to distract her into swallowing the rest of the liquid. Her assailant moved to face her now, a hand still resting on her shoulder, head dipping to meet her eyes.

“Easy now, lightweight,” the deeply tanned young man with dark, unruly hair said as he laughed. “Drink first, then breathe.”

Reaching over the opposite edge of the bar, he retrieved a towel from the serving area, helping to blot some of the liquid from her face and chest before using it to sop up what she had sprayed across the bar.

Steadying her erratic breathing, she waited to see how long the stranger’s gaze would linger. He did not look like a Deryn, with his deeper, sunhewn complexion and his dark hair. The features of local people were reminiscent of their watery roots, much brighter and more prismatic than their fellow land dwelling kin. The Paragon of Water had created them in an image like tropical fish who could walk on land, unlike their dark cousins, born of the Paragon of Order, much more interested in practicality than presentation. The Abyssal were even more pale, with the exception of the occasional shock of their pastel hair, of which, hers was the only remaining feature retained from her original parentage. Looking up through it now, the strands of coral draping into her face, created a curtain between their gazes. His flicked momentarily away, resting on her neck, at where her gills had once been that now were simply three scarred lines. Reaching up, she pulled the collar tighter around her body, cutting off his access, and his eyes jumped back to hers.

Searching for the correct polite response, she settled on a quiet, “Thank you.”

“Serik!”

Based on his response, this was his name. A quick eye roll followed by a sigh, and he turned away towards a large man standing at a table in the corner trimuphantly raising two larger vessels larger than her own, their contents sloshing over the sides. Much to the chagrin of the other party members, it was splashing in fat, errant drops onto their heads. This man too looked strange, but not like the companion to whom he was shouting. Beyond the obvious differences in height and body build, the man referred to as Serik being much more trim and compact than the other, his coloring was even more strange compared to those around him. The shimmery quality of her own skin was merely a trick of the light, but if she didn’t know better, she would swear that this larger man looked stained by the red-violet dye that the land dwellers had learned to refine from sea snails.

“Get over here, you bastard,” the man continued shouting, “or, not only am I taking your turn, I’m taking your winnings.”

Another distraction made her jump. The sensory overstimulation was beginning to rub her patience raw. The bar matron had returned, leaving after serving her a plate of strange looking food. It did not look right, as if someone had turned it inside out and removed all of it’s innards. Grabbing a piece of it, she hissed, the soft flaky flesh burning her finger tips.

“Something wrong?”

The stranger, Serik, was hovering, decidedly not leaving, watching her curiously. She did not like it.

“Everything, actually,” she growled.

Pushing the plate away slightly, her anger flared as her traitorous mouth watered at the promise of a delectable meal, encouraged by the smell of the food picked up by her traitorous nose. She wanted to scream, to push him out of the way and go running back to beach, tears ready to burst forth as she imagined prostrating herself in the surf, begging for forgiveness.

Surely, sparing the life of a mortal child could not have been worth all this.

“Can you elaborate?”

“It’s hot!” She spat, eyes narrowing at him. “Your food is hot, and your ice isn’t cold.” She lifted the glass in her hand for emphasis, letting the last bit fall under her breath. “I do not care for your strange magic.”

Serik leaned back, taking her in from head to newly acquired toe.

“You…” he weighed his words as if he were searching for them. “You are an odd duck.”

“Excuse me?”

“And, clearly, you are also not from around here.”

“I’m taking your drink, too!” His companion yelled again, enticing him back to the table. “Give up! Take a hint! She’s not interested.”

The crowd at the table broke out into riotous laughter. Another beat passed as he continued to contemplate her. Arlenis was reaching to limits of her patience with his company.

“You should return to your companion,” she spoke with the force of her will behind it.

As the words registered, he blinked, shaking his head as if something had struck him.

“Yes. I will.”

Turning promptly, shoulders straightening, he left her alone at the bar to comply with her instructions. Returning her attention to her vessel of overly sweet, bitter cider, and the bizarre hot fish, she tugged the plate back towards her. Prodding at the flesh of the fish, it seemed to have lost some of it’s initial heat, and was now a more tolerable state of merely warm. Plucking at a piece of the flesh, it flaked off, squishy in her long fingers, and she drew it apprehensively to her mouth.

Like the cider, it did not taste like she expected, but even warm, the salty familiarity of the morsel actually made her sigh as the flavor exploded over her tongue. Now, with the promise of sustenance in her mouth, she became ravenous. Using both hands, she shoveled the food into her mouth so fast she barely tasted the rest, consumed by the desire to sate her twisting, coiling stomach. Once she was finished, she used the towel still on the counter of the bar to wipe her greasy hands, and tossed it onto the now empty plate as she turned to leave. Tugging the coat tighter around her new frame, she dropped her head to avoid any more eyes and made her way to the exit.

The sound of the busy tavern evaporated again as the door shut behind her. She wrapped her arms around her body tightly, keeping the coat closed and denying the chill accompanying the breeze across the wooden decking connecting the buildings. Making her way to the end of a pier, she leaned on the dry rotting rail, ignoring the splinters she could feel even through the fabric of the stolen coat, and tried to figure out just what in the infinite universe she was going to do.

When morning came the docks would be crawling with people, preparing boats for departure, selling wares in their stalls, loading and unloading those strange boxes on spinning circles she saw them using to travel. She did not have anywhere to stay, and she did not know how these metal coins worked, their various worths a mystery to her. To add insult to injury, she detected the beginnings of mist on the wind, indicating a storm was looming. She sighed again, dropping her head and raking her fingers through her brittle, sunbaked hair.

She would not succumb to this melancholy behavior, no matter how tempting the desire was to lay down somewhere dark, curl up into a ball, and wait for death to claim her. She refused to give the elders who had cursed her the satisfaction of knowing that cast out from them that she had given up so easily.

Resolved to fight, to survive, she exhaled an assertive breathe and stood up to full height. That’s when she felt the net snag around her, consuming her, throwing her off balance as her feet changed places with her jaw, connecting painfully with the planks below.