“Ink, thank the Great Mother Ocean you’re alive,” Roald said with a relieved exhale as I entered the darkened pool hall of Space Coast Billiards. The small building, boasting bright pink paint, was nestled off AIA along the Atlantic in Cocoa Beach. Cocoa Beach, lined with tourist shops, hotels, and pastel-colored houses, was starkly different from Miami. The small town, a bit past its prime, had a humble look and feel. I’d caught just a glimpse of the pier as we drove through the town. I loved being so close to the ocean, smelling the briny scent of the sea in the wind, tasting salt in the air. Space Coast Billiards sat in a row of similarly painted shops that advertised hermit crab races, key lime pie, and buy-one-get-one-free bikini sales. Since it was early morning, the billiard hall, which doubled as a tavern, was shuttered. Apparently, Space Coast Billiards was a night spot. Inside, the décor, surfboards, and taxidermied fish were a far cry from the chic modern trappings of Club Blue in Miami, but it had its own charm. “Hal,” Roald said then, nodding to the nagual. “Many thanks for saving our princess.”
I scanned the room. There were at least three dozen people assembled there, about a dozen of which were suffocators from my own tribe. I nodded respectfully to them. They returned the gesture. In the crowd, however, I saw others. The naguals were easy to notice, their eyes glimmering in the dim light. The others I did not recognize must have been the freshwater mers. They were a handsome-looking, dark-haired group with large, dark eyes.
“She looks like her father,” a voice called from the back of the room. “Princess Ink,” an old man, one of the freshwater mers, said as he approached the front. He was a slip of a thing, bent and walking with a stick. His tanned face was deeply lined. “You are welcome here among us.”
“This is Milne,” Hal introduced. “He is the eldest of the mers in the Indian River Lagoon.”
“Well, we aren’t really in the lagoon much anymore, are we old friend,” the old man said cheerfully to Hal. “But at least we still have our home here in the brine waters. We have your father to thank for that, though it cost him his life.”
I felt as if a fist had tightened around my heart. “What do you mean?” I asked.
Milne looked up at Hal. “You didn’t tell her?”
Hal shook his head and then took my hand. I felt a soft vibration emanate from him as he tried to lend me strength and comfort.
Milne cast a glance from Hal to me. “Amid the war, your father negotiated an accord between our people. If the nagual and the freshwaters would lay down our arms and accept the rule of the Atlantics, not aligning ourselves with the Gulfs, we would be given rule over the Indian River Lagoon and the Florida coastline from Oceanus north to Jacksonville.
“We accepted. It was a fair agreement. Creon, however, cast a warrant for our death behind your father’s back. He wanted our lands. When your father stepped in to protect us, Creon’s men took your father to the heart of the deep and left him there to die. Your mother was easier to kill. They paid a human to execute her. She was lost in the Everglades. The mamiwata and her people loved your mother and searched for her, but they couldn’t recover her body. Creon then executed most of us until our last king bought us this small slice of land in exchange for his head. So much blood. This small girl is the only living descendant of our royal line. Come forward, Imogen,” Milne called.
A young mermaid stepped forward, perhaps no more than fourteen or so. She had a delicate face, dark eyes, and luxurious, flowing dark hair. “My Lady,” she said then, bowing politely to me.
It is silent in the deep. Leagues below the surface, truth dies. My kin and I had lived blind under the waves. Secrets swam all around us. Hal was right when he said there was blood in the water. But, blood had been in the water for many years. Creon had simply done an excellent job of concealing it.
I bowed to Imogen and then cast a glance at the collected crowd. What a ragtag group they were, the last of the naguals and freshwaters, murdered to the edge of extinction by my uncle, who had just sentenced me to death. In my heart, I had always known Creon had killed my parents. I’d known it like I knew my own name. Now, more than ever, I yearned to end what Creon had started. Now that, finally, someone had confirmed what I’d known all along.
Imogen looked at me. “What shall we do now?”
I glanced up at Hal, who nodded to me.
“Now, we fight.”