Бесплатный фрагмент - A mermaid and a corsair

A mission for the pirates

“There she is!” The sea creature, which had recently taken control of the ship, clapped its clawed hands in triumph. “I got her at last! It is your duty to deliver her to King of Opal. And be quickly!”

“Her?” Desmond looked doubtfully at the silver net spread over the sea. It was not the Princess of the Seas, but a heavy gilded chest with runic inscriptions.

Morgen must have gone mad trying to get revenge on the sea king. Desmond clenched his fingers on the hilt of his saber, expecting the crew to mutiny, but none of his corsairs moved. They all stared at the catch like hypnotized men. He guessed it’s the magic marks engraved on the lid. They take away people’s thoughts. Then why hadn’t he fallen under their influence himself? It must be the amulet. Desmond lovingly stroked the silver pendant given to him by a young witch on the coast who had fallen in love with him. Cassandra was well versed in sea enchantments and how to defend against them. There was a reason she was considered a worthy follower of the famous coastal sorceress Rokuela.

But the huge oblong chest that had been caught in the net looked more like treasure from a shipwreck than a personal item of the Morgens. Morgens, as the sea-dwellers were called, were creepy, ugly monsters. One of them, for some reason, decided to betray the sea king. It approached Desmond in a tavern on the pirate island of Peony and began to exhort him:

“You are a brave corsair and a corsair captain. You need to get something from King of Opal to rule the seas, and King of Opal needs a princess of the sea. I will catch her for you, but you will deliver her to Opal.

Desmond was drunk at the time of the conversation, but not drunk enough not to suspect that he was being lured into a trap. However, a few leading questions settled the conversation in the morgen’s favor.

“I want revenge on the sea king,” he confessed at the end of the conversation, hiding his monstrous body under a cloak made from a scrap of black sail.

“You’re taking a risk! Even all who sail the seas are at his mercy. And what’s it like for those who live in the water?”

“It’s a lot to ask for a broken heart.”

Desmond didn’t even know the morgen had a heart, but the creature pressed his hand to his chest. There beneath the bones and slime was indeed a ball of black muscle beating beneath what looked like a human heart.

Desmond was willing to go to great lengths to please the ruler of Opal. After all, the wizard who had recently taken control of piracy ruled there. If you don’t please him, you can’t plunder the seas. In the last decade, corsair fishing has become extremely difficult. The sea king does not let you sail the seas without his permission, on the other hand are the rulers-sorcerers of coastal countries. Either pay tribute to all of them or sink.

Not surprisingly, Desmond agreed to the absurd proposal of the morgen, not even thinking about what punishment awaits them all in case of failure. And so the morgen spread a silver net over the sea, and in it instead of the princess was caught a shining chest. Desmond was not discouraged. The chest could be resold at the market in Pion. After all, it was made of scarlet gold. The magic symbols engraved on it might scare many away, but Cassandra would know where to find a magic buyer. Desmond had turned to her more than once when no one wanted to buy valuable items that supposedly bore a curse.

The chest was too heavy. Even a dozen pirates couldn’t drag it onto the deck, but morgen was able to lift it over the side and bring it aft at once. How could the net not be torn by the weight of the thing? The net itself disappeared as soon as the chest was on the ship.

“Now sail to Opal!” Morgen commanded. “Change course before they miss it.”

Desmond couldn’t understand what the morgen was up to, but he gave the command anyway.

“Where’s the Princess of the Sea?” He asked after a pause. “Why did King of Opal need her so badly?”

“It is for the wedding, of course.”

“What wedding is it?”

“It is the royal wedding.

“Had the King of Opal thought of getting married? I remember he’s a wizard and a bachelor.”

“That’s why he chose the daughter of the sea king as his bride. Only problem is, she didn’t choose him. She must be forced to make the right choice. This chest will solve King Opal’s wedding problem, and you will be rewarded.”

That’s even better than catching the princess! Desmond was already afraid that Cassandra’s amulet would not save him from the fury of the angry sea sorceress. After all, everyone knows that the sea king’s daughters are powerful sorceresses. For them to create a storm and sink an entire fleet is worthless. If King of Opal pulls off his marriage scam and marries such a sorceress, he will become the most powerful ruler among all the coastal kingdoms.

“Do I have the right to ask a favor from the king instead of a monetary reward?” Desmond asked the morgen.

“It will be easy for you to bargain with him when he gets the chest. Just don’t open it for the rest of the voyage.”

“Or else a water genie will come out of it?”

“It will be bad!”

Desmond bit his tongue.

The chest was fluted like a shell.

“Do not open it, no matter what sounds come out of it,” morgen warned again. “Carry the chest closed all the way to Opal. I won’t be able to see you off. I have business to attend to!”

What business could a sea monster have? Desmond didn’t have time to follow the morgen’s disappearance. It was a muddy puddle on the deck. It splashed into the crew.

“Oh, I don’t like these signs!” Desmond ran his fingers over the runic engravings on the side of the chest. The lid creaked and slid open easily. From the inside, it looked like the sash of an enormous shell.

Morgen had said not to open the chest. Something monstrous might be hidden in it. Desmond instinctively gripped his saber, wondering what kind of monster the sea king’s daughter might be. After all, the sea king himself is probably a monster with octopus-like limbs. His daughters might resemble squid, large toads, or a living mountain of clams. Desmond expected to see a creepy sea witch clawing at him with all her tentacles, but he was in for a surprise.

A souvenir from the bottom of sea

In the chest among the shells and pearls slept a beautiful mermaid. She looked ominous. She was dead! Desmond had never seen a dead mermaid before.

One fin moved. Is it a reflex? So is she dead or asleep? She doesn’t seem to be breathing, but do mermaids breathe? If they needed air, they wouldn’t be underwater.

“There are so many jewels!” His assistant said. “It’s a whole treasure trove!”

“But how do we get them off?” Desmond ran his fingers over the large pearls embedded in the mermaid’s skin. Even the coral crown grew from her forehead. And in her fins were small diamonds and rubies.

“Just like a princess of the sea!” Desmond whistled in admiration. His knees buckled, as if he had never seen a princess before. Well, maybe he’d never seen a sea princess. But he’d seen enough earthly ones. They’re all greedy and scheming! That’s why he became a pirate. Secular society is sometimes worse than a pack of wolves. Pirates are more honest. They rob directly, not bypass them.

“I know a rich collector who’d buy the whole thing,” said the assistant.

“No!” Desmond’s indignation boiled over.

“Do you think it’s more profitable to pick out the stones one by one?”

“Just leave her alone for now!”

He wanted to keep the mermaid as a shrine, but he couldn’t tell it to the sea robbers. She was like a goddess who sleeps, but is about to wake up, and then at her will there will be a storm. All the pirates would be swamped like blasphemers who had committed sacrilege. They’re idiots for agreeing to such a dangerous mission. It’s best not to mess with sea deities, but the customer assured that simple amulets would help keep the mermaid’s magic power in chains.

Her purple lashes fluttered. Or was it just a thought? Desmond caught himself wishing she were alive and earthy.

The crew would laugh at the fact that he missed the harlots always hanging around the harbors. Desmond had long detested the harlots and dancers of Peony Island. But he liked the graceful coastal sorceresses. They were also called sorceresses, enchantresses and wave charmers. They often performed ritual dances on the shore, their dresses spreading sea foam on the sand. Cassandra was one of them. Unlike most blond sea wizards, she had a bright red hair and a stroppy temper. She had once brought down an entire fleet. She simply whispered a spell while standing on the rocks above the waves, and all the ships began to sink in the middle of a calm sea. The storm didn’t even start, and the royal frigates that had been launched in pursuit of Desmond were left in splinters. That day the pirates learned to respect the witches of the sea, and Desmond had time to see the tentacles of the kraken that had dragged the ships to the bottom.

“I will help you make a contract with the sea king’s representatives,” Cassandra promised, and that evening she made a deal with a blue-skinned creature that crawled out of the waves. The creature had a shell horn that summoned a sea army of monsters and a golden crest of spikes on its horned head. Cassandra befriended such monsters, and sometimes bargained with them over something.

“My help is not disinterested,” she liked to say. “You will give half of your loot to the sea king, and I will get a tenth of the captain’s share.”

It’s good to be king of the sea! You can profit from all the pirates in the world. If you don’t pay your tribute to the king, your ship will sink.

Desmond now carried a glowing treaty rolled up in a scroll. If broken or lost, the contract would be broken and the ship would be in trouble.

Greatly, the contract did not contain a single clause forbidding a pirate from kidnapping a sea princess.

“You are only mine!” Desmond gently ran his finger over her cheek, which was studded with pearls, and hurt himself. The pearls were very sharp.

He was immediately reminded of the forced sacrifices of the captives. The bound beauties were thrown overboard into the sea. Sometimes they were seen being caught by the paws of the morgens sticking out of the waves. Desmond had always watched indifferently, but now it seemed to him that he himself might be sacrificed to the sea creatures.

The webbed hands of the mermaid moved. This was no longer a reflex! The purple webbing resembled lace, but the claws on the mermaid’s fingers were as sharp as razors. A mermaid could kill if she got her claws on someone’s throat.

The foam of purple curls around the mermaid’s face also looked like lace. Desmond hadn’t realized that mermaids could be so beautiful. Until now, he had thought Cassandra was the most beautiful girl in the world. It turned out there were more beautiful creatures. Only they weren’t human!

The sight of the sleeping mermaid frightened the crew, and Desmond didn’t want to think about having to part with her. He had kidnapped her for King of Opal, not for himself. And he wanted to keep her for himself.

“Merediana will give you a hard time. You’ll be sorry you ever touched her!” Some nimble crab with a carbuncle in his forehead crawled out of the mermaid’s hair. Did he really say that? No way! Crabs can’t speak human, and the pirates on Desmond’s crew can’t grunt like old men. So who had said the words?

Desmond looked around. There were legends that some ships were haunted by the ghosts of men who had died at sea, and by clabautermanns, the tree spirits of the masts, who were brought along with the logs to the scaffolding. Dryads, who did not like to leave even felled trees, stayed to live in the logs and thus also became part of the mast or even the carved figure on the bow. Maybe he had something like that on his ship? This ship belonged to another pirate before him. His ghost is probably haunting the place.

“And who is Merediana?”

“I’m sorry, who, captain?” The mate heard nothing and wondered.

“Merediana,” Desmond repeated dully. “I’ve never heard that name before.

“Neither have I, Captain.”

“Maybe that’s the name of the wife of the king of the sea?”

“No, it’s definitely Lilothea,” the mate glanced warily at the waves. “But it’s better not to say her name. They say you can summon her that way. If you say her name over the waves and drip blood, she will appear in the open sea, come to the ship, treading on the waves, and use magic… only for harm or for good, it is not known, so it is better not to call her.”

The mate’s fears were understandable. The entire crew still had wounds from the recent battles. Blood could have already dripped into the water, all that was left was to say Lilothea’s name. Instead, Desmond whispered instead:

“Merediana…”

A seagull flew over the ship and gave a high-pitched squawk. A bloody stain spread across the big sail. The gull’s corpse with its head torn off fell to the deck. Who would have time to rip a seagull’s head off in flight?

“Open a barrel of the best rum for the crew. Get them drunk and set course to Opal,” Desmond told the mate.

He understood and grinned. Better to get the crew drunk than let them talk about the curse. Many of the pirates were already whispering that the chest with the mermaid must be thrown back into the sea or there would be trouble. How superstitious sailors are!

Desmond himself was not particularly superstitious. He often saw creepy morgens on the shore, handing out gold to simpletons, who then became slaves of the sea king. He himself had once taken a few coins from a morgen, and nothing had happened to him after that. But they said that his skin would be covered with slime, he would be unable to breathe, and some force would drag him to the bottom. The morgen gold was said to be paid for by eternal slavery at the bottom.

The morgen’s coins were kept in Desmond’s cabin as a souvenir. Another souvenir from the sea’s bottom will be a purple mermaid. We should move it to the cabin so the crew won’t stare at it. The pirates have a dark look in their eyes. They’re just waiting for the mermaid to start a riot.

The mermaid’s fin moved gracefully. Is she really waking up? The fan of purple eyelashes trembled slightly.

Could it be that she is the one called Merediana? Cassandra had once danced on the shore and called the names of all the sea king’s daughters in a chant. Desmond could hardly remember them all. There were Yasmin, Aisha, Mirelle, Etea, Anemone, Foletta, Korethia, Mirilla, Serpentina, Amirana, Morelia, and Lorelei. Meredian’s name, on the other hand, he had not heard.

The sky above the ship was darkening rapidly. A storm must be brewing soon. A stormy wind was blowing. Out of the wind came a chorus of voices:

“You are a rebel!”

“You are a kidnapper!”

“You have abused the trust of the sea king!”

“You have desecrated the shrines of the sea!”

“You have taken on board an unearthly creature!”

“You are a notorious pirate!”

“You are marked for doom!”

The ominous words echoed in his ears. Desmond expected a storm to come. Instead, it was as if a swarm of piranhas had swooped down on the ship. “The Triumphant” rocked on the waves and tilted as if a cannonball had hit its side. But no one was firing cannonballs at it. There was no one to do that! No oncoming ships are visible on the horizon, and it seems that the sea battle has already begun.

The crew had no time to react. Desmond regretted getting them drunk. It felt like there was a hole in the bottom and “The Triumphator” was going down. The helm was unattended. The helmsman was clutched by the tentacles of a large octopus. It began to strangle the poor man. Desmond threw his saber and cut off a couple of tentacles. They hissed and crawled across the deck.

“You are a pirate!” A voice came from over the side.

Desmond leaned over the side and looked out over the waves. There were swarms of mermaids frolicking below. Their voices sounded like a ghostly chorus. Their slippery blue and green scaled bodies were no match for the purple mermaid he had kidnapped. Truly, she is the princess of the seas. The predatory mermaids with sharp teeth and ears that besieged the ship were no longer admired, but disgusted. Only one of them had something like a diadem shimmering on her head. Apparently, among all the mermaids attacking the ship, she was the only one with a noble nautical background.

“He’s a corsair, not a pirate,” she corrected her friends.

“And what’s the difference?” The other mermaids showed claws as sharp as stilettos and jagged elbows. All of them were clearly not princesses, but something like fighting half-fish, ready to ram a ship with their sharp limbs.

“Corsairs are those who had noble blood in them before they became brigands. Corsairs must have some manners and honor. And pirates are just common, brutal bandits. You can’t negotiate with them, you can only sink them.”

The mermaid with a diadem on her forehead raised her white eyes at Desmond.

“You are a man of noble blood. How can you kidnap the princess of the sea? Return her to the sea and forget that she ever existed.”

The request was made in the tone of an order. The sight of the mermaid made Desmond’s mind go foggy. It must be some kind of hypnosis. Desmond made an effort and averted his eyes.

The mermaid’s suggestion was pointless. “The Triumphator” was already sinking. He could give the mermaids the Princess or not, the ship will sink anyway. He could try to make a deal, but it wouldn’t be worth it. All pirates will either die in the water or be slaves in the sea kingdom. Too bad the crew got drunk when they should be fighting back. But then again, what can pirates do against mermaid magic? All corsairs, alas, are not magicians. Desmond touched Cassandra’s amulet and recited the short spell she had taught him.

The holes in the bottom caused by the mermaids’ claws immediately healed, as if the ship were a living creature capable of rapid healing.

The annoyed mermaids swore with glee and beat the water furiously with their fins. They swooped at the ship again and again, crushing the wooden sides with sharp notches on their arms that resembled gills. The amulet around Desmond’s neck glowed, and the ship self-repaired. All the breaches were filled with fresh wooden planks, as if someone had nailed them over the damaged ones. The mermaids had fallen into despair. No matter how hard they tried to sink “The Triumphator”, they failed.

“It will soon sink itself,” predicted the mermaid with the diadem. An ominous green mist immediately spread through the water around the ship. It enveloped the ship amorphously, but somehow it could not penetrate on board, as if it was bumping into an invisible barrier.

“Remember that Shaina has cursed you.”

And who is Shaina? Desmond didn’t know that.

“My father cursed me, too, when I ran away from Mirid,” he muttered to himself as he picked up the bloody saber. The blood on it came from the helmsman’s wound, and the severed octopus limbs were water instead of blood. Desmond cursed himself for saving the helmsman and injuring his shoulder. But he could not abandon the poor man, who was being strangled by something that had crawled aboard from the sea. Now this octopus-like creature was trying to push the chest with the purple mermaid overboard. It was unable to do so, although it was working with all its tentacles, of which there were dozens.

“Get out!” Desmond threatened it with his saber. But it was not the saber that frightened the creature, but the shining amulet around the captain’s neck. It squinted, hissed, and crawled overboard, dropping the chest.

The glow of Cassandra’s amulet repelled sea creatures. He would have to thank her. Desmond had even intended to give Cassandra a bunch of flowers until he saw the purple mermaid. Things had changed since she’d been dragged aboard. She slept as peacefully as if she were dead, but there was danger from her. And her beauty was enchanting, stripping away will, clouding judgment. Desmond could not think clearly in the presence of the mermaid.

Even now, while she slept, he felt himself in her power, as if she had kidnapped him, not he her. It appeared that it was possible to be captured by a mermaid even while she slept. But what happens when she wakes up?

Sleeping mermaid

It began to rain. The slanting jets beat on the sails, but the blood stain on the center sail was not washed away. The seagull’s blood was staining the deck as well. The mermaid’s lips became so bright as if they were stained with blood.

Couldn’t she rip the bird’s head off and drink its blood? The mermaid lies in the chest as if in a coffin. Why does it seem that she drank the bird’s blood?

Desmond found that he could not lift the chest himself and drag it into the cabin. He was strong, but his strength was not enough this time. We’d have to call for helpers. So far, all the pirates were drunk. Drunks are useless. Only the helmsman and the ship’s healer who had treated his wound remained partially sober. Neither of them was fit to help.

Desmond tried again to move the heavy chest. It wouldn’t budge an inch, as if it were embedded in the deck. What to do? You can’t leave a mermaid unattended. We’ll have to keep watch next to the chest. Desmond felt like taking a nap. His eyelids were drooping. From somewhere in the depths of the sea came sounds like a mermaid’s song. Or were they coming from the deck?

The predatory mermaid packs, swimming away, were heaving something about going to sic newts or even a leviathan on the ship. They were probably just intimidating the pirates.

A familiar morgen appeared abruptly on board. A puddle of dark water immediately spread across the deck.

“Did someone tell you we were in trouble?” Desmond wondered. How quickly these sea creatures react to everything.

“I smelled it myself,” the morgen took a quick look at the damage and became enraged. The sight of the sleeping mermaid had stirred a storm of emotions, from anger to worship.

“What’s the matter with you? Would you like some rum to calm you down? It always makes pirates feel better,” Desmond didn’t think that one day he’d have to comfort a ruthless sea monster.

“This is the first time I’ve seen her not in a sea temple or palace,” it hissed.

“And who put her in the chest if not you?”

It was probably a stupid question. The morgen poked his tentacles at the runes on the shell-like walls of the chest. Apparently the rune signs explained everything without words. Cassandra would have understood such an explanation, but Desmond was almost illiterate in magic. He only knew what he had been taught by Cassandra herself and an old court wizarde from Mirid.

“What is her name?” Desmond began to inquire.

“It is none of your business!”

“Yes, it is, if she’s sailing to Opal on my ship.”

“It would be easy for me to sink your ship,” the morgen threatened, his many amber eyes flashing.

“If ‘The Triumphator’ sinks, who will take her to Opal?”

“I’ll drag her to the oncoming ship and hypnotize the captain to be more cooperative than you are,” the morgen immediately found a compromise. Apparently, his powers aren’t in the dozens.

“I doubt there’s a fool enough to bring such a dangerous cargo to Opal, even under hypnosis. She reeks of death. Are you sure she’s alive?”

“She’s asleep!”

It was as if the word “sleeping” meant something magical. Cassandra had told him that the ocean dwellers became dull when they hibernated and were easily mistaken for statues standing upright in the water. But touch a statue like that and it would grab you with its many tentacles. So Desmond never touched the carved figures standing like pillars on the water. The ship always sailed past them without hitting them, even if it came straight at them.

He explained to his pirates that such figures were mile’s poles for morgens, and it was forbidden to touch them. He would not tell the crew directly all of Cassandra’s secrets. Sometimes you can make things up as you go along. Once, an oncoming sculpture winked at Desmond. It was alive, though it seemed carved from white wood.

But the purple mermaid didn’t look like a sculpture at all. The jewels on her were magnificent. If they weren’t attached to her skin, the crew would have tried to take them off and split them up by now.

“Is she asleep under the influence of some magical elixir?” Desmond guessed.

“If you know too much, you’ll grow old,” the morgen said sullenly.

“It’s an Earth proverb,” Desmond caught his eye.

“Sometimes it pays to borrow something even from Earthlings.”

“I thought you morgens were too proud and independent. You’d rather drown an Earthman than imitate him.”

One morgen’s tentacle wrapped around Desmond’s neck.

“Don’t make me angry!”

Desmond didn’t have time to answer. The tentacle bumped into the amulet and burned. Morgen had to let the corsair go.

“So what’s her name? Yasmin? Aisha? Mirelle? Lorelei? Anemone? Mirilla? Etea? Amirana? Elegy? Foletta? Morelia? Serpentina? Korephea?”

“How do you know the names of the sea king’s daughters?” The morgen hissed indignantly. “Surely there must be spies in the Underwater Kingdom. This is outrageous! The man knows the names of the entire list of sea queens!”

“Which one is she?” Desmond insisted.

“She is none of them. You don’t know her name.”

That’s right! He didn’t know it. Unless…

“Her name is Merediana,” Desmond made one last attempt.

It was clear from the morgen’s doomed hiss that he was not mistaken.

“She is Princess Merediana,” the morgen corrected. “She is her underwater highness.”

“She is a future hostage of the King of Opal, who dreams of conquering the seas with magic. What are you going to do with her?”

“Why do you care?”

“I have a right to be curious, because I’m transporting her. And that’s risky! The ship’s already been attacked.”

“If you hadn’t broken the instructions, there wouldn’t have been an attack,” the morgen poked his tentacle at the open lid, tried to close it again, and couldn’t. Even he didn’t have the strength.

“The underwater creatures wouldn’t have smelled it on your board if the top defenses hadn’t been removed.”

Desmond had already realized that himself. Curiosity is a bad thing. That’s what Cassandra was saying. Some newt, supposedly in love with her, had been playing on his shell whistle for a long time, calling Cassandra to go down to the bottom. Cassandra was hesitant, though she was curious to see the underwater world for herself.

Cassandra knew the recipe for a potion that would help her breathe underwater for a couple of hours, but she was still hesitant to follow the newt to the bottom. He might not be so good-natured in the sea and would not let her go back.

Cassandra wouldn’t have advised Desmond to open the chest, but then he wouldn’t have seen Merediana. Seeing her once was better than possessing all the treasures of the sea kingdom.

“Are all princesses of the sea so beautiful?”

“You must have thought her jewelry was beautiful. You pirates are only attracted to expensive things. Alas, they cannot be removed. They’re part of her body. But the King of Opal will reimburse you for their value.”

Desmond would have been better off keeping the mermaid’s chest. Even if she doesn’t wake up, it’s a pleasure to look at her. When she’s around, you feel like you’re in a realm of magic. But something strange is happening on board. A bloodstain is spreading all over the sail. The blood is even visible on the other sails. It’s as cold as an icy desert. A crust of ice stretches across the masts and hoarfrost on the ropes.

“The morgens of the royal family know how to freeze the sea. Didn’t you know that?”

“No, I didn’t,” Desmond shook his head in denial. How could he know such intricacies? He didn’t know the rulers of the sea, and he didn’t gossip about them.

“Merediana must be the eldest of the sea king’s daughters,” Desmond sensed the power emanating from the sleeping mermaid.

“No, she is not the eldest, but the most treacherous.”

“Is she treacherous?” Desmond couldn’t believe it.

“They all have innocent faces, but their souls are black, rotten, magic,” morgen hissed angrily.

Desmond had never even considered that mermaids had souls. All he had seen was Merediana’s body. It reeked of magical currents. Even asleep, she subdued him.

One time he even wanted to throw her overboard and dive into the waves after her. Surely that was her wish, not his. The sleeping mermaid silently tells him what to do.

No, this trick won’t work. He’s in command! A beautiful mermaid can’t woo him. Desmond struggled to muster up the will.

“We’ve got to get her into my quarters.”

“It will be better in the hold. I’ll draw signs on the entrance and on the bottom of the ship to keep her from getting loose.”

“Wait! Then I won’t see her for the rest of the voyage.”

Morgen tapped the deck sympathetically with his tentacles and tried on again to close the chest. He failed again.

“You shouldn’t have opened it! Now we’ll have to move it somewhere else. Otherwise, we’ll all be in trouble.”

“But she’s asleep!”

“You’re so naive! I’ll never mess with a human again!”

Morgen grunted like a nagging old wife. As if someone had forced him to make a deal with the pirate captain! He’d forced himself on him, hadn’t he? And now he’s not happy. Don’t the morgens know how inquisitive people are? The corsair was no exception to the general rule. He opened the chest and it was as if he was addicted to the mermaid. Even people who get used to the narcotic candy called “ette” don’t feel so addicted.

Desmond felt uncomfortable that the morgen was touching the chest with the mermaid. However, the chest was soon empty. The tentacles coiled around Merediana and pulled her out of the chest. It wasn’t easy. The mermaid’s jewelry was stuck to the walls.

The morgen was much better at sorcery than Cassandra. He was able to freeze the water into ice, and from the ice create a container as high as the ceiling of the hold. The container of ice was as clear as glass. Now the mermaid was inside this container.

“Let her sleep!”

“What if the water melts?”

“It will not be,” The morgen drew some symbols of water near the container, which also froze with glittering ice. “Don’t bother her anymore! Suddenly, after a long sleep, she will become the Queen of Opal.”

“Are you kidding?”

The morgen let out either a wrenching laugh or a growl. Desmond felt uneasy.

He looked back as he left the hold. He felt purple webbed fingers touch his shoulder, and Merediana’s voice called to him.

He’s never even heard her voice. How would he know what it sounded like? Maybe mermaids have husky, ugly voices. What if, closer to land, a beautiful mermaid shrank and turned into a wrinkled ugly woman? On the water, these creatures can only pretend to be beautiful and trick people with sorcery.

“You are not even a man, but a pirate,” Desmond remembered the curses he had heard both on land and from enemies defeated at sea. “All you pirates are worse than cattle. You’ll all end up in the noose and die in agony.”

As he locked the hold, he truly felt like the last of the cattle. After all, the princess of the sea was left there alone in the dark, amidst the magical symbols that were probably draining the life out of her.

Should he let her go? But then he’d be killed himself. Everyone knows that mermaids drag sailors to the bottom. Has anyone ever heard of an exception?

In his heart Desmond cherished the hope that he would be the exception and the mermaid would love him instead of drowning him. But mermaids are very dangerous and cruel mistresses of the sea.

Does he really need the love of a mermaid?

Queen of the sea

Desmond couldn’t sleep. He tossed from side to side on the narrow bunk. The mermaid’s song was in his ears. It seemed to emanate from all the walls of the captain’s cabin and even from the low ceiling.

When he closed his eyes, he could see Merediana sitting on a fancy throne of shells.

“Captain! Wake up!” The young man who had entered the cabin shook him by the shoulder.

“What’s the matter? Is it a riot over a mermaid?” Desmond was already awake. He sat up on his bunk. “Is the crew so superstitious they want to throw me overboard with the magic cargo?”

“No, something worse has happened,” the youngster was very shy and hid his eyes.

He can’t be trusted, Desmond’s mind flashed. The ship’s boy was not long ago the Crown Prince’s page in Mirid. He should have brought him along for nothing. The boy, accustomed to the luxury of royal palaces, dreamed of adventure, but being in a sailor’s cabin on a pirate ship might change his mind.

“Do you want to go back to Mirid?”

“No, I’m fine here, but the fleas are biting me,” he flicked a creature off his sleeve that looked more like a tiny scorpion than a flea. “They must have gotten to me from the skipper. But I didn’t come to you about fleas. And I didn’t come to you about a riot.”

“Then what do you want?”

“I found this in the helmsman’s things.”

“You went through the helmsman’s things?”

“I didn’t mean to, but it was like a mermaid’s voice called me and… you know how it is, you hear a song and you do something you didn’t mean to do.”

“It is nonsense!” Desmond was careful to hide the fact that he himself had fallen under the mermaid’s spell. He snatched a piece of paper from the young man’s hands. It turned out to be a wanted notice.

“I didn’t know they were going to catch me and hang me like any pirate!”

“Take a closer look,” insisted the young man. “The reward for you is very high — 1,500 gold coins. That’s a fortune. With it you can buy your own estate with plantations. For an ordinary pirate, you get a hundred gold pieces at most, but no more.”

“So I don’t remember doing anything outrageous to be valued so highly.”

“Or maybe it’s your past. The text at the bottom of the ad says that you’re being rewarded by the Mirid’s government, and that you must be captured alive.”

“You’re so damn literate!” Desmond crumpled up the wanted notice. It looked like the helmsman had turned out to be a spy sent from Mirid. He’d saved him for nothing. The case had almost solved itself when the helmsman had almost died on the voyage. Now he’d have to kill him anyway. Too bad the sea creature’s tentacles didn’t finish the job.

In the morning, we’ll have to see if there’s anyone on board who can replace the helmsman. With the last one injured, it won’t raise suspicion.

“Do you think your father has a reward for your capture?” The young man inquired cautiously.

Desmond could only laugh deafeningly.

“My father put a bounty on my head.”

“But it says you must be caught alive.”

“It’s a figure of speech. Pirates prefer to be caught dead.”

The coins he took from the morgen fell out of the chest on the shelf. The ship must have swayed, so they fell out. The gold glittered dazzlingly.

“It is sea gold!” The young man saw the crests with the kraken, crowns and mermaids. “They’re talismans, not money. You should drill a hole in them, string them on a string and wear them around your neck. They’d make excellent sea magic charms.”

The ship’s boy picked up one coin, and the skin on his palm from contact with the sea gold immediately began to turn blue and rot.

“Ouch!” The kid dropped the coin. “How can you even keep them in your house? Anyone else would have died of seasickness by now. It’s like you’re enchanted!”

It must have been Cassandra’s amulet. Although it seems he took the gold from the morgen long before he got the amulet as a gift.

Desmond followed the young man’s advice and made a necklace out of the coins. It was easy. Someone had already drilled holes in them. All that was left was to string them on a string.

“Didn’t you go down into the hold?” He asked the ubiquitous young man.

“No, the door was locked.”

“Have you heard any suspicious noises from down there?”

“I always hear a song without words, as if the mermaid is humming something under her nose,” admitted the young man. “You say she is in the hold now? Can I see her? I didn’t even see her when they dragged her on deck. There was nothing to see behind the backs of the older pirates.”

“Grab a lantern and let’s go!” Desmond found a shard of mirror in the chest and quickly combed his hair with his fingers. Somehow he was worried about how he would look, as if the sleeping mermaid could see him.

“You’re not as handsome as you were at court, but you still look good,” the young man praised. “You’re not so dapper anymore.”

Desmond could see that he looked bad himself, but once he had been considered the handsomest boy in Mirid. His golden hair had recently been trimmed with a dagger blade, but it was almost shoulder-length again. The ends were curling, and there were no scars on the skin of his face yet. Could a mermaid like him? Earth girls liked him. But what is mermaid flavor? Is it true that mermaids can only like drowned guys? Or was it all a sailor’s fiction?

Desmond threw on a tattered camisole and followed the young man carrying the lantern. The watchmen were asleep that night. This was not usually the case, not even during a feast. Just because it was night didn’t mean the ship couldn’t be attacked. Pirates were not allowed to be careless. Had the mermaid’s presence suppressed their will?

Nothing had changed in the hold. Barrels of rum, ale, and wine, taken from merchant ships that had crossed “The Triumphant’s” path, were piled around. Bales of cloth and spices were piled nearby, to be sold in Pion or Arcades. Only the container with the captured mermaid had changed location. It stretched to the ceiling. The mermaid was no longer lying down, but straightened up to her full height, as if she were floating on ice. In this position she seemed even more beautiful.

“Wow!” The young man whistled. “We have a sea goddess in the hold!”

The wax from the candle in the lantern dripped on the symbols on the floor, left by the morgen, and melted them. The ice inside the vessel immediately began to melt. The mermaid wiggled her fins. She woke up instantly, as if the magical protection that made her sleep had been removed. She was no longer motionless. Her webbed hands pressed against a thin partition that had not yet melted. Desmond even thought it was made of glass, not of ice. Or was it still ice? He ran his fingers along the partition. His fingers immediately felt frosty cold.

The mermaid’s purple hair fluttered in the water like a scarlet storm. The open eyes were iridescent. They flashed alternately with different hues. The pearls growing in her skin also glistened and shimmered with pearlescent hues.

“Merediana!” Desmond whispered breathlessly, as if making a prayer to a goddess. Her eyes mesmerized him.

The mermaid was pounding against the partition, demanding.

“Let me out! Let me out!”

How could he hear her voice through the water? And why hadn’t the top layer of the tank melted? Desmond looked around for something to break it with. He hadn’t brought his saber. There were plenty of boarding hooks in the hold, and a harpoon among them.

“Don’t!” The young man was afraid. “What if she storms when you let her go?”

“We can’t keep her here like a fishbowl.”

“But you used to keep captives from foreign ships, who were sold as slaves in Pion,” the young man said reasonably.

“The mermaid is prettier, and she is magical. You can’t treat her disrespectfully.”

“Do you want to lose the King Opal’s favor? I hear he wants to marry one of the sea queens, perhaps her.”

“The King of Opal wants to marry a mermaid? I doubt it. That sounds more like gossip.”

“But in exchange for her, the King of Opal will give you anything you want. You could ask him to magically alter the Mirid’s Almanac. Then you can get even with all your enemies and reap the benefits. The King of Opal is rumored to be capable of all kinds of magical wonders.”

He didn’t care about the King of Opal. Desmond swung his harpoon and shattered the magic cage. Ice, sharp as glass, shattered into shards. A suspiciously large amount of water spurted to the bottom of the hold, as if a hole had reappeared in the bottom of the ship. The water level was rising.

Merediana shook her purple hair. Up close, she appeared so beautiful it took Desmond’s breath away.

“Just don’t cause a storm to flood my ship,” Desmond asked her. He was no fool, and he knew that the bubbling water was not flooding the hold by accident. It was already up to his shoulders. Cassandra’s amulet glowed alarmingly scarlet. It meant danger was near.

Merediana swam up to Desmond. He couldn’t resist touching her, and his hands slid around her waist and into her sharp scales.

“Who is more valuable: the whole ship or one captain?” Merediana ran her webbed fingers through his hair. “You’re not a typical pirate captain and you won’t drown.”

She noticed the amulet.

“How romantic?!” Merediana tried to rip the amulet from Desmond’s neck, but couldn’t. Her fingers burned from contact with the amulet.

“It is nasty Earth sorceresses!” The sea beauty cursed. Her arms wrapped around Desmond’s shoulders and held him captive. Desmond felt he could not move. All he could do was obey the mermaid. She pulled him with her into the water, and then under the water. A hole formed in the bottom of the ship, out of nowhere. Meredina dived into it, dragging Desmond as if he were a slave on a leash. In her embrace, Desmond could not think clearly. He did not even immediately realize that the mermaid was dragging him as a prisoner to the Underworld.

Mermaid’s captive

It was dark underwater. Then a light glimmered in the distance. Merediana was actively raking the water masses with her fin. Clumps of algae and coral grew all around. The mermaid swam between them as if through a tunnel.

The swim had been going on for about an hour. Desmond would have to drown. He did not immediately realize that he was living underwater against the laws of nature. People suffocate here. And he’s still alive. Do we have Cassandra’s amulet to thank for that? Or was it the embrace of the Princess of the Sea? Until Merediana releases him, will he not suffocate?

The mermaid hummed a song on the way about the pleasure of drowning handsome boys.

“How I love to drag someone handsome to the bottom, hug and kiss him and watch him suffocate and then become a skeleton on the bottom.”

Is she kidding? Can’t she see that Desmond isn’t drowning?

Merediana laughed. She pressed her lips against her captive’s for a moment. The kiss brought unexpected pleasure. Desmond was taken aback. Was the mermaid trying to give him artificial respiration or was this a kiss of love?

“Yes, you won’t drown,” Merediana concluded. “There are strong people. They have a harder time than the weak.”

On the way they began to meet flocks of motley fish. All of them, seeing Merediana, gave way to her. Even fish are afraid to swim close to her, but Desmond fell into her arms. The mermaid fluttered him like a doll, dragging him behind her, and he could not resist her. His whole body felt as if it were restrained. He was neither alive nor dead. What a trap he’d fallen into! Hadn’t he been warned how dangerous Merediana was!

The bottom appeared below. Plantations of seaweed stretched across it. In their thickets glimpsed the bones of human skeletons. Were all the drowned men victims of Merediana? Among them there was a chest full of gold. Here was a pirate’s dream of sunken treasure, but there was no way to retrieve it.

Desmond was a little disappointed in the sea kingdom. Where are the palaces, temples and various wonders? It’s just an ordinary, dreary bottom. It doesn’t look like a fairytale sea kingdom at all.

There was a surprise ahead. The shining gate, decorated with bas-reliefs in the form of heads of magical creatures, turned out to be the entrance to the real Underwater Kingdom. It turned out that the dreary thickets of seaweed were only the suburbs of the sea paradise. Beyond the gate stretched fabulous underwater gardens and pyramids of pearls.

Merediana swam up to the golden heads on the gate.

“I have brought a prisoner, let us both through!”

The golden faces suddenly came to life and gave the mermaid smirks that made Desmond’s blood run cold.

“Be careful, Merediana! They look too predatory!” He wanted to warn, but all he got out of his mouth was a gurgle. The water bubbled with bubbles.

“He is a prisoner! It is another one!” The faces sang out. “You have too many amusements! Leave them outside the gate when you’ve had your fill. Prostitutes are no good to anyone here.”

“This is a corsair and a mermaid kidnapper! A violator of the law of the sea! He will be judged by the sea king himself, for he has kidnapped the Princess of the Sea.”

“Wow!” The faces whistled, and winked at Desmond, saying, in their opinion, he is a hero for daring to do such a thing.

“You don’t know what’s going on the surface!” Merediana was angry. “Are you blind?”

The eyes of the golden faces were monochrome and golden, but they could not be called sightless. They seemed to see even more than they should.

“We don’t like to observe the surface. There are bad memories there.”

“It is not there, but in the sky!”

“The sky stretches right over the sea. How can you look at the surface and not see it?”

“I respect your grief, but the fall was a long time ago. Stop moaning and open the gate!”

The gate creaked reluctantly. Merediana sailed through the narrow gate and dragged Desmond through.

“Ouch!” one of the faces tried to bite his arm. Desmond was surprised to find that his voice could now be heard under water.

“They are biters,” Merediana nodded. “I don’t like them, but you can’t swim into the Underworld without their permission.”

She waved her fins more vigorously. The gate slammed shut, catching a piece of Desmond’s sleeve. If Merediana hadn’t swim at double speed, the pirate’s arm would have been elbow-deep in the teeth of the living faces.

The golden heads snorted in displeasure.

“You haven’t fed us! You haven’t paid the tribute for the passage to the Undersea Kingdom or sacrificed to us! We will report you to the Sea King Seal!”

Merediana turned around and flashed her tongue at them. Desmond flinched. Her tongue was a bifurcated stinger.

“They’ll report me to my father!” She pouted capriciously. “My father will punish them himself! I am his favorite daughter… after Yasmin.”

Merediana frowned.

“It’s strange that until Yasmin went to live on the islands of the Between Worlds, I wasn’t the foremost of the sea queens. The first seat in the sea court was only vacated by a pirate in Yasmin’s care, that’s the only reason you’re still alive,” Merediana shook Desmond like a toy. “I respect pirates. Without them, I wouldn’t be the most important of all the sea queens.”

And by far the strongest! Desmond was horrified at how much physical strength lay in the graceful mermaid’s frail body. Merediana could crush not only him, but his entire pirate crew with one fingernail. She could crush a ship and an entire fortress with her hands. Only magic can make a slender mermaid stronger than a giant. Surprisingly, with such strength, Merediana could not free herself from either the cube or the rune-stained chest.

The runes of the nameless morgen were far more powerful than the mermaid’s magic. Where is this morgen now? Why isn’t he rushing to the rescue? He should have sensed by now that the mermaid had freed herself. So why isn’t he rushing to help his business partner?

Desmond caught himself thinking that he didn’t want the release. The mermaid’s closeness was so sweet that he wished he could remain captive forever. If the fetters were Merediana’s embrace, he would gladly become her eternal captive.

That’s how people get dragged into the Underworld! It’s all due to the enchantment of the magical creatures of the sea. Proximity to them is like a magnet or a drug. You can step off a cliff or drown with them.

Merediana’s purple hair waving in the water was softer than silk. The mermaid’s skin was phosphorescent. The scarlet scales on her tail shimmered. Merediana was the most beautiful creature not only in the underwater world, but in the entire universe! If she wanted to keep him captive, he would be happy. Desmond was ready to give up his career as a pirate (if only criminal activity can be called a career), his dreams of glory, and even his long-standing enmity with the rulers of Mirid. He was even willing to drown for Merediana. He had to fall in love so hard at first sight!

Desmond thought that if Merediana were to leave him now, he would not return to land. Better to die in the water where she lived than to live on the surface of the water without her.

Cassandra would explain such a condition by saying that the pirate was bewitched by mermaid magic. Therefore, Desmond would not ask Cassandra’s opinion.

Beyond the golden gate stretched the underwater gardens. All the trees and bushes here were blue, blue, and rarely white. Pyramids of shells and pearls moved suspiciously, as if whole hordes of monsters lurked inside.

Paths of pearls twisted around a cluster of underwater flowers. Desmond wondered what the paths were for if the underwater creatures did not walk, but swam.

The water flowers turned out to be alive and predatory. They greedily caught the passing fry. One large flower the size of a hut tried to catch Desmond’s foot.

“Don’t dare!” Merediana hissed at him, and the petals of the predatory flower immediately froze.

“I am the mistress of this sea, and everything and everyone here is subject to me, so no one has the right to trespass on my prey,” Merediana explained to the captive.

“So I am your prey?” Desmond was flattered. “I’ve never been preyed upon by a pretty girl before.”

“But the Coast Guard must have hunted you in regiments.”

“That’s right.”

How did Merediana know so much about life up there? Did she often swim dangerously close to people? It doesn’t look like it! A miracle like her would only be caught for her jewelry. Desmond’s heart squeezed when he imagined that someone might try to catch the sea queen with a net just to pick the jewels out of her skin.

He was probably worrying for nothing. Merediana would probably tear the net and use destructive sea magic against the hunters.

But she couldn’t break the chest, and she didn’t break the cube either. She needed a helper. Probably, fate itself sent her a corsair, who fell in love with the mermaid at first sight.

The intimacy with the queen of the sea drove Desmond crazy. That’s who he would be willing to do any feat for. He had once agreed to use her himself as a precious cargo. Now if a mermaid sent him to kill the King of Opal himself, he wouldn’t hesitate to do it.

“I don’t like leaving ghost ships on the surface,” Merediana hummed, “but a ship that dares to take a sleeping mermaid aboard will meet a dire fate.”

“Don’t tell me I’ll be without a ship. I’m already without one. If you remember, you dragged me to the bottom.”

“And you, if you remember, you stole me out of the sea.”

“It wasn’t me.”

“It was Udo! That’s what I thought! A simple man couldn’t have been so clever.”

Is it an insult that the Princess of the Sea called him a simple man? He’s not a simple man. He’s a brave pirate captain. Even as a corsair, it wasn’t easy to become a captain. If the mermaid knew how much effort he had put in. The respect of the pirates had to be earned too. However, now that the pirate captain has been kidnapped by a mermaid, it is unlikely that any of the crew will wait for his return or look for him at the bottom. Most likely, he will be put into the drowning and a new captain will be chosen. The enviable spot won’t stay empty for long. The crew might even fight over the rank of captain.

“So you don’t know how to draw sea runes?” Merediana concluded.

“You guessed right.”

“Then you’re perfect for me.”

“Suited for what?”

“It is to annoy my father and sisters.”

“I thought you needed a personal bodyguard.”

“I already have bodyguards — sea dragons.”

Merediana whistled musically, and immediately the huge silhouettes of blue water dragons rose from behind the pearly pyramids.

“These are the Morags — sea dragons,” she introduced. “They are the authorized bodyguards of the Sea King’s daughters.”

The Morags squinted suspiciously at Desmond.

“Where were they when Udo kidnapped you?”

The morgen who held a grudge against Merediana was probably named Udo, though he didn’t introduce himself to Desmond.

The mermaid was suddenly angry.

“It is none of your business, corsair!” She hissed, squeezing Desmond’s shoulder painfully. Her claws dug into the flesh to the bone.

Desmond felt the pain. The dragons sniffed at the smell of blood, but did not dare to attack. Merediana’s presence made them behave.

“I see, we can’t ask you about your business. You have secrets from the sea king and the bodyguards of the queens.”

“You talk so much! I should tear out your tongue!”

Merediana’s eyes glittered in a way that could have frightened him.

“Don’t you need a companion?”

“If I do, I’ll talk to the singing shells or the magic psaltery.”

“But they can’t tell you about the land, but I can. I’m the only earthling here.”

“How self-assured you are!” Merediana snorted. “I’d like to drown you, but you don’t.”

The mermaid glanced at his amulet.

“Is it a gift from your beloved?” She asked.

Is she jealous? Desmond’s heart thumped with joy.

“No, it’s not from my lover. A fortune-teller made it for me. It’s a good luck charm. Well, I’ve had good luck. I’ve met the Princess of the Sea.”

Not long ago he would have called Cassandra a girlfriend, but now, under Merediana’s iridescent gaze, that was impossible.

“So you want me to tell you about the land? Your shells can’t do that.”

“I’ve swam to land before, there’s nothing particularly interesting there.”

“That’s because you’ve only been to the shores. Everything interesting is inside the continents.”

“I’ve been inside, too.”

“Can you conjure up legs instead of fins?”

“No, I can’t. You are a stupid corsair!”

“Why am I stupid?”

“Don’t you know that all sea creatures can enter the world through springs, pools, fountains, any kind of water vessels? If you run away, for example, I can reach you through any pitcher or bowl you want to drink from. A webbed hand will swim out of there and strangle you.

“It’s that simple!”

“You humans are vulnerable until you learn to do without water. After all, we Morgens own the water.”

“It’s so easy for mermaids to catch and drown boys! Is that how you’ve caught every prisoner that escapes from you?”

“No one’s ever escaped from me, and I’ve lived for over a hundred years.”

“You’re that much older than me? What a surprise!”

“Humans have a short lifespan, but we Morgens are immortal beings.”

“So you’ll still be alive even after I’m dead?”

“And I don’t need your stories about the earth. If I want to know about the wonders of the earth, the observation mirrors will tell me everything.”

“Observation mirrors? I’ve never heard of such a thing.”

“People don’t know anything about anything. If you get a mermaid thing, it’s useless to you. But if a mermaid gets a harp from a sunken ship, it will play and report to the underwater people about everything that happened on earth and with its masters, and with its owners, and with itself. Bring me your friend’s comb, and I will tell you all about her. Her comb will tell me all her heartfelt secrets.”

“Cassandra is not my girlfriend!”

“So her name is Cassandra,” the mermaid looked questioningly at the amulet. It glowed and blinked more and more alarmingly.

“She is Cassandra!” Merediana repeated in a high-pitched voice.

Desmond thought her singsong voice echoed across the sea bottom and could be heard as far away as the coast. It was as if Cassandra had heard a mermaid’s call.

Perhaps his imagination was running wild.

“I don’t like coastal sorcerers,” Merediana interjected. “They’re all frauds, liars, and lechers. They’ve fooled so many pirates!”

“Are mermaids more honorable? Don’t you drown fishermen and sailors by the thousands? Don’t you play your shell flutes to cause storms and send whole armadas to the bottom?”

Merediana was silent for a long time. Apparently, she was tormented by her conscience.

“You’re too soft-hearted for a pirate,” she said at last. “How many have you killed in sea battles yourself? It was all for profit.”

“And what do mermaids drown people for? Is it for fun?”

“It is for love!”

Merediana suddenly turned around and pressed her lips to his. The kiss stunned him. For the sake of it Desmond was ready to become dumb as a fish for eternity and not to judge Merediana for anything else. A mermaid’s kiss is pure magic!

It was like Desmond was floating in the sky instead of drowning underwater. Too bad the kiss didn’t last long. Someone was calling Merediana. Somewhere in the distance, a horn was blowing.

“They are Marshals of the sea!” She determined by ear. “It seemed the court was seriously concerned about my disappearance, even though I hadn’t been gone long. They sent a whole army after me. If you had brought me to shore, the coast would be in trouble.”

“What can Morgens armies do on land?” Desmond asked brazenly.

The answer stunned him.

“They can flood the whole country!”

Yes, Merediana was best not to be confronted. He had the nerve to kidnap such a marvel! She alone could flood an entire continent. He didn’t doubt it. And armies of monsters would have come to the rescue.

“Are you going to put me on trial right away? Or will you find Udo first?”

“I’ll find someone to investigate, but in the meantime, you’ll be my hostage.”

How sweet that sounds! Desmond prepared himself for the pleasures of paradise in the company of a mermaid, but a very different fate awaited him.

As soon as the magical gardens were behind him, the vast blue seaweed plantations appeared ahead. They stretched into infinity and resembled earthly fields with crops. A path ran between the stubble. Desmond thought he saw creatures hiding in the seaweed. On earth such creatures would be called leprechauns, but what were they called here?

Merediana dragged Desmond swimming over the algae plantations. The plants appeared to be alive. The seaweeds deftly wrapped themselves around Desmond’s knees. They were as strong as ropes.

“It is not now!” Merediana pulled her captive out of the net of algae and floated a little higher so they wouldn’t reach Desmond’s legs again.

Contrary to expectations, the plantations did not appear to be endless. At the end of them was a huge pyramid decorated with large pearls. Mermaids, tritons, and other creepy creatures like large octopuses swarmed toward Merediana.

“Your Highness!”

“Where have you been swimming for so long?”

“Who is that with you?”

The questions came in a chorus, but Merediana imperiously stopped all inquiries.

“Stop being a hypocrite! You’ve already seen everything in the observation mirrors. This corsair has broken all the laws of the sea, disregarded his treaty with the sea king, conspired with the traitors of my dynasty, tried to kidnap the daughter of the sea king. He will be tried by King Seal himself.”

“But your highness,” muttered an octopus dressed like a waving priest’s robe. “His sea majesty, King Seal is busy negotiating with the ocean dynasty. He won’t be free for another century at the earliest.”

Desmond was relieved. He’ll be dead in a century.

“I’ll hurry my father,” Merediana tossed Desmond into the tentacles of the large octopuses, which resembled the slave traders of Pion. The tentacles immediately wrapped a strong net around Desmond.

“Dor,” Merediana beckoned to the huge morgen that looked like a sea giant. “Let him be a slave on your plantations until my father passes judgment on him.”

“But…” The blue-skinned monster named Dor hesitated. “He’s quite handsome. Handsome men are usually sacrificed in the temple of Darunon. Or they are given to mermaids for fun. Are you sure you don’t want to keep him or give him to your sisters as a gift?”

“Don’t talk too much!” Merediana was furious. “He’s a slave from now on! You must be strict with him! Let him work on the sea plantations and realize how free pirates live without the interests of the sea king.”

What a mess! Desmond looked hopefully at Merediana, but she turned away from him. It looks like he really did not go to the paradise of mermaid love, but to the sea hell.

Slaves of the sea kingdom

The slave branding and collar were not the limit of Desmond’s dreams, but they were what awaited him. The brand proved to be red-hot even in the water. It hissed and wriggled like a living thing. It must be magical. It wasn’t the only one the wardens had. Dor brought three different brandings. One branded victims for the temple, one branded slaves for the sea plantations, one branded workers for the underwater mines. All those branded were doomed.

“People are treated like cattle here,” Desmond said noisily.

“Do you think a captured pirate would be treated more gently on the surface?” Merediana arched her purple eyebrows haughtily. What a beauty she was! Desmond’s heart sank at the sight of her riding a huge seahorse. The curvature on its back was as if it had been specially adapted as a saddle for a mermaid. Merediana curled her tail into a ring and pulled on the reins.

Was she really going to leave? Wouldn’t she want to make the captured pirate her personal slave? Desmond had never encountered such pronounced female indifference before. If only a mermaid could be called a woman.

The branding had indeed turned out to be magical. While the tentacles of the octopus overseers held the young man tightly, Dor tried to cauterize his forehead with the brand, but nothing worked. The brand hissed and dug into Desmond’s skin, but it couldn’t make a mark on him.

“Was he enchanted?” Dor scratched the back of his head with a long tentacle.

“You just don’t know how to do anything, you assholes!” Merediana was angry.

The overseers were afraid of her anger. She must have whipped them more than once herself. By the way, the whip, made of a live sea serpent, looked great in her hand. It coiled around Merediana’s wrist like a bracelet, then it hissed, wriggling in her palm.

And a mermaid like that wants to dump him as a slave on a plantation instead of keeping him for her. Her slave he’d be more willing to be. Desmond could not understand himself. He had never wanted to be anyone’s slave until now, and now the mermaid had waved her purple tail in front of him and made his head spin. Earthly beauties are far from her.

Merediana tightened the reins of seaweed and made the skate swim closer.

“It’s done like this!” Merediana ripped open the shirt on her captive’s chest and placed her hand where his heart should have been beating. Her claws and webbing were suddenly red-hot. Desmond felt his skin burn. A large burn spread across his chest, the mark of a mermaid’s palm.

Oh, my God! Merediana had branded her mark on him. Well, maybe she’ll take him with her after all. The sea queen’s look was unyielding. It’s obvious she wants to punish him for kidnapping an eminent person.

“Let him work hard. Don’t let him chill,” she told Dor.

The monster bowed courteously.

“If I find out you didn’t treat him too harshly…” Merediana squinted, her eyes turning into two red slits. Desmond felt dizzy.

“And if my sisters want him, don’t give him to them. Everyone knows their sympathy for beautiful earthlings.”

Merediana’s character turned out to be very unhealthy. How could such a beautiful woman be so mean! If only he had been warned that the Princess of the Sea was such a nuisance!

“If you want to be my master, you’ll be my slave!” She turned to Desmond.

Desmond laughed.

“Do you think it is fun?”

“All the aristocrats and courtesans and earthly princesses told me that in a streamlined form. Only the mermaid said it directly. You’re honest, but impractical. I’m not a galley slave, I’m not shackled. I can swim back to the surface.”

Not so. Her magical power made him kneel on the sea bottom.

“I could sell you as a galley slave, too, and threaten the captain that I’ll send a storm every time you’re treated too gently.”

“You’re better than the princesses of Earth! They didn’t think of that, just threatened me with war if I didn’t marry them.”

“What do they care about a pirate?”

Desmond wanted to argue that he wasn’t a pirate, or at least he hadn’t always been a pirate, but decided not to say anything. It was better that the mermaid didn’t know that. Or else she would decide to sell him to his family for a large ransom or blackmail the king with such a prisoner. She can’t read minds, apparently. Or can she? Her eyes are too perceptive.

And he thinks she’s better than the princesses of Earth. All princesses are the same bore, Earth or sea.

“Oh, I have forgotten,” Merediana slipped her hand under his arm and pulled out a shining scroll. “You’ve broken a maritime treaty, and even though you have a favorable contract, you’re still liable.”

The glittering scroll stretched into a ribbon in her hands, and the ribbon wrapped around the captive’s wrists and ankles.

“It is so much for shackles!” The mermaid snarled.

The shimmering scroll was indeed able to change its shape and transformed into a kind of shackles. You can’t run far in these shackles. They glow brightly underwater, attracting unnecessary attention.

“He’s shackled like a privileged hostage,” Dor squinted suspiciously.

“It’s only until the trial. Make sure he doesn’t try to escape before the sea king judges him. I’ll try to arrange with my father for the trial to take place as soon as possible.”

“And what happens after the trial?” Desmond felt suddenly unable to speak. Only gurgling bubbles came out of his mouth. Merediana smiled slyly. She must have blocked his speech with her magic.

“Slaves are supposed to be silent,” she said, her crowned head held high and proud. Her purple curls fluttered in the water like a storm.

Desmond stared at her dumbfounded. Would he never see her again? It was unlikely that she would personally appear at the trial. Most likely, the sea king himself and all the underwater executioners would torture and execute him. But Merediana will report to her father and ask that the kidnapper be dealt with severely.

“You will probably meet your former friends and enemies on the plantations. Many pirates and sailors end up here.” Merediana nodded at the shabby shadows bent on the seaweed plantations. They themselves no longer resembled workers, but slouching water monsters. Were they all former pirates and current slaves of the sea kingdom?

An incredibly beautiful newt swam up to Desmond and gave him a stern look.

“Should we sacrifice him to Darunon’s followers right away so that he wouldn’t further annoy your highness?” The triton nodded at the temple behind the plantations, with huge tentacles wrapped around its pillars.

It must have been the temple where Darunon’s so-called followers dwelt. Desmond had heard somewhere that Darunon was a terrifying sea god. His followers were probably monsters, too.

“It is not now, Laor,” Merediana, who was about to leave, turned the seahorse around and looked at the newt in surprise.

“Why aren’t you at the ceremony at the palace? You were supposed to help there.”

Laor tucked the blue strands of hair behind his ears in embarrassment. His ears were real shells. His tail sparkled with emerald scales. Apparently, the newt is an important person at court.

“And someone like you was appointed as an advisor to the sea king!” Merediana arched her elegant eyebrows. “You’d leave the council chamber at a difficult moment and swim after any mermaid!”

“It is not any mermaid, but you.”

Triton frowned guiltily.

Desmond had hoped with all his heart that Laor was Merediana’s brother, but it didn’t seem to be the case. Cassandra had said nothing about the sea king having sons. She only mentioned the names of his daughters.

For some reason, Desmond felt an unbearable hatred at the sight of the handsome Triton. If it weren’t for the shackles, he would have killed him. If only a newt could be killed. He thought sea creatures were immortal. Anyway, morgens are long-lived. Merediana herself has admitted to being well into her late teens. Laor must be her age. They both look about eighteen years old, and they both have eternity under their belts.

“What a pair they’d make!” Dor sighed as he watched Merediana and the newt swim away. “It is too bad the princess has already been promised to marry the ocean prince.”

“What do you say?” Desmond was so excited that he could have broken out of his magical shackles. The octopuses barely held him back. One overseer whipped him with a seaweed scourge. It hurt more than the whip.

Merediana, meanwhile, swam up to the temple and stroked the tentacles of a large kraken that wrapped around all the columns of the structure. Laor followed her. What a lucky fellow! Merediana had not driven him away. She’d just gotten rid of Desmond.

Underwater plantations

The work on the plantations was hard and deadly. The ink-colored algae burned your fingers. He could see why the morgens were reluctant to pick it themselves. Desmond’s palms were burned and abraded after half an hour’s work. The algae were still moving, alive and trying to nibble his fingers. They wrapped themselves around the hands, rubbed against the skin as if they were blades, and could even tear off the hand.

One slave, who had had both arms torn off at the elbow by the seaweed, was seized by the overseers and thrown into the sacrificial well near the temple. There, apparently, the poor man died. Other maimed slaves were attacked by swarms of piranhas and eaten alive.

Desmond recognized an old pirate friend he had met in a tavern on Pion Island. The pirate was a tall, burly man who was nicknamed Black Pike. Even he had been enslaved by the morgens. Wow!

Pike noticed Desmond too, recognized him, and for a moment distracted himself from his work. The naughty algae did not miss the moment. They immediately dug into the wrist of Pike, wrapped a network around his legs, stomach, shoulders, twisted a bundle neck. In a minute only bloody pieces of Pike were left. He was literally crushed and torn apart.

“And so will you if you get distracted again!” The slippery tentacles of the octopus slid down Desmond’s body. They were sticky and nasty. The octopus was groping the pirate as if it was going to eat him alive.

“Leave him alone!” Dor arrived just in time for the octopus to almost crush Desmond. “The princesses will probably want him as their servant. He looks a lot like the pirate their sister ran away with. He is also blue-eyed, also blond. All in all it is a royal type. He’s for royalty.”

“They’ll tear him apart in the first game. Such a full-blooded slave will be wasted,” grumbled the octopus, but he reluctantly let Desmond go.

What kind of games are sea queens playing? Desmond noticed that the octopuses were frightened and no longer looked in his direction. How can you frighten such big guys?

The seaweed, on the other hand, was not to be deterred. They were still trying to bite off Desmond’s fingers or at least tear out his nails.

“Why do sea people need so much seaweed?” Desmond hissed under his breath.

“They use it to weave nets at the ocean’s edge,” whispered a slave nearby. He was gathering seaweed on the same stubble as Desmond.

“Are you here for piracy and kidnapping mermaids, too?”

“No, I’m here for breaking a treaty with the king of the sea. I’m a merchant, trying to keep some of my profits from Seal. It didn’t work out. Now I’m working my ass off.”

“Do you have a name?”

“On land, I was called Tiel. At sea, they don’t remember my name. Everyone here is an equal slave.”

“My name is Desmond.”

“You’re a pirate in disgrace to the king of the sea?”

“I am a corsair.”

“Well, corsairs are sea robbers with noble blood. They’re supposed to honor the treaty.”

“We all get into trouble.”

“That’s right,” Tiel looked at the overseers, who were distracted by the punishment of the other slaves. We can talk a little more, maybe even confer about escape.”

“So did you run into greed?”

“It not exactly,” Til blushed. “I withheld not only the profit from the sea king, but also the girl who was to be sacrificed to the sea. I just couldn’t drown her.”

“I see,” Desmond decided to move on to the hot topic. “Can you escape from here?”

“Are you a wizard?”

“Suppose so,” Desmond was glad Cassandra’s amulet hadn’t been taken from him. The amulet gave him a small amount of magical power. Maybe it would be enough to escape.

“We need to remove the shackles, which are magical, deceive the guards, and then convince the Nephilims to let us go.”

“What are Nephilims?

“That’s what I call the winged heads on the gates of the Underworld, but the mermaids themselves call them something else. Mevellines, I think. Mermaids have exquisite speech and terms of their own. Mermaids and newts are the nobility of the underwater world, and monsters like these,” Tiel nodded at the octopuses, “are common people.”

“We’re the villains, because we have to work,” Desmond felt a painful whiplash on his back. It was one of the overseers who had swum close to him and noticed that he was slacking off.

“Get to work, Earthman! Be quickly!” The octopus’ many eyes flashed with such anger that Desmond thought it best to work hard.

The algae had to be plucked up by the roots and then tied into fancy sheaves. In a fraction of a minute a new algae would grow in place of the plucked ones. The work on the plantations never stopped. You could labor here forever and the land would remain uncultivated.

“I’ll be damned for messing with a mermaid!” Desmond swore through his teeth as the insolent algae pinched his fingers.

The cursing made Desmond a desirable target for punishment. He received whips and whiplashes that caused wounds and burns to blossom on his skin.

“The pirate captain had become a slave. Oh, my!”

Desmond looked back at the voice and spotted his longtime foe. The one-eyed captain of “The Mockingbird” was giving him an unkind look. What a meeting! Spike had become his nemesis when they’d shared the proceeds on Pion. And now the enemy was here. They were both slaves on the same plantation. The black patch from Spike’s eye was gone, and a scorpion had taken up residence in the empty eye socket. It had gnawed so deeply into his eyelid that it seemed like a second eye.

How many more enemies from land could one meet in the sea kingdom! Desmond had a bad feeling. Spike had definitely spotted him and recognized him. For now they both labor under the whips of the overseers. But if the octopuses let their guard down, there would be a fight.

Cassandra’s amulet vibrated on Desmond’s chest like a second heart. The magical thing was sensitive to approaching danger.

Merediana had come to see the work. She behaved with the utmost arrogance. It would seem from the outside that she didn’t know Desmond at all.

“I’ll get out of here, get to land, and get a love elixir so strong she won’t be able to live without me. Cassandra can make such elixirs,” Desmond muttered to himself. He had to have something to comfort himself with.

Cassandra could make a magic elixir, but Cassandra was far away. He needed the potion right here, right now. Desmond was going crazy at the sight of Merediana. She had sent him to work on the seaweed plantations while she rode like an overseer in a shell phaeton pulled by giant crabs. The reins in her hands were made of purple seaweed. Where did such seaweed grow? Desmond had seen endless plantations of blue and green algae, sometimes white. But there was no red.

Merediana was chasing crabs with her whip. So he wasn’t the only one in bondage. Desmond felt the blow of the whip just then. The monster overseers noticed he was distracted from his work again. There was no need to ogle Merediana, but he couldn’t help himself. If you can’t see her, there’s nothing to live for. He was ensnared by her on a deep mental level. The fact that his body was in her physical slavery no longer mattered. Worst of all, his soul remained enslaved. Even if he accomplished a fantastic feat and escaped from the sea kingdom, his heart would remain enslaved to the sea king’s daughter.

How funny! He wanted to ensnare her, but he was ensnared himself. It’s best not to make any deals with supernatural creatures. Any ventures against magical creatures will lead you into a trap.

According to Merediana, a mermaid is a sea deity. She wants to be worshipped, and at the same time Desmond’s heart beat like a caged bird. He could barely keep his cool and weed the seaweed.

Does Merediana see right through him? Was that probably the reason she was looking at him with such disdain? Pirates in love can only elicit laughter and squeamishness from mermaids. What did he expect? Even if on land, his handsome looks made women admire him, in the sea, he’s just food for the fish. It’s full of beautiful newts. Not even angels can match Laor’s beauty alone.

Then why do sea princesses choose Earth guys for their amusement? Maybe they like to torture earthlings.

The monster overlords behaved more and more harshly. Whips made of seaweed, which made the flesh decompose, were whipped incessantly. Slaves mutilated by the whipping were fed to the fish. Instead of an underwater palace, he was in an underwater hell. And he feared he would fall prey to the queens of the sea.

“Why did you anger the mermaids so much that they sent you here?” Dor was suddenly interested in him.

“Do you have to anger them to do that?” Desmond said, risking a whip of seaweed.

“They usually like pirates. The eldest daughter of the sea king, Princess Yasmin, even married a pirate and now lives with him on the islands of the Between Worlds.”

“Is it really?” Desmond stared greedily after Merediana. Maybe he has a chance.

The Sea Princess traveled back and forth to the plantations in a crab carriage. He didn’t think she’d come here just for him. Somehow Desmond was sure she wanted to see him tortured.

After all, he had kidnapped her and wanted to sell her to the King of Opal. If he had known from the beginning that the kidnapped princess would turn out to be such a magical beauty! Then he would have kidnapped her just for himself.

How strange! He’s her slave, and he only dreams of kidnapping her again. If one day he gets free, it will only be to steal her away from the Underwater Kingdom. Princess Merediana has become his obsession.

“You haven’t seen the other princesses yet,” Tiel intercepted Desmond’s longing gaze. “They are all rare beauties, but they are dangerous to be close to. They torture and kill their earthly lovers.”

“Do they have earthly lovers?” Desmond felt hopeful.

“I just called them that. They probably just like torturing handsome Earth boys.”

“Then why didn’t they pick you to torture?”

“I’m not very handsome, and I have scars. Mermaids only appreciate exceptional earthly beauty. They steal the youngest and most pampered aristocrats from the shore or from ships to play with them for long periods of time. I once saw them torture a beautiful prince to death. Have you ever seen a real prince in your life? I’ve never seen one on the surface, but here, in the claws of mermaids, I have.”

Desmond was silent. Talking about royalty and princes was more painful to him than being hit with a whip.

“Princes, too, are slaves to their origins and courtly conventions,” he muttered. “So it makes no difference to be a slave in the palace or on the plantations. Both the heir to the throne and the mermaid’s servant are slaves to the same degree.”

“You must have taken some prince hostage who told you how hard it was for him to be the heir to the throne,” Tiel suggested.

Desmond laughed in response. His laughter attracted Merediana. The mermaid swam up to him in anger. Her huge crabs moved their claws near Desmond’s face.

“Is the slave having fun?” She wondered.

Desmond didn’t know what to say. The situation did look comical from the outside. He was bending his back on a plantation and laughing at something!

Merediana took his silence as an insult and slashed him across the cheek with her whip. The pain burned worse than fire. The red seaweed whip must have been enchanted. Its blow caused the skin to burst and split open, exposing bone. Blood trickled thinly across the water. The flocks of predatory fish that swam past the plantations immediately became alert.

Before Desmond could panic, a miracle happened. The scar on his cheek closed instantly. The skin melted back together.

Merediana stared at him in bewilderment.

“This slave really is special. There’s a reason masks say…” she furrowed her purple eyebrows. “I’m taking him for myself!”

“Wasn’t he yours before?” The handsome triton gave the corsair a murderous look.

Laor did his best to follow the Princess like a bodyguard. For the chance to be near her, he would definitely kill. Desmond sensed the hatred emanating from the newt. Had Laor not realized that Merediana didn’t care about her captive? Yes, she might use him for some magical experiments, but she wouldn’t look at him as a boyfriend. Too bad! You’d go to great lengths to get her attention.

“Swim to the temple! Tell the priests I’ll sacrifice to their gods tonight,” Merediana shamelessly shoved the newt away from her.

Laor clearly did not like to play the role of an errand boy, but he obeyed without complaint and swam to the columns of the ominous temple.

That’s how sacrifices are made. Desmond was interested. He wondered what rituals the sea queens participate in.

“How do you like your new estate?” Merediana sneered, looking down at Desmond arrogantly. He was standing just below her crab carriage, which floated in the water just above the seaweed and his head. The Sea Princess was showing with all her appearance that her rank was superior to both overseers and slaves. It’s not even clear without a show!

“Is it a new estate?” Desmond grimaced.

“Well, it is a place of work,” the Princess corrected herself. “Or what do you humans call a physical work site?”

“Pirates like me don’t work, but take what others have earned.”

“Well, then, I’ve made an honest laborer out of a pirate. Are you grateful to me? Who else but me could set you on the righteous path?”

“No one’s ever tried. I’ve been dead for a long time. You overdid it, pulling me out of sin.”

“But I got you out and made you work honestly on the sea plantations instead of robbing them. Of all the Sea King’s daughters, I am the only one unique. My sisters should bow to me.”

She and her sisters seem to have a strained relationship, Desmond realized. Apparently, Merediana wanted to be the sole heir to the sea throne. Maybe she would offer him a deal to kidnap and sell all her sisters to King of Opal. Then she could be befriended as a customer. Desmond tensed, but Merediana was in no hurry to make a deal with him.

“So you like it here? Do you know what this area is?”

“It’s a seaside plantation! They rot the workers alive!”

“You think you’d be better off in the Earth penal colony?”

“I wasn’t planning on going there.”

“The only way for a pirate to go is to hard labor.”

Merediana clutched her seaweed whip warily.

— There’s also the scaffold,” Desmond said helpfully.

“And which path would you choose?”

“It is a free sea.”

“It’s not forever, unless you make a new contract with the sea king, offering him something mutually beneficial. Not many people would interest him.”

“I’ve already made a contract with you.”

“You fell into my claws and became my slave,” Merediana clarified, sipping the sea-grass tea the helpful jellyfish had served her. “Making a contract is something else.”

“So let’s make a contract. Let’s become partners.”

“It’s too late for that. I need you more as a slave.”

“So you do need me!”

She looks at him too indifferently. Only the occasional flicker of cunning was in her eyes.

What’s she up to? It’s hard being a mermaid’s slave. It is better a scourge on land than to be a captive at sea.

Unless the mermaid loves you, whispered the voice of dreams, but how can you expect her to love you? Mermaids are emotionless. They themselves are delightful and in love, but their heart is colder than a fish. He wondered if Merediana had a dead fish in her chest. It was an obvious assumption. Why else would the scaly beauty be so cold? The earthly princesses were the ones who wouldn’t let him pass. He was the most enviable groom in the Mediterranean until the morgens ravaged his kingdom with floods. He must hide who he is from Merediana, or she will surely bring an army of morgens to his native shores and bring him to the flooded country to mock him. Look what your homeland has become.

She is a beautiful pest!

Good thing Merediana didn’t try to find out who he was or where he came from. She wasn’t interested. To a sea princess, he’s just a corsair.

“Are you happy to be in the claws of a mermaid, pirate?” Merediana played with her whip. The algae were opening up outgrowths as if they were fans.

“I didn’t think the mermaid would turn out to be a planter!”

“You thought the mermaid would turn out to be a valuable cargo that could be sold profitably to the royal collection.”

Here she shamed him. Desmond frowned guiltily.

“Someday your work on the sea plantations will break you, and you will stop being so proud.”

Merediana made the crabs turn around and dragged her luxurious carriage toward the sea temple. What on earth was she doing in that temple?

Desmond had heard all sorts of tales of creepy sea gods who were best never to be awakened or called from the depths. They could help, but the cost would be enormous.

Merediana swam away. For Desmond it was as if the sun had set. To look at her was the only pleasure in his hopeless life of slavery. In an hour on the sea plantations, he was as tired as if he’d worked years in the mines. Perhaps even hauling boulders in the quarry was not as hard as fighting the living and predatory algae.

The hot tropical sun did not scorch the sea plantations, but the water itself suffocated the slaves, making them unable to breathe. Desmond wondered how he hadn’t been suffocated underwater. The slaves must be fed some magical herb that kept them from drowning in the Underworld. Cassandra said that the miracle herb could be dug under the sand at the edge of the sea. The portion of the herb you eat determines how long you can breathe underwater. But the herb is so bitter that not everyone can chew it. The elite prefer to buy elixirs that allow them to breathe in the water. Cassandra’s customers were not only pirates, but also coastal aristocrats who needed to make the occasional trip to the sea realm for some reason.

Desmond was pondering that he wouldn’t be able to live long in the underwater plantations when he noticed living skeletons working under the blows of an algae whip. The skeletons had scraps of clothing with galloons hanging from them. Apparently they were former seafarers.

“If the princess needs it, she will make her slaves immortal so that their labor on the plantations will last forever,” Tiel explained. “Immortality is not a gift, but a punishment. Your body rots, your bones crumble to dust, and you still have to work.”

Desmond’s heart sank into his heels. He’d rather die. But Merediana won’t let him die. She wants him to suffer.

Promenade

There was no escape from the barracks. The walls of the barracks were made up of eyeballed, living jellyfish clutched together by long tentacles.

The multicolored eyes glared brazenly, not allowing the slaves to be left alone for a second. You feel like you’re in a circle of sleepy spies.

“Those bastards snitch on everything, so it’s best not to talk in the barracks,” Tiel confirmed, and went to sleep.

Desmond couldn’t sleep a wink. The amulet began to burn his chest. It burned like a miniature sun pressed against his skin. Cassandra probably recognized that her ward corsair was in trouble. Sea sorceresses have various ways of getting the latest news from the sea bottom. Cassandra claimed she could hear the whispers of the waves. Allegedly, the waves brought her gossip from the sea palace.

Desmond did not believe in this nonsense, but since he had fallen into the claws of a mermaid, he had become more reasonable. The Underwater Kingdom is indeed full of all sorts of wonders. Living algae braid the network of people’s bodies and tear them apart, multicolored eyes of jellyfish sparkle from the wall like a scattering of precious stones. Can a wall of jellyfish be called a hedge?

Instead of the corn tortillas given to slaves on land, bowls of seaweed were distributed underwater. Desmond realized it was best not to eat them. Those slaves who ate seaweed had eyes as blank as a zombie’s. Apparently, the food is not meant to fill the stomach, but to enslave the mind.

Desmond hadn’t felt hunger since being at the bottom. Tiel also gave his portion of food to the other slaves.

“You can go as long as you want without food in the Underworld,” he explained. “Only those who have tasted the local food and become addicted to it begin to feel hungry.”

“And I don’t think anyone in the Underwater Kingdom is thirsty at all. There’s water everywhere.”

“It is wrong! Princesses drink nectar from water lilies and lotuses. And in the royal palace they serve exquisite magical wines, I don’t know what they are made of, obviously not from grapes.”

“I wish I could be in the palace of the sea king,” Desmond sighed dreamily. Surely Merediana lived there.

“Don’t dream of it!”

“Why is it?”

“Slaves can only be brought there if they become the playthings of the sea queens. And to become their plaything means martyrdom.”

“What’s the difference between dying on a plantation or in a sea palace?”

Tiel was already asleep and snoring. He was not going to answer Desmond. All the slaves were asleep after a tiring day. Some of them still retained some vestiges of humanity, while others had skin cracked with slimy growths. The slaves of the Underwater Kingdom had mutated.

“Who asked them to break the treaty of the sea? Now we have to deal with them all!” Dor wailed outside. His gruff voice sounded like the howling of a gale. “And this new handsome slave is a disaster! Maim him with a careless blow of the whip, and the Princess Merediana will have us all whipped!”

Dor must be mistaken or exaggerating. Merediana doesn’t give a damn about Desmond. Unless there’s another slave in the barracks she likes.

Dor’s voice trailed off outside. Jellyfish glittered with curious eyes from the hedge. If you try to get out of the barracks, you’ll get burned by a wall of jellyfish. What a trap! Desmond felt like a wild animal caught in a trap. There’s no way out!

There was not a rustle in the barracks to herald the movement of the slaves. No one stirred from side to side, nor was anyone awake. Yet the sharp blade pressed against Desmond’s neck.

“What a reunion, captain of ‘The Triumphator.’ The sea gods themselves have sent you to me to get even!” Spike’s bass voice came over his ear.

Desmond jerked sharply. Now there would be a fight. Too bad slaves weren’t chained to walls of jellyfish. Then Spike wouldn’t have been able to reach him. The blade sliced through his jugular vein and bounced off. Probably it bumped into the amulet. Spike didn’t even have time to cry out. His own stiletto stabbed him in the eye and went through his brain. “The Mockingbird” captain’s body sank to the sandy bottom. The bedding made of mosses greedily soaked up the blood.

Desmond felt blood loss and near fainting for a moment, and then the wound in his throat suddenly healed itself. What a marvel! If he was so invulnerable on the surface, then he would not be afraid of any enemy’s sabers and bayonets. How come he only gained the ability to heal himself in the Sea Realm? Perhaps Cassandra’s amulet had some special power in the water.

At the place where Spike’s blood had rushed into the water, a gap had formed in the wall of jellyfish. Either the jellyfish had rushed to lick the blood off the bedding, or they had briefly unhooked their limbs. It doesn’t matter what disoriented them. What mattered was that Desmond had a chance to slip away.

The corsair immediately seized the opportunity. He couldn’t believe he had a chance to escape so easily. He must have swum a whole league before he remembered Tiel. We’d have to go back for him.

There was no sign of the overseers outside. They must have gone to rest and forgotten to post sentries. Or Cassandra’s glowing amulet had blinded the sentries. If so, it would also blind the creatures at the entrance gate and force them to release the prisoner.