A Love So Deep: Chapter 3 (Patreon)

My desperate primal scream pauses the tentacle’s constriction though the suckers latch on tight.

“Nanea, wait!”  The male voice exclaims.  If I thought it was for any heroic reason I am quickly corrected.  “You’ll damage the torque.  It is valuable.  Remove it and the human will perish on its own.”

“Please don’t kill me!”  I beg quite literally for my life.  My attempts to recoil are fruitless as I am completely bound up.  “Please!  Please!  Whoever you are, let me live!”  My voice is bassy and muffled, as one would expect underwater, not like their crystal clear voices.

“It is speaking.”  The woman says as the tentacle loosens.  It drags back until the tip rests against my throat.  “Those vibrations are words.”

“Probably pleading for its life.  I cannot imagine how confused it must be right now.”

Slowly drifting into sight comes a face that would nightmarish if not for its alien beauty.  It was the face of a mature woman, regal and proud, both recognizably human yet also being far from it.  Her skin is a smooth dark maroon which made her large golden yellow eyes seem to glow from the contrast.  Her onyx black pupils were the shape of hourglasses sat on the their sides.  There was no nose or ears to speak of, though there were two very subtle slits along the sides of her head where the ears would be.  The lovely contour of her jawline lead down to a noble chin, below that a long elegant neck.  Her full lips were just half a shade darker than the skin around it and, though hairless, her ‘brows’ had a coarser texture than the rest with a color similar to the lips.  Instead of hair there were long tendrils, each maybe the width of my pinky finger, with a familiar crimson paisley pattern.  The tentacle at my neck belonged to this creature.  Though I did not know the height of the bed or table I lay upon I had the sense that she was tall and imposing.  She had the shoulders, arms, and torso of a strong statuesque woman and wore a loose flowing lilac sleeveless shirt along with various bits of metal and coral jewelry.  She had a full bosom that matched well with her powerful physique.  Even beyond her impressive physical appearance her bearing made it clear that this was a woman of some authority.

Her inhuman eyes meet mine.  “It is awake.  Damn.”  Her lips did not move as she spoke.

Darting up over her shoulder is a fishy humanoid face that I had seen before, though it was difficult recall.  “Well hello there…human.”  He then mutters to himself, though like the other his mouth remains closed.  “I never thought I’d ever say those words.”

“Do not talk to it.  Put it back to sleep.”

Impossible creatures, impossible magic, an impossible scenario, yet here I am.  My rekindled instinct to survive, burning brighter than it ever had, overrides even my desire to scream and freak out at the surreal and horrifying reality I found myself in.  Directing my attention to the woman, who was clearly in charge here, I beg.  “No!  Please!  Don’t kill me!  Don’t kill me!  Let me live!  PLEEEASE!”

“I think it wants to live.”

“Of course it does!”  The woman’s strange eyes focus on my neck.  “You say to remove this.”

Just then there is a clunk behind them and they both turn their heads to look.  “Mistress!”  Comes a new voice.  “What’s goin on in here?  We can hear all the way down in the tavern.”

“Don’t come in here Ellerie!”

“What is that!?”

In a flash a small figure zips into sight.  Floating above me and facing down is a wide-eyed being that looked a cross between a sprightly college aged girl and a cuttlefish.  From the waist down instead of legs she had a ring of three foot long tentacles!  Along the outsides of her slender arms, from shoulder to wrist, were long wavering fins that rippled rhythmically as she kept her place suspended above me.  She had the same tendril like hair as the other woman, though at only a few inches long they were much shorter, and the same lack of nose and ears.  Her wide oval eyes are a vibrant lime green, the dark pupils squiggly horizontal slits.  Her tentacles and hair were not a single color but constantly shifting patterns of flowery pinks and blues and turquoise, the more human parts of her were a pale cotton candy pink.  As she studies me the moving patterns sped up considerably, as if in response to her surprised emotions.  Around her chest, covering her perky apple sized breasts, she wore an aquamarine tube top that showed off her soft tummy.  She had a single piece of jewelry, a white sand dollar like amulet held by a simple length of twine.  Unlike her ‘mistress’ she was petite, if given human legs I would guess she would stand just above five foot tall.

“Wooooah!”  She exclaims as she stares at me with huge disbelieving eyes.

“Ellerie!”  Nanea brings a hand to her forehead and grumbles.  “Spirits below.”

“What is it!?”

“It’s a human.”  Haali answers, a bit pride peeking through.  “I found it.”

I look to this newcomer.  “Help me!”

“Ah!”  Ellerie gasps, how I could tell that I could not say, and a tiny squirt of black ink poots out below her.  “Those sounds came from this?”

“Yes.  It’s trying to talk to us.  This is how they speak.”

“Wow!  A real human!  No way!”

“I created an enchantment that allows it to live.”

“Haali, enough.”  Nanea says firmly.  “Ellerie, you have to leave now my dear.  Forget that you saw anything here, understand?”

“I wanna watch.”  Ellerie looks to Nanea with something approaching a pout.  “What…what are you doing with it?”

Haali seizes on the moment.  “Mistress is going to kill it.  She thinks it is a danger.”

“Haali!”

“What!?”  Ellerie peeps, the patterns on her skin suddenly darkening and going still for a moment.  “No!  Why?  Why kill it?”

By the frigid glare that Nanea gives to Haali I am surprised the water between them doesn’t freeze solid.  “You bastard.”

Moving with incredible speed Ellerie darts down to her Mistress’s side and grabs her arm.  “You said you weren’t going to kill anyone anymore unless you had to.”

Nanea looks down at the smaller woman with a surprising tenderness.  “It is not an anyone.  It is a surfacer.  That doesn’t count.”  She strokes the girl’s cheek.  “And I do have to my dear, for all of our safety.”

“I am no danger.”  I say, even though they could not understand.  “I do count.  I am a person and I want to live.”

All three look down at me with different expressions.  Haali simply looked fascinated.  In Ellerie’s eyes I see pity and sorrow.  In Nanea’s stern expression there is annoyance.

“Please.”  I say, trying to let my earnest tone communicate what my words could not.  “Please.  I’ll do anything you want.  Don’t kill me.”

Nanea looks back to Ellerie.  “My dear, you must let me deal with this.  Leave the room and forget what you have seen.”

Ellerie pulls her lips into her mouth and nibbles at them before saying very softly.  “Yes Mistress.  At least…I got to see a human…I guess.  Farewell human.”

“Ellerie.”  I call out, wriggling and trying to free myself from my bonds, as the woman looks at me sadly one last time and disappears from sight.  “Ellerie.  You have to convince them.  Let me live.  Talk to them.”

A thunk reverberates through the room, a door closing I assume.

“When this is done we will have words Haali.”  Nanea says, her grave voice as sharp as a dagger.

A humbled and possibly scared Haali bows very low and lays flat his fins.  “I am sorry.  I only spoke the truth Mistress.”

“You push our friendship too far.”  She says.  Reaching out she touches my neck with a hand, or more precisely the thing that was around my neck.  “Remove this and it is done?”

“Yes Mistress.  It will not survive long without it.”

I go still.  I gaze up at this towering alien woman and keep up a constant stream of supplicating talk.  “Please don’t kill me.  Please. I won’t cause danger. I am no trouble.  I am a nobody.  Just a stupid person who did the stupidest thing a person can do.  I don’t want to die anymore.  Take me home and you’ll never have to hear from me again.  Please Mistress Nanea.  Please have mercy on me.”

As I talk I gaze into her peculiar golden cephalopod eyes beseeching her verbally and in expression and in every way I could think of to spare my worthless life.  I feel her fingers feeling along the edge of the item that kept me alive but her eyes never leaves mine.  Though nothing changes in her bearing or expression I sense something…crack.  Her hand pauses, the tip of one finger caresses the tender skin of my neck.  An imperceptible softness comes over her.  Slowly turning her head she looks back toward the door the other of her kind had disappeared through.  She is silent for a long time before her shoulders slump.

“You owe me Haali.”  She says, pulling away from me without even glancing back my way.  “And it will be a lot more than two years of servitude.”

Haali looks up at her.  “You…you mean…?”

“Yes.  It can stay here.”

A wave of overwhelming relief rushes through me and I let out a groan of momentary exultation.  “Thank you!”

Haali meanwhile had swum from my sight and begun to grovel.  “Thank you!  Oh thank you great Mistress!  You will not regret this.”

“Get up you fool.”  She snaps.  “Release the human.  It may solve my problem for me.  If it tries anything, anything at all, we put it down on the spot and bury the body where nobody will find it.  Understand?”

“Yes Mistress!  Thank you Mistress!”

I watch as Haali swims over me to cross to other side.  His lower body, as I already suspected, was the long sinuous tail of a huge fish.  Haali was a merman.  His ebullient face appears up close to mine, close enough I could make out his individual scales, as he whispers soundlessly.  “I don’t know if you can understand us human but you’ve been given a second chance.  Don’t mess this up!”

Chapter 4