Stolen Dream

Chapter Two

It had been more difficult than she'd expected to go back for the last boy. She hadn't wanted to leave the one on shore.

It wasn't like her to hesitate.

Ziza moved through the water with her usual speed and intent, searching through the darkness with eyes that were excellent at using even the tiniest light to see more than most. Like a cat.

There.

She pushed herself hard to get to him quickly, catching him around the waist and using her powerful tailfin to drive them up to the surface of the water. She gulped in a lungful of air, but her passenger was completely limp.

Ziza looked towards shore and was caught between impossible choices. She couldn't return the boy to shore. Not now. There were far too many people there that would see her and want to save her. But she couldn't just leave the boy. He was still alive, though barely.

There was nothing else to do. She dragged him back down into the water, moving quickly to get to her underground lair. It wasn't much, but it was hers and it had air in it.

She rolled him onto the slab of rock just outside of the water and got to work saving his life. She pushed air into his lungs, enough to force the water out before turning him on his side so he could naturally throw up. He sucked in a few breaths of air, but didn't regain consciousness.

All the better, as far as she was concerned. She hoped he'd just sleep for the night and she could return him to the beach in the morning with none the wiser.

She dove down to get out of her cave and went looking for easy prey. All that rescuing had given her quite the appetite. She spent the next hour eating and taking brief trips to the surface for air and to see what the weather was doing.

The storm was still raging and it had started to rain torrentially. Great. She hated that she had to go up for air all the time, that she was unique among her kind. She couldn't breathe underwater. It came with a trade-off, though. She could, to some degree, control the air above the water. She hadn't needed to touch the boy to force air into his lungs, she'd simply needed to concentrate and mentally push it.

It was just one more thing that kept her from her own kind. She was a secret to her own people. No one but her parents and sister knew of her existence. She lived differently than they did, keeping to the daylight hours instead of being out all night.

Speaking of which, she looked around carefully and started back towards her lair. She'd stayed out later than she should have, rescuing those boys. If she was spotted...It would be bad. Like, she'd be put to death kind of bad.

Not something she should be risking just for a full belly.

Ziza didn't think she'd been spotted, but she was careful to cover her tracks as she returned to her lair. It was close to the humans for a reason. One more layer of defense as few merfolk would dare come this close to where humans liked to swim and play.

She'd already nearly been discovered half a dozen times by divers exploring her little cave. She'd managed to elude them, but it was becoming more and more difficult to believe she had to.

Her parents lectured her about her interest in humans constantly. They told her that it wasn't safe and even begged her to stay away. She didn't listen. And next time they visited she was going to get a huge lecture for saving the kid.

It wasn't the first time she'd interfered with humans and she knew it wouldn't be the last. She was fascinated by them and drawn to them. Perhaps it was that she looked so much like them, that they never seemed to think twice about talking to her without seeming at all surprised by her existence. Well, except for her voice. That always gave them pause.