The Siren Queen

Chapter Six

Nerissa freely acknowledged that it was incredibly foolhardy, possibly even downright insane, for her, of all mermaids, with her subpar swimming ability, to embark on a perilous quest. Especially since she didn't have the foggiest notion as to how her and Stormer would actually go about rescuing Lord Zale, once they reached the Far North. For a split second, as they rode out of Pacifica and into the Wilderness, she entertained the idea of turning Stormer around, coming back home to the royal palace, and tearing up the note she left. She knew that her parents and MerLisa must be worried sick about her.

"We...must...go...north...find...Zale..." Stormer reiterated, as if he had read the Crown Princess of Pacifica's mind.

"That's right...". Nerissa endeavored to suppress her lingering doubts. She loved Zale, and couldn't imagine living without him. If being reunited with him was risky, that was a risk she had to be willing to take.

The hustle and bustle of the well-established merfolk kingdom of Pacifica was almost as dissimilar from the still yet murky waters of the Wilderness as the land was from the sea. Nerissa had gone exploring in the Wilderness with Lord Zale a few times, but this was her first time alone out there. She hadn't even been traveling for very long, and there was already not a single other mermaid or merman anywhere in sight, just coral, wild aquatic plants, and numerous species of Wild animals of various shapes, sizes, and colors, as far as Nerissa's blue-green eyes could see. At least I have Stormer with me..., she thought.

The Civilized marine animals in Pacifica, who spoke the same language as the merfolk and lived much as they did, were different from the Wild sea creatures who lived in the Wilderness. Wild animals could not speak, and Nerissa was well aware that many of them were vicious predators who would not think twice before eating her, and probably Stormer too, for breakfast. Giant seahorses like Stormer were descended from wild giant seahorses, but they had been domesticated by merfolk millennia ago.

Spotting a humungous Great White shark swimming toward them, Crown Princess Nerissa recalled learning in school that predators target the slow and injured, so it was vitally important to move with purpose around them. She quickly sprang off of Stormer's back, gathered what little strength she had, and swam as fast as she could, which in all honesty wasn't very fast, but she tried the best she could.

"Do not worry...". A telepathic message emerged in Nerissa's head, comparable in some ways to Stormer's, yet distinct somehow. "Mermaids taste most dreadful...And I am not too fond of the flavor of giant seahorses either!"

"I can...communicate with you, Mr. Shark...?" asked Nerissa, startled.

"Yes...as you are a mermaid princess, past the Age of Ascension, with a heart purer than a pearl...". There was an age-old Pacifican legend about an unusual mermaid princess "with a heart purer than a pearl" who developed the power to talk to Wild animals, but most merfolk didn't believe it was indeed true.

For the next couple of days, Nerissa alternated between riding Stormer and swimming beside him. At night, they slept uncomfortably in dim, cramped caves. Mere words couldn't express how much Nerissa missed her soft kelp mattress and sea sponge pillow back at the palace.

She also felt quite lonely, with no one to talk to except Stormer and the occasional friendly Wild sea creature as she passed by them. As a Princess, Nerissa was accustomed to being continuously surrounded by other merfolk and Civilized sea creatures, so this degree of isolation was like a tidal wave of shock to her system.

Stormer grazed on sea grass and algae, and she lived off of the SeaPro protein bars she had packed, as well as seaweed she gathered along the way. SeaPro bars were only intended to be a protein-rich, low-calorie snack for merfolk to eat between meals, so the Crown Princess of Pacifica was still pretty hungry after eating one. She strived to eat only the bare minimum she needed to survive, but she ran out of protein bars after three days.

Nerissa had no choice now but to forage for bivalves, as a source of protein. Most species of bivalves, such as cockles and mussels, were found in the shallow intertidal waters near the shoreline. She swam closer to the shore, and apprehensively dug in the sand for cockles, remembering what Lord Zale, the son of a successful oyster rancher, had told her about shellfish harvesting methods.

Even though bivalves were always said to be non-sentient organisms, Nerissa nevertheless wasn't thrilled with the concept of being directly responsible for taking a life. She did not ethically object to eating certain varieties of mollusks, but she had never killed one herself before. As she cracked open a cockle's shell and nibbled gingerly on it, Nerissa breathed a silent prayer to Amphitrite, the Goddess of the Sea, to honor the life of the poor bivalve.

"Don't eat me, you big, strange fish...!" a small, gray, Wild fish messaged her, when it saw her eating the shellfish.

"Mermaids never eat fish with tails and fins" Nerissa reassured the frightened little fish and gently petted it.