The Mer Prince

Chapter 33

New Character's POV

If I closed my eyes and drifted, I could imagine I was safe again, in the cold and quiet. In my young innocence. My hands could brush against the seaweed and all I would feel is the dancing feeling of the plant tickling my skin. This faint feeling always reminded me of my brother with his glowing brown and gold hair, sharp smile, and when he chased me though the kelp with the exotic feather from the surface he brought and used to tickle me.

I remembered that and the anger his parents had for him playing around with a discarded runt. "You have twenty siblings to play with!" They would scold. "Let that seven-legged runt die and come home."

Yet my brother never did go home, or play with his siblings. He didn't like his siblings as much as he liked me, or at least that's what he told me. The strongest had to stay with the weakest, in his view. He taught me so many things and even found me a cleft, a place safe from harm to live in. Eventually though, all good things seemed to come to an end for me.

I open my eyes to see the blue above me. Not the dreamy dark blue I enjoyed when I was so young and naive. Just the blaring pale color through clear water, and the sun baking through the ripples with no clouds to grant mercy. I turned over, finishing my reminiscing for the day, when there was a large splash at the other end of the tank- and then something shot past me.

No, someone!

My face was almost hit by a gold-fish fluke, certainly larger than any said-fish offered to me. It was a mer, and I shot after them, stopping as they hid in my garden. Hiding from me?

No, I reasoned, pushing to the top of the water and looking out to my one and only true enemy- the human, Washington. He stood and looked concerned and was yelling, for his merperson subject in a tank with me, frightened as he should be. I was an octi, a meat eater and violent creature with eight tentacles and a passion for life as my parents had taught my family to be!

I lowered back down and slowly snuck to where the mer was, seeing him laid on the bottom of the kelp bed and his eyes to the top of the water. I lifted my tentacles for an attack when I suddenly realized there was no reason to. The mer was stressed and going a little pale. He was pale when he came in, but now it seemed to really kick in. He looked like he would die without my help.

Another prisoner in the human's schemes, I realize.

I lowered a tentacle over his eyes and closed them lightly, before taking him in my arms and rocketing to the crevice that they had given to me in respect for my own privacy. He didn't seem to stir, which was concerning enough. With three tentacles and both hands, I felt over him for his pulse. He was still hanging in there.

The question arose to how he got in here, especially at an already weakened state. I looked out and around for the answer to find a bag of salt was being poured into my yard.

This has honestly been one of the oddest ways my day has ever started. I reason to myself.

I went ahead and left the merman on my bed, though his tail hung off. Despite the orange tail, I could bet it was a man with the flat chest and short hair, unless this mer told me otherwise. In any case I still don't care what the gender is, they need to not-die now. I haven't had proper company, besides these human shits, for almost two decades. On the slim chance he did survive, I'll attempt hospitality instead of hostility.

Swimming out of my home, I was doused with salt. I could stand a lot of salt or the removal of salt, but I thought this month they had been testing lowering the salinity around me. I didn't care for the experiments, and being doused with the white-solid pissed me off.

I swam up and looked around at the frantic workers. "PISS OFF!" I shouted, watching them run back every time I neared the edges. I had a 'nasty habit' of trying to drown all of them on more than one occasion. I had told them they had a nasty habit of being too damn close to my home.

Washington and I's gazes met. I narrowed my eyes and glared. "Give us back the mermaid!" He called.

"Go fuck a squid! They're my merm now!" I yelled back, before going back down and going quickly to check if he was okay. It seemed he was coming around, and the sea salt seemed to be helping his condition get better.

Out of curiosity, I moved my face close to his as he opened his eyes.

His eyes squeezed closed, before opening slowly.

I frowned.

Those were human eyes.