He Lies Within the Sea (eremika)

Chapter Fourteen

With a gasp, Mikasa opened her eyes. Darkness shrouded the area around her, but there was a dim glow to the sand beneath her. She breathed heavy as her eyes scanned the bright reddish color of her tail, the shimmering scales of a sunset. Heart thumping hard against her chest, she recalled what had happened- the empty look in that woman's eyes as she helped the dark tailed mermaids drag her away.

Blinking away the blurred edges around her eyes, she was sitting against the walls of the cell- or rather, leaning against them, partly floating in the water all around her. She could breath, and it was odd, but this was how things were. She needed to get used to it. Slapping her cheeks before a quick jerk of her head, Mikasa woke up to this world around her. She focused on the sand first, admiring the glow for a split second.

It was a pinkish color almost, like a salmon like color, and it illuminated the floor whereas everything was dark. The stone of the wall around her seemed oddly human- oddly like the bricks of a real prison or a real castle, depending where one was. Perhaps she was in both- the dungeons of a castle. Her throat tightened and her head thrummed. How long was she out? When had this all begun? How many hours? Days? Oh, please not weeks.

Her hands clenched beside her, tail twitching, and the aches in her body radiated through her bones. She bit down but shook her head, swimming forward until she was nearly hovering on the edge of her tail, her head close to hitting the rock above her. She grabbed the bars and pushed her head against them, trying to see out of the place. All she could see among the dark was the glow of the sand and a glowing torch of pink fire- probably not actual fire since this was the sea- right before what seemed to be a metal door. It was round and had a handle, not a doorknob.

"What the hell?" she muttered to herself, sighing. Her shoulders sagged, but within the core of her being, she felt a motivation to break out. She tried pulling on the bars, but a small spark fluttered through her arms, biting at her senses. She released them with the pain, furrowing at her palms.

It was odd, really, all that was happening. First, things were normal. Mikasa was an average girl living her life, but then she saw Eren jump into the sea, emerging as a mermaid. They started a friendship that was cut by the killing of a mermaid with a shimmering tail and Eren's return home. Now, it was only complicated by Mikasa finding out that she, too, was a mermaid, and now? Now she was imprisoned without knowing why.

Well, she had an idea. He called her an abomination, so it was clear the the King- apparently her grandfather- wasn't fond of the idea of her mother being with a human. It was the story that Eren told her long ago, and it made sense. He banished her-and now? Now Mikasa was an unwanted child in the home of her mother's childhood- in the home where her family isn't wanted by her own family. It was messed up, but she didn't care about the King or that white tailed mermaid or anything.

All she couldn't stop thinking of was Eren, bound with rope. Now that she was pulled away by the King, her heart pounded at the thought that the silver tailed mermaids would retaliate by hurting him because she didn't go with them. She didn't know what they wanted with her, though. Was it that odd power she had? The one that shoved the silver tailed mermaid away the first time? 

She didn't know, but she couldn't bother thinking about why and only about what she'd do. First, she had to wait for someone to show up, but before she could even think beyond that, someone did show up. It was a twist of luck that she wasn't sure was good or bad.

She decided it was bad when she saw the flowing locks of blonde hair fluttering around a woman's delicate face, her tail a shimmering white. Her eyes were curious, but the rest of her looked blank. Mikasa stiffened and backed up in the cell a bit, but she didn't break the stare she had with the mermaid after she emerged from the rounded door.