The house is full of water, from floor to ceiling.
There's a dark creature trying to capture the two people trapped inside the walls.
There's one way to escape.
One way, and one escapee.
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"And are the stars aligned properly, Iju?"
"Of course, Empress."
"Then there's no need for a patrol tonight. I will go myself." The empress went to rise from her rocky throne, her tentacles swirling the silt that lie around the underwater cave. A cloud of soot enveloped the man's stricken face.
"You can't—my Lady—I insist you let me at least prepare an escort to the shoreline! The stars show signs of great danger, and you know the Legbearers—"
"Silence."
Iju frowned, casting an embarrassed stare at the ground as heat rose to his cold-blooded face. His eel-like tail flicked in the water.
"I thought you knew the ritual better than that, Iju. Your father certainly did," the empress said with a sly look. "The stars tell us it is time, and I will obey."
"O-of course, Empress."
"Prepare a grave for the morning then, Iju. Let them think I died. Tell them my daughter will ascend to the throne." The empress smiled distantly, the words feeling strange on her tongue. She didn't have a daughter.
"Yes, my Lady."
"I will go at sundown alone," said Empress Kifu. She paused for a moment. "And prepare a secure chamber for the new Empress. She will want to escape."
***
Kifu wasted no time traveling to the ocean shallows, her powerful, jellyfish-like lappets propelling her closer and closer to her foretold death-place. If the stars ordained it so, there was no point in trying to delay the inevitable. I have served long enough, she tried to convince herself as she swam up, up, up from the deep abyss where her empire rested peacefully.
But, as the wavering forms of stars started to shine through the glassy movements of the surface, a cold feeling seeped into her chest and pushed her heart into her throat. She didn't want to give it all up.
She wanted to keep what she had.
The shallows were warm despite the cold on the surface. Though storms raged above the water, muffled thunder crackling through the currents, it was calm under the tossed waves. A storm, Kifu thought hopefully. Perhaps there will be no host tonight.
Her body somehow steady in the churning ocean, Kifu raised her head above the water, her dark hair going limp at contact with the surface. It was dark and chaotic. What looked like tall seaweed was thrashing in the wind, black rocks stark against white sand. Wind lashed out at Kifu, leeching heat from her soaked face. Rain pelted down on her vulnerable, pale skin. No, she thought as she scanned the empty beach. Perhaps no hosts at all.
"Watch out!"
The wind howled.
"Beat you there!"
Kifu's head snapped to where the voices came from. They sounded close.
There. Two juveniles. Female. A perfect host, Kifu's hopes sank. Glancing up at the stars, which seemed to twinkle knowingly, she drew on her power as empress to get closer to the Legbearers. She could feel her bodily form shrinking, stretching, writhing—morphing. Cold-blooded scales replaced mammalian skin, covering her body and sprouting fins, a long tail, and gills. A thousand scents came hurtling towards Kifu, but she was focused on one: the stench of human.
Her beady eyes narrowed in her eel form, the predator swimming closer, the waves launching her faster, the scent-trail nearer, the legs wading further, the stars shining brighter—
Blood bloomed dark in saltwater as Kifu's jagged fins struck soft tissue. She held on tight to the leg like a constrictor, twisting round and round and tighter and tighter—she heard a distant cry. With a final thrust, drawing on her power, Kifu sent the soul of the empress spiraling into the wound like a disease, its dark tendrils climbing into the angry, raw flesh and disappearing with a sick squelch underwater. Kifu swam with renewed vigor towards the new Empress, starting to transform back into her form to try and drag the Legbearer to the Empire of the Deep before she died. She drew on her power one last time.
"Katie!" she heard from the surface, muted by the water.
Something has me!" came the frantic reply.
Before she could fully morph, Kifu felt a blow to her head as another juvenile attacked her from behind. The new Empress was escaping, fleeing in the water. No! she thought desperately as the Legbearer struck her unconscious.
The last thing she saw were the stars, quivering from underneath the ocean waves, seeming to laugh maniacally.
And when she awoke, the Legbearers called her 'Katie'.
