Eddie was falling through darkness.

The sudden drop made her let go of the demon’s arm and she flailed, screaming in terror. She couldn’t see Nero, or the room they had left behind.

She couldn’t see anything at all.

A heavier blackness rose to meet her as she plunged downwards and Eddie only had enough time to shut her eyes before hitting the surface with enough force to travel beneath it.

Cold water pressed into her from all sides.

She gasped in surprise at the sudden sensation and seawater flooded into her mouth. The salt burned at her throat and nose as she coughed it out. Unable to breathe, a new panic set in and she thrashed around with her arms in the darkness, completely disorientated and looking for the surface. She kicked out her legs but with nowhere to aim she didn’t know if she was heading upwards or deeper into the sea. Her lungs burned, screaming at her for air.

Her vision dimmed and she silently cursed at herself for being so single minded in her desperation that she jumped feet first into a new world, and now she was paying for it with her life. Nero had told her it was dangerous, but she hadn’t considered what that might mean. She hadn’t wanted to. Oh, she really should have listened.

At the edge of her consciousness she could feel her power rising to meet her, begging to be used, to be commanded. But, her mind was too hazy to focus on anything.

At last, she thought she saw a lighter patch above her and moved towards it. Even though her body felt like it was made of lead, instinct kept her kicking, pounding at the water with her screaming muscles as numbness steeped into her bones and into her thoughts.

After several excruciating moments, Eddie broke the surface. Spluttering and choking, she took in deep lungfuls of air. The pain in her limbs and the chillness of the water told her she was alive still. She’d survived the fall.

Alive, and floating in a dark ocean lit only by the soft glow of the moon. She wiped the seawater from her eyes and looked around, at last she saw with relief that Nero had made it too, he was not far off and also treading water. She hadn’t lost her guide then. Even though he’d been nothing but unpleasant to her, she felt comforted that they were in this together.

Unlike Eddie, Nero looked completely unphased. He waited patiently for her to catch her breath, watching her from a distance.

Eddie had calmed down from her initial panic and was floating gently up and down as slow waves rolled past. The longer she floated there, her eyes adjusted to the night and she could see the inky black sea stretching all the way out to the horizon. Above them, the sky was strewn with stars. She had never seen so many, she’d lived in towns and cities all her life where light pollution made it impossible to see more than Orion and The Plow, but here in the darkness of the sea the sky seemed alive with twinkling lights. If it weren’t for her current circumstances, she’d find this view spectacular.

Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

Once she was breathing normally, Nero broke the silence. “Do you still want to do this?”

He’d swum behind her as she collected her thoughts and she turned to follow his voice. She saw to huge relief they weren’t stranded in open ocean as she had feared, but were in fact not far from shore. Just a short swim away a beach was lit up with flaming bonfires and figures stood around chatting, dancing and laughing, oblivious to her earlier terror.

Nero watched her take it all in, waiting for an answer. She tried to sound braver than she felt.

“Of course I do. Did you think a bit of cold water would scare me off? If there’s one thing you need to know, it’s that I’m stubborn and I don’t give up easily.”

“That’s two things.”

“The point is I’m going to find Daisy tonight, as we agreed. Then I’ll give you your spell and we can each go on our merry ways and never see or talk to each other again.”

He snorted and shook his head, then began swimming towards the shore.

“This way witch. Keep up.”

Despite the short distance to cover, Eddie was exhausted by the time she crawled out of the sea. The effects of her earlier adrenaline rush made her muscles ache like she’d run a marathon. Wet sand clung to her palms and knees. She felt it slide down her shins and into her sodden boots as she stood on shaky legs, panting. At least it was warmer on land.

She watched Nero as he combed his hair back from his face, unbothered by their recent hundred foot drop into the cold sea. Eddie narrowed her eyes.

“Why did you ask me if I still wanted to do this?”

He considered her for a moment. “You seemed pretty shaken and I thought you might have changed your mind about this whole expedition.”

She crossed her arms. “You thought, or you hoped?”

He blinked at her, his face a mask of innocence. Then he carried on, ”I can take you back any time you want, you know. Of course, I’ll still need you to hold up your end of the bargain…”

Eddie staggered towards Nero an shoved him hard.

“You arsehole, you planned that didn’t you! You opened the portal over the sea to scare me off!”

His lips twitched, failing to hide his smirk. “I did say this would be dangerous.”

“What’s wrong with you? I could have died!”

He brushed the wet sand left from her handprints off of his jacket. “I had to be sure you weren’t a threat to my people. You say you’ve only just started learning magic but to be able to perform those spells, you’d have to be an incredibly powerful witch. I needed to be certain that whatever this is, you’re not hiding any nefarious intentions.”

“Explain. How. Throwing. Me. In. The. Sea. Helped. You. Figure. That. Out.” She ground out.

For a split second he looked guilty, then his face returned to its usual hard mask. His jaw ticked as he thought. Finally, he sighed, sounding resigned. “This bay is protected by a seamonster. She hunts by sensing thoughts and will drag any enemy of the Demon Realm to the bottom of the ocean. Has done, on many an occasion. If you meant any harm here, she would have taken you too.”

A tense silence followed his confession.

“You’re out of your mind. Don’t follow me.”

Eddie turned on her heel and took off up the beach, trying to put as much distance between her and Nero as she could in wet cowboy boots. She’d been honest with him from the start about what she wanted and he’d intentionally tried to get her killed. She wasn’t scared anymore, she was angry. He could rot for all she cared. She’d find Daisy on her own, she didn’t need him.