Water enveloped the trio. Baetica’s ears burned as a shot of cold water rushed in before his flaps shut. He let go of Antalis and Vesicula and they spun to face him. Angry bubbles shot of their mouths.

“Antalis and Vesicula, you are both fools,” chided Baetica before either could get a word in edgewise. “What do you think you’re doing? Prince Setacea gave us specific instructions not to engage, and here I find you climbing up the side of the ship. What do you have to say for yourselves?” Bubbles created a white halo around him as he swished angrily through the sea.

“We didn’t engage them,” spat Vesicula. “We were just following along to make sure they didn’t do anything, when they threatened us.”

“And then,” continued Antalis as he took up the story, “Those beasts threatened to drop a net on us.” His red hair splayed out around his head like a startled school of fish as he jolted around through the water.

“A net, Baetica,” said Vesicula. “We hadn’t done anything.”

“Then you pull back out of reach.” Baetica crossed his arms over his chest. “If you two can’t—”

A harpoon sliced through the water and speared Vesicula near the tip of his tail. His agonized scream reverberated through the water until it was cut off as he broke the surface. Baetica raced after him, climbing spears out. Water streamed from his body as he climbed up the side of the ship and over the rail.

Vesicula was already on the deck underneath a net. His climbing spears were out and he was slashing at the trio attacking him. Two of the men were unknown to Baetica, but the blond he recognized.

Garrick looked over at him and sneered. “Back for more, Baetica?” Smoothly, he traipsed around Vesicula’s reach as he walked around the net.

“Let him go Garrick,” said Baetica. He schooled his voice to calm. That creature had the temperament of a barracuda—liable to attack for no reason, and definitely going to attack if given the smallest excuse. “I have no wish to fight with you.”

Garrick laughed.

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“But,” continued Baetica, narrowing his eyes, “he is coming with me even if I have to slice your throat.”

“Peace.” Garrick’s face contorted with a mix of disgust and rage as he spat on the deck. “I hate peace.” Drops of Vesicula’s blue-grey blood splattered on the deck as Garrick yanked his harpoon from Vesicula’s fin and charged Baetica.

As Baetica coiled his tail beneath him so he could launch Garrick into the sea, he heard the screams of his people and the thuds of their climbing spears pecking up the hull. His knuckles whitened around the shafts of his spears as he knocked the first blow of Garrick’s harpoon away.

Baetica swung his spear out and caught Garrick’s ankles, throwing him to the ground. He crawled forward to finish the monster off, but before he was able to drive his spear through Garrick’s chest, another human tumbled backwards over him. They rolled across the deck together until Baetica was able to throw him into the ship’s bulkhead. The man crumpled as his head cracked against the wood.

Baetica howled as Garrick’s harpoon pinned his tail to the ground. Ignoring the pain, he shot one of his climbing spears around and nicked Garrick’s arm. He smiled with satisfaction as the man yelled in pain and let go of the harpoon. Baetica gripped both spears in one hand and ripped the harpoon from his tail.

A horn called across the waters. Over the deck the merfolk disengaged with the humans and dove back into the sea. Baetica glanced towards the net and watched Vesicula crawl across the deck and pull himself over the rail. The net was still tangled on his fins. Growling, Baetica threw the harpoon at an approaching sailor and lunged over the rail.

“Coward!” Garrick’s cry was the last thing he heard before the roar of the ocean waves swept him beneath the surface.

Gadilidae met him beneath the waves and wrapped an arm around him. A thin stream of blue-grey blood wisped away from a cut jut below his left eye.

Mytilidae swam beside him as they moved deeper beneath the surface. A necklace of shark’s teeth outlined her throat and a belt of them encircled her waist. Without them, the shark’s teeth club she held in her hand would look out of place against her strikingly beautiful features. With them, she looked terrifying, and Baetica was glad she fought for them. She attached her club to her belt and wrapped her arm around Baetica’s waist, just above her husband’s, to help him swim.

“Vesicula?” he asked.

Mytilidae’s gaze stared straight ahead as they swam towards the sound of the horn that was now calling from deeper beneath the waves. “He will make it. Like you, his tail was wounded. But more than anything, his pride has been cut.”

A crowd of merfolk parted before them as they approached. Prince Setacea saw them and shook his head with disappointment as his gaze travelled over Gadilidae, Mytilidae, and Baetica. “When your wounds have been tended, we will have words in my palace Gadilidae.” He looked over the pod. “The rest of you, go home. On pain of death, I will not hear of any of you rushing the surface again.” The royal guards parted the crowd as Setacea turned to leave.