Back pressed against the wall of the giant shell, Erin lasted about two minutes of the much longer dive before that pretty pink wall began to shrink around her. Heels braced on the rim with seawater lapping at her toes, there was only light enough coming though its partially-translucent exterior that she could see very faintly in any direction except down. The opening below was just a mouth of nightmarish black ocean waiting to bite down on her foot and drag her in at any moment.
It wasn't long before total darkness blanketed the too-small space, leaving nothing but the muted rush of Coyrifan’s tail rhythmically beating the water and the vague sense of forward motion as her only indications that she wasn't floating in an empty void. She sank down to a crouch, clinging to the wall with one hand and clutching her chest with the other as she tried to control her breathing. It's fine, there's air, she repeated over and over. You're just imagining it. Everything's fine. Coy would never hurt me. He wouldn't let me drown.
Oh boy, was Koben going to get it good. If and when she made it back to land, her little fist would be enthusiastically introducing itself to his princely nose the moment he was in range.
The satisfying thought was likely the only thing that let her hold on long enough to survive the terrifying ride without going full-on fetal position.
At last, the primitive diving bell stilled—after a frightening rock back and forth as Coyrifan secured it to some sort of tether, of course. Already at maximum on the tension-meter, Erin was almost sick at the quiet splish of the merling coming up through the opening. It was so impossibly dark that she was unable to be certain what, exactly, had come up until he spoke.
“Almost there,” he said, his soft voice almost a shout in the dead silence. “We’ll need to swim a short way, but the pressure should be safe enough for you here.”
“I’m g—gonna need a moment,” Erin said, half-gagging on the words. With no further ado, she groped around, found Coyrifan’s shoulder, and made her way down his arm to grip his hand in both of hers.
“You shorelings have such poor constitution,” the merling murmured, sounding genuinely surprised.
Erin ignored that, too busy focusing as hard as she could on the warm presence and familiar scent of thyme that lingered close by. “Please tell me there’s light where we’re going. I can’t keep doing this dark underwater thing.”
“And poor darksight, as well,” he said as the girl blindly felt for his other hand. After a few moments’ useless effort, he obligingly placed it right in hers. “Yes, there will be ample light.”
“Good,” she groaned, pressing her forehead onto the cluster of hands she’d gathered. “I’m just gonna keep my eyes shut until we get there.”
When she was ready, Erin slipped into the chilling water with Coyrifan, who put his arm around her and swam quickly through what turned out to be a network of underwater tunnels. They came up in a cave pool filled with plants that glowed bright enough to let the girl lock desperate eyes on the merling, but would be utter garbage for reading or other similarly visual activities.
It wasn’t until he cleared his throat in a very human-like way that Erin realized he was still holding her very close. She was still staring right at him, also very close. She followed his meaningful nod to the ledge he’d brought her to, then turned back to find him suddenly eye to eye with her. The moment a puckish smile slipped across his face, she abruptly broke away to hoist herself up and out of the water.
That sudden twinge of panic moved her to frantically looking around the dim cave until her eyes fell on a lantern sitting against a wall. She went for it, hearing a splash and then scuffing sounds behind her as Coy also got out of the water.
She was pleased to see that the lantern had plenty of fuel in it, and that next to it lay a portable fire starter that resembled a brass tube of lipstick which could be squeezed to create a spark. Erin lit that sucker right up, a primal comfort warming her insides as the tiny flame took, then grew enough to properly light her surroundings.
Holding the lantern high, she looked over to where Coy was flicking excess water from his tail and wiping rivulets of water from his arms and chest. “I can take my land form much more easily if I am dry first,” he said by way of explanation, then patted the floor beside him. Erin set the lamp there, then sat down, feeling about a hundred times better now that the warm light filled the cave.
As the merling concentrated on carefully wringing out his tail fins, Erin did her best to think about anything except the trip through the darkness that she’d just taken. Maybe it was because her world was suddenly contained within a single ball of golden lamplight, but there wasn’t much else she could think of at the moment except Coyrifan himself.
“So… do you bring girls down here with that shell often?” Yeah, that was definitely cringe. A little too late to edit, though.
The merling’s face went warm with humor. “It’s only been used for that once, as of today.” He gathered up another section of fins and drew them through his hands, lightly squeezing out more water as he went. “Mostly, I use it to safely transport useful items from your submerged dwellings during Flood, such as that lamp. I also sit and practice holding the manling shape from time to time, but it’s easier and more effective to use sky jellies or just walk about on land.”
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
“What’s a sky jelly?”
“I have a feeling you’d be particularly averse to it, though it would allow you to breathe underwater for a short while.”
Erin imagined a round, glassy jellyfish with an air bubble inside of it, clinging around her head like a slimy helmet. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure you’re right about that.” So it wasn’t automatic. They actually had to train in order to shapeshift. “How long can you stay that way, then? With legs, I mean.”
Coyrifan’s next order of business was to groom his damp flaxen hair, brushing it back and scrubbing it with his fingertips. “Most of us are limited to about an hour. I hold the record in my tribe, of course. I once made almost three, but the chief called off the competition early because he was hungry.”
“I believe it,” Erin said, more about Coy’s ability than the obvious truth of the chief’s fun-crushing ways. For a stomach-churning moment, she slipped into wondering how close to Chief Ferrifan’s territory they were just then. If they were very close, or even within it, did it mean that Erin would see him in the flesh?
It was a welcome distraction when Coyrifan held his breath and began to shift in a matter of a few seconds, the curves of his tail sharpening and dividing down the center to form legs. Bizarrely—and thankfully—the same blue shirt and brown slacks that he’d worn before modestly appeared as a part of the transformation. Erin wondered how that was possible, but wasn’t about to make things awkward by asking about it.
When the transformation was complete, Coy rolled onto his hip and leaned over the ledge, grabbing something out of the water. He immediately put it into his pocket when he saw Erin looking, a no-good smirk sliding across his mouth.
She squinted at him. “You’re not planning to ask me to hold out my hand and then drop a crab in it, are you?”
That won her another grin. “Nothing of the sort, I assure you.” Getting to his feet, he then picked up the lantern and beckoned Erin to come with him into an adjoining tunnel.
“Now where are we going?” she queried, not exactly thrilled at the prospect of traversing more dank, dark tunnels.
“I have to make sure no one accidentally happens upon you if they found this cave. We are quite near the Howliths, so the area is traveled regularly, and by several tribes besides my own.”
“That’s comforting,” Erin deadpanned, but followed him.
Unlike the caves at the surface where they had first met Coyrifan and Imyra, this network of tunnels was much more complex, as was the path the merling took Erin on. At each tunnel’s entrance were a series of markings scratched in the stone. They meant absolutely nothing to the girl, but Coy only needed to glance at them to know exactly where to go next.
At one point, Coyrifan paused, pointing at a symbol that resembled a circle with wavy lines radiating off of it. “This is the symbol for ‘out.’”
Out, huh? That could be useful. Erin leaned in and looked at it closely to make sure she wouldn’t mistake any similar markings for the same. “It looks like a sun.”
“Exactly. Should you ever need to flee back to the first cave, just choose every tunnel marked with that symbol.”
She didn’t like thinking about what might happen to make her need to flee, so she just nodded.
They went on, eventually reaching a small, cozy room that was fully lit by Coyrifan’s single lantern. It looked somewhat lived in, if a little dusty. There was an assortment of man-made things lying around in vaguely organized piles. Sheep fleeces and books were the two main things Erin noticed, along with other random things such as the odd metal pot, a few paintings of landscapes and one of a dog, and various junk items.
“You read?” Erin asked, nodding toward the books.
The merling shook his fair head. “I cannot, but I still find the etchings in some of them telling enough to imagine what kind of story might be written there. Those are my favorites.”
“I guess you guys can’t really use paper underwater, huh? Do you have any other way to write things down besides scratching symbols on the walls?”
“No need. Our histories are all passed down verbally.”
Erin nodded, looking around again. “So... what happens now? This was all kind of sudden, I have no idea what’s actually going on.” And she was trying not to let that fact freak her out, now that she was thinking about it. And how deep under the ocean were they, just then?
“My apologies, Erin. We were allowed no time to prepare, so Koben and I had to act immediately.”
Erin looked at him, trying to control her face. “Am I staying here very long? What do I do about clothes and food? There’s a pot in here, but no wood for fuel. You can’t cook safely in a cave, anyway, not without proper ventilation. I am not eating raw fish, even for you.”
“That will be taken care of,” Coyrifan promised, trying to calm her down with gentle waves of his palms. “I’m to meet Koben in the morning to collect some supplies for you.”
“Good,” she said with a pout, crossing her arms. It was all she could do to refrain from stomping her foot as well.
It was kind of a dumb and childish thing to do when she thought about it, but Coyrifan just seemed amused, tilting his head just so. “Right. I’ll leave you be to prepare your hollow to your liking, then.”
“Oh no you don’t,” Erin spat as he turned to go. He’d barely taken a step before she had a hold of his arm. “You are not leaving me here alone.”
She tried to hold the stern look, but when Coyrifan looked at her, all soft and warm and welcoming, she felt her stupid eyes widen in a pleading stare, completely against her will.
“It’s just… look, I’m scared silly, okay? This is not my native environment, if you hadn’t noticed.”
“I see,” the merling said.
Erin had the distinct, sinking feeling that he was about to say something droll and then leave anyway. He waited just long enough to make her sweat, then went to the pile of fleeces, divided it in two, and gestured for her to come and take her half.
As the girl set about laying out a satisfactory bed for herself, Coyrifan tossed his fleeces by the pile of books, flopped down upon them, and picked out something to read. Or not read, she supposed, since he’d said he only looked at the pictures. Whim struck her, and she went over and opened a book for herself.
The letters she saw on those pages were off by a fairly significant degree, but—in a manner similar to recognizing latin-based words in other languages back home on Earth—Erin found she could sort of guess some of the words. Maybe even enough to figure out most of the story. “I think I can make this work,” she said, a grin forming on her lips.
“Make what work?” Coy asked.
Instead of answering, Erin sat down beside him, snatched the book out of his hand, and started to read it aloud.