AN: Uploading old stuff
...
She pulled on the oars, her muscles screaming in protest, the sweat on her brow beading and rolling down her face. Her breath came in painful gasps, the sea air attacking her tongue and throat with every determined drag of air into her lungs. The clouds overhead gathered dark and heavy overhead, but she would not be deterred – she would not stop. She gritted her teeth and pulled on, the oars pushing the ocean back to propel her forward, towards her trap. She glanced behind her and adjusted her strides, eyeing the group of rocks that were only visible during low tide and aiming towards them. The shore beyond was growing farther away, the smoke from the fire she had set rose into the sky to be lost in the grey storm gathering, and her heart raced in fear barely contained by the power of her will alone.
Catching a Ningyo will bring storms and misfortune.
She wasn't so far from the shore; any storm that was summoned would push her back in, not take her out farther – she could make it back, even if she didn't know how to swim.
A ningyo washed up onto the shore is an omen for war or calamity – but which calls the other is unknown.
The ningyo wouldn't wash up on shore – it would be taken on shore in her boat – but even if what she did counted, they were already at war. If it caused calamity she'd be miles away by the time it struck. Miles away and alive and forever young, unable to be hurt or to die until she was too old to care anymore. She would eat its flesh and run away from the village she had escaped, run away from her prefecture, her emperor, this land.
Those who eat the pleasant-tasting flesh of a ningyo will attain remarkable longevity.
The nose of her boat hit the rocks behind her and she released her oars, trusting they would stay in their lock, and fought to remain calm, taking deep, even breaths, staring back at the shore and preparing herself for what she was about to do. What she needed to do.
Ningyos look half-human, half-fish, and have a monkey's mouth with small teeth like a fish, shining golden scales, and a quiet voice like a skylark or a flute.
It's not human, she thought to herself, It's ningyo, not human. She shuddered, still panting, her hands in fists on her legs, her eyes focusing on the back of the boat, not the waves, not the shore, and not the rope tied to the rock beside her that disappeared beneath the dark water. It's not human. … and men are out there, wiping out clans. They'll find me and kill me to make sure I don't come back, no matter what I say. I have to run. Her deep blue eyes shifted nervously to the water beside her, beneath where the rope disappeared.And having the powers of the ningyo would guarantee I can survive.
Thunder crashed overhead, jolting her into action, the sound too similar to the houses cracking beneath the fires. She grabbed the blade and put it on the seat across from her, ready to use to end its life, and then leaned over the side, first her right, then her left hand grabbing the rope. She pulled, the boat moving in response to sit above the spot as she hauled her catch upward, her heart being faster as she realized that she had caught something, and that it could be the answer to her need. She reached farther into the water and heaved mightily, pulling as the nose of her boat crashed into the rock again, keeping almost steady as she saw a flash of something golden in the water beneath her. Thunder crashed again, loud and frightening, a warning to let things be, to free the ningyo and leave, but she couldn't – she was too afraid to leave without it, and fear of what had been overpowered what could be. Hand over hand the rope pulled the load closer, the golden scales of what must have been the tail shimmering as though through seaweed. Finally the top of her net crested the water, and she gripped the netting between her fingers and threw her weight backwards, hauling her catch into the boat with her eyes closed. As the weight of the slippery mass hit the interior of her boat, the waves rocking everything back and forth violently, she grabbed the hilt of her blade and struggled to free her legs from the mass, her chest hurting with the stress on her heart, every nerve of hers twitching with anticipation and fear as she scrambled and kicked herself free.
The noise that it made was terrifying at first, quiet and light but obviously startled and frightened; the sounds tugged at her emotions but she couldn't let it go. It flailed as she finally freed herself from beneath it, huddling in the back of the boat, the blade in one hand, her eyes trying to find a place to strike to kill it – but as she looked for a vital spot she recognized so many similarities that the breath caught in her throat repeatedly, her chest heaving as she sobbed. Ningyo or not, it was half-human – what she had thought was seaweed was instead long hair, the color of the sea. As it cried out in fear it pushed parted the hair from its face so it could see, and it was not the monkey-mouth on a fishy-face she had been expecting, but instead a face so beautiful and so human that it nearly broke her heart with how perfect it was, and the sea-green eyes that looked at her in fear panic struck her to her soul. It was human. It had feelings.
Her hand shook so terribly she dropped the knife, and in her failure to save even herself, she wrapped her arms about her chest, curled up pain, and gave in. "I'm sorry!" she screamed, "I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" she cried over and over, her words for the ningyo, for her family, for everyone she had left behind. Tears would not come, the dry sobs that wracked her body serving only to further her guilt rather than alleviate it. Frustrated at her inability to succeed even in crying, she stretched herself back out again, grabbed the knife one more time, and reached for the net holding the beautiful pale woman with the golden fish tail, and slashed through the rope, strand by strand, to create a hole. Sobs still escaping her, she tossed the knife into the back of her boat and reached beneath the sea creature and rolled her off the side, back to where she belonged, and then fell prone into the bottom of her boat as the rain began to fall.
What would she do now?
What could she do now?
She didn't want to die, and she could not kill to save herself. She was a coward. She might as well follow the ningyo back into the sea and drown –
The boat rocked alarmingly and her eyes burst open, her hands and legs pushing against either side of the boat to steady herself as fear swelled again – she couldn't swim, if her boat capsized she would drown – she didn't want to die!
Water dripped into the boat from above, heavier than the rain, and she looked up to see the beautiful ningyo looking down at her, her arms crossed on the side of the boat to support herself. "You have freed me; what are your wishes?"
Wishes?! "I don't want to eat you anymore, Ningyo! Go back to the depths and be free," she muttered, looking away.
"I am no 'ningyo'," she said calmly, her voice melodic as a flute, "I am Ceasg, maiden of the sea. You have freed me, so I will grant you three wishes. What do you wish for, daughter of the shore?"
She wasn't even a ningyo. If she had gone through with it she would have killed her and eaten her for nothing. She was a failure. "I only wish to be free of the war on the shore," she said, her voice empty. Something warm and wet touched her cheek and she started from the suddenness of the gesture, looking up to see the Caesg looking down at her, her eyes mesmerizing. The hand that caressed her cheek had webbed fingers, but was otherwise like hers, and the touch was so comforting and gentle and so like everything she craved, as the creature removed it, she sat up to follow it. Soon they were staring at each other over the tipping boat, and the hand moved back to her cheek, and then the other to the other side of her face as the boat tipped even farther over, her weight leaning farther over the side, mesmerized by the beautiful eyes of the Caesg, their faces getting closer together… At the critical moment, just as the boat finally gave in and started to flip, the caesg brought the young woman's face to her own and kissed her lips as she dragged her beneath the waves.
And so her first wish was fulfilled.
…..
A year later, two caesg swam side by side through the depths; one had long hair the color of the sea and a tail of deepest gold, the other's hair was short and blonde with a tail of shining silver. As they moved through the seaweed surrounding an underwater mountain of dark rocks and over the wreckage of a small boat, the blonde took the hand of the golden-tailed sea-maiden in her own, and kept swimming.