"Okay, but what if someone chopped off an arm, for instance?"

I asked this question of my father in the blue haze of early morning light that directly preceded the dawn as we descended the hills of Father's once-estate and back down to the docks to take our leave.

Father turned to look at me, an eyebrow raised. "What?!" he asked incredulously.

"If your body can heal itself, would you eventually grow that limb back?"

He squinted at my question, as though he couldn't believe that this was actually a conversation we were having. "I can't say that I've tried to find out, nor would I like to answer that question presently."

I considered this for a moment, then asked, "But…you really can't die? Certainly decapitation would do the trick? What about splitting one of you lot right down the middle? You would just be…fine? I rather doubt that."

Father widened his eyes and stopped walking, turning fully to me. "Alright, I'm beginning to be concerned that these are the questions you're asking me. Can we stop?" he said, though his voice revealed twinges of amusement.

I laughed as we continued our stride through the still-sleeping town. "Alright, yes, but you mean to tell me that in all your years as an immortal being, you never once encountered appendage loss?"

He considered this for a moment, then slowly recalled, "Not as an immortal, no. On the Isla Cruces, I—"

"OOH!" I squealed in excitement, causing him to immediately hush me as not to awaken anyone nearby. Quieter, I eagerly asked, "Is it true? The mill wheel fight between you and Will and Jack? Elizabeth told me about it but it can't be true…can it?"

He gave a small smile that started from the corner of his mouth. "It's true," he confirmed, slightly reveling in the pride of that memory. "Now do you want the answer to your unsettling queries or not?"

I nodded, allowing him to proceed, to which he said, "Post-wheel incident, I encountered one of the original Dutchman crew that freely carried his head in his hands. So I suppose it is still possible to go on despite decapitation, though no, I doubt a new head will regenerate."

I took a minute to take this information in, then after a moment, I reached into my makeshift carry sack that I had tied together from one of the old bedsheets in Father's room and procured my journal, scribbling, "Decapitation possible?" "Isla Cruces reveals evidence," and finally, "MILL FIGHT RUMORS TRUE!" When I looked up, I saw Father smiling down at me. When our eyes met, he turned to look back out towards our destination, then stop walking. I stopped as well and followed his disconcerted expression upon seeing some bizarre flailing and splashing circling the water immediately surrounding where the Dauntless was docked.

He unsheathed his sword, and ordered, jaw tight, "Stay here."

I silently obeyed, though I pulled my gun out from its holster on my side and held my finger anxiously over the trigger, ready to leap into action at a moment's notice. Father carefully maneuvered across the docks, stepping carefully as not to alarm whatever was writhing around our boat. He had his sword raised and pointed downwards as he grew steadily closer. I kept an eye on the mysterious creature, catching sight of a peach-colored tail. If that was a fish entangled in our anchor line, I had never seen anything that color that was that large as well. Something was amiss…

So attentive was I on this puzzling activity that I was unprepared when two handed grabbed me, one clutching my shoulder and the other wrapped around my mouth. I let out a whimper in alarm that went unheard by my father and froze when I felt the man who had caught me whisper in my ear from behind, "I am sorry about this, miss. Remain calm and I promise no harm will come to you."

Friends, when an unknown assailant tells you to remain calm is precisely the time when not to remain calm. So I instantly raised my arm, firing my gun straight into the air, which caused both my assailant to jump and release me, as well as caused my father to turn back. "FATHER!" I shouted, to which he came running my way. Before he could get very far, however, something flew from the spot where the creature had suddenly stopped splashing about. This was a sort of sticky webbing that launched from the water within seconds and latched itself onto his ankle. The force as the web began to retract back into the water was so great that he fell forward and was dragged across the dock towards the open ocean. I broke into a sprint to help him as soon as I saw this occur; If he touched the water, I knew I would never get him back from Jones.

However, as soon as I began running, I found myself careening to the ground myself as my legs were swept out from under me inexplicably. Turning around, I was sent reeling when my eyes traced the cane that had knocked me to the ground up to the hand of my assailant…the same, sandy-haired, unshaven man with black eyes who had been at the tavern on St. Martin with his female partner. He came forward to grab at me again, to which I sent a swift kick to his chest, causing him to recoil with an "oof!" As he was still towering above me, I took the opportunity to use his temporary disarmament to scramble my feet and point my gun square at his forehead. Seeing that he had been bested, he turned and began to flee… inexplicably straight towards the ocean. Despite moving rather quickly, he was still heavily reliant upon the use of the cane, so without a second thought, I fired, my bullet finding its intended target with ease as the cane shattered into a thousand wooden shards. My assailant tumbled to the ground and frantically began crawling with all his might closer towards the edge of the dock.

Father, who had successfully chopped through the web before touching the water and dodged two more launched attempts to drag him back, raced up alongside me as we together pursued the man who had tried to abduct me. We caught up to him by the time the top half of his body dangled precariously over the edge of the dock. Father raised his arm to swipe towards him when he rolled over to look up at us. Both Father and I recoiled at this, as all of a sudden the fellow's eyes were fully black and his mouth was open in a full hiss, sharp fangs procuring from either side of his front teeth. We leapt back, which allowed him to tumble into the ocean face first. Then something truly remarkable happened; His legs, the last thing we could spot of him, transformed into blue scales, his trousers and shoes tearing to shreds as his bones and skin fused together and formed a blue tail that splashed us as he fled.

Father and I exchanged a bewildered glance as we raised our weapons defensively once more and neared the edge of the dock. For a moment, he seemed to have been gone, the once turbulent waves soon returning to a relatively calm tide after the great disruption that had just surpassed. Just when I was about to open my mouth to ask Father, "Have they gone?" however, two webs shot out and each grabbed one of my forearms, then coiled to pull me straight into the ocean. I struggled, pulling against them with all of my might, and Father, ever quick on his feet, freed me with one swift chop from the blade his finely crafted sword.

This sent our attackers to the surface, two of them in total; sure enough, the very same couple from St. Martin, both of them with their webbed hands tensed and black, soulless eyes glimmering, ready to make their next move. Mermaids! Father and I charged them in defense however, him with his sword raised and me firing a deafening shot into the ocean between them. I turned the barrel towards the man, staring him down, while Father was parried against the woman. He flinched when she raised up and hissed again, but her male counterpart began to see that they were no match against our weapons.

"No!" he instructed her. "It's over!"

Her scale-covered chest rose heavily as she held her breath, reluctant to give up the fight.

"Syrena!" he yelled again. "Surrender!"

She finally minded him, gritting her fangs and relaxing her webbed claws into two flat palms raised over her head in surrender. He made the same move, looking between me and Father. "Let us go and we'll bother you no more," he assured us.

"We cannot! Not after all we've worked for!" she hissed back at him in the accent I now understood why I couldn't trace before.

Father's voice remained steady and unwavering as he calmly ordered, "Tell me why he sent you." A wave of panic rushed through me. Jones was back and had proven himself friendly to aggressive creatures from the depths before—he could have easily sent any number of creatures to take Father back to the depths.

The merman squinted up at us in confusion. "No one sent us," he replied.

"Anna, gun," Father ordered without breaking his gaze on the couple.

"What? Why?" I began to protest.

He cut me off by saying, "I don't want the blood of these monstrosities on your hands. Now, come. Turn it over."

Syrena hissed and began to back away as the merman pled, "Please, sir, we know not what you mean! We were not sent!"

"Anna, gun!" Father repeated emphatically. I obeyed, laying it in his outstretched palm as he cocked it. "If you tell me how you found me, you get to escape with your lives."

"Please, sir!" the man cried again, sending a blue-scaled arm in front of the one named Syrena to protect her. "We swear we've come only on our own account."

"WHY!" Father shouted through gritted teeth.

"We came for her!" Syrena shouted back, pointing to me.

I felt my blood run cold at this. Me? What was I wanted by a pair of mermaids? My mouth fell agape as I asked, "You have been following me this whole time, haven't you? You were in that tavern, but I saw you!" I said pointing to the man. "I saw you swimming alongside us before we got here!" Suddenly, something else hit me. "And you were there on that deserted island, weren't you? You both tried to drag me to the depths then too, didn't you?"

"No," the man insisted, his arms still raised in surrender. "We saved you! We've been protecting you this whole time!"

Father snorted. "Ah, so abduction and attempted murder is 'saving' now is it?"

Syrena pushed past the merman at this. "You said this girl was your daughter," she hissed, "And yet she has nearly died many times under your 'care!' We stopped the tavern brawl. We freed your boat from the shadow beasts and led you to the island!"

Father and I exchanged another glance. "…you…?" he stammered. "You stopped the force pulling our boat below?"

"Because you endanger the daughter of Calypso!"

I nearly had to sit down upon hearing this. How did these…things know who I was? I snatched my pistol back from Father as I pointed it between both of them. "Who are you? How do you know us and what do you want with me?"

The two of them shared a reluctant look, then she slightly nodded her head in resigned agreement. With her permission, he turned to me and looked at me earnestly with his charcoal eyes. "This is Syrena," he said motioning to her, "And I am Phillip. We're in grave danger, and only Calypso herself can help us.