The mermaid pack had chased them into the deep waters.
Kylo suddenly remembered why he hated their kind. Now, seeing them here in their true from, he was reminded that they truly were ferocious things. Beasts made of sinew and claws and teeth so sharp their could easily sever a regular human's bones right in half if one should be so unlucky to be caught out in the waters when they were close.
Good thing Kylo and his men weren't regular humans.
He and two of his Knights held their own again the pack of the four monsters. The beasts kept trying to capsize their ship, but the powers of the Force kept them back. It was hardly a fair fight from the start with even the sea churning high over the bow and threatening to end finish the task on its own.
And still, Kylo and his Knights prevailed as they always did. One of the monsters, probably the leader of the pack, had gotten too bold and stuck its head out of the water to try and drag Kylo down to the depths with his teeth. His head hadn't remained attached to its shoulders for long.
The three remaining merfolk had retreated then, churning up the waters even further in their fury. One of Kylo's Knights, Aemon who carried with him both the Force of magic and a natural affinity for manipulating the weather, had calmed the waves enough for them to steer their vessel back to shore and secure it against the upcoming storm.
"They're getting bolder," Taleisin, his other Knight, commented. "They never used to come this close. Never would attack us for simply being out there unless we were trying to steal their hunt from them."
Kylo simply grunts in answer. Years ago the merfolk had been more of an issue, but as of recent they had mostly retreated to the far depths of the ocean. Something unknown must have happened to stir the old conflict up again.
"There's been a change," Aemon agrees, following the same line of logic Kylo had chased himself. "To do with that netting you found, perhaps? On it's own such a thing wouldn't be unusual but with the timing you observed-"
"We will keep all facets in mind," Kylo interrupts, "but no use in wasting ourselves to speculation. Let's all remain focused, observant, and ever vigilant. Now go and tell the other Knights what's happened. We've slain one of the worst ones, but now the rest of them will be out for revenge."
He dismisses him men quickly, not wanting to give any time for the adrenaline of the moment to fade and possibly reveal the underlying secret that had been nagging at Kylo's mind.
His Knights are nothing if not well-trained, and they take their leader cue and leave to complete their new order.
Kylo frowns at the ocean and the deeper clouds looming above it. On a different day he would normally stay out longer to keep watch for any foolish fishermen who wanted to try their luck and risk their life. Today, however, they were on their own. Kylo has a very different obligation waiting for him at the watchtower.
A mystery he needed to solve. A situation he needed to have done and dealt with.
Best get on with it then.
By the time Kylo had trudged back to the watchtower, he was soaked through and his leather clothes squeaked with every step. In short he was more than ready to shut the whole world out and recover from the day's struggles alone.
Pity that he wasn't.
He felt the girl's presence before he saw her. It was a rather odd feeling, manifesting itself as something deeper in his mind than a normal human or his Knights. Stranger still was that he could hear it at all now, but the sound lead him straight to her nonetheless.
She- the girl, the mermaid, the aberration- was still in his tower. That was the good news. All the rest was very bad though, because somehow she had both reopened many of her wounds and had gotten out of her room.
Kylo finds her about twenty steps up from the bottom of the spiral staircase to the lighthouse room where he'd locked her. And he had absolutely made sure that he'd locked her, but when he looks up high above her started, wide-eyed face, he can see the honey colored afternoon light spilling in from the open door.
"How the bloody hell did you even do that?!"
He stomps forward, not expecting any answer and only feeling his heart rate spike when he takes in the fresh bruises and once-more bloody gashes that cover the girl's poor limbs.
His target hisses in response, but it's very much a defensive noise. She scuffles back away from him, crawling backwards up the steps on arms that are shaking so badly her whole body trembles. The lower half of her body is both propelled and held back by her legs which move spastically and buckle underneath her more often than not.
Kylo takes the steps three at a time- they were always on the short side for his stride anyhow- and seizes the girl under her arms before she sends herself plummeting down the steps.
She bites him. Hard. Hard enough that Kylo can see the short muscles in her jaw tightening with the movement as she tries to sink her teeth through the flesh of his wrist.
He snorts and heaves her up off her feet.
"Try that again when I'm not wearing gloves, m'Lady. You might find it to be a more effective defense."
M'Lady is an odd choice of word and it sits strangely on Kylo's mind, but the only other option had been 'beastie' which seems rather inappropriate given the fleshy, naked human display he's currently hauling back up the steps.
The girl-creature growls, apparently figuring out her only folly, and again begins the trashing in his grip. Kylo had expected that, though her attempts to kick him in the stomach and more sensitive areas wear on his nerves by the time he reaches the top landing.
"I see your legs are developing in nicely," he comments as he kicks the door open fully ajar.
Inside the room is in a predictable state of being tossed and turned, and Kylo immediately discovers the culprit to her escape. He had left a metal picture frame up there with some of his painting and calligraphy supplies. The conceited part of his mind had once thought perhaps he might paint a picture worth framing, but now this creature had broken it for him before he could make use of it. In fact, half of it is still wedged in the doorjamb, having been used to pry the drawbar up so she could get out.
"Clever little beast."
The bench that had been her bed had of course been overturned, so Kylo sets mermaid down on the floor with perhaps a bit more downward force than truly necessary.
He had expected her to immediately make a run, or crawling limp more accurately, for the exit. Or maybe to try and hide herself in a corner of the sparsely furnished room like a cat hiding from its owner.
Instead, the girl wastes no time. Unworkable legs or not, she lunges herself at him the moment her bare backside hits the wooden planks of the floor.
She tackles Kylo's legs, knocking him off balance and together they tumble down. She scrabbles at him, hissing and growling as her hands try to claw out his eyes. Lucky for Kylo her human nails are far from suited for the task, and he quickly manages to subdue her wrists before he takes more than a few scratches along his forehead that he'll have to explain to his men.
"I fell and got tangled in a particularly nasty piece of seaweed. That's what I'll tell them."
Kylo tries to roll the girl under him, but to her credit she's far stronger than her frail limbs would lead to belief. Her growls take on a more panicked undertone as he tries and mostly succeeds in overpowering her. They fumble about, rolling and kicking and jerking their way from one side of the lightroom to the other as the feral beast struggles to either flee from him or kill him or both.
Then one of her uncoordinated knees catches him right between the legs and it's Kylo's turn to howl.
For a second the girl's eyes widen, abrupt fear and surprise shooting across her face. Then she struggles harder still, bucking him off her as she twists onto her stomach and starts to crawl towards the open door.
"Enough!" Kylo shouts.
He grabs her by the ankle, dragging her back and sinking his other hand into her messy tangle of brown hair. Then he sits on her, pinning her torso in place with his bodyweight.
He knows it's going to be hard for her to breathe like this. That's exactly the point. Between his weight and the hand in her hair pulling her head back it's as effective a restraint as if he'd pulled the scruff of an unruly kitten's neck.
A minute of rapidly weakening struggles goes by. Maybe less, but it feels like forever until the mermaid finally falls slack underneath him, her eyes starting to roll back in her head and her arms falling limply to the sides.
The slight blue tinge to her lips confirms that she really can't breathe properly, but Kylo gives her a few more moment to calm down before he pushes himself off.
"There."
He crouches beside her, just far enough to be out of the range of her teeth but still close to easily subdue if there's to be another round.
"Have you made your point, yet? You're angry with me. I understand that. It's understandable."
Slowly, the girl recoils from under him. She scoots backwards, drawing her legs up to her torso like a spider curling around itself. Kylo clears his throat and looks away before standing up. Mermaid without a tail or not, her pose was decidedly indelicate.
He takes a few steps back. She eyes him warily, bringing them to a draw. Incrementally her shoulders start to relax as she apparently decides that he's not about to do whatever it was she thought he was trying to do to her.
Then she huffs and leans her back against the wall behind her. She rubs her wrists with her palms, and Kylo frowns when he sees the reddish blue bruises there. He must have aggravated her injury when they were wrestling.
He's trying to kill me.
Kylo had been glaring out of one of the many windows rather than look at her, but as soon as the thought shines crystal clear into his mind he spins around again to gape at the girl.
She'd said that into his head. Or at least she'd thought it loud and clear enough that he could hear it himself. The words were not words per se, but rather instinctive the meaning behind them.
"You can understand me?"
He steps closer and the girl cringes. Something sweeps along Kylo's mind, pulling away from it. Something that he hadn't even realized was there until it was gone.
For a brief moment, she'd been in his head and he hadn't even realized it.
Merfolk were magical creature by nature, that was what made them both so feared and hunted. Never had Kylo even come close to sensing one that could wield their energy in the way this girl had just done.
I'm not going to hurt you.
He tries to push it into the girl's mind, following the same pathways that he'd used to put her to sleep before.
No answer, but Kylo could almost swear that he saw her flinch.
Maybe she can sense the lie of it, then? Because only a few hours at best had gone by since he'd planned on dispatching her life with his own blade.
What are you?
He tries to press the question just like the other, but this time he encounters the same void of nothingness that he had first experienced from her. Not a lack of sentience or life, but rather a lack of anything at all.
"Back to square one, then."
Kylo turns from to the girl to straighten up the room while he waits to see if she'll attack him again. She doesn't. When he finishes correcting her bed, he's staring at a one of her feet and poking at a new cut on it with the same fingernails she had recently tried to maim him with.
Kylo opens his mouth, then sighs and closes it.
"You wouldn't listen to me, anyhow. Are you hungry? I'm absolutely starving after dealing with your own retched kind."
No response. A pout on the girl's human lips, and then a furrowing of her brow as she regards her now blood-specked fingertips. At this rate Kylo won't have to worry about finishing the girl off, she's well on the way to that herself.
This time when he leaves, he padlocks the door behind him and hopes that that will be enough to keep the mermaid inside until he can figure out what in the hells to do with her.
author's note:
As always, find me on tumblr at lost-inthesunlight and on twitter at Ava_Avdal : )
Comment replies:
Czokolate - I'm glad you're enjoying this story so far! Thanks for commenting again on ch2! : )