"The Evening Star was last seen departing from Winterton two weeks ago. Even under the most unfavorable winds it should have reached us by now."
Kylo nods, taking in this new piece of information. A ship as big as the Evening Star disappearing with no explanation? They were no longer at war with the Winterton Hold. The weather was still favorable for travel and the waters should have been peaceful.
Which left only one plausible conclusion, but the ramifications if it were true, it would be greatly problematic.
"We have no proof it's the merfolk," Kylo finally answers. "The ship could have failed from a leak. She could have struck a rock. The fact that the only… only remains that have been discovered show to have been eaten could have easily happened after the fact."
The Knights look to one another, each of them waiting for the other to speak up an contradict their leader. Predictably it's Ria who finally does so.
"Sir, the villagers are terrified. What happened to the fishermen this morning has only cemented their worst fears. They are starting to turn on us, I'm afraid. They feel we haven't been doing enough."
Displeasure twists in Kylo's chest. Taleisin who had been in the midst of force healing the rest of the mermaid's bite wound starts to pull away until Kylo waves him to continue. All of his Knights feared their leader's temper, and even Kylo has to admit that his patience for this tightly wrought situation is reaching it's breaking point.
"Tomorrow then," he says, standing a pulling on his shirt. "Tomorrow we will go hunting. We will divide ourselves into two groups. I will lead the first and you, Aemon, will lead the second. We'll row out into the edge of the deep waters and be ready for anything. What happened to me today," he gestures at his now bandaged shoulder, "will not be allowed to happen again. We keep care for each other. If one of us should start to be affected by their tricks, the rest of us will be ready. We'll bring back to the villagers a prize on a spike. As many as we can."
Kylo can sense the differing opinions of his Knights. Five of them were here, Aemon, Taleisin, Ria, and the twin archers. Seven more were stationed at the other side of the island, though they would frequently travel to and from each place as need required.
"One of us should stay with you here," Taleisin says. "If the effects of the mermaid's influence haven't worn off fully yet-"
"I am fine. I wish to be alone tonight."
He throws a stronger edge of severity into his tone. Taleisin doesn't back down, though, and Kylo can sense his other Knights readying themselves to be united in argument.
It's Ria that speaks next.
"Sir," she says, "we found you half naked stumbling about the fog and calling out for an imaginary lady. You've been tricked by a merfolk, something that should not have been possible, and you've been bitten. I understand that your pride-"
"Ria, you outstep your place. All of you do. I have recovered, my mind is my own, and I will rest. Tomorrow we have a very difficult day ahead of us. We will find the cause of what has been happening, what has happened to me, but tonight I wish to be alone to think in peace."
It had been… humiliating. That was the best word for it. He had been so distracted with trying to find the girl that he hadn't even felt his men come close to him. Close enough that they found him tearing apart the old workshop shed searching under every corner and inside every barrel for the wayward girl. The door to it had been opened but, if she ad been there, she had come and gone and disappeared into the fog.
Perhaps forever.
Kylo had done the only thing he could think of, which was lie to his own Knights and embellish the story of the mermaid's attack to explain his behavior.
"Is that your final request, Sir?" Taliesin asks, breaking the silence that had fallen.
"It is," he answers. "Now leave. Tell the others and try to reach them before nightfall but turn back if you'll be caught out. Strange dealings are afoot and we cannot take anymore risks."
The Knights leave him then, but Kylo can feel their growing suspicion linger in the air long after their departure.
It's evening and Kylo has done everything he could not to think about the girl.
He shouldn't at all. She was a abnormality. A random passerby in the narrative of his life.
Except that she was unique and he had sworn to help her. He had done on the first day when he thought she was dead and nothing since then had changed his vow. He had promised to find out what had happened to her and solve the mystery of her unique existence.
Maybe it would be best if she had gone back to where she had come from. Turned back into a mermaid and returned to her own kind. He couldn't offer her a life here, not when he knew that his own men could and would strike her down if they ever knew the truth of her existence.
Still… he leaves the door unlocked. Kylo never did that. He had too many enemies to sleep like that, trusting on the goodwill of others. Truth be told he would have liked to leave the door open because what if she doesn't know how to use it? Were doorknobs too foreign for her? Why is he even thinking of such concerns?
The light in the tower is next and that one's even worse. The light could be seen for miles on a clear night, and tonight wasn't clear. If she was looking for it… she might not see it. If she'd wandered she might find herself lost, alone out in the dark night with no where to go and no proper clothes to keep the chill out.
When he ascends tot he top of the tower to light the lamp, Kylo finds what the girl had been doing before. She had gotten into the ink of his calligraphy set and she had been painting.
Murals brushed on with fingertips now decorate the walls. Swirling shapes reminiscent of the sea. A figure. A human figure, outlined in strong bold strokes. And then a strangely familiar face rendered under an erratic, critical eye.
She had drawn him. It was a jagged and dreamlike representation, but Kylo could recognize himself easily.
"She even got the bump on the nose right," he muses, his shoulders slumping.
At least, if she were not to come back, he would have something to remember her by.
The night was a stormy one.
Strong winds lashed at the shutters, and Kylo could hear the crashing surf against the rocky shore just a few hundred paces away.
No girl. If she was out there, she was probably freezing. Kylo can't help but picture her, huddled under a rock somewhere, lips turning blue and teeth chattering as hypothermia starts to set in.
"You should have stayed. You should have bloody well stayed. I have a fire. I would have cooked for you. You would have been safe."
More than once during the afternoon Kylo had braved the growing rains to go out again and look for her. This time he was very careful, but his men had stayed true to their word and gone about their orders.
No trace of the girl, though. If it hadn't been raining she might have left footprints, but now any sign of where she had gone had been long swept away under the muck. Every time he had called out 'M'Lady!' to a distant rock or bent over trees he had felt more and more like a madman.
And now the hour was approaching midnight. Not a moment of sleep was to be found. He should have been resting, but the winds had set his mind on edge. They had an oddly hollow, mournful sound to them, almost as if the storm itself was trying to tell him a message.
He listened. Listened for a hint of whatever the Force was trying to tell him. There was nothing. Just more howling from the storm interspersed with an occasional crackling from the fire or the turning of the page of a book he was reading without reading.
And then he hears it. A knock. Not a knocking on a door, but an heavier thump followed by a creak.
It's right at his front door and Kylo is on his feet in an instant, saber in his hand if need be. After the last days he has faced any manner of event could be about to happen.
The girl was there, hunched over, crawling on all fours, and absolutely covered in blood.
"Gods!"
Kylo grabs for his cowl to throw over her but stops when he catches a glimpse at the feral and enraged glint to her eyes. He stops mid-step, watching helplessly as she crawls toward him, a trail of blood following her path. No, she's not on all fours, she on three with one of her arms hidden out of sight, pressed against her stomach like she was holding her insides in place.
There was so much blood. Even with the rain the girl was a horror to behold. Kylo stares at her helplessly, his mind racing over how much he might be able to cure her himself or will he have to take her to the village somehow? Would she even survive the trip there?
She grunts then, still crawling forward, and Kylo takes a step back. If she's turned again- if she's changed-
"What in the gods has happened to you?" he whispers.
Her dress is shredded, nearly torn off her and hanging on by just one shoulder strap. Even in the dim light from behind him Kylo can see all the cuts and gashes that mar her skin.
In her hands is a sickle, a rusted farmer's tool from the shed he'd been at earlier. The girl keeps crawling toward him then, her other hand still tucked close to her stomach.
When she gets to his feet her hand raises up then, offering to him what she had been hiding out of sight.
It's a head. The severed head of the mermaid that bit him.
That's where the blood had come from, at least most of it. Kylo stares speechlessly. The girl finally looks up at him, her bounty extended in offering and a smile on her blood-smeared face.
He had thought that he had killed that mermaid in the water, but apparently he hadn't. Or apparently just killing her hadn't been good enough.
Apparently his girl had swam down to the bottom of the ocean to finish the job herself.
Author's note:
Aw, Rey brought her host a gift, isn't that sweet of her? ;)