Summary: Plans are being set in motion and the Moon is one more night from rising
Zac stood on the pier that the Ocean Cafe sat on watching out over the sea. Just waves and buoys, David loading his tinny with Sirena's help. A nice and normal scene. Nothing life threatening, nothing dangerous. It was nice.
He'd spent the morning with Evie chilling together at his bungalow. They had a lot to talk about but both him and Evie agreed to have today for them before any serious discussion. The Full Moon was coming up and there was a chance he could lose his Powers. No Powers, no lying. Everything could go back to just him and Evie, Cam, Carly and David being a normal group of normal people with normal teenage problems.
It felt so good just being Zac again. Zac and Evie against their normal teenage world. Homework and looming exams were the worst things facing them. He was in a nice bubble of normality, still riding it out. He'd got juice in a to-go cup and had a catch up with David and Carly to keep it all going.
"Hi Zac."
His bubble burst. The rainbow view shattered as Lyla came up beside him. Then he inwardly hit himself. What a horrible thing to say. Lyla was just trying to help, she'd been there for him with everything with the Moon Ring and Trident and had always believed in him. It wasn't her fault that in that moment she was a reminder of everything he'd spent all morning forgetting existed.
"Hey," Zac gave her a quick smile before looking back out to the Sea.
"Everything okay? You weren't here this morning. I came by."
"I was at home," Zac answered, he quickly tacked on an extra, "spending some time with Evie." He was still with Evie, he loved Evie, he wanted Evie. Evie, not Lyla. Evie.
"Ah."
"Mum was baking so we just had a chill you know, nothing major, nothing magic. All good. All fun. All good."
Lyla just nodded and Zac focused his view out on the sea as his cheeks flushed. That was some stupid rambling that just came out his mouth, like really stupid.
"Magic is my whole life," Lyla said, "I can't imagine not having it or enjoying not having it."
"Well I mean you guys are still hoping to get rid of mine right? That's what it's all about isn't it? You get rid of my Powers and everything goes back to how it was?"
"It was the plan first, but no one knows how to…"
Zac thought about it. Waves brushing his feet and his toes remaining as toes. His legs not merging into one powerful limb and slicing the water with ease. The wash of the Moon's light across his skin being nothing. For something he never imagined was ever possible, the thought of losing it was indescribable. It felt like him. He and his tail were one and the same. Speeding through the Ocean was a rush of freedom like nothing he'd ever experienced before. He couldn't imagine never feeling that again. Mako felt like his home but then it really was Lyla's home, and Sirena's, and Nixie's. They were born there and forced to leave because of him.
"If I lose my tail, your Pod comes back?" Zac asked. The Mermaid's would have their family back, their home. He'd be back to just being Zac.
"That's the thinking. They only left out of fear of a Merman. No Merman, no worry."
"And the Moon Pool will take my Powers?"
"We don't know but it's all we have. It's also the safest place for working through the Moon Spell and that will keep you safe from the Trident."
"You really think so?"
"I believe in you Zac, you can do this," Lyla placed her hand on top of his on the Cafe's railing. "Why don't you come with me? I can show you the Moon Pool so you know what to expect for the Full Moon."
"Right now?"
Lyla took his hand into her's, "come on."
Zac looked about for anyone else on the pier watching them. He let Lyla take his hand and lead him behind the cafe and down to the waves lapping the dock below. They dove in together as one, a perfect reflection of each other, Lyla's orange tail moving effortlessly beside his. The soft fluttering in his stomach immediately turned to churning guilt.
He loved Evie, yet here he was with Lyla. He eased his hand out of her's and focused on his own swimming. Evie had dealt with nothing but lies and hiding from him and here he was out with the very girl giving Evie the need to have all these doubts.
Zac shook it off and focused on the water, the way his fin sliced through the current, the fish darting past, the ambling turtles and even the odd reef shark passing by. Their black tips stood out like signposts as he navigated the reef.
Lyla reached over and tapped his arm before pointing off to their right. A large humpback whale was making its way out to the deeper waters. Zac had never been so close to one before. The whale called out to them as it continued its swim, vanishing into the blue in a matter of seconds.
Nixie surfaced in the Moon Pool, ready to just sit and think over Cam's proposal. Instead she was greeted with Zac and Lyla. Zac caused all of this and here was Lyla taking him into their most important place. Mako was their home, not his. He had no right to be here.
"How could you?" Nixie spun on the spot and ducked down, one strong flick of her fin and she was torpedoing out of the short tunnel and onto the open reef. She aimed straight for Rita's house, it was the safest way to get to the beach and find out what on tides Cam had planned.
Zac needed to be stopped and no one else was going to do anything about it. If no one would then it was going to have to be her. Again. How did she end up being the one cleaning up everyone else's messes?
Nixie surfaced in the grotto pool. Rita was there, tail stretched out in front of her as she was brushing her hair. She was intently combing out a particular section of her hair with a thin bone carved comb.
It took Nixie coming to rest on the ledge before the older Mermaid even noticed her.
"Nixie, what's wrong?"
"Nothing's wrong. I'm perfectly fine."
"Your face tells me otherwise and I can literally feel the anger coming off you. What happened?"
"Lyla took Zac to the Moon Pool without asking us. It's our home! It's our place! And she took him there. After everything he's done she just happily leads him into the Moon Pool. Now next Full Moon when he gets the Trident he'll know exactly how to get there!"
Nixie let the stream of anger flow from her, her mind not even registering many of the words that came out. Rita just sat there and let her rant even as the waves of the pool were whipped into a frenzy and a chilled wind blew.
"Nixie, I need you to listen to me. I need you to follow my voice and listen."
Rita's words sounded distant. Like her ears were plugged up with sea slime.
"Breathe in for me and I need you to breathe in for a count of four okay? Breathe in. One, two, three, four."
Nixie took a small shaky breath in, trying to keep to Rita's counting. The Mermaid's voice was soft with an almost sing-song lilt to it. Her tone was steady as she kept speaking.
"Now hold it for four. One, two, three, four. And breathe out for four. One, two, three, four. Then hold for four. One, two, three, four."
She was trying, her heart counted each beat for her the blood echoing in her ears.
"In, two, three, four. Hold, two, three, four. Out, two, three, four. Hold, two, three, four."
Her breathing eased. Her heart was slowing with each cycle of breathing.
"Just keep following my voice Nixie. In, two, three, four. Hold, two, three, four."
Nixie kept listening, kept following and the anger slowly fizzed out as the waves and the wind eased and settled too. She hadn't realised she was capable of that, her Powers doing that without her control.
"Come over here Nixie."
Half awake Nixie slipped into the water and crossed the short distance to collapse into Rita. Then the tears came. Why was she crying? She didn't cry, she was Nixie, yet still she sobbed into Rita. The other Mermaid held her, stroking her hair and humming a song that took Nixie right back to the Pod.
It was a song she used to hear some nights when the older Mermaids would watch them. There was the one she remembered most with dark hair, not quite as dark as her own, who used to tell them stories of distant oceans and knew songs no one else did. After their conversation in the grotto Nixie knew it was Rita but her mind wouldn't let her connect the hazy image of back then to the Rita she knew now.
The song Rita sang softly was one Nixie remembered from those sleepless nights after her mother left and she clung to any Mermaid who gave her affection. Rita had been one of those Mermaids and here she was now offering the same.
It was even the same song, she recognised it now. Nixie let her eyes close as the tears slowed. She felt small again, like a little hatchling once again clinging to any sort of a mother figure to fill the huge gap in her life.
One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four.
She counted her breathing as Rita had told her and let everything wash over her. She wasn't a hatchling anymore.
Nixie woke with a start of confusion. She was still half on Rita from the Mermaid comforting her.
"Sorry," Nixie apologised and lowered herself back down into the water. She hadn't meant to sleep. Or cry. Or get so angry in the first place.
"It's okay Nixie."
"I remember you used to sing that song before, what is it?"
"It's an old one from an Irish pod we used to visit, a lullaby really. I can't say I know every word I sing but I know it loosely translates to 'Song of the Sea.' *
"Thank you," Nixie glided back across the water and threw her arms around Rita. They needed Zac dealt with and she was going to do something about it. Rita returned Nixie's embrace and didn't let go until Nixie herself did.
"I'll be back later, I feel like a walk on the beach," Nixie pulled away from Rita.
"Have fun and look out for sea glass for me."
"You're as bad as Sirena!" Nixie ducked under the water and twisted the best she could in the small pool. Sirena loved gathering the small treasures and it seemed Rita did too. Nixie had already found the stash one, a little shelf filled with jars of small shells, pretty rocks and colourful sea glass.
Nixie shot out of the grotto and set her course for the beach. She'd planned on walking there but with her outburst and unexpected nap she had a good feeling she was late for Cam.
"Cam!" Nixie called out and subjected herself to what land people called "jogging" to catch up with him. By the time she'd swum down onto Miami Beach and changed herself back it must have been past the hour Cam had said as the land boy was making his way off the sands and back towards the city.
He stopped and waited for her on the wooden walkway with a very smug look, leaning back against the railings with his sun glasses up on his head. He knew he had her and Nixie stifled the urge to smack him. It would be funny to see his face change.
"Thought you weren't interested," Cam remarked, "you never showed."
"I got held up, I was with Rita. Didn't want to make her suspicious about why I was rushing off."
Cam pursed his lips slightly and nodded, "you never told her anything?"
"Of course not. So, your plan?"
"Come on, we'll talk and walk," Cam pushed off the railing and headed up the walkway without so much as waiting for Nixie. This land boy held all the power and it was making the anger bubble again.
"I've thought about this a lot. We'll go tomorrow. I get scuba gear from Evie, you open the door with your magic ring and then I dive in and get the Trident. In and out before anyone notices what's happened. Then the Full Moon rises and Zac has no idea where it is. You can take it and hide it somewhere by the time he gets to it the Moon is over."
She didn't want to admit it but it sounded like a plan, a real plan that stood a chance of stopping Zac, for this Full Moon at least. With Rita back to normal maybe she would have found something to strip him of his Powers and then no more problems.
"You really think it will work?" Nixie questioned. It seemed like a good plan, there could be holes but it was a good plan.
"Do you really have any better option?"
"I walk away and leave you plotting yourself. You can't do anything about Zac without me and my 'magic ring' so quit acting like the biggest shark in the sea," Nixie turned and left Cam standing there. Where had that come from?
Today was a mess. She needed to see Sirena and just be in her Sirena-ness and be able to just breathe.
Except Sirena would be with David and Lyla was off with Zac and that just left Nixie. Alone. Alone. Alone. Alone.
It echoed and echoed even as Nixie took a seat in the cafe and ordered her drink that Carly insisted she pay for right away. Alone. The drink sprayed over her accompanied with laughs and sniggers but no offers to help, even as she ran to the cool room and fell to the hard ground.
The cool room door opened before Nixie could react accompanied with Carly's voice.
"Carly! Dave's calling for you!"
Cam. The land boy with confusing motives who she had not so long ago discussed secret plans with.
"Nice tail," Cam's voice was directed straight to her. Nixie could feel his eyes scanning her tail.
"Were you expecting a propeller?"
"I'll cover you."
I'm back with another chapter and will most likely disappear into nothingness for another undetermined amount of time
Thank you for reading and I'll try and remain present