Chapter 10 Coral and Sand #2
The motions of her limbs were slow and stilted, nothing like what she’d been used to when swimming in her selkie form.
A twitch of her tail had been enough to propel her forward then, and she used to relish in the way her muscles stretched as she swam, how she could race the strongest currents without a care.
Her body could slip through water as sleek and fast as a storm drake cutting through air during a hunt.
But now the water pressed cold and heavy against her skin, hindering her rather than pushing her forward, and her muscles ached with the effort it took to keep moving.
Before the bottom of the sea floor even came into sight, Calla was hating every moment of this.
She used to be strong. She used to be fast. Swimming had used to feel so natural she’d always feared she wouldn’t be able to return to the surface if she lingered too long beneath the waters.
Was this what the wish had done to her? Crippled her?
And it hadn’t even been worth it. Because now she was too selkie for the lands, and too human for the waters.
And she would never belong to either.
The resentment of it gnawed beneath her ribs, even as she knew that Riley had tried to help. Without Riley paying the price she had, Calla would’ve become trapped in these cold, bottomless depths before long. No crew, no ship, no infuriating first mates with no regard for their own life.
Calla wondered what Sable would think of her if she saw her now. Perhaps she did get a glimpse, and that was why she’d fled. Her lips twisted in a bitter smile at the thought. Sable would never. Of all her faults, being a coward was not one of them.
She’d barely even flinched when Riley flung Calla’s skin at everyone’s feet.
It made her chest ache all the more at her absence.
Calla could’ve had more than she’d ever wanted, if only she’d known to reach for it.
It was with that thought that she finally reached the bottom of the sea, and Calla searched around for rock, or anything a coral might cling to as it grew.
There was something just off to the side, a dark silhouette, still as death.
At least her sight had stayed as sharp as before, penetrating through the darkness with ease.
She swam towards the object until it grew larger, towering over her, and the silhouette sharpened into the broken bones of a shipwreck.
Algae twisted and swirled into the cracked wood.
Its hull was broken, opening up like an eerie doorway. Inside, darkness.
And just where the hull met the ocean floor, something white shone softly. White coral. Growing off the wreck’s hull.
Cautiously, Calla looked around. The place was quiet, but not bare.
Fish smaller than the span of her hand fed at where the rotting wood gave way to new life, and they flinched away as she approached.
Their eyes glinted from the shadows as they watched her movements cautiously, until they became content she was not here to hunt them and drifted back to their source of food.
As Calla reached to break a piece of the coral, her nose picked up a scent, and her head snapped in its direction. She frowned. Inhaled deeper. The scent was almost nostalgic in its familiarity, though she could not place it.
Then it grew stronger, and Calla stilled, drawing out her dagger. It was a predator’s smell.
She couldn’t help but drink it in, almost greedily. Something about it felt soothing, like a part of herself she was missing. She did a closer study of the shipwreck.
And there it was. Movement. Coming from the hull’s broken entrance. A shadow whizzed out of it, faster than Calla could react, and stopped in front of her.
If her webbed fingers hadn’t been gripping her dagger’s hilt so tightly, she would’ve dropped it.
Because, before her, floated a selkie.
The selkie looked at Calla head-on and blinked.
Calla blinked, too. She wasn’t sure her mouth wasn’t gaping in shock.
She’d never seen another selkie before. Not even her own mother.
She couldn’t have, since they’d never gone into the waters together.
Her mother had only taken her to the waters when land sickness struck, and never went in herself.
She had categorically forbidden her from even approaching the shore under any other circumstances, and by the time Calla had broken that rule, she’d been too dead to care.
Breaking from her shock faster than Calla did, the selkie dipped her head, and there was something both curious and pacifying in that gesture.
Calla’s grip on her dagger did not lessen, but she let her arm fall by her side.
All her muscles tightened with tension as the selkie swam in a slow, studying circle around her with lazy flaps of her tail.
Calla’s skin prickled with unease. She was not as she should be.
She should be like this, like her–thick, smooth hide, round and built for swimming, with muscles answering her at the twitch of a thought, the sharp canines of a predator to hunt and defend herself with.
Calla had none of that anymore. She wasn’t–
What are you?
Calla’s breath hitched. She stared at the creature before her in growing horror.
The thought had been similar to when the Heart had spoken to her in her own voice, trying–and succeeding–to manipulate the darkest of her thoughts to the surface.
Digging so deeply into Calla’s head that she hadn’t even been able to tell her thoughts hadn’t been her own.
Taking root like a weed, trying to drive Calla out of her own mind.
But this wasn’t like that. This voice had sounded clear and startling and nothing like her own.
The selkie tilted her head at the silence that stretched between them.
You don’t look like me, but you feel like me.
Calla opened her mouth to speak, but she could not. Not underwater. Clearly this was the selkie, though. Speaking to her in her own mind. Calla had never known that was something she could do.
Another thing, lost.
The selkie’s face became pensive, and she drifted closer. Not close enough to touch, but close enough for Calla to count the mottled darkness of its silver hide.
Nod if you can hear me.
Calla swallowed. She nodded once, slowly, never taking her eyes off the selkie. Her heart was racing. Her own skin felt too tight. Wrong.
The selkie’s lips twitched in faint amusement.
This didn’t feel real. A sudden impulse to claw her way out of her own skin, out of her own head, hit Calla in the ribs.
It was one thing to battle the memory of what it felt like to be whole underwater, but now that she was confronted with everything she would never have again, this was too much.
She drew away, as if she might escape this, but something tethered her to this moment.
When would she ever see one of her own kind again?
Are you even trying to speak back to me? It’s not that hard, you know? The seal pups can do it.
Calla’s thoughts halted. She… had not, had she? She’d been too busy spiralling.
Licking her lips, Calla tried to speak again. Not with her voice this time, but with her thoughts. It came out stilted, and she felt foolish.
Hello?
The selkie did a little twirl in place, fins flapping in joy. It soured the already curdled feeling in Calla’s chest.
Yes, like that. The selkie tilted her head again. So, what happened to you?
So much for pleasantries, Calla said, pressing her lips together.
Pleasantries? The selkie asked, confused. What are those?
Calla frowned. People usually engage in small-talk before asking questions such as those.
The selkie looked even more confused. Why do we care what people do? We are not people. A sudden calm settled on her features. Oh. I have offended you.
Calla’s mouth ran dry. She did feel offended. The selkie might not consider herself people, but Calla did. She was people. What else could she be now?
Something of it must’ve shown on her face, because the selkie drifted further away, and Calla’s heart lurched in her chest. What was she doing? This was the first time she’d met someone like her–what she used to be. Who cared about pleasantries?
I will go now. My pack is waiting.
Wait! Calla pleaded, just stopping herself from reaching out. But something had shuttered in the selkie’s expression, and she knew that whatever chance she’d had, she’d squandered it. Packs? Selkies lived in packs? There were so many things she did not know. So many questions. There are others?
The selkie paused her retreat, just long enough to sniff in Calla’s direction. Her face rippled into a growl. As clear a rejection as any. Calla felt it sore in her chest.
Human mates? You should’ve known better than to walk the lands.
No wonder they did this to you. Yes, there are others, and you are not welcome.
They’ll tear you apart with that stink on you if you come close.
Do you even know what humans do to the likes of us?
The selkie looked at her intensely, and for a moment, Calla thought she was awaiting a reply, but then she noticed what was happening around them.
The coral was drying out, crumbling onto the sea floor like sand.
The small fish feeding on the wreck flopped belly up, dead.
Life drained out of everything nearby right before her eyes, and all Calla could do was stare in horror.
That’s what they’d do to us if they could. You are a fool.
And then she was gone.
Her words echoed in Calla’s head as she floated there, numb with shock. The selkie had killed everything like it was nothing. Just to prove a point. Just to reject her, before Calla could string more than two words together.
A quiet, grieving thought pushed at the edge of her awareness.
I was born on the land.
She’d never had a choice. She’d never stood a chance.
Eventually, Calla shook herself out of her stupor and headed back towards the surface. Just as she reached it, another thought broke through her awareness, quiet and muddled.
Mates?
What had she meant, mates?
It didn’t matter. Calla had gotten what she’d come for.
With the piece of white coral in her pocket, Calla climbed back up on deck.
The pirates waiting around jumped to their feet as they saw her approaching.
Gadrielle’s mouth twisted in distaste at the sight of Calla’s clothes, dripping all over the wooden deck, but she said nothing, and Calla reached for the coral inside her pocket.
Her fingers came out gripping wet sand. She stared at her fist for one long moment, not comprehending, and then her stomach twisted, her skin growing cold all over. The selkie. Calla hadn’t thought–
She hadn’t thought.
“Calla?” Riley asked, coming to stand before her. The other pirates kept at a distance from the pain that must’ve been showing on her face, but not Riley.
Calla didn’t meet her gaze. She barely stopped herself from snapping. This, at least, wasn’t Riley’s fault. “We will figure out something else,” she said, her voice sounding hollow to her own ears, and then she strode away.
“Wait, Calla–”
But Calla did not wait.
She had failed. It was all she seemed to do lately, and the last thing she needed was witnesses.