voyage

        Eric woke up to a knock on his door. He felt around the bed for Nherisa, who, yes, he let share his bed.

        She wasn't there.

        It was the middle of the night (or so he thought), who would be knocking on his door at the time? Could it be Nherisa playing a prank on him?

        Eric stood up on his feet and went downstairs to open the door. Standing in front of him were three men, dressed in the royal attire.

        "It is of royal protocol that I inform you about the royal family's departure for the haven of knowledge." Said the leader of the three. "They left at night to avoid drawing attention and we came at night for the same reason."

        "Thank you." Eric said, slamming the door in their face as politely and gently as he could. He walked to the kitchen to check if Nherisa was there.

        She wasn't.

        "Where could she have gone?" He asked himself.

       

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        'The regal II' set sail on the rixej river with Zephyra on the stern. She watched the little cottages bathing in the moonlight and imagined villagers sleeping inside them.

        Her mother's decision to leave under the moon was a wise one. They wouldn't want to alert anyone with their sudden departure. Apart, of course, from Eric.

        Zephyra imagined his sleep being interrupted by the sound of trumpets. She smiled as they left the island.

        Zephyra wiped her eyes. Was she hallucinating or did she just see a woman dive into the water? At this time of the night?

        She leaned further over the railing, trying to catch a glimpse of her. The woman was underwater for a long time. How could she bare such cold temperature or hold her breath for so long? Zephyra leaned further.

        "Be careful not to fall off, princess!" Shouted Bailewick running towards her.

        He was too late.

        Zephyra leaned further and fell overboard. Bailewick grabbed the end of a rope and jumped in after her.

        Zephyra splashed into the water.

        Before thinking about all the water that had entered into her nose, she looked around for the woman. She saw a shadowy figure swimming away from Fantascia. The first thing she noticed was that the woman was swimming at great speed with her webbed feet.

        Everything was visible to her. Why was everything visible to her? Before she could squeeze more out of the second she was inside the water, Bailewick had tied a rope around her and pulled her out.

        The next second, she was riding Bailewick live a pair of water skies.

        "Pull yourself up." He managed to say to her despite being riden like a water ski.

        Zephyra couldn't.

        "Pull yourself up, Zephyra!" Went Bailewick.

        How easy did he think it was with her princess arms?

        Frustrated, Bailewick held on to the rope himself. Pulling himself up a bit, he tied the rope around him and Zephyra. He pulled both of them up  to the deck.

        "Zephyra!" Cornelia exclaimed, standing by the door leading back into the stern castle.

        Standing up on her feet, Zephyra realised she was in a lot of trouble.

        "Zephyra go to your cabin." Cornelia said.

        "Mother..."

        "Now!" Cornelia said. "And you are not allowed to come out."

        Zephyra walked inside feeling sorry for herself.

        "You were supposed to be watching her." Cordelia said, walking away  too.

        Bailewick was not sorry though.

        He was glad.

        Glad that all those years he wasn't crazy.

        That all those years ago he had seen the truth and not a lie.

        For today she had seen it too.

       

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        Nherisa reached the old shipwreck for the seventeenth time in seventeen days. She checked inside. Cordelia wasn't there.

        She had searched everywhere she thought Cordelia could have hidden. She wasn't in any one of those places. Now either she was hiding in Encrea or she was in the hands of her enemies - dead or alive.

        Nherisa refused to believe she was dead. She had to be alive somewhere. It didn't matter where but she would find her. Even if it meant searching every building in Encrea while sea dwellers slept until she found her.

        But where would she start? Cordelia couldn't hide in any random place without being caught. She had to have been careful in choosing her refuge.

        It had to be somewhere no one in Encrea would want to go. Somewhere like the shipwreck she was sitting on.

        The shipwreck.

        She pushed forward and swam back towards Encrea. She didn't stop once to rest until she reached the eastern part of Encrea.

        She swam into the large shipwreck that stood crashed into a construction site already on top of thirteen storey buildings. She searched all the rooms which were surprisingly many.

        There was no sign of Cordelia.

        It was when Nherisa was about to start searching random buildings that the sun started to rise.

        She was late.

        She swam back up to the surface as quickly as she could, putting on her shoes before coming out of the water. She ran - not very fast as her feet were still adjusting - back to Eric's cottage.

        Hoping Eric wouldn't wake early and that her clothes would dry quickly, she opened the door to meet Eric anxiously waiting for her at his dining table.

        "Where did you go?" He asked as he turned around to look at her.

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        Bailewick walked into Zephyra's cabin.

        She was sitting on the floor beside her bed, looking out the window. Bailewick walked towards her. He placed his hand on her shoulder.

        "Come with me." He said. "I have to show you something."

        "But mother said not to go out." Zephyra said.

        "She said not to go out on the deck. Now come with me." Bailewick said and walked out of the room.

        "Wait for me." Zephyra said, running after him.

        They walked down the hall and went up five flights of stairs. To the fourth floor above the main deck. There were two doors on the left and right sides. The door to the left led to the crow's nest and the other door, Zephyra didn't even know what was behind.

        Bailewick walked over to it. He brought out a big bunch of keys from his pocket. After a few seconds of flipping, he finally found the right one. He opened the lock and pushed the door open.

        Zephyra walked into the room after him. She looked around at the tacky decor and the terrible arrangement of the room.

        "Is this your cabin?" She was forced to ask.

        "No." Bailewick said. "It is the place where your parents and I keep everything we find out about the sea dwellers, or at least the ones we could save from the shipwreck."

        "Sea dwellers?"

        "You saw it the other night, didn't you."

        "You mean the fish person."

        "They are called sea dwellers."

        Suddenly the room made sense to Zephyra. She looked around at the pieces of paper scattered around on the tables. The weird paintings on the wall depicting what the painter had seen of a sea dweller. The torn nets and broken harpoons.

        "For years, your parents have been trying to prove their existence." Bailewick said. "After the last incident, your mother called it off because she felt we were creating war between our two tribes.

        "They is a whole tribe of them?" Zephyra's child mind was officially overwhelmed. "And what incident?"

        "The last time your parents tried to capture a sea dweller, 'the regal' was sunk." Bailewick said. "And yes, there is a lot of them down there." He picked a piece of paper from a table and showed it to cordelia. "On their last try, your parents found out that they live in very tall towers underwater."

        "Those are taller and wider than our towers." Zephyra said.

        "This was your father's legacy, and now you have to continue it too." Bailewick said.

        "You mean capturing them, hurting them and possibly even killing them?" Zephyra felt offended.

        "No." Bailewick said. "Merely trying to prove their existence."

        "Without hurting them?"

        "Without hurting them." Bailewick said. "You start your training tomorrow. I have to leave before your parents find out I had created this room again."

        "Why can't they know?"

 

        "Your mother wants us to leave them alone, but I believe that it is better to make peace." Bailewick said, leading her outside. He turned to her after locking the door and said: "This is our little secret."

        Zephyra nodded and walked away.

 

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        "I was kidnapped and taken out to sea by pirates." Nherisa said off the tip of her tongue, sittingona chair besideEric.

        "You are lying, Nherisa." Eric said. "There are no pirates on our seas and even if there were, why would they kidnap you and how could they have done it without making any noise? Pirates did not pass through this village."

        Wow! Nherisa had always been taught that humans were savage beasts that killed any kind that was not theirs. She always imagined they would be so easy to fool.

        "The truth is....I miss my sister." Nherisa said. "The storm that caused that shipwreck is the reason why I could get so close to your land. But my sister," Nherisa was shedding tears. "I don't know where the storm took her. Every night I would go out to the coast, hoping that one of those nights, she would come to me."

        Eric looked at her tears. He felt partly sorry for her. And part of him felt bad that he wasn't able to fill the void her family left in her heart.

        "It's alright." Eric said. He moved husband chair closer to hers and rested her head on hus chest. "Don't worry, Nherisa, you are not alone, I am here with you."

        "I miss my sister, I miss my family." Nherisa cried.

        Eric felt sorry even more. Her family was lost forever. She eould never meet them again. But she had him, right?

        "How can you miss your family when I am here? Your family is anyone who loves you, Nherisa. I love you Nherisa. I am your family."

        Nherisa looked up. She never felt more loved even by her mother. Or so she thought sinse she didn't even remember her mother's love. Right then she was in need of love and didn't have anyone else to give it to her.

        But Eric couldn't give her motherly love. Even though she had grown to love him too, he couldn't love her as a sister.

        But he could give her romance. Perhaps that would help.

        She placed her hand on his lap, he ran his down her back.

        Nherisa gave total control to Eric.

       

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        Chains

        Cordelia opened her eyes to chains wrapped around her. She saw herself surrounded by nothingness, but bright light nothingness. The only other thing she could see was a blue essence in front of her.

       "Wake up Cordelia," It said. "Wake up and take what is rightly yours."

        "What are you?" Cordelia asked.

        "Your new consciousness, Cordelia."

       "How?"

        "You see, many years I have been tied down inside of you, watching you take childish steps and make foolish decisions when I could be ruling the world. But not anymore. Today I take over. Today I take control. I just have to wait for you to wake up."

        Cordelia looked around. She understood what it meant. It was childish and foolish to believe that the greatest power she ever had was a curse.

        It was hard to imagine that with two unique abilities, all she had managed to do instead of finding her mother's murderers was get herself banished. She couldn't even manage to beat up a few drealivs without dying.

        But she wasn't dead.

        It's all a dream, she told herself. I am not going to let my sub-consciousness take the better of me.

        "I am Cordelia: daughter of the sea." Cordelia said. "And letting you take over my thoughts would be the biggest mistake I would ever make. My body is my own and you have no right over it."

        With that the chains around Cordelia were cone ant they appeared on the strange spirit.

        Her eyes opened in reality.

        She was surrounded by darkness.

        Once again defeated. Too tired to stand up, she closed her eyes again and went back to sleep.

        Cordelia opened her eyes for the second time.

        This time, she could see everything clearly. She was inside a small room in a tall building. Her back ached from lying on rock for....

        How long exactly had she been lying in a stranger's house?

        With a sharp pain in the neck she sat up and began to recall. She remembered all that had happened.....when exactly? Who would have been kind enough to let her stay in their house? After the shipwreck everyone was expected to be terrified of her.

         In her deep thought she failed to notice an old orealea sitting on a rock close to her, chanting spells. "Finally, you woke."

        "Who are you?" Cordelia asked and after looking around at the nice room she was kept in asked: "Why did you bring me here?"

        "I was there, watching, studying, learning." The old drealiv said.

        Looking at the magical items in her hand, - a gold sherlack, a moyse shell and a frigil's blue scale - she could tell she was a witch.

        "It was you by the construction site, wasn't it?" Cordelia said with a sharp pain in her head. "Why did you help me? And why haven't you taken me to the king."

        "I know too much to be stupid enough to do that." The witch said, turning around so that Cordelia could see her face well. " I found you after so many years."

        "Do I know you?" Cordelia was sure she didn't lose her memory. She remembered every moment of her life thanks to her psychic abilities.

        "It was you twenty years ago. The whirlpool. It was you."

        "You know about that?"

        "Since that day I've been watching." The witch said. "That whirlpool was created from Sakar's shrine twenty years ago."

        "I see you did your home work."

        "A month later, you and your sister are the latest sensation in Encrea. All thanks to Sakar's powers which he gave to you."

        "What is your point?" Cordelia asked.

        "Then there was the plague and every other incident after that including the shipwreck, it was all connected to you and your sister."

        "What kind of crazed stalker are you?" Cordelia said, swimming towards the doorway.

        "I know who killed your mother."

        Cordelia froze.