Swimming Without a Net

  I like your friend, Tennian said shyly. The blond one. I never knew a surface dweller could be so loyal.

  The blond…Oh, Jonas! For God’s sake. Jonas was why Tennian was breaking The Mermaid Code of Silence? He’d laugh his ass off when she told him. Assuming she decided his ego wouldn’t go all Fourth of July from the stimulation.

  His Highness says your friend has kept your secret for many years. For a surface dweller that would be accomplishment enough, but your friend is different.

  You don’t know HOW different.

  As a man of science he could have gotten a great deal of gold if he had whispered the right thing into the right ear.

  Jonas isn’t a big fan of gold. He likes to play the stock market, when he’s not raiding the racks at Nordstrom’s.

  Whatever he likes to play with, Tennian thought at her seriously, without the slightest flicker of a smile, he does not do so with your reputation, or your life. I was…unaware of that quality in bipeds. It has made me wish to speak with them, when I never wanted to before.

  That’s why you’re talking to me? Because I’ve got good taste in friends?

  Well, as they say, you cannot choose kin, only allies. And you chose well. It made me think you would be wise in other things as well. Oh, I am sorry! That was rude of me. Tennian used a tiny bone to pick her sharp, sharp teeth. Did you want me to catch something for you?

  Good God no! Fred calmed herself as Tennian’s eyes went wide in surprise at the vehemence of her tone. Thought. Whatever. I mean, no thanks. I’m allergic.

  Allergic?

  Fish makes me sick.

  Fish…makes you ill?

  Yeah, but don’t worry. I eat plenty of vegetables, protein, stuff like that. Really, Tennian, don’t worry.

  It makes you ILL?

  Well, remember, I’m only half Undersea Folk. Luckily, Mom and Sam were vegetarians, so it was never really a…Are you all right?

  Then Tennian did something that amazed Fred: she laughed so hard she ended up upside down, her long blue hair actually dragging in the sand as she clutched her stomach and rolled back and forth in the current.

  Ho ho ho, Tennian thought, rolling, rolling.

  Fred watched her for a long moment, unamused. Finally: You’re an odd duck, Tennian.

  ILL? It makes you ILL? Ha! Ha! HA!

  I could really, Fred added, get to dislike you.

  Oh, I hope not, Tennian said, shaking sand out of her hair. Because I think I will like you.

  You think you will like me? Fred was amused in spite of herself. Or, maybe, because of Tennian.

  Oh yes! You and I will be great friends, I think. You will pretend I annoy you, while you secretly become more and more fond of me.

  Think so?

  Tennian put a small white hand out to Fred who, surprised, took it. Of course. Because you are lonely, as am I. And lonely people have to stay close to one another. Do you not find that is so?

  And Fred, who disliked being cornered on any subject, couldn’t help a nod of agreement.

  Seventeen

  I appreciate your laying all this out for me, Fred said. God knows nobody else has said shit.

  You asked, Tennian replied simply. How could I not answer?

  You’d be surprised how easily people haven’t answered. Fred fumed and snorted to herself for a moment. Not answering is not a problem at all for most people, seems like. So thanks.

  Courtesy to a guest is—What is THAT?

  Fred looked. There, floating forty yards away, was Thomas’s pet project. That’s the URV. My—uh, my other biped friend, Thomas, he built it.

  It is so shiny! Like a shot, Tennian had crossed the forty yards and was swimming around and around the small silver URV. So this is where the king keeps disappearing! We have been wondering and wondering, and to think, I, Tennian, have discovered the secret!

  Yeah. Good work.

  Then this is Artur’s rival for your affections, this Thomas.

  Yeah.

  Tennian stroked the shiny silver hull and looked up at Fred, dark blue eyes gleaming. My people were positively humming at the thought of a half-bree—um, of a stranger attending the Pelagic. You can imagine our reaction when King Mekkam granted permission for a surface dweller to attend!

  Total freak-out, huh?

  To put it mildly! But there was some concern as to how he was going to join us. Some thought he would have to bring air tanks and fins.

  Right, a scuba suit.

  Skooba?

  Self-contained underwater breathing apparatus. Air tanks and fins. You’ve never heard that bef—Never mind. When would you have? Anyway, yeah, that was one option. But not very practical if you guys are going to be meeting for more than a couple of hours, which it sounds like you are.

  Tennian had gone back to swimming in admiring circles. He has built a little house for himself under the waves! How very, very clever!

  Why did Tennian’s honest admiration make her uncomfortable? Yeah, he’s a clever guy.

  I knew of that quality in bipeds. But I did not know one could build something so aesthetically pleasing. It is not at all like those horrid clunky things that search for other war makers.

  And, clear as thought, the image of a nuclear submarine left Tennian’s mind and popped into Fred’s. That’s a submarine, although war maker is as good a name as any. And you should see the inside of a Burger King if you think this is cool.

  Tennian was now pressing her face against one of the windows and tapping her long fingers on the glass. Except it probably wasn’t glass; it was probably some kind of durable—

  He sees me! He is waving!

  Of course, Fred thought sourly. Why am I not surprised he’s in there? He’s probably finding some other inappropriate HBO series for Mekkam to practice his vocabulary on. The Sopranos, maybe? Entourage? Oh, the horror.

  Yeah, he’s spending a lot of time in the URV.

  He is beckoning for me to come in! May I?

  What do I care?

  It is allowed?

  Fred nearly swam into the URV’s smooth, curved corner. You’re asking me?

  Well. Tennian looked up at her. He is unmated and you are unmated. So that is acceptable. But His Highness the prince has explained that this biped also wishes to make you his, so I—

  Tennian. We’re just friends. He wants more, and I’m dealing with that. This felt like “not quite the truth,” and Fred tried to shrug off her unease.

  Not very well, as it clearly communicated to Tennian, who was frowning and keeping her distance. But—

  Go.

  Are you sure I will cause no offense?

  My God, Fred thought. I’m going to have to physically shove her into the URV or she’ll think I’m in love with Thomas.

  I’m sure! Go!

  Still, Tennian hesitated. I think that you are being kind.

  Then you haven’t been paying attention AT ALL.

  I think that if I go in I will cause offense. I will stay out here, with you.

  Tennian! I think it’s physically impossible for you to cause offense. Come on, I’ll introduce you.

  You will? There will be a formal introduction?

  Well, I don’t know about formal—

  I may go inside? It’s permitted?

  For God’s sake. Come on.

  Much later, Fred would come to bitterly regret that impulse. But for now, she was relieved (she was pretty sure) to see Tennian dart toward the air lock.

  Eighteen

  “Thomas, this is Tennian. Tennian, this is Dr. Thomas Pearson.”

  “It is good to meet you, Thomas.”

  “You, too, Tennian.”

  “That reminds me…I noticed you guys don’t use last names. Do you even have them?”

  “Last…” Tennian had been looking eagerly around the URV, but managed to wrench her attention back to Fred. “Oh, you mean family names! We have them—I am Tennian of the Meerklet line; and Artur, like his siblings and his father, are of the Zennor li
ne—but we do not use them.”

  “Why not?” Thomas asked.

  “Because…because we do not. It is not necessary. Normally,” Tennian added, staring with big adoring eyes at the coffeemaker in the galley.

  “Oh. Thanks for clearing that up.” Fred cleared her throat. “Usually among bipeds, you don’t call someone by their first name unless they ask you to, or you’ve known them for a while.”

  Tennian actually gasped in horror. “Then I have given offense!”

  “No,” Thomas breathed. “Not at all.”

  “Yeah,” Fred said sourly. “Not at all.”

  “It is good of you to overlook my lapse.”

  “No problem,” Thomas murmured.

  “Yeah, don’t even worry about it.”

  Thomas was trying not to gape, or leer, and Fred actually had a bit of sympathy for the guy. He’d been minding his own business in his underwater dorm room, and suddenly two naked women were dripping all over his tile.

  In fact, Thomas was so determinedly making eye contact and avoiding looking elsewhere, his own eyes were almost watering. Given that Tennian was lithe, exotic, and pretty, and had the nicest set of knockers Fred had ever seen outside of a Victoria’s Secret catalog, that was quite an accomplishment.

  “I saw you outside,” he said, then coughed to clear his throat. When he continued, he sounded more like a man and less like a Ford 4 × 4. “You were like—like a daydream I had once.”

  Tennian smiled shyly, and Fred was startled—and annoyed—to feel a stab of jealousy. And not a little poke, either, but a vicious stab. It felt like someone had slammed an icicle through her chest. Her face was probably as green as her hair right now.

  Jealousy?

  Not only was it stupid, it was pointless. She had absolutely no right to that emotion at all. She’d spent an awful lot of time shoving Thomas and Artur away. And had been devastated when they’d both actually up and left. Now here they were, the three of them, together again. And she was still pushing them away.

  Make up your damned mind, she told herself savagely, very glad she wasn’t underwater where just anyone could pick up her thoughts.

  Pick one, or pick neither, or become a Mormon and pick both, but stop all this wishy-washy bullshit.

  “—known Fredrika for long?”

  “We met a year ago. Your king sent Artur to Boston—that’s a city on the coast—”

  “She lives in Chesapeake Bay, Thomas,” Fred said, exasperated.

  “Oh. Then you know where Boston is. Anyway, King Mekkam sent Artur to find Fred and help figure out who was dumping poison into the bay.”

  “Yes, yes!” Tennian actually jumped up and down. This did excellent things to her cleavage. Thomas’s eyes watered even more. “His Highness Prince Artur had many exciting tales when he returned! We were shocked that he took life, but it seems as though the villain left him no choice.”

  “Not hardly. He was shooting up the place. He shot Fred, too.”

  “Yes! It was so exciting!” Tennian glanced at Fred. “Ah, although it was regrettable that you were injured.”

  “Oh, she was totally fine,” Thomas said, waving away Fred’s gunshot wound to the chest. She glared at him so hard she thought her skull was going to crack, but he was oblivious. “But anyway, here you are, so let me show you around. This is the galley—are you hungry? Do you want a snack?”

  “She had one outside,” Fred said, still shuddering at the memory. She wondered if Thomas would still be so infatuated once he saw gentle, shy Tennian chow her way through the belly of a nurse shark. “She’s probably still got fish scales in her teeth.”

  “Great, that’s great. Something to drink?”

  “Your tiny house makes drinks?”

  “Sure!” Thomas opened the small, silver fridge. “Here, have a Coke. Do you like Coke?”

  Tennian found she did. In fact, the caffeine and sugar from the three Cokes made her as talkative as she ever got out of water. In fact, for Tennian, she was practically gushing.

  “—so shiny and beautiful from the outside! I was drawn to it like—like—”

  “A crow is drawn to tinfoil?” Fred suggested.

  Thomas gave her a look. “Never mind Dr. Sourpuss over there; she’s always grouchy. And here’s where I sleep.”

  Fred had been following them through the small ship, feeling out of place but also strangely reluctant to leave the two of them alone. Thomas was a mermaid geek; when he was a little boy his mom had read him all kinds of mermaid stories and the lonely little boy (his dad was always off on some mystery job or other) often fantasized about finding a friend in the sea. He’d become a marine biologist as a direct result of those stories, and that childhood.

  And maybe…maybe he only liked Fred because she was a mermaid. To posit that further, maybe he’d like any mermaid.

  Well, sure he would. And why not? God knew Fred was no Miss Congeniality. She wasn’t even a Miss October. And this month Thomas was going to meet scads of mermaids. Hundreds. Maybe even thousands.

  Her rotten luck that he ran into Tennian, who was apparently pretty open-minded for her people. Any other mermaid probably would have been scared shitless of him (treacherous bipeds, don’t you know). Or disdainful. But not this mermaid. Of all the rotten! Damned! Luck!

  Tennian was patting the bed, then sitting on it, then bouncing on it. “If you can’t sleep underwater and let the current rock you, this is likely the next best thing,” she said, her blue hair flying all over the place as she bounced, bounced, bounced. Thomas lost the battle and stared at her breasts, which were also bouncing.

  “So. I. Uh.” Thomas cleared his throat. “I noticed you’re a natural—I mean, that’s your natural hair color. I mean, obviously it’s your natural hair color. A very, um, striking and vivid blue. Is that, um, common in your family? Ow!”

  “I’m sorry,” Fred said sweetly. “Was that your kneecap?”

  “Right, thanks,” he muttered. Then, louder, “Sorry, Tennian, those were pretty rude questions. It’s not every day I have a naked, gorgeous mermaid in my—ow, goddammit!”

  “I’m sorry. Was that your other kneecap?”

  Thomas hobbled over to the chair in the corner and sat down, groaning softly.

  “Are you well, Thomas?” Tennian asked, stopping in mid-bounce.

  “As well as can be expected,” he said through gritted teeth, rubbing his knees. “Anyway, that’s all of the URV.”

  “It is wonderful!”

  “Thank you. I worked hard on it.”

  “What, work?” Fred scoffed. “You drew up the plans and then hired a bunch of people to build it for you.”

  “You know how many sex scenes I had to write to afford this thing?” Thomas griped. “Let’s just say all my characters aren’t going to be doing anything below the shoulders for a while. I’m so burned out it’s not even funny.”

  “Burned out? Sex scenes?”

  “Biped talk,” Thomas said hastily.

  “Don’t you want to tell Tennian about your girlie books?”

  “Maybe later. Say, Tennian, do you know when the Pelagic is supposed to start?”

  “Tomorrow morning. His Majesty wanted to give you and Fredrika plenty of time to rest from your travels.”

  “Well, that was thoughtful. Oh, that reminds me, Mekkam’s coming back tonight for season three. I don’t know when the guy sleeps.”

  “Season three?” Fred yelped. “You couldn’t have tried him out on the Discovery Channel? Let him watch Meerkat Manor or a show about grubs? Jeez, anything but HBO, even Dirty Jobs, fer Crissakes.”

  “Look, he saw me watching Deadwood, he wanted to watch Deadwood. I’m supposed to tell a king what to do? Back off, Fred, or I’ll put the bullet I pulled out of you right back in.”

  “I’d like to see you try, Romance Boy. I can’t believe that out of all the people the king could be hanging out with, he picked you.”

  “That will be very helpful for you,” Tennian said, shaking
the last can of Coke in a vain attempt to get three or four more drops out. “Do you know why?”

  “Uh…”

  Fred made an impatient sound. “Because when the rest of her people find out Mekkam likes you enough to hang out in the URV and watch HBO reruns, they’ll warm up to you a lot quicker than they normally would have.”

  “Oh.” Thomas looked surprised, then pleased. “I didn’t think of it like that. You don’t suppose Mekkam’s faking the interest, is he?”

  “Our king does not fake,” Tennian said, all trace of mirth gone from her face. She had been rolling around in the blankets but now abruptly sat up.

  “Okay, sorry. I didn’t mean to offend, or imply that King Mekkam lied. It’s just hard for Fred and me to accept all this in such a short time. She’s a half-and-half, and I’m a surface dweller, but the royal family is welcoming us with open arms. You can’t blame us for wondering.”

  “I can, but I shall not.” Tennian shook her head and looked wry. “Only bipeds would view the gift of friendship with suspicion.”

  “Yeah, sneaky rotten bipeds like Thomas, here,” Fred said helpfully. “Disgusting! Two hairy legs, no tail, no stamina in the open water…It’s enough to make you barf, when you think about it!”

  “It’s probably just the novelty. Which in Fred’s case, at least, wears off,” Thomas joked.

  At least, she was pretty sure he was joking.

  Fred resisted the urge to kick him in the knee again. One to grow on, as her stepfather might have said.

  Nineteen

  “And then…then! He was practically slobbering all over her. Granted, she was a gorgeous naked woman with striking blue hair—and blue pubic hair—but still.”

  “Fred.”

  “Slobbering! Like a summer hound.” Fred was pacing back and forth beside the pool. “And she was all, ‘Oh, Thomas, you’re so clever. Oh, Thomas, you built such a pretty underwater dorm room. Oh, Thomas, can I have a tenth Coke?’ Sickening.”