The Mermaid That's Sweetest

[Part2] ⤀ 9] A Ship of Secrets

[Part2] ⤀ 9] A Ship of Secrets

I wake up dazed and dizzy within a hammock, swinging in a ship's cellar. I can hear excited whispers and general activities around me, as if I've woken up to a gathering of friends.

But then I recognise the voices; and they are my friends.

Vanora. Rivea. Darya.

But... they are my friends right... so... why am I bound? I can feel rope around my entire body.

And then I hear yet more voices.

Halina. Zandy. Roanne.

I'm imagining things. I'm delirious. Hallucinating. Surely. I've even opened my eyes but my vision is foggy and I can't wipe my eyes clean because I'm, once again, bound.

My friends... they're... they are laughing... and they sound quite free.

"Oh, I love this kind of tea, it's so sweet with the orange twang," Halina sighs, "Oh, wow, more flavours? Blade! You shouldn't have!"

"I keep all kinds," that whispered husky chuckle...

I must be dead.

"So, I hold the sword like this?" Darya speaks to someone.

"Aye," a male answers.

"Can you stop distracting the pirate crew? Shit, Darya, do you know how long it took to enchant them?" Vanora hisses, "Don't distract them too far or they might notice the Strange."

I blink quicker. Shit. I think we're gaining control. The Darvs. My vision clears a bit and I turn to see zombified hunched men waltzing around the ship's cellar – while the six girls, are all naked, with seaweed bracelets, sitting on pirate laps or slow-dancing with them to the sound of the ocean.

"Since when did you all get here?" I ask, coughing when my throat feels dry and gross, "Rivea?"

She is closest to me and she turns, her face souring into a frown, "Oh, no, Lily is awake – someone knock her out!" Rivea yells out, annoyed.

"What in the Deep happened here? Someone tell me!" I yell back.

"Shut up!" Halina adds, jumping from Blade's lap and walking over to point at me as I lie restrained in my swing, "We did this without your help! Vanora and Rivea saved us from the Topaz Isle. The only idiot we had to abduct was you, Lily, because you're so damn sulky and useless when you're sad! You were going to stay on that Isle and give up our cause? You have the most powerful gift – Power over the Rough! All you wanted to do was make Eros sad like you – how pathetic," I open my mouth to retort, but Halina holds up that finger, waving it back and forth, "Don't cause us trouble or we will knock you out again."

"So, it wasn't Blade's idea?" I ask, still confused... and a little in denial.

"Rivea and I enchanted Blade's crew," Vanora waltzes up with her pirate, smugly smiling over me, "We told them to help us lure you to us, then when Blade got you and Darya, we told them to sail back to Lord Edwin's Estate in Angleton. They did and we swam back and got Halina, Zandy and Roanne. Then, we sailed away. We did this. It was our controlled plan. The whole time."

"You... sailed back to Angleton, and Eros did not see you?" I whisper.

"I'm sure after Eros woke up after being bludgeoned over the head, Eros will be on his ship now, sailing in the wrong direction. He didn't know we went around the island, he thought we sailed off with you to the Main Land, as Blade made his intentions known," Vanora adds, "We've got multiple days head start to get back to Belle Island. We'll make it before Eros or any of Ezili find out where we really went. Or how we achieved it. They think Blade simply stole us. But Blade is under our control."