The Merlin Effect (18 page)

“It looked like something out of a fable,” he said, a touch of awe in his voice.

Kate, studying the smoking vent, did not answer for some time. “It could have been the weird light down here, playing tricks.”

“Could have been. But I’m sure I saw it. And it looked just like…” He paused, unable to say the word. “Like a
mermaid.
”

Together they floated, silently waiting, hoping to glimpse it again. But they saw nothing beyond the glowing fumes.

“Let’s go,” said Kate at last. She slid through the water, waving her gossamery form. Despite her fears, she still could not help but enjoy the feeling of weightlessness, of being so insubstantial that she was almost part of the water itself. Then, with a sharp pang, she thought of her father and Isabella. Even if she could possibly find them, would it be in time? And what could she hope to do to help them? Seeing a house-size boulder covered with a thick mat of yellow vegetation, she drifted toward it, occupied with her thoughts.

At once, the boulder stirred. From under its hulking form, more than a dozen burly legs extended, groping on the rocks. The vegetation, so soft and swaying from a distance, hardened into murderous spikes, each one as long as a lance. The
monster, with narrow slits where eyes might once have been, lifted itself from its lair and opened its gargantuan mouth, where an army of tongues rippled like a nest of blood red worms.

“Look out!”

The pair turned and whipped through the water. But the spidery creature pursued them relentlessly, crashing over fuming vents and rock outcroppings. The faster they swam, the nearer it drew, legs churning, snarling angrily. Beads of brown sludge oozed from the edges of its mouth.

Glancing to the rear, Kate could see the monster pulling nearer. Terry, swimming clumsily, had fallen so far behind her that the beast was almost on top of him.

“Hellllp!” he cried. “It’s going to—”

As his words disappeared in an avalanche of snarling, Kate spotted a shallow cave about equidistant between them. Without thinking, she reversed her direction and raced back toward it, throwing herself directly into Terry and driving them both into the mouth of the cave. They wriggled inside just as the monster arrived.

Protected by a ledge of overhanging rock, they pressed against the back of the cave. The cries of the creature echoed around them, rising in repeating crescendos. Then, inexplicably, the noise ceased.

For several minutes they waited, not daring to move. Still as stone, they could only hope that the monster had finally given up and departed.

“There!” screamed Kate.

A long, leathery leg reached into the cave, slithering toward them. They shrank still deeper into their burrow, even as the leg lashed out at them. It grazed Kate’s flank, but could not quite reach her.

For an instant the leg seemed to hesitate. Then it planted itself against the rock ledge directly above them. The snarling resumed, as the leg began pulling on the roof of the cave, trying to tear it away.

A jagged piece of rock broke loose. Kate grabbed it in the folds of her tail and stabbed at the leg. The creature roared wrathfully, but kept its leg in place. Harder and harder it pulled. The water in the cave grew murky with crumbling rock.

All at once, the rock ledge buckled. Before Kate or Terry knew what had happened, the slab flew off, exposing the cave. There, gaping at them, was the cavernous mouth. The squirming tongues stretched toward them.

Then, in a shriek of pain, the monster jerked backward. A titanic tail wrapped around its body, squeezing mercilessly. The yellow spikes snapped off like stalactites as the beast writhed and kicked, trying to free itself from its attacker, a great blue scorpion with a poisonous barb and slashing fangs.

Great clouds of sediment rose all around as the two leviathans wrestled, battling in the depths. The scorpion’s fangs ripped at the flesh of its opponent, even as powerful legs tried to break its back. On and on they fought, screaming and roaring, pounding themselves against the sea floor.

Kate and Terry could do no more than cower in the small hollow that once had been a cave. They waited for some chance to escape, knowing it would probably never come. Meanwhile, the battle grew ever more violent. The monsters thrashed and tumbled, battering each other’s bodies, unwilling to stop until one lay vanquished.

Finally, the legs of the spiderlike beast hung limp. The blue scorpion lifted its head and bellowed a cry of victory.

“Don’t move,” whispered Kate. “Maybe it will go away.”

“Don’t bet on it,” Terry replied nervously.

Using its great barb, the scorpion butted the corpse fiercely, making sure its adversary would not rise and strike again. Finally, coiling its tail, it seemed to prepare to crawl away, when suddenly it halted. Spotting the two gleaming forms in the hollow, it stretched its neck toward them.

The colossal head lowered until it hung only a few feet above Kate and Terry. Darkly, the scorpion’s indigo eyes examined them. Then it opened its jaws, baring the horrible fangs.

A
s the deadly fangs draped over them, the two water spirits huddled tightly together.

“You shouldn’t have come back for me,” grumbled Terry. “That was stupid.”

“Guess so,” Kate said sullenly.

“I suppose I should say thanks.”

“I suppose I should say you’re welcome.”

Just then, something odd happened. The fangs began to melt into seawater, along with the rest of the scorpion’s head. The blue armor covering the length of its body grew steadily lighter in color, fading to the point of transparency. The indigo eyes flashed for the last time. Then, with a slight
pop
, the scorpion disappeared completely.

Floating in its place, barely as large as one of the fangs, was a grotesque little fish with a beaklike nose. The entire body was covered with scraggly white hairs, while the dorsal fin wriggled energetically, as if trying to scratch. Then, to the astonishment of Kate and Terry, the fish spoke.

“I never should have shown you the book.”

“Geoffrey!” whooped Kate. “It’s you.”

The fish opened his jaws to the widest, much as the scorpion had done, then gurgled noisily before snapping them shut. “Pardon my yawning,” he said grumpily. Swimming closer to Terry, the fish eyed him suspiciously. “And what, may I ask, is this?”

“The same could be asked of you,” answered Terry. “I never thought I’d owe my life to a scrawny old fish.”

“Delighted to be of service,” came the reply. “Actually, before you arrived I was searching for some way to slip past the many-legged creature.” His thin mouth pinched as he fought to hold back a yawn. “Thanks to you, I was able to mount a surprise attack.”

“Where,” asked Kate as quietly as she could, “is the Horn?”

The fish looked at her slyly, then uncurled a small fin under his tail just enough to reveal a gleaming object tucked inside. “Reduced in size, but safe enough.” The fin closed tight again. “Well now, if you’re going to accompany me—”

“Yes!” exclaimed Kate, her whole transparent body vibrating. Then she fell still. “Was that creature you killed related to the spider monster who guarded the entrance to the land of Shaa?”

The old fish blew a bubble, which expanded to the size of his head before popping. “No doubt.”

“Does that mean the entrance to Shaa is near?”

“Nearer than you know.” The fish’s white mane quivered. “The land of Shaa lies at the bottom of a great abyss.
Darkest of the dark
, as it is known in legend.”

“That’s the only way I want to know it,” said Kate.

“You may not wish to accompany me, then.”

“You mean—?”

His dorsal fin wriggling, the old fish said grimly, “That is the way, the only way, to the Glass House. For the Glass House and the land of Shaa lie on the same path. If you are going to join me, you must travel down the same dark passage as Emrys and Merlin did long ago.”

Kate felt suddenly limp.

“You can go back to the ship in the way you came, if you choose. I shall do my best to send word.”

Her single-celled form tensed. “I’m coming with you.”

The old fish studied her. “Are you quite sure?”

“Quite sure.”

“Well then, as I was saying, if you’re going to accompany me, you will need to dress more appropriately. A disguise, what? As you are, you’ll soon end up as salad for one of Nimue’s sea demons.”

Terry swung his silver-blue eye toward the monstrous corpse, whose mouth gaped wide, its tongues hanging limp. “Whatever sea demons are, they can’t be as bad as that thing over there.”

Shaking himself, the old fish said to Kate, “He doesn’t know very much, does he?”

“No,” she replied. “But he’s learning.”

“Don’t count on it.” Terry turned to Geoffrey. “I won’t delay you any longer. Would you mind changing me so I can get out of here?”

“It will be a pleasure,” replied the fish. He burbled some syllables and waved his fin awkwardly.

Pop.
Terry’s watery shape vanished. In its place swam an ugly fish with goggle eyes, the same kind of fish that Isabella had analyzed in her makeshift laboratory.

“Hey, what’s going on?” sputtered Terry. “I meant change me into a person. Not a fish version of Frankenstein! Change me back. Right now!”

“That might be risky,” answered Geoffrey. “In the first place, people don’t survive very long at the bottom of the sea. In the second place, I am not sure I can do it. Going from human to animal is much easier than the other way around. You might end up as a peacock or a giraffe.”

Kate could not suppress a giggle. “That might be an improvement.”

Pop.
She found herself as an elegant fish with emerald green scales and a phosphorescent stripe down both sides. Elegant, but for the fact that in her nose she sported a large brass ring.

“What’s this?” she exclaimed. “There’s a ring in my nose.”

“A nice touch,” pronounced Terry.

“My apologies,” said Geoffrey. “It’s happened to me before. I must work on that charm.”

“Can’t you make it disappear?”

“Unfortunately not,” he sighed. “A quirky business, this. At least I got the luminous stripes right. You can be our torch. There is no light where we are going.”

With a quick jackknife he darted away, followed a few seconds later by Kate and Terry, muttering to themselves about their new forms. The white-haired fish led them across the ocean floor, offering a running commentary about how to swim like a fish.

“Your head is sagging,” coached Geoffrey. “Look dead ahead.”

“Easy for you to say,” huffed Kate. “I’ve got this stupid ring in my nose.”

She tried again.

“Not like that! You’re weaving like a drunkard. Use your spine. Your whole spine.”

“Here, I’ll show you,” offered Terry. “It’s easy once you
get the hang of it.” He gave a sharp jerk of his tail and promptly flipped over backward.

“Gee, thanks,” moaned Kate.

After several false starts, however, she started to move with some confidence. Before long she and the others reached the very spot where they had encountered the spidery creature. As they approached, a black chasm loomed before them. Wider than a whale, it looked impossibly deep and utterly dark, illuminated only by the faint glow of a smoking vent nearby.

“Is that it?” asked Kate doubtfully.

Geoffrey eyed the chasm. “The abyss.”

“You’re joking,” said Terry as he cautiously approached the edge. “Magma is pushing higher all the time! Going down there would be like swimming straight into the eruption.”

“You can wait for us here if you prefer,” offered Geoffrey, circling slowly above the entrance. “Of course, you might have to deal with the mother of your many-legged friend. And she might not be in a very jolly mood when she returns.”

With that, Geoffrey dived into the abyss. Not far behind came Kate, whose phosphorescent stripes cast a pale blue light on the jagged rock walls, and behind her, a reluctant Terry.

Suddenly, a fissure opened in the rock just ahead of them. Molten lava bubbled out, sizzling like hot coals doused with water. The walls of the abyss trembled as the space filled with a distant rumbling. Gradually, the fiery lava dimmed, hardening into stone before their eyes.

“As if it weren’t hot enough in here already,” said Geoffrey, jackknifing past the fissure.

“This is insane,” objected Terry, starting to retreat.

Kate beckoned to him with her fin.

“But we’ll be fried fish fillets if we go any deeper.”

“It’s our only chance,” she replied, darting past the smoldering stone. She did not look back, but waited to hear him swim again before she continued.

Downward they swam, plunging into the chasm. Despite the uncomfortable warmth of the water, Kate felt increasingly gripped by a strange chill, a chill she had felt somewhere before. The vague, half-formed memory of a nightmare swelled inside her. It was not a matter of temperature, or of anything physical. Something about this place blew biting cold on her innermost self. The chill only deepened as they descended.

“Douse the torch!” ordered Geoffrey.

Kate obeyed. The abyss fell raven black. Although she could not see, she still could feel. The icy feeling grew stronger, working into her bones, her brain, her blood.
Darkest of the dark.
She wanted to shriek. At that instant a shadowed figure swept by, rising out of the depths. It brushed her with its frozen breath as it passed.

In time, she dared speak again. “What was that?”

“I don’t want to know,” said Terry, shaken.

“A sea demon.” Geoffrey’s tail twitched nervously. “We must be doubly careful now. We should proceed without any light.”

Terry frowned. “But I can’t do that. I’ll swim straight into a wall.”

“Not advisable,” the elder fish replied crisply. “Stay right with me, close as you can.”

Following his suggestion, Kate positioned herself immediately behind Geoffrey, while Terry trailed her closely. Sometimes, especially rounding bends, they would bump into one
another, jamming faces into tails. As they continued, though, they swam with increasing coordination. Kate gradually became aware of a new sense guiding her motions, that ancient instinct that binds a school of fish together as they swim in unison. In time their three bodies moved almost as one.