2 Deja Blue (8 page)

I quickly
walked up the beach toward Anya and Nick, who were waiting at the lounge chairs. My legs seemed okay, even though just moments ago they were most likely bruised, cut
,
scraped
,
and probably
worse. I
had a feeling there were a few broken bones that I didn’t really feel because of my shock, and Brennan’s quick healing. I
still felt the residue of the
Fairy
magic
he
used to heal me. The warm tingly sensation still tickled on the surface of my skin. I waved and tried to smile brightly as I heard Anya speaking in my head, “
I’m so glad you’re okay
,
Ruby! I knew you would be. Nick doesn’t know a thing. Just tell him you were swimming by the Jetty.
” Anya sat next to Nick, daintily eating her
french
fries, glancing up at me and waving nonchalantly. Even though the voice in my head was full of concern, the air about her was blasé. Nobody would’ve guessed she was actually
having a conversation with me.
Boy, she was good at concealing her emotions and thoughts. I tried to mimic her and keep a smooth look of calm on my face, with my fake-smile glued in place. I hoped Nick wouldn’t notice I was still shaking and recovering from my near-drowning experience.

“Hey Ru
b
e
s!
I wondered if you were
gonna
get back in time to eat this before it melted!” Nick called out as he held up a large Styrofoam cup filled with two scoops of ice cream. Well, at least I
could stuff my face with my favorite indulgence as I mulled over my
Mermaid
encounter. “
Thanks,
Nick! Yeah, I lost track of time out there…I didn’t realize how
long it would take me to swim back
! Guess I’m not as fast as I thought,” I shyly smiled and shrugged, taking the cup of ice cream from him.

“Where’s Brennan?” He asked, looking out towards the water and the jetty. I followed his gaze and saw Brennan talking to Celestine. They were sitting on the edge of the jetty, feet dangling above the water
.  F
rom where we were
sitting
the
Mermaid
looked like she had legs! What the hell happened to her tail? Oh. It probably went away
when she got out of the water
…Guess they got one thing right in the movies, huh? But
,
was she sitting up there naked? It was too hard to tell from where we were. I shook my head. So many questions, not enough answers. “Oh, he met some girl he knew, I think,” I kind of mumbled, as I shoveled a spoonful of strawberry ice cream into my mouth. I would definitely have to work on the lying thing if I was going
to
keep this
Fairy
stuff from Nick. Even
I
didn’t believe the words coming out of my mouth.

“Cool,” Nick smiled, nodding. Huh. Guess I’m better at it than I thought. I took another spoonful of strawberry ice cream and wished it was chocolate. Chocolate is my favorite. Don’t get me wrong…I love ice cream in any flavor (except coffee – yuck)
,
but
,
for some reason, every time Nick order
s
ice cream
for me
,
he gets
strawberry. I guess I felt too self-conscious to tell him that I prefer
chocolate. I didn’t want to sound ungrateful, and I certainly didn’t want to make him feel bad
,
thinking he ordered me the wrong flavor.
Because really, it was fine.
Wasn’t it? I loved eating ice cream. I kept shoveling it in my mouth to give me an excuse not to talk for a few minutes while I tried to figure out what else to say. I mean, what does a person say when
they’ve just been
being nearly crushed and killed by huge boulders under water and
rescued by a
Fairy
and
Mermaid
?  I knew exactly what I could say.
Nothing.
I couldn’t say a word of any of it to Nick. So I kept my mouth full of strawberry ice cream and tried to look “normal.”
Whatever
that
looks like.

A few minutes later, Brennan came walking up the beach towards us. “Hey guys, sorry about that.” Brennan said as he gestured back towards the jetty. “I met a chick,” he said as he made this cool-guy “I rock” face, and put his fist up to Nick to bump it.

Nick bumped his fist to Brennan’s and replied, “Cool, dude!
She hot?”

“Definitely,” Brennan smirked.

“Did
ya
get her digits?”

“
Ohhhh
yeah.”
Brennan nodded, plopping down in the sand in front of us. I just sat there, staring dumbly between the boys, mindlessly shoveling ice cream into my mouth. I suddenly heard Anya’s voice in my head, “
Talk to Brennan,”
she said. Just then, Anya got up from her chair, pulling on Nick’s arm, “Come on,
Nick, you owe me a re-match. I think I can beat you out to the buoy this time. I’m all energized with
french
fries now!” Nick looked at me, unsure of what to do.

“Go! Go!” I mumbled with my mouth full of ice cream
.
I waved them on
. “I’m just
gonna
finish eating this and lay out for a few minutes. I’ll meet you guys in the water in a few.” Nick shrugged, “Okay, but don’t take too long!” He smiled and headed back into the water with Anya. I watched them go
,
and then I looked at Brennan as soon as they were out of earshot. “Okay. Spill it.” I said.

Brennan let out a big sigh and shook his head slowly. “It’s an unfortunate situation. And now, you’re caught right in the middle. Apparently, Celestine is in love with a
Troll
.”

I rolled my eyes and impatiently shook my head, waving my hand around for him to continue, “Yeah, yeah, I get it.
How cliché.
The
Mermaid
is i
n love with the human.
Us poor-
loser ‘under the bridge dwellers.’
I know all about
that stupid little nick-name
that the
Yoopers
give us.
Blah, blah.
How sad for her.
Why
is it so unfortunate
,
and how am I involved in this?” Brennan snapped his head up in surprise at my candor
,
and a slow smile spread across his face. He let out a soft chuckle as he shook his head from side to side.

“What’s so funny?” I demanded, frowning at him. “So the
Mermaid
loves a human…it’s in about a hundred different
f
airy
tales. I have seen
The Little
Mermaid
,
ya
know.  I should know better by now than to think there’s not some truth to them
, right? Anya’s already lectured me on that topic today.”

B
rennan snickered again, “True.
But, Kansas, it’s unfortunate because she’s
not
in love with a
human
. She’s in love with a
real
Troll
.”

My mouth fell open as I stared at Brennan in silence.

“What did you just say?” I asked, because I knew I must have misunderstood him.

“I
said
Celestine is in love with a
real
Troll
. Come on Kansas, I thought y
ou were much brighter than this. Shall I start calling you the Scarecrow? I think you’re missing some brains,
” Brennan joked.

“
You’re
telling me that there are real
Troll
s?
Seriously?”
I don’t know why I wa
s so shocked. After all, I saw F
airies, slayed dragons
,
and just got rescued by a
Mermaid
, but now I’m supposed to believe in
Troll
s? What is this world coming to?

Brennan simply nodded. “Yep,” his lips popped on the “p” sound, then he continued, “And it’s unfortunate because, just as the
fairy
tales say, most
Mer
people
don’t like outsiders. Falling in love with a
…(
ahem)…an
Earthener
is strictly forbidden. They like to keep their bloodlines clean.”

“
Earthener
?”

“A member of the Earthen Court.
Merpeople
don’t often app
rove of mating outside of
their
own
Court.  Unfortunately, a long, long, long time ago, some very
adverse
events occurred, tainting the
Merpeople’s
opinions of those outside of their own Court.  You see, some of your fairy tales are based partly in truth. There are Danish and Swedish stories
that tell of human men who went
to the beach
es to watch the
S
elkies
– or
Mermaid
s
– dance
.
One of these men
hid the skin of
a
bea
utiful
S
elkie
, so she couldn’t go back to sea, and forced
her to marry him.
After
years of imprisonment, the
S
elkie
finally escaped, but the man
hunted her down and killed her
S
elkie
family as punishment. S
he
then promised
to take revenge upon
all of the
men of
the village. Without divulging too many details, I can tell you that
some
of this actually did happen. And some happened not only with humans, but with
many
members of the
three
other Courts of Fey
..
.
Earthen,
Air
and Fire.
Merpeople
are a very proud clan. They believe they are
the
superior
race in their Court
and they believe in keeping their kin pure bred.

“Pure bred? You sound like you’re talking about horses!” I snorted.

Brennan just waved off my comment and continued, “So, as I was saying,
Trolls are members of my
Earthen
Court. They are the keepers of the minerals, metals and stones. They are
also
the protectors
of
the grounds of Fey. They value the earth and all that
it’s made of, so they protect it and those who rule in the Earthen Cou
rt.
Some
Troll
s, however, are known to be quite…
ahhh
…greedy.”

I stood up, march
ed
around the beach in circles, sh
ook
my head and sp
oke
quickly, without taking a breath, “Back up a second, you said before that
’ ‘It’s an unfortunate situation’ And
I was
‘
caught right in the middle.
’
How am I caught right in the middle? I didn’t even know that
Mermaid
s
existed
until about an hour ago when Anya told me about the Water Court
. A
nd I’ve never even
met
a Mermaid until about fifteen minutes ago when Celestine helped you move those boulders off of me! How am
I
in the middle?”  My voice went up about three octaves
,
and I sounded very
shrieky
. I was rambling like a crazy person. I stood there with my hands on my hips, staring at Brennan, daring him to challenge
me
.

Brennan stayed still
sitting there on the beach
, looking relaxed
as he leaned back onto the palms of his
hands. He looked up at me seriously, “You are in the middle of it because of
Grobel
.” He said
the
name with
an
accent on the first syllable
,
so it sounded like GROW-bull. (As in, what a bunch of bull, I thought.) Ugh. I was getting quite annoyed with his
calm
attitude and his cryptic
Fairy
responses. Why the hell don’t they just come out and tell me everything? I had remembered hearing that name before…when
Celestine was talking to me. But I
was a bit dazed
at that time,
so
I couldn’t really remember the details of what she said.