Swept Away (10 page)

Gabriel leads me outside, to a motorboat, surprisingly secured, as if magnetized to the surface of the water. Another boat is floating out in the ocean, empty.

I blink, adjusting my eyes to the explosion of light. “Where are we?” I take note of the position of the sun. It’s mid-morning. 

“Off the coast of southern Florida,” Gabriel informs. He holds out his hand and I step inside the boat. 

I’m still fuzzy. I guess being immortal doesn’t improve one’s intelligence. “What?” I ask, sitting inside the boat.

“Look behind you,” he says.

I do and see nothing but ocean. “Where’s the cave?” I ask. 

“It’s there. You just can’t see it,” he says, and then starts up the engine. The boat is moving fast, skipping along the surface of the water.

My hair keeps flying in my face. I tuck it behind my ears. “I don’t understand!” I yell over the engine noise.

“It’s invisible!” he yells, explaining. “A mariner discovers the cave, the fountain, when he is pulled in by gravitational forces. My boat was lured in, at the cave opening, and then, it became visible. Now that we’re moving away, we can’t see it.”

“How did you and Emilio know where to look?”

“De la Vega found it, found the secret. See there?” Gabriel says, pointing.

I see the water, moving in a different direction. It should be moving forward, but where the cave is, the water flows backward. Retrograde.

I shake my head, fascinated. “Imagine all those who’ve come so close, but not quite, and never knew.”

He nods and takes my hand, smiling. We’re free, flying across the water. No one can harm us now. We’re immortal and we have millennia upon millennia together. 

A shadow creeps across my mind, turning happiness into sorrow. 

“What about my parents?”I say to Gabriel, “and Camilla and Alejandro?” I squeeze Gabriel’s hand. “I’ll go on and they won’t. How will I explain?”

He squeezes my hand back. “I’m sorry, Daria, but you can’t. You can’t go back home.”

I sink into my seat. “Where are we going?”

“Spain, if you’d like. We can start a life there and no one will find us.”

I’m crying. 

“Daria…”

I hold up my hand, telling Gabriel to give me some time, some space. He settles back, maneuvering the motorboat, looking into the distance. I stare out at the ocean. I want to jump in and descend, drown. I know I won’t die, but down there, in that dark abyss, I know where I’m going. I can rise at any time, ascend, and break the surface. I can breathe in air and feel the sun’s warmth on my face. I can be a mermaid, I think with amusement. 

I laugh. Gabriel turns to me. “What’s wrong?”

I shake my head, but then decide to say, “Are mermaids real?”

He laughs. “What a peculiar question.”

I shrug. “Not really.  I mean, we’re immortal, from a magic pool, so it’s not a stretch to wonder about the existence of mermaids—or mermen.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Atlantis?” he says.

I smile. “Can we live there?”

“Atlantis doesn’t exist. Spain does. I know Spain.”

“It’s your home, Gabriel. You get to go back home, but you forbid me from returning to mine.”

The boat slows, and then stops, along the shore. I look around. 

“Where are we?”

“Florida,” he says, and helps me out of the boat. “A secret cove,” he adds. “I was here, long ago, with De la Vega’s expedition.”

We walk along the sand, and then sit, next to each other. We’re all alone. I wonder if we’re the first visitors, here, since De la Vega and his men came ashore. I see no signs of civilization, but I don’t know what’s hidden through the thicket of trees beyond. 

“I’m not forbidding you to do anything, Daria,” Gabriel says, holding my hand. He turns towards me. “You can go back home, if you wish. We can part ways, if you wish. Daria, I won’t make you do anything you don’t want to do. However, you must see reason: every year, you’ll be seventeen. You won’t age. Your family, your friends, will. What will you say when they are old and gray, and you’re not?”

“I’m immortal and there’s a Fountain of Youth?” I say. 

“They would believe you, of course, how could they not, but Daria do you want to see everyone around you die?”

I play with the sand, letting it fall between my fingers. “You’d rather I run away, with you, to Spain?”

“We can stay here, if you’d like,” he says, gesturing at our surroundings. He smiles.  “We could live in a tree house, sleep in a hammock. Eat fruit and nuts and fish.” He smirks. “Run around naked.”

I laugh. “Do we need to sleep, to eat?”

He shakes his head. “No, but others will notice, if you live among mortals, and you must keep up appearances,” he says.

“Not if we’re here, in this secret cove, just the two of us.”

He nods. “No, not here,” he agrees. He sounds solemn. 

“You miss Spain,” I surmise.

He squeezes my hand, and then kisses it. “I do, but home is where you are, Daria. I’ll never leave you.”

I lay down, looking up at the blue sky, the white clouds. “Can we stay here, a while?” I ask.

“We can stay here, forever, Daria.”

“I love you,” I say.

“I love you too.”

It’s dark. Night has fallen. The moon is out. Gabriel is building a fire on shore. I look at him above the surface of the water. I descend, and keep falling, down, down, down, to the bottom. I’m drowning, but I can’t die. I’ll never die. 

Was it worth it? I wonder. 

I ascend, but don’t break the surface. The moonlight shines a path away from shore. I follow and swim away. In the distance, I hear Gabriel calling my name. I descend, again, and this time, a wave picks me up, and carries me far away.

I panic and struggle against the tide. I may be immortal, but the ocean is superior, and it’s holding me prisoner. 

I manage to break above the surface. “Gabriel!” I scream out for help.

“Daria!” he yells back, panicked. I hear him crash into the water, swimming towards me.

I’m struggling to be free, to swim to him, but the ocean has me in its grip. I give up and let it take me down into its depths. The silence is deafening. I close my eyes and resign myself to my fate. 

As I’m ready to lie forever, at the bottom of the ocean, I feel arms around me, strong, pulling me up. It’s Gabriel. We’re face-to-face. I embrace him and we ascend, kicking our feet to the surface, breaking the ocean’s restraints.

We swim back to shore and collapse. Our clothes are in tatters. 

Gabriel leans over me. “Daria, are you all right?” he says, sounding muffled.

I shake water out of my ears. I can hear clearly again. Crickets are chirping in the distance. 

“I am. I’m sorry.”

“About what?” he asks, confused.

“I wanted to be lost, adrift. I wanted the ocean to carry me away, but when it granted my wish, I rebelled, and tried to escape. It wouldn’t let me.”

Gabriel picks me up and gathers me in his arms. “Darling Daria, what can I do?” He’s rocking me back and forth.

“Hold me,” I say. “Hold me forever.”

“Always,” he says.

We sit next to the fire and watch the sun rise. Birds fly in the sky. Life goes on. 

And so shall we.

Melanie Matthews is the author of
Coldhearted, Burning Hearts, The Rebel Prince, Stargazer
, and
Prophecy Girl.
  She lives in South Carolina.