My entry. I'm not too happy with it tbh - I had to write most of it in a hurry - but at least I got it done
Under the SeaDirnec sat down on a rock, rubbing his wrists irritably. It made no difference – the enchanted manacles wouldn't come off, not without the touch of free merfolk – but it made him feel like he was doing something.
Someone stirred in the very back of the cave where he was kept, and Dirnec glanced up.
"Something's different, isn't it?"
The cave's only other occupant, a golden-haired, golden-tailed mermaid, didn't react in any way. Dirnec hadn't expected her to. He didn't even know the name of his fellow slave; she'd been captured before him as a trophy slave and concubine to the royal family, and never spoke a word that he'd heard.
She was the only companion he had, however, and Dirnec had grown rather fond of her over the years. There had been times when she'd seemed on the verge of speaking, only to regress to silence after being summoned to the prince's chambers.
"Yeah." Dirnec looked at the cave entrance. There was a feeling in the ocean, a subtle undercurrent of excitement that had been building for some time. "Think it's war?"
Meruna – Dirnec had given her that name shortly after their first meeting, not knowing what else to call her – wilted in her chains.
"Right. Sorry. They took you during a war, didn't they?" They'd taken him in a different war, but that hadn't been nearly so bad; he'd been too young to be much use and so they'd just chained him down here and forgotten about him in pursuit of stronger, adult merfolk.
This couldn't be a war, though, or they'd have heard the screaming by now. As he watched, a shadow appeared in the mouth of the cave and Meruna retreated, hiding her face in the wall. A mermaid swam in, sat down on the rock, buried her face in her hands and burst into tears.
Dirnec's breath quickened a little. This was the chance he'd been waiting for; a free mermaid who wasn't an overseer.
In the formal dialect, he asked softly, "My mistress, why do you weep?"
The mermaid raised her head to fix him with a cold stare, but Dirnec had kept his eyes respectfully low and his voice meek.
"You are addressing the princess of the Orthalom clan. My father has ordered me to marry the prince of this clan to try and broker peace between us. Tonight is the first day of our three-day nuptial feast."
Hope leaped in Dirnec so fast that he was afraid the princess could see him quivering.
So that's it! A royal wedding. If he played this right...
"And my mistress's fiance has to drape the chain over your wrist to symbolize your union." Dirnec smiled once, slowly, but never raised his eyes. "I can help, if my mistress pleases."
"How?"
"If my mistress will be good enough to obtain a jar of fat, all she need do is cover her wrists with it and she will soon find her worries disappear."
The princess stared at him, then turned away without another word and swam off.
After several moments, Meruna drifted over to Dirnec, the faintest frown on her face.
"You're not from around here, right?" Dirnec said. "Prenuptial ceremonies last three days in these clans. There's a new ritual every day to symbolize the bond between husband and wife. If they all fail, the marriage is annulled."
The frown deepened, and Meruna opened her mouth, then closed it again slowly.
"We help her, she helps us," Dirnec elaborated. "Tomorrow night, they have to hold hands, and the night after that, they embrace. If we get her out of this, maybe she'll get
us out of
this."
Meruna looked away sharply, biting her lip.
"Oh, she will," Dirnec reiterated. Glancing at the exit, he smiled. "I'm sure of it."
In spite of his confidence, the rest of the day and night passed without any word from the princess. It wasn't until the following evening that she swam back, biting her lip, a frown on her face.
As soon as he saw her, Dirnec bowed deeply. "My mistress. May I ask if last night was successful?"
"It was," she replied distractedly, "but I am concerned about this evening."
Dirnec smiled. "If my mistress pleases, there is a simple solution to this, and one that may be found right here in this cave."
He swam over to a clump of coral polyps on the wall, picked the biggest one and brought it over to the princess.
"If my mistress will only eat this, she will find her worries disappear."
The princess made no move to take it. "What is it?"
"A simple medicine to raise one's temperature." That part was true enough, as Dirnec had found out to his cost as a merboy. "Your fiance won't be able to come near you, let alone touch you, unless he wants his hands to blister in front of him."
When the princess still didn't move, Dirnec dared to place it on the rock next to her. "However, it takes time to work. I would recommend my mistress eat it now."
She picked it up, turned it over and over in her hands, then bit into it, shuddering at the bitter taste as she gulped rather than swallowed.
Dirnec raised his eyes, smiling a little.
Game on.
The princess frowned suddenly, touching her forehead. "What..."
She turned to stare at him through suddenly vacant eyes, and Dirnec straightened up fully, his smile broadening.
"How does it feel?"
She shook her head hard. "I...I don't...dizzy..." The princess attempted to draw herself up and drifted sideways instead, catching hold of the cave wall. "I..."
Dirnec caught hold of her as she fell forward and thanked every ancestral spirit that there was no overseer around to see him holding a free person. "Maybe you should sit down."
She blinked hard, noting the shift from formal speech to the more casual dialect but unable to form the words to chastise him.
"You. Have to. Carry Me. To. Palace," she managed.
Dirnec grinned over her shoulder at Meruna, who had swum forward and was watching them intently. "I would, but..." He rattled the manacles with a shrug.
With a shaking hand, the princess touched the gem in the center of Dirnec's chest. The manacles opened and fell away and she seized him, digging her nails into his shoulders hard enough to draw blood.
"Now! Take me. Palace!"
Dirnec ran his hands along her arms, holding her, then smiled and pushed her away.
"No. No, I don't think I will."
She stared at him, then tried to lunge forward, only to be brought up short by the same manacles that had imprisoned Dirnec for so many years and which he'd slipped around her wrists.
"I'm.
Princess!"
"Yeah, it'll probably spark off a war when your clan sees you're down in the slaves' cave," Dirnec agreed as he swam behind her to free Meruna, who clung to him and buried her face in his shoulder. "But we'll be long gone by the time that happens. Your clan will free you and your marriage will
definitely be off now, and
we will get out and start a new life, without you."
The princess yanked wildly at the chains. "They'll. Recognize-"
"I doubt that," Dirnec said pleasantly as he and Meruna swam over to the exit. "This is a wedding, remember? Nobody knows everybody at these things. Oh, and don't worry about the effects of the polyp. They're rather unpleasant, but not fatal. You'll be fine in a week or so."
The princess tried to scream, but her tongue suddenly seemed too large for her mouth. Dirnec took one last look over his shoulder at her, then swam away to freedom with Meruna.