Kidnapped
A long time later, you lie beside Hermakles, wrapped in his arms: soft purple seaweed grows on the coral near the Smoking Hole. It makes a warm, soft bed for you to lie upon, and it made a warm soft bed for- other things. . .
You turn and glance at Hermakles, who holds you close in his arms; you lie with your head pillowed upon his broad rock-hard muscular chest. That isn’t all about him that is rock hard, you muse to yourself with a giggle.
You heave a sigh and cuddle closer to him, drifting off to sleep.
#
You awake with a start, feeling cold, your head resting on nothing; you almost fall over as you seek instinctively for the warm body you fell asleep against.
Night has fallen: the reef is dark, the water is cold. You sit up and look around worriedly. “Hermakles?” you call. “Hermakles, where are you?!”
The distant whisper of the tide is your only response.
You push yourself up and swim up out of the small hole at the edge of the Smoking Hole. You look around desperately, but there is no one to be seen: you are alone. Hermakles abandoned you while you slept.
You look around again and shiver: the reef at night seems a cold dark place; a dim silver glow of moonlight is barely enough to illuminate the outline of the coral stacks, to show that there is nothing moving now, where before everything had been a constant kaleidoscope of motion. “Hello?”you call. “Is there anyone there? Hello?!”
Again, no answer comes.
You look around once more, and you start to turn away, then stop when you see a lone merman swimming toward you. For a moment your heart leaps, thinking it is Hermakles come back to you, then you realize that this can not be him: this merman is shorter and sleeker than the rough hard merman you spent the night with.
As he comes closer, you see that he is a blue-scaled dark-haired merman with narrow red eyes. He does look sleek; his scales are polished to a bright sheen, and his bearing is light and easy and confident, as if he owns everything he sees.
The strange merman swims to a halt a little ways form you and glares at you angrily. “Where is he?” the strange merman demands.
“Who?” you ask, bewildered.
“Hermakles!” he snaps.
“I don’t know,” you reply sadly.
He stares at you, then his eyes widen with realization as he puts the pieces together. “He left you behind, didn’t he?” he says.
Despondent, you nod silently.
“He has a habit of doing that,” the strange merman says.. “I am Skander,” he says with a nod. “Hermakles owes me a lot,” he adds , a little sullenly. “he keeps leaving behind things for me, but it’s never enough to settle the debt.” He smiles at you wickedly. “But you’ll do!”
You stare at him, confused. “What do you mean?” you ask. “I’ll do for what-MMPH!” You never even heard the second merman swimming up behind you: he slaps his hand across your lips, cutting off your speech.
With his free hand, the burly merman behind you drags your hands together behind your back and holds them there while he wraps a length of seaweed rope around your wrists.
Skander watches as his henchman ties you up, binding your hands to your tail so you cannot swim. “Bring her along, Dimakles,” he says with a negligent gesture, then turns and swims away.
Written by J-B-Hickock on 26 December 2014