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Romelle found them where they had fallen—Keith still unconscious and Orion gnawing through the ropes of netting entangling his father. At the sound of another mer approaching Orion had spun around and bared his teeth to Romelle, hissing as best he could.
She noticed his damaged tail and she noticed the pale color to Keith’s scales—the longer he had been unconscious the more drained he appeared.
<Hello> she clicked as softly as she could.
Orion just hissed back at her.
<I’m Romelle. I live here.> She pointed past the kelp beds. <There’s a small cave I call home. I can help you.>
<No!>
She took stock of exactly what might be wrong. After a pause she said <Wait here> and swam off.
Orion did not want to wait there but Keith was still tangled up completely. Orion had been cutting through what he could for the past hour or so but there were too many areas where it crisscrossed for him to have made much damage. At least he had freed his father’s face.
He kept a close eye on the strange mer—Romelle—when she reappeared. She had a pinkish-orange tail, looking somewhat tropical, and she had an accent he didn’t recognize. This time she had something in her hand, which she held out, palm open, for Orion. He didn’t want to swim to close.
<This is sharp enough to cut the ropes quickly.> She saw he wouldn’t approach her, so she put it onto the ground.
He grabbed it, realizing it was a shell that had been cut so that it had a serrated edge. He ran a finger carefully over it and then tried to cut one of the ropes, never fully turning his back to her. To his surprise it sliced almost impossibly easily and he chirruped out a high-pitched noise of excitement before checking himself.
<I have another one; I could help you.>
But he shook his head and got to work. She kept her distance, even when he turned his back. The nets still took a while—another half hour—but besides floating in the gentle current she didn’t move at all.
He still couldn’t move his father, though; that was still the biggest issue. He knew it wasn’t safe where they were.
<I can take you both back to my place.> She pointed again in the direction of her home.
She saw Orion pause and she knew how dangerous it was out in the wild for a guppy and an unconscious mer.
<Were you taken by the humans?> Her voice was soft.
Orion nodded.
<I was, too. But, like you, I got away.> She moved away some of her hair, which covered a great deal of her back. Down the back side of her neck, in an area where skin met scale, were terrible scars that looked as if something had tried to claw into her. <They took me back to a lab and did some tests, but I got away. I can help you and keep you safe until he wakes up.>
<My dad.>
<Until your dad wakes up.>
She was delighted that Orion had spoken; it hopefully meant he would come back with her, to safety.
He allowed her to get close and to pull Keith along. He helped the little he could, but Romelle was stronger than she looked, and her cave was not far. She helped them both settle in and Keith was looking worse than he had even half an hour before.
<Is he going to be okay?> Orion did nothing to hide the fear in his voice.
Romelle nodded. <I can go get him some medicine. Stay here, where it’s safe.>
Orion cuddled up against Keith, pulling one of Keith’s arms around him, and laid his head against his father’s chest. He listened to his heart beat, prepared to stay awake until Romelle returned. But sleep dragged Orion down—it had been a long, terrifying day for the little guppy—and soon he was out.
…
Keith woke to the face of a stranger. He panicked, throwing his tail up so as to push her away, and scanning for Orion. She wasn’t hurt when he tossed her away, seemingly prepared, but he also managed to dislodge Orion, who had cuddled up against him, arms wrapped around as much they could.
He was asleep, and luckily he stayed asleep as Keith scooped him back in.
<Who are you? Where are we?>
Romelle explained to him and then asked if she could check the rest of his wounds. She had used an elixir to help him recover from whatever the humans had injected him with. He would have recovered on his own, but it would have taken quite a long time and his health would never quite recover if the injection had been allowed to run its full course.
<I need to find my mate and my daughter> he told her after he decided she could be trusted. <Hopefully they stuck to the plan. But I don’t know where we are right now and I don’t know how to get there.>
<I can help. I think it’s time I moved as well. I hadn’t realized the humans had returned to this area.>
She got to where Orion had clawed into him in order to hold on. The scratches stung a bit when she pressed medicine to them gently. She paused, hard, as she worked.
And then she met his gaze and pulled his free hand towards the wounds and placed it over them. They were partly on his belly and partly on the area where his tail scales met his waist.
He looked at her, confused.
She pressed his hand gently into the area, keeping her eyes locked on his.
And then his eyes widened when he felt what she had.
To be continued… and finished! The final installment of Safer Waters will drop in two days.