Chapter 16

Rory stopped. "What?"

Finley sighed. "This will be easier if I just show you."

At once Rory felt himself lifted up and grew dizzy as the scene dissolved away. He saw himself with Keltrain and a few other warriors fighting humans at the river. Rory threw spears at the humans and dove under when they approached. But no spear can match a gun. One of the humans fired a shot directly into Rory's chest. He sank into the river, blood rushing out of him and mixing with the black sludge from the factory. Rory glanced over and saw Finley with a solemn expression.

"Don't you see? Killing the humans won't bring me back. You will only get yourself killed."

"Then how do I stop them?" Rory asked. They were back at the oyster farm.

"Go to their king. Explain what's going on," said Finley.

"What? Go to their king?" Rory laughed sardonically. "The king is not going to want to talk to me."

"Rory of the Indigo clan, son of her majesty Queen Delriah, are you not royalty yourself?" Finley demanded.

"Yes, but-"

"Then royalty will meet with royalty and discuss a peace treaty. Thought that's what you princes were supposed to do." Finley paused. "Besides sleep all day and dine on mussels at whim."

Rory laughed.

"Shut up, merm. No human, much less the human king is going to speak with a merman," he said.

"Then maybe the king won't be speaking with a merman," Finley said. "Look, I have to go now. Just promise me that you won't go back to the river."

Rory looked at his friend. Finley was just as strong, as handsome, and as lively as he had been the day he died. He soaked up every single second of their time and knew that he would keep his promise.

"I do. I won't," he said.

The dream started to dissolve.

"Goodbye!" Rory shouted.

"Don't worry," said Finley. "I'll still be around."

Rory woke up and felt as though the earth had shifted beneath him, a great plate that had dislodged and was slowly making its way to another to crash violently against another. He had seen Finley again. Seen him and heard his voice and was so close he could have reached out and touched him. It was his same voice, the same inflection he used, the same cocky, self-confident tone Finley had always had, yet wise, like he was a venerable one trapped in the body of a youth. He even had the same mannerisms, the way he curled his tail when he was impatient or shrugged his left shoulder when he wanted to avoid a topic. It was him. It was Finley.

Rory felt like he had been giving a gift; an amazing, once-in-a-lifetime gift. Humbled by this power, whatever it was, Rory climbed out of the hammock and knelt on the sand. He grabbed a handful of it and threw some over his left shoulder, then his right, and then showered the rest over his head. He whispered the ancient language that honored the Ocean goddess, the sea gods, and every other god or goddess who he did not know. With tears in his eyes, he laughed.

Finley, smart, wise, brave Finley had visited him one last time to warn him. He knew what he had said was true. He knew that if his people were to attack the humans, they would all perish. Then there would be no one left to defend the ocean, no one to protect the roe and the venerable ones, and the river of sludge would simply keep flowing forever.

Rory swam out of his room. He needed the vast space of the open ocean, leagues away from the reef. He needed to think without interruption and in relative silence.

He spied a school of dolphins surging toward the surface.

But first...

He joined the dolphins in their jumping escapade. They leaped out of the water and zoomed around each other, playing and tagging and screeching their dolphin laugh. Rory's heart still felt like an iron anchor, weighed with the guilt and anguish over Finley's death. But Finley showed him that he needed to live. To celebrate the freedom and beauty of life. So, despite the heaviness in his tail, and grief winding around his heart, Rory flew upward. As he burst through the water, he felt the stinging cold of the wind on his arms and back and relished it. For a brief moment, raindrops pelted his skin before he plunged into the water again. When he sprang out of the water again, he managed to crow and gave all his sadness and pain to the ocean to hold, just for a little while.