22. Part of His World

22

PART OF HIS WORLD

PACARI

T he deeper we get, the more worried I get. Teresa keeps insisting she's fine.

While I knew she'd have no problem breathing, that's not the only difficulty humans face in the depths. Past the depth of a shark, they already face risks from pressure.

But Teresa triggered a hardening of the magic stored within me. With her wish, she bonded us. In truth, there are not many yacunayi left. I spent much of my youth alone, until I ran into an elder who informed me much of what I know now. He said several hundred years ago, those of our people who did not die by starvation went into hiding. There was a time when it was a danger to seek out the magic necessary to our survival. He told me many things .

But he did not tell me it was possible for our people to produce such hardened pearls should our pleasure be overfilled. He did not tell me what to expect of the magic thence created.

"You really don't feel anything? I will be despondent should you implode," I grumble, holding her tight as I swim us further downwards.

"The biggest problem I'm having is that it takes so long to get down there. You're getting all morose and worried. But I feel fine. I've hurt my ears in the deep end of a pool before and I haven't felt anything like that this whole time. And we're like a scary amount of deep into the ocean now."

"Are you scared?" I ask, not hearing it in her voice.

"No, not with you," she says simply, as if it's obvious.

My heart flips again. I kiss her neck as I bring us deeper and deeper.She shivers suddenly, so I pull her close.

"This must be what it's like to be in space," she says, her voice full of awe.

In some ways, maybe it does look like space, especially with so much krill dotting the waters, still visible with the sparse light that make it this deep. They're hard to make out because of their dark coloring, but many of the animals down here swim only a few dozen feet from us—one massive, majestic body included .

"It's so empty here," Teresa says, confirming that she can't see well.

"There's a whale to our right," I tell her.

She gasps and turns, searching carefully. When it sings, she squeals, grabbing at my shoulders and spinning to look at me.

"Oh my god, that's so loud! That's a whale!" she exclaims.

"A blue whale," I tell her, observing the animal's extreme size.

"Isn't that like a really big whale? Is that the biggest whale? That's a—it's so—Pacari, I can barely see all of it and it's so massive!"

"Yes," I laugh. "Bigger than fifteen of me laid in a row. They come here for the krill, migrating north from their breeding grounds in the south."

She's adorable like this. I breathe in her energy, the vividness of her expressions, the patter of her heart. Many different whales travel these waters. This one is late, usually blue whales are all gone by the end of spring. The gentle giants are a wonder even to me, but I am anxious to show Teresa my greatest pride. When she has taken her fill of the poorly lit blue whale, I pull her deeper and deeper, closer to the crepuscular waters that bear my garden.

As we descend, I know the thing to look out for, other than pressure, is the drop in temperature. Her skin is much hotter than the water around us, but chilly to the touch.

"Are you cold?" I ask.

"Maybe a little," she answers, her body shivering.

My body shivers, too, but it's much more efficient than what humans do. I cross one arm over her chest, pull her fingers so they're flush with her skin, encourage her to pull her legs close as well. Then, I begin to vibrate as we continue to swim. Though we are less hydrodynamic, now the vibrations make it easier to swim through the fast moving water around us. The vibrations heat the water around us as well, and now we are in a bubble of warmth that should keep her safe until we get to the garden.

I know she will love it, for the way she coos and squeals over each new animal as it gets close enough for her to see.

"You weren't kidding about this being a deep sea thing, huh," she says as the light fades faster and faster.

"No," I answer. "Despite the difficulty, it's the safest place for the enclosure. Humans never come down here."

She laughs darkly. "We're the only thing you have to be worried about?"

"The Abyssal Ones keep to themselves. Except for Cirro—"

"Your friend."

"Yes, so he's unlikely to tear it apart or snack on its creatures. Besides, he prefers bigger game."

She shudders, but I do not think it is from the cold. I will not elaborate on what he eats, it will only distress her and have her asking questions about who the Abyssal Ones are and if she is in danger. But she is not when she is with me.

Finally, I see it, nestled into a mineral deposit. There is a vent nearby—another benefit to this part of the abyss. One of the warm spots. All around us, there are little blips of life that shine in the darkness.

"You guys having a rave down here?" she laughs, teeth chattering slightly. "Some of these fish look like they've been hooked up to LEDs. Gamers would salivate over some of these set ups. Zephyr? They'd lose their shit."

"It's dangerous enough to bring you here, and… I do not want to share with them what I share with you."

"Oh," she says. "Well. You don't have to tell me twice."

As we get close to the opening, she gasps when the light of my glow illuminates the rock.

"Is that—gold?"

"Among other minerals," I tell her. "The vents push them out and they settle in the area once they cool. "

"Ah!" she squeaks.

I pull her close in alarm, worried that she's seen some predator I missed. Unlikely, considering I can see so much more down here than she can, but possible.

"Oh my god, look at them, they're so small!" she says, her voice high but quiet.

I follow her finger to the octopus nursery that has been visible to me for quite some time. Countless mothers no bigger than Teresa's hands burrow themselves in the crevices of rock encasing my garden. They look like tentacle-wrapped pearls.

"Why are they curled up like that?" she asks.

"They're brooding. Protecting their embryos to make sure the eggs hatch well," I tell her. "It's actually why I chose this area for my garden. At first, I would help take care of the eggs that were abandoned, or keep predators away. Then every now and then I would find a hurt life form and nurse it back to health. I needed somewhere to keep it, and because the thermal vents act as a hot spring to this area, it makes for a perfect sanctuary. Or it did. The vent died out recently, and we lost a lot of the life here—until I made my deal with the Lantern Witch."

"So this warmth…" she pauses. "That's magic?"

I nod. "I'm not sure it's enough. You can't see it, but there's not as many here as there were only a week ago. Though I collected what magic I could as fast as possible, it just wasn't enough to fully restore the ecosystem. It's why I still have to work for the witch."

Teresa turns her head towards me. She can't see me too well in these depths, but I can see her. Her expression is… awe-filled.

"You're amazing, do you know that?" she says before pressing a kiss to my lips.

I close my eyes, let her lips sit against mine, marveling in the feel of her here, only just outside my favorite place in the whole world. Once again, words catch in my throat as I find myself unable to vocalize the way she makes me feel. Warmth and peace flood my veins, and I know nothing will ever feel more right than being with her.

I shake my head.

"All of them are amazing, look at them. The anemones, the shrimp, the coral, even the plants—every one of them working in concert with the beings around them. Even when they die, their lives go on to fuel the rest of the ecosystem. Everything has its place, here."

"So cute," she bubbles under her breath.

I flush, grip the rock at the entrance to the grotto, and pull her in.

"We can visit them later. I have to show you what I've been working on," I tell her.

No longer needing to swim at faster speeds, there's no reason to keep holding her at my front—except that I never want to stop touching her. Her body is much more relaxed now, her legs kicking in time with but not pressed closed to mine. Her hand rests on mine at her waist. I push us through the rocky entrance until we are at the center of the grotto. Small little gasps escape her as she catches sight of random colors as some of the fish swim across the entryway.

And then, finally we are in the center of the grotto, surrounded on all sides by exquisite bioluminescence. To see it thriving so quickly after the reinstallation of the magic that keeps it running fills me with peace.

At last, Teresa is so in awe that she pushes herself off of me to explore. She follows a vampire squid, mystified by the little glowing blue lines at the end of its red tentacles. I laugh to myself that this is the first animal she goes after, considering they are unlike most cephalopods. There's a certain kinship between us, for vampire squids mate again and again. The pearl octopus scattered across the rock outside the grotto mate once, produce their eggs, protect them, and die. As do most cephalopods, which is why the vampire squid is so unique.

"Its eyes are so cute," she says.

"Its eyes?" I repeat, looking it over.

"The little blue dots?"

I laugh. "No, those are just dots on its mantle. You don't think it looks scary?"

She shakes her head, looks back at me in confusion.

"It's supposed to look like eyes and teeth, I think," I say.

To be honest, I also think it's cute, but I can see the entire body, unlike her. She laughs, getting distracted by a brilliant bright blue cloud from against the wall.

"What is that!" she squeals.

"A grumpy flytrap anemone sending some mucus your way," I laugh.

"Mucus?" she squeals. "The glowy blue stuff?"

"You heard me," I chuckle.

She turns away from the anemone only to swim close to a small forest of soft corals, whose light shifts up and down the polyps.

"Gamer heaven," she mutters. "I wish I could show Zeph."

Once her enchantment with the coral has lessened, she moves on to the umbellula, long red invertebrates with a cluster of tentacles and polyps at the end of a thin white stalk that glow with green stripes.

And then a red-crown jellyfish flashes blue across its bell in a panic as a shrimp crawls up its tentacles in search of food. Teresa looks at the display in awe, her eyes shifting between me and the jellyfish. She spins around as best as she can to look at it all, but humans are not the best swimmers. I glide over to her, pull her into my arms.

"Care to dance?" I ask.

"Always," she says, beaming wide.