2. 20,000 Lattes Near the Sea

CHAPTER TWO

20,000 LATTES NEAR THE SEA

The Present: Trick inside Bean There, Froth That Cafe, Sausalito

On his better days, Trick liked to pretend that it wasn’t his fault. He’d been adopted by a pack of werewolves, technically it was all downhill from there. Literally , since the pack lived at the top of a very steep hill.

Trick forced himself to remember that he lived there with them. No longer footloose and fancy free (sleeping each night in the back of his old car). Now Trick resided in an actual room. In an actual house. Trick the dratsie and a pack of werewolves, together. And one very powerful magistar. And occasionally a kitsune drag queen named Mana. And most often a merman named Marvin.

Which was where the real problem lay. Trick liked Marvin a lot. But he had serious issues with mermen.

It was weird that years later, decades even, he was somehow full circle in another small town, on another coast, with another merman in his life. Although this one didn’t want to screw him silly at the slightest opportunity. Marvin had Alec for that.

So far as strange circumstances and terrible situations that were entirely his own fault were concerned, this was probably one of the better ones. Merman notwithstanding.

It had all started when one of those werewolves had plonked himself down at a corner table and began studying in Trick’s café, Bean There, Froth That. Yes, werewolves study. And no, Trick didn’t own the cafe, but it was his territory. Otters were territorial about transitional social spaces.

Then, because Colin was there, Judd started showing up. Wherever Judd went, his fellow enforcer, Kevin, inevitably followed. Once the two enforcers were around, well, the Alpha had to come check out what was drawing them regularly to the local cafe on the waterfront. Then the Beta popped in, and then Max, all powerful Beta-mate.

Actually Max had been one of the first to frequent the Bean, but at the time Trick thought he was just one of the world’s sexiest human joggers. Trick would never have guessed that Max was part of a pack. No, Max was a godling – gifted unto spandex and gay men. But because Trick brewed a mean coffee and was willing to cater to Max’s ridiculous sweet tooth, the magistar started making regular stops at the Bean, after his morning run.

All of which is to say, eventually and inevitably all of the San Andreas pack showed up in Trick’s cafe including the Alpha-mate, Marvin the merman.

That was when things got fishy. Because Trick might not be accustomed to werewolves but he was overly comfortable around mermen. And he genuinely liked Marvin. Marvin was a hoot and a half. He had a fantastic wardrobe and killer style for a man who should be more comfortable in scales than sequins.

Then, because they were around and causing a ruckus, and Trick was naturally attracted to ruckuses, Trick got involved with the pack. And because they were werewolves, they then got involved in his life. Suddenly there were bear shifter policemen, money laundry (yes, laundry, not laundering) investigations, werewolf country music singers with sinister agendas, and one incredibly gorgeous gold-spangled jacket.

And Trick found himself diving into the ocean, with Marvin the merman, on the tail of some selkie bad guys with offshore accounts and mafia connections.

As you do.

Especially if you’re Trick.

Ultimately, because the werewolf pack found out that he was sleeping in his car, and they did not like that idea, Trick ended up living with them whether he liked it or not.

Now Marvin, whenever he wasn’t working but his Alpha-mate was (which seemed to be an inordinate amount of the time), had installed himself amongst the regulars at Trick’s cafe, just as if he’d always been there.

Today he was occupying the front table, in the big window, wearing a tight cropped aqua t-shirt with a lettuce hem and “princess” scrawled across the front in glitter. He had on baggy ripped low-slung acid-washed jeans, and approximately four hundred jelly bracelets, purple glitter platform jelly shoes with a floating fish scape in the soles, elaborate teal and turquoise eye makeup (which brought out his eyes), and pale purple glittery lip gloss. He looked fantastic.

Trick, of course, had dressed to complement. They often coordinated their outfits these days. Marvin had given Trick full access to his wardrobe. They were about the same size. Trick was wearing the same makeup, a ribbed lavender bodysuit with oversized white cargo pants, rainbow laced turquoise boots, and a pair of silver glitter earrings, one of which said “queen” and the other “bitch.” And his apron, of course.

The Bean was buzzing with activity, just as Trick liked it. He was feeling particularly twirly, since someone had put retro stylings on the jukebox. (Okay, it was Trick, but he liked to pretend he had a mystic musical benefactor with fantastic taste.)

The bell chimed as a very large personage entered Trick’s cafe. At six foot ten, he automatically ducked his head as he entered, giving him the aura of gentlemanly behavior. Deputy Kettil had arrived.

The bear shifter looked annoyed and surprised to find Trick behind the counter. Even though Trick was the main barista and was always behind the counter.

At one time Trick had doubted Deputy Kettil’s sexuality because his closet was so deep it was practically a walk-in. It probably housed Turkish delight instead of mothballs. Trick didn’t doubt anymore. The big man’s eyes were always laser-focused on Trick, hot and interested. Trick was all too familiar with that expression. The cop had been a problem for Trick from the get-go. He was protective, repressed, and clearly liked Trick a lot. Unfortunately, Trick had a weakness for all those things in a man. He loved the attention, too. Of course he did. But Kettil was still a cop and Trick was, technically, illegal, not to mention he came by his hatred of cops honestly. Most importantly, a hot pot of Trick’s spice and fabulousness didn’t do closets, even if it was big enough to fit Marvin’s whole wardrobe.

A man couldn’t hide his sexuality and date Trick. He shuddered to even contemplate walking around town next to an off-duty Deputy Kettil. Apart from the incongruity in their sizes, the act of them being out on a date together would instantly render Kettil’s closet null and void.

Trick may not take himself seriously, but he expected his lovers to at least try to honor his existence, as rarely as this lasted, and as poor as his track record may be.

That too wasn’t his fault. Trick suffered from Sato-comparison-itis. The thing he missed most (not that Trick would ever admit to missing anything about Sato at all, of course! ) was the intensity of focus. Sato’s eyes on him, Sato’s care over him. Sato had always looked at him like he was the greatest thing ever. No matter what he wore. No matter what he said. No matter how much trouble he got into.

“Where’s your better half?” asked Trick. Technically, the bear shifter had a partner on the force, but he always seemed to have shaken himself loose when the time came to get coffee.

No response from the deputy, just a hard stare.

Trick tried again. “Hellllooooo there, officer, what can I do you for today?”

Deputy Kettil blushed becomingly.

“You never stop, do you?” he growled in a tone guaranteed to cause Trick to shiver slightly, in a good way. Trick reminded himself that he wasn’t up for coaching a three-hundred- pound slab of yummy through a sexual identity crisis.

“I was born with a full head of hair, an innate love of oysters, and no sense of shame whatsoever.”

“A hardened flirt from the get-go?”

“Hardened indeed. So, Deputy Snookums, you feeling pot or black this morning?”

“What?” grumbled the bear shifter.

Trick sighed. The man had no sense of humor. “A whole pot of black coffee for you today or just your usual thimbleful of depression?”

Deputy Kettil always studiously avoided the shifter side of the menu for some unknown reason and simply got a shot of espresso when he got anything at all. Trick was confused by this. And a little hurt. After all, the shifter’s menu was where his true genius lay. There was a rosemary, honey, and lemon toddy with a salmon oil float that was specifically designed with bear shifters in mind. Maybe Trick had even been thinking about Kettil when he invented it.

Then again, maybe the bear shifter really wanted an excuse to come into The Bean, growl at Trick, order a drink he hated, and leave. Who was Trick to judge what bear shifters did for fun?

“Just a shot of espresso and none of your nonsense.”

“You’re no fun.”

“You’re only just now figuring that out?”

Trick teased the bear out of habit; he wasn’t sold on Deputy Kettil. Even if Kettil was out, policemen were a difficult dating proposition for a dratsie with a devoutly criminal family and a record including trumped-up charges from corrupt cops.

Trick wrinkled his nose and reached for the bean. “It’s Kona today.”

Deputy Kettil grunted approval, Hawaiian was his favorite.

Trick liked them too, but he didn’t admit to it. Hawaii was a place he’d never visited but deeply resented. Hawaii had been the start of the end. Hawaii meant loss. Wasn’t the beans’ fault where they came from, but he always specified Kona because saying Hawaii made him angry. Also, Kona indicated that lovely chocolatey note and he needed everyone to be educated about bean origin flavor profiles. It was a barista’s moral imperative.

Kettil began examining the pastry case.

Trick plonked down the espresso.

Kettil shot it down. Winced.

Trick tilted his head at the case. “You want something more ? Don’t strain yourself.”

“That salmon?”

Trick grinned big and batted his lashes. “Salmon sarriette with capers and cream cheese.”

A curt nod. “To go, please.”

“Look at you, branching out. So brave.”

Kettil glared at him.

“You want it warmed?”

“No, thank you.”

“So polite.” Trick popped the pastry into a paper baggie.

The bear turned and walked out without another word.

“Bye bye now,” trilled Trick at his massive back.

Trick caught Marvin turning to watch Kettil leave. The merman had observed the entire interchange with interest.

Trick felt suddenly exhausted. He wished he had better taste and a different type.

Floyd, who was so much a part of the cafe furniture that Trick forgot he existed half the time, said, “Deputy Kettil seems interested in you, kid. You gonna tap that?”

“Floyd! Language! How old do you think you are?” Varyenite, sitting at the back, waved a silver-and-amber-bedecked hand at Floyd, who was at least eighty years old if he was a day. She had a grey mohawk and ran the tarot, incense, and crystal shop three doors down because, as she put it, she “went woo and lesbian in the eighties and saw absolutely no reason to correct for a lifetime of spiritual growth.” She came to Trick’s cafe every morning for his turmeric, citron, and cayenne herbal restorative. She got a shot of espresso in it, though, and her pastry preference was an old-fashioned doughnut because, as she reminded Trick often, she lived the stereotype but wasn’t defined by it.

“So?” Varyenite turned sharp eyes onto Trick, “ are you going to tap that?”

Trick began wiping down the espresso machine in annoyance. “I don’t know. He’s a bear shifter. He’s a cop. He’s closeted.”

“Come to think of it, we’ve never really seen you date, have we?” Varyenite nibbled at the extra-glazed crunchy edge of her doughnut.

Floyd’s knitting needles clacked with interest. “You don’t date, kid?

Trick glared at his two most loyal customers. “I’ve been known to. But I’m more of a catch-and-release type.” Easier to leave them first.

Marvin, of course, entered the conversation at that juncture. “Oh thank goodness, I knew you were a fabulous slut!”

Trick blew kisses at him. “Honored, of course.”

Floyd squinted his eyes behind his thick specs in understanding. “Organ focused, just not the heart?”

“Floyd, really!” said Varyenite, but only because she felt she ought.

Trick grinned. “What can I say, the flesh is willing but the spirit is weak.”

“Burned?” suggested Varyenite, perceptively.

Trick let out a dramatic sigh. “Badly. Heart and soul shattered into a million opalescent pieces and scattered all over the Mississippi Delta, like Louisiana’s Osiris.”

Varyenite nodded sagely. “Dildo origin story.”

Trick made victory fingers at her understanding of Egyptian mythology.

“So are you gonna catch and release the bear?” Floyd was relentless. He was kept alive on a diet of cappuccinos and other people’s business.

“I’m not sure he would know what to do with me.” Trick gestured at his own slender frame then spun like he was on an ice rink. “ This is not intro-level gay.”

“The boy has a point,” said Floyd to Varyenite.

“The boy is all points and rainbow facets,” she replied, brushing crumbs off her fingertips and standing up. “See you tomorrow, gentleman, when no doubt nothing will have changed.”

Marvin stood as well. “Well this has been an enlightening morning but sadly, I too must work today.” Marvin worked as an adjunct to the Coast Guard, of all things. He was currently half occupied with collecting remains in conjunction with a mass murder investigation, and half occupied trying to persuade the Coast Guard that, as their primary submersible contract worker, he should be allowed to wear a robe instead of a uniform. One that he was designing of course, modeled after a boxer’s robe, only with more sparkle.

The Coast Guard was very unsure about the pugilist robe scheme, but they loved what Marvin could do for them once he was in the water. Unlike any other sea shifter, Marvin retained his ability for human vocal communication, and that was invaluable. He was, despite everything, remarkably good at his job – mostly search, rescue, and salvage (not murder). So the Coast Guard was disposed to put up with Marvin, his sparkles, and his eccentricities. So far, though, no robe.

Marvin held out hope.

Marvin was gathering up his mock-croc shoulder bag, teal of course, when suddenly he caught sight of someone out on the sidewalk, and pivoted slowly to track them as they came into the cafe.

Trick looked up, alert because Marvin was. At the tinkling bell he expected to see one of the pack or a very handsome stranger with loads of muscles.

Instead, it was a stunningly beautiful woman. Woman being the operative word. Trick could appreciate female beauty, of course he could, but he’d never known Marvin to give any woman a second glance – who wasn’t friend or family. This one was neither.

In fact, she seemed a stranger to the Bay Area. She was wearing impractical shoes and a skirt suit. Not a tourist but a professional. No one ever came to Sausalito on business . Trick couldn’t remember the last time he’d even seen a skirt suit in person.

Marvin looked at her hard for a long moment.

“Oh, hell no ,” he said, and then promptly dashed out of the cafe.

“Rude!” said the woman, before approaching Trick’s counter. She flicked a lock of salt-crusted hair behind her shoulder with one webbed hand. She had a length of black pearls coiled around her wrist.

Great, first Deputy Kettil and now… mermaids. And Trick had woken up in such a good mood that morning.

The Present: Sato, who hates politics, dealing with mermaid politicians

The grand assembly halls of the True Deep are nothing like a human might expect, had any two-legged ever been allowed to visit. Which they most definitely had not.

They are not beautiful. There are no sculptures. There are no crystal hallways to swim through, decorated with pearls and seashells. They are pretty in their bioluminescence, the way the lantern fish drift throughout, lighting the way. The assembly halls are made up of anemone gardens and kelp forests, they have no floors or ceilings, nothing is intentionally built or decorated.

The Deep is merely an idea, a designated temporary sea-zone claimed by the Soteria while they conspire and plan, before they move on.

What is beautiful about the Deep is the merfolk who inhabit it. They need no grand architectural gestures to attract the minds of men. They never have. There is nothing the land could produce more stunning than an average mermaid.

And they know it.

The mermen are beautiful too.

But no one cares about them.

The mermaids are the pearls that truly decorate the Deep. It matters not what surrounds them because few can look away. The stunning colors of their tails, the delicate see-through fins, the perfect symmetry in faces, the beautiful luster patterns on some and the iridescent skin on others. Sirens indeed.

Sato Daiki thought it was a pity, since it was all wasted on him. He kind of, just a little bit hated them for all of it.

Irony that he, one of the few males in attendance, really didn’t want to be there. He suffered the whims of the Soteria’s current because occasionally it took him to land. To his hunting grounds. Away from the deep.

He had traded his freedom for opportunity. But it meant all too often he was trapped in the middle of the ocean by bureaucracy.

“How much longer?” he signed at Meymey, hiding his hands behind his dorsal fin.

Meymey only flicked him to stay still and silent. The gesture was annoying and offensive.

A lull in debate and his sister swam before the council and took up position. Among her peers, she looked particularly young.

“Oh I see, our little Paralia wishes to speak, how cute,” said the Ogress.

“The humans are having a gathering.” Meymey started in on her speech without acknowledging the older member.

Only to be immediately interrupted by the Anax. “The humans can never not have gatherings, there are so many of them. What matters this particular one to us?”

“It is around a topic of great interest to the merfolk,” insisted Meymey.

“What do they know of things that interest us?” the Anax persisted.

Meymey puffed out her cheeks, frustrated. She was the youngest there and Sato wondered, not for the first time, how his mother had managed to get her into such a powerful position.

“Let the child sing.” That was the Klepsydra. From what Sato had deduced, she was not exactly allied with his mother’s pod but she wasn’t in opposition either. She did not always vote alongside his sister, and was probably weighing in at this instance simply to keep things moving. She was, after all, the official timekeeper.

Meymey pressed on. “It is a gathering around something called marine biology .”

“They have those all the time.” The Anax was fierce and barbed always. “This is nothing new or special. Perhaps you do not realize because you are so young.” She had a temper that could boil water. Sato did not like her.

“This one will be focused on the breeding and procreation of sea creatures and something the humans call population statistics.” Meymey always swam her intended current firmly, fighting for her voice and vote.

The other four members of the Soteria were suddenly interested in what she had to say.

“ Breeding? Are you certain?” That was the Sibyl speaking, the oldest of the Soteria and the only one among them approaching infertility and obsolescence.

Meymey fluttered her hands in mermaid agreement. “And all matters connected to it.”

“But for fish.”

“And sea mammals,” pressed Meymey. “Are merfolk not mammals of the sea?”

“We are people of the sea. We do not behave the same way.”

Especially not around breeding, thought Sato. He had grown, during his time living among humans, to believe that merfolk had a truly impractical way of perpetuating their species. Mermaids having to hunt down and fuck human males once a month. This was something that required migration, like salmon swimming upstream, only mermaids swam into a two-legged form and beached themselves in pursuit of sex. Since, aside from vangill, all mermen were sterile, a whole other species had been unwittingly recruited to participate. There simply weren’t enough vangill to go around. It was a system that codified the outcast state of mermen and rejected mermaids who couldn’t breed as useless. It was unpleasant. Sato often felt merfolk deserved to die out. Perpetuating the species was mean-spirited and complicated. Why bother?

But it was all the ruling mermaids cared about.

Meymey made her big political play then. “I should attend this gathering openly as Paralia of the Deep.”

“Send a merman in your stead.” The Anax looked pointedly at Sato.

He blinked slowly back at her. He would like that. He could hunt for Patrick untroubled by mermaids and their agenda.

Meymey glanced at him.

Sato twitched his tail in a faintly accepting way.

“Mermen do not care enough for our concerns around this matter, as a species,” she replied. She wanted to go herself. It was her prerogative. And she was right, Sato didn’t care.

“Of course they do not, they are too stupid to care.” The Anax sneered at Sato.

Sato’s face did not change. He was happy to be thought stupid and unsympathetic. The faces of the four other vangill, each floating close to his respective Soteria, also did not change. They had all heard it many times before. Although only Sato played dull-witted and uncaring on purpose. He had a reputation for violence and he preferred it that way.

“Then send a spy or envoy. A selkie or a dratsie should do.” That was the Ogress. Meymey may play for a different political camp, but she was still a mermaid and should not be risked or sullied when others might do the dirty job of actually having to talk with humans.

“You wish me to explain to an outsider the full scope of our concerns on this matter?”

“Of course not!”

“Then how would they know what information to look for?” Meymey remained calm and patient, belying her age. The others did not liaise with the transitional shifter species as much as the Paralia. And those like the selkie and the dratsie were intentionally kept in ignorance on the full scope of merfolk population decrease. Other water shifters could not be allowed to realize how dire their numbers, or the mermaids would lose control of the sea.

So far as Sato could gather, after too many years in and out of these damn assemblies, merfolk population numbers were not just declining, but drastically reduced. The mermaids were, at this point, justifiably worried that within three or four generations there would, in fact, simply be no more sea people at all.

Sato was bored by the whole crisis.

“You’re saying this is a mermaid’s job and only she can do it?”

Meymey fluttered her hands again. “I’m saying this is the Paralia’s job. Is it not in my mandate to act as ambassador to the dry world above?”

“You are to be a diplomat to the humans and land-bound shifters when absolutely necessary and when called upon by their governing bodies to represent the oceans. And you are to maintain contact with those sea folk who transition between land and shore. But to walk amongst them yourself ? To talk with humans one-on-one, not for breeding but for actual communication? To seek counsel with them? Surely that is excessive exposure. Surely that is too much to ask. Especially of one so young as you.” The Sibyl sounded nice. She sounded like she was genuinely concerned for innocent little Meymey’s well-being. She was being patronizing.

Sato wholly distrusted the Sibyl. Possibly more than any of the other Soteria. She was the only one who had never tried to sleep with him. That was a relief but also why he distrusted her. Mermaids always wanted sex with vangill. They were, after all, the only potent mermen.

Meymey’s tail stiffened at the implied incompetence. “There is no one better. Plus I will have Sato for protection. He will keep me safe.”

Sato wished she hadn’t mentioned him. She had reminded them that he was special, that he was the best, and that they had never had him.

“Your brother with the magic spurs, how could we ever forget.” The Ogress’s tongue was sharper than Sato’s spurs.

Sato knew for a fact she fucked her own vangill regularly, but no child had resulted. Frankly, he knew way too much about the sex lives of the five Soteria of the Deep. It was annoying for a man of his inclination.

“There’s a rumor he prefers two legs over tails in all things,” shot back the Anax.

Meymey jumped to Sato’s defense. “There’s a rumor you insult my brother because he doesn’t want to breed you .”

Shocked silence descended at that. The Ogress’s vangill coiled his tail slightly, side-eyeing Sato.

Sato ever so subtly let the tips his spurs show, like huge curved deadly teeth down the length of both forearms. His control had only gotten better over the years. He suspected he was always ready to fight these days. He had probably been that way from the moment Patrick left him behind. His spurs lurked in the shallows of his own flesh, easy to access, ready to deploy.

Even more subtly, the other four vangill all backed down. Hovered a little higher in the water, tails forcefully relaxed.

The mermaids may jockey constantly for power and position, alliances may shift as easily and as often as the tides. But the five vangill of the Deep knew which one of them would win a fight, without ever having to actually duke it out. They also all knew that Sato Daiki never stopped training. That his spurs were not just instinct, they were practiced. He went to land regularly. Ran the beaches, interfaced with humans, practiced with their lifeguards, and participated in their athletic competitions. He did strange things in the sand like volleyball, matkot, and ssireum. Occasionally he did very strange things to the sand, like punching it or running through it.

There were endless rumors around Sato Daiki and what he did when the Soteria were not meeting. When the ladies were back with their home pods or on rotation visiting their constituents. He led tuna hunts, and was known to go up against whitetips, makos, and even the occasional bull shark just for the thrill of it. Some even claimed he did not fuck mermaids because he got his sexual thrills from killing. That his unnatural bent was not human women but blood.

Sato let all the rumors flow, cultivated them even. Perhaps he did find solace in shark-infested waters, in using his spurs to kill more often than other vangill. He needed to use them. He’d been frozen in time by those spurs, adolescent and sullen, lost Patrick because of them. He used them to fight the world because of what those spurs had cost him. One dratsie, paid pound by pound in fish flesh. The sea and its inhabitants owed him that much.

Eventually, too long, Sato felt, the Soteria voted.

Meymey got her wish, three to two.

“I will recruit a diplomatic pod and…” Meymey cut herself short, eyes suddenly focused on the Klepsydra’s daughter, who was only present because she was still a minor and must stay close to her mother.

“Klepsydra, your child, she is…?”

Sato followed her focus. “Bleeding,” he snapped out, sharp and annoyed.

“Congratulations!” said the Sibyl brightly.

The Klepsydra looked indulgent. “She has begun her first courses.”

“She should be on land!” sang out Sato, a near shriek.

“Well, yes, but we had a meeting.” The Klepsydra was dismissive.

Sato had already turned to scan the surrounding waters. How long had she been bleeding freely? How far did her trail extend? What waters had she swum through to get here?

Behind him there was arguing.

In front of him there was the speck of something familiar moving through the water fast, a shark.

Of course there was.

Some distance away but Sato knew a shark when he saw one. It was no doubt coming toward them in that open-jawed inevitable way that was feeding frenzy from having scented blood in the water .

Sato showed his teeth at the threat, pointed like the shark’s. Good, he was bored.

His spurs were already out.

He spared a glance to his sister. “Get away from the others. Go to that cave where we stopped for lunch on the way here. I’ll meet you there.”

She did not argue or talk back. Not under these circumstances.

Sato assumed the other vangill would see to their charges but he glared at the Klepsydra’s merman. “You’re an idiot.”

One of the other vangill agreed with him. “Get her daughter to land now.”

“But she’s too?—”

“You risked all the Soteria!”

Sato ignored their bickering and braced for the shark attack.

The best thing about sharks was how stupid they were.

The thing came in and at Sato, because Sato stayed ostentatiously in its way. It didn’t know whose blood, only that there was blood. Its mouth was wide, all those rows of teeth on display, deadly and hungry and intent.

Sato admired the beautiful horror of it, but also wished the sea would occasionally offer up some novelty.

It was great white, but a young one, only about twice as big as he was. Fast, but not fast enough. Sato dodged and dipped down to one side, slashed out with his spurs, going for the gills.

He missed, but got a good slice in.

The shark barely registered. But now, it was bleeding too.

None of the other vangill came to fight alongside Sato. He couldn’t blame them. They would be getting their charges to safety.

Had it been anything but blood in the water, Sato would have done the same. But blood meant more sharks.

He caught the back end of the shark with one set of spurs, near its tail, hooked in hard. Then he crawled up the shark’s thrashing body with his spurs, poke poke poke, until he was back at its head. He dug firmly in with his left spurs, dangling from that one arm. Riding and floating along the length of the shark's writhing body. Let himself be buffeted. He was positioned so that the shark could not curl around and bite him, because it would have snapped itself in half.

He began stabbing and slashing with his right spurs until finally he got them into the creature’s gills. Now it was in real pain.

The water was white and red and pink with blood and froth.

Anchored into the shark’s most sensitive spot, Sato began pumping his tail, driving the shark with power and agony, back the way it had come.

The shark, panicked and suffering and no longer breathing properly, allowed itself to be ridden away.

Now there was a new trail of fresh blood in the water.

Now any sharks that followed would have a new target.

The only way to hide the scent of blood in the Deep was with more blood.

Eventually Sato retracted his spurs, let go of the shark. He charged up to the surface, moving as fast as he could. In case the shark followed. And to wash the blood off of himself.

He took to the air, jetting out of water and spinning, using gravity to fling any shark flesh still attached to him away.

He did it again. And again. Moving even faster through the air than the water. Casting bits of shark to the skies.

He spotted a yacht then, one of the fancy pleasure ones that rich old men bought because after humans acquired too much money they liked to acquire too much risk.

He beached himself on it easily, traded tail for legs.

The boat was not what he expected. It was filled with men in dark clothes and piles of brick-shaped objects stuffed into plastic bags.

Someone shot at him.

Drug runners.

The yacht lurched, hit broadside by an injured great white.

Then, as expected, there came another shark, bigger, also crashing into the yacht.

The men started yelling and running around uselessly. Some of them started shooting over the side of the boat.

They yelled at Sato too, in one of the human languages he did not speak.

Sato shrieked back at them, in the language of the sea. He couldn’t quite make their ears bleed like a mermaid’s, but it did hurt and added to the chaos.

The yacht nearly capsized from shark attack.

One of the humans fell over the side.

Some of the drugs fell over the other side.

That upset them more than anything else.

Sato could have swum away. But this was more interesting.

The sharks seemed to be well occupied with each other, and the fallen man, and possibly the drugs. One never knew what a shark swallowed when in a feeding frenzy.

Sato gauged the bulk of the activity. Sharks, humans, blood, all focused in the same place. He ran the length of the yacht and launched himself off the front, diving as far out as he could, clear of the chaos.

He hit the sea, shifted, and swam away.

He met his sister at that small cave with the very narrow mouth which he himself could barely fit through.

“You bleed the shark so it would lure away any others following the scent trail.”

Sato hardly need answer the truth.

“You’re smarter than you look, brother.”

“Can we go now?” asked Sato, trying not to sound pitiful. The land beckoned. He wanted to hunt for Patrick.

His sister chatted about her plans to recruit a diplomatic pod to attend the humans’ marine biology gathering with her. It was her first official opportunity to visit the human world. She was apprehensive but excited.

“Scientists should be easy for you. Nerds,” he said.

“Nerds?”

“Nerd is a subcategory of human that thinks more than it acts, obsesses more than it loves, and conflates dominance with intellectualism.”

“Do we like them?” she asked.

“You will because they are easy to manipulate. I do not care.”

“That’s a shocker. You, not caring.” She had learned all her sarcasm from him.

Sato was proud.

She bumped up against him softly as they swam. “You killed the shark?”

“Maybe. Not sure. I left it to play with some humans.”

“Sometimes I wonder if they’re right about you.”

Sato looked at her.

“Liking it too much.”

“Is it wrong to enjoy one’s job?” Sometimes he worried about that too. He needed to find Patrick. He missed feeling.

“I think it helps them feel better about themselves to believe you have unnatural preferences and that is the reason you reject them.”

“I know.”

“Why do you reject them?”

“You actually want to know why your brother doesn’t stick dick into your coworkers?”

Meymey blew out bubbles in exasperation. “The Klepsydra at the very least is universally acknowledged as the most beautiful mermaid in all seven seas. And she’s obviously fertile.”

Sato remained unmoved. “She’s of the opposite political party.”

“So?”

“My spawn would be raised a Red Tide.” And by an idiot who doesn’t get her daughter out of the water when she starts her period.

“Never say you actually care about merfolk political factions, Daidai.” Sometimes Meymey was far too perceptive.

She didn’t know that he never slept with any mermaids, ever. She didn’t know he had no children at all swimming the oceans. Irony incarnate. There he was, the strongest of the vangill, aware that merfolk were fading out of existence and that he could help with that. Yet he had never once bothered to increase their numbers.

Didn’t want to.

Couldn’t do it.

Just wanted Patrick.

When he felt any kind of urge at all, Sato took himself away, to the land. To some solitary beach. To soft sand of the kind Patrick once drew in. To spend himself on memories. To hate himself a little more for his own needs. Resenting the sea that had kept him from fulfilling one all-important promise a decade earlier. He went to a dry place where he could nurse regrets instead of children, away from the watery world that was now both his prison and his sanctuary.

He’d never admit any of that to Meymey. She was all he had now. His misery would oppress her with another unsolvable problem among many. Perhaps she thought he still grieved a lost love. Or perhaps she thought he went out regularly to sow his powerful vangill seed, just not among the Soteria. Maybe she even believed, or wanted to believe, there were hundreds of young Satos swimming with other pods in other waters.

Sato said only, “You know I will never fuck any of the Soteria. Things would get too complicated for you.”

“It’s only sex, Daidai.”

“Fine, things would get too complicated for me .”

“Sometimes I think you are the most human of any of us and that is why you are so good with your spurs.”

“Explain.”

“The human inclination for violence, for advanced weaponry, that was what you really got from them, living with your sire for all those years.”

“It’s an interesting theory.”

“Well, I appreciate the result, whatever the cause.” Meymey may not understand him or his choices, but he was her big brother first and foremost, and her protector. She had never been given cause to doubt his abilities or loyalty.

“Where is the landmass we’re ultimately swimming to?” he asked, hoping it was a place he hadn’t searched before. Hoping for a chance at one missing dratsie.

“It’s on the other side of the Pacific Plate. You know, that fault line that gives the humans trouble all the time. What do they call it?”

“Don’t all fault lines give humans trouble? The two-legs find it nearly impossible to deal with a quake.” Sato thought back to that rescue mission in Hawaii, the one that had kept him from Patrick. It had been the first of many.

Meymey fluttered her tail extra hard, putting on a burst of speed.

Sato caught up with her easily. Her tail was a similar blue color to his, and almost as beautiful, but nowhere near as big or powerful. “Which fault line, Meymey?”

“The one near that famous bridge that’s red but the idiot humans call it golden.”

Sato put a human geographical map into his head and frowned at the unexpected trivia question. “The San Andreas fault line?” he hazarded.

“Yes, that’s the one!”

“Is the human marine biology gathering in the place they call San Francisco?” Sato felt a thrill. It had a reputation for being an accommodating city for shifters and other disenfranchised folk. It was the kind of place he could imagine Patrick settling into.

The hunt was back on.