The Cooks found a nice, little coral reef where they could anchor the catamaran. It was located close to the Kate. Tracey recognized it. His eyes filled with curiosity as he watched Rush drop the anchor. The way the chain moved intrigued him and seemed to pull him under a trance. He had never seen a boat anchor before. After all, who needed a boat on Merlin’s Island and Coutarine Island when fairies could just fly all over the place?
Mr. Cook glanced at the young fairy while he dropped anchor and asked him, “What is it, Tracey?”
“Sir, it’s just, I’ve never seen a boat drop anchor before. It-It’s beautiful.” Staring at him, Rush let out a low sigh and focused his attention back on the anchor. This young man was quite unusual no doubt about it, but he liked that his family had stumbled upon him. Tracey tapped Mr. Cook’s shoulder and calmly asked him, “Excuse me, sir, but do you think I could go snorkeling with you?”
“Why? You nearly drowned just a few minutes ago!”
Merlin’s apprentice shook his head and admitted, “No I didn’t, sir. The way you jerked me out of the water caused the seawater to fill my throat and nose. That was why I coughed. Please. I can take you to where I saw the Kate.”
“Ya sure, kid?”
“Yes, I’m sure.”
The look Tracey gave Mr. Cook finally allowed him to be able to tag along, as long as he stayed out of trouble. Tracey had never done any snorkeling before, though, so he had no idea how to prepare for it. The Cooks helped him. They worked together to fit him with flippers and asked him if he wanted to change into a bathing suit, but Tracey protested. He didn’t want them to notice the scars on his back. As the family finished with his flippers, Rush handed Merlin’s apprentice a snorkel mask.
Holding it in both hands, he looked it up and down and confusingly asked, “What am I supposed to with this?”
Wearing his own flippers, Rush passed in front of him and sarcastically answered, “You wear it. It helps you breathe underwater. The goggles go over your eyes, and the tube goes in your mouth.” Tracey gulped at the sight of the tube, because memories of being in the ICU attached to a ventilator at Coutarine’s Fairy Hospital invaded his mind. It was not fun. He couldn’t speak with the tube in.
“But what if I can already breathe underwater?” he shakily asked Rush.
Mr. Cook chortled and brought his hand to his lips, “Oh, Tracey, you’re hilarious. Every human wishes they could breathe underwater, but it’s just not possible. Sorry, kid.”
Um, Tracey thought in his mind, I’m not exactly human, sir. Well, technically I am; I’m just a special human. A fairy to be exact. He didn’t say this out loud though because he wanted to keep his secret safe, so he just went ahead and dealt with the snorkel mask. He would have to find a way to sneak away from the Cook family while they were snorkeling because of Alexandria and Gene waiting for him at the Kate.
To Tracey, the snorkel flippers felt very strange on his feet. He felt like a duck. It was weird to see his toes because he almost always had his feet covered, either by socks or shoes. The Cooks’ two youngest children couldn’t go swimming with them, because they were too small, so the grandparents and uncles watched over them while Tracey, Mr. Cook, Mrs. Cook, and Sawyer all went for a dip. One of the uncles had injured his foot, so he was stranded on the boat. Though, he too really wanted to see the Kate. The other uncle didn’t really care for swimming. He chose fishing over it. Tracey was the first one in the water, but that was only because he tripped over one of his flippers. Splash! When he came to surface, he spat water like a spout out of his mouth and pulled hair out of his face.
The young fairy yelped when he heard Mr. Cook yell, “Cannonball!” and he cannonballed off the catamaran. Tracey flapped his flippers and quickly swam out of the way so he wouldn’t be crushed. Mrs. Cook and Sawyer jumped in after Rush and laughed as they playfully started to splash each other.
Tracey almost managed to sneak away, but then Rush ruined everything, “Oi, Trace! So, where’s the Kate again?” and Merlin’s apprentice was forced to stay behind just a little bit longer,
“Oh, um, it’s this way.” With that, he clumsily kicked his flippers and started forward. The Cooks followed him.
Right now, there was very little current and wind, so swimming wasn’t that hard. The ocean was so still; it almost looked like glass. Before reaching the Kate, the Cooks did a little snorkeling since they were right over a coral reef. Tracey curiously watched them put their goggles over their eyes, their tubes in their mouths, and stuck their heads underwater. Good, they were distracted. Right now was the perfect time to leave.
Because they helped him swim faster, Tracey kept his flippers on his feet, but he held his goggles and tube in his hand. He refused to put the tube in his mouth after experiencing the ventilator.
When everything was set and ready to go, he dove like a dolphin underwater. His flippers emerged on the surface and then vanished as he swam deeper and deeper. The swim down felt quite mysterious. Tracey knew he was on an adventure. He hid behind a rock on the bottom of the reef and gripped it with both hands, peering up to the Cooks who continued to swim with their heads underwater. They were nearing the edge of the reef – the location where he saw the Kate. When Merlin’s apprentice swam out from behind the rock, he pressed his tummy on the reef’s sand and slithered across it like a snake. Shoals of different-colored fish danced by his head, and a few moray eels swam parallel with him on either side. While they watched him with their blue, intimidating eyes, they didn’t attack the young fairy. As soon as he reached the end of the reef, the eels scattered, and he held his breath as he peered over the edge into the deep blue waters of the Atlantic Ocean. There was the Kate waiting patiently for him to visit her.
Though she was still only a blur, Tracey knew she was there. “I can do this. I can do this,” he whispered to himself. A shiver ran up his spine. Honestly, the ocean looked a little bit creepy the further down it went. Could Tracey make this swim? Did his merfairy powers work when he was wingless? What if the pressure was too much for him to bear? What if he got trapped down there and never returned to surface? No! The young man couldn’t let his negative emotions control his actions. He had to do this. The fate of the human and fairy worlds rested on his shoulders. It was his job as Merlin’s apprentice to prevent The Mincing from destroying everything.
Inhaling a breath of air, the young man glanced up at surface one last time to make sure the Cooks hadn’t seen him. They hadn’t. They were exploring the reef elsewhere. It was going to be a while before they found the ship. Hopefully, they wouldn’t notice he was gone. Tracey took one more deep breath, and then, with a kick of his flippers, he slithered off the edge of the reef and started down towards the shipwreck of the Kate.
“I can do this. I can do this,” Tracey whispered to himself over and over again as he swam into the depths of the ocean. Repeating it gave him confidence. The world darkened around him, and tall seaweed brushed up against his legs and wrists. Yet, Tracey carried on with his swim, but things took a slight turn when he was about halfway down to the Kate. Her wreckage had now become even more visible. A long shadow rested on the seafloor just twenty feet deeper, and it was surrounded by other dark figures (perhaps the Kate’s propellers and boilers). Down there, longer strands of seaweed danced around Tracey’s head and body. They swayed like palm trees in the eye of a hurricane. Merlin’s young apprentice stopped just ten feet above the shipwreck when he heard something – singing. Beautiful, female singing. It was familiar, yet not familiar. “Wha-What’s that?” Tracey asked with a shiver in his voice. He turned his head in every direction but saw nothing. The only thing present was some seaweed over there and the singing.
The young fairy nervously bit his lip and turned his head and body to the right when the beautiful voice sung, “Come with me, my one true love, and I will take you to the sea.”
Tracey’s nervous face vanished, and he closed his eyes. The mark of the Octopus Man once again flashed on his arm. A smaller figure appeared in the darkness of the sea and crept towards him. It was a mermaid. She was the one who was singing, but she looked different from the average mermaid. One of the differences was her skin tone. It was light green. Her tail was blue, and her long, dark green hair was held back by a blue headband. She wore a green, seashell bra, pink lipstick, and silver star earrings. Her ears were pointy, and she had blue eyes. She was not just a mermaid; she was a siren, and an ally of Poseidon.
She pulled Tracey down to the shipwreck of the Kate with her singing. With his eyes still closed, Merlin’s apprentice followed her. “Come with me, my one true love, and I will take you to the sea,” the siren repeated. She held her arm out towards the fairy.
Tracey couldn’t let her drag him to Poseidon! Now that he was a merfairy, he could fight and defeat her. Yelling, he first shook his head out and reached for it, “No! I’m not going to let you take me!” A force of energy pulled him back towards surface while another one dragged him to the Kate.
Flapping her tail, the siren swam closer. Just before she could sing another line, the ninja-like fairy drew his shuriken and sliced her across the arm with it. A cloud of blood escaped the wound, and she screeched in pain. This attack made her mad, and it wasn’t long until her appearance shifted from beautiful to terrifying. Her hair blew out all over the place, her eyes glowed red, and sharp fangs appeared in her mouth. She roared at Merlin’s apprentice who retreated back a few feet. The siren launched her fangs at him, but he thought fast. He had to. Sirens feasted on magic.
Tracey quickly grabbed his shuriken. A large toothbrush appeared in his right hand. Remaining calm, he acted out a dentist. “Remember to brush your teeth everyday, miss.” He propped the toothbrush up to the top and base of the siren’s mouth. Then, as fast as a ninja, he kicked his flippers and shot in the direction of the Kate.
Behind, the siren snapped down on the toothbrush and broke it in two. Her eyes landed on Tracey, and she chased after him. A trail of blood pumped out behind her.
There she was. There was the shipwreck of the Kate. Her body, or what was left of it, rested on its side in the water. She was covered in barnacles, shells, and oysters, and seaweed grew out of her sides all around her. Her broken propellers and boilers surrounded her and rested on rocks and sand. She was a huge ship! Tracey didn’t have time to admire her right now, though. He had to get away from the siren and find Alexandria and Gene before it was too late. Tossing his snorkel mask and tube aside, his golden brown eyes caught a broken porthole, and he swam to it as fast as his legs could carry him. The siren roared behind him and ripped up his snorkel mask and tube with her razor sharp fangs. Tracey dodged rocks and shipwrecked ship machinery on his journey to the porthole and swam right through it…well, almost. His body wasn’t the problem; it was his legs. His flippers became tangled up with each other and caused Tracey’s legs to get caught in the porthole. Eyes widening, he glanced back to his legs and ferociously kicked his flippers. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t get them through. Finally, the fairy kicked off the flippers, which they sunk towards the seabed, and pulled his legs through the porthole. He made it just in time too. The siren snapped her fangs at his bare feet but missed.
Tracey found himself in a room that looked like a trashed office. Hundreds of parchments floated in the water around it, and a desk rested toppled on its side, as well as a few chairs. An 1800s map was pinned on the wall. Shoals of blue angel fish, groupers, and parrot fish scattered and moved out of the way of Tracey who crashed into the wall.
The siren, after next ripping up his flippers, swam through the porthole too and edged close to Merlin’s apprentice. The mark of the Octopus Man flashed brighter and brighter on his arm as she approached. The siren opened her fang-covered mouth to sing again, but Tracey refused to let that happen.
Pushing himself off the wall, he grabbed a chair and used it to smack her across the head with it. Constantly he smacked her, over and over again, until finally, the siren grabbed the chair’s legs, and her sharp, blue fingernails dug into his skin. They almost looked like claws. With one last smack, Tracey next used the chair to shove her into a closet. He slammed the door in her face and blocked it with the legs of the chair. She didn’t stay trapped for long. The siren broke free with a force of magic. It slammed into the fairy and caused him to crash into a bed. Both it and he flipped.
Tracey landed on his front, and right next to him appeared the face of a skeleton. A skeleton fell out of the bed with him. The young man screamed at the sight of it and quickly dragged himself out from under the bed. The angered siren momentarily pulled her attention away from him and focused on the skeleton instead. With a small spell, she ordered it to come to life. Green sparkles danced around the dead body, and its eye sockets seemed to blink. Tracey felt like he was going to faint.
Covered in old rags, the undead skeleton stood up and picked up his sword that had fallen when he fell. Barnacles were on its blade and hilt, and he pointed it at Tracey. In a scary, demotic voice, he spoke the lyrics to the song "The Dishonored Dead."
It was like Satan himself had paid Tracey a visit: “‘We are dishonored – abandoned, rotting at the scum of damnation. For eternity, we were consigned to oblivion, pushed to the shadows of existence. The sun will drown. The oceans will fill with your blood. And the rise of the forgotten will come to punish your soul!’” As soon as he said that, he lifted his sword and slashed at Merlin’s apprentice. It barely missed him. The tip of the sword tore the shoulder sleeve of his tunic and ran into the wall.
While the skeleton pulled it out, Tracey got the heck out of there. He hurried to the office’s entryway and slammed the doors shut. He now floated in a hallway. Merlin’s apprentice could barely see another closet at the end of it. It was a fairly large closet too. That was where he hid. Rushing to the closet, he opened it and dove inside, slamming the doors behind him. The petrified fairy retreated to the corner and plopped his butt down on the rotting floor. He pulled his knees up close and inhaled breaths of air. It was dark in the closet, and that only added to his fear. Remember, Tracey hated the dark.
For ten minutes straight, he remained hidden in the closet. The doors to the office broke open – he heard it, and the voice of the undead skeleton stabbed him like a thousand knives.
Over and over again, he said, “‘The oceans will fill with your blood. And the rise of the forgotten will come and punish your soul.’” That literally was the scariest thing Tracey’s ever heard from somebody else. It beat Peter Nelson and even the Octopus Man himself. Who knew song lyrics could be so horrifying.
While Tracey waited for the coast to clear, he held his breath and glanced down on his arm with the Octopus Man’s mark on it. It had not vanished from sight. That meant he was not out of the hay yet. Strangely though, the siren didn’t try to lure him out with singing. She and the skeleton didn’t even try opening the closet to check if he was hiding in it. Tracey heard them swish right by it.
For five minutes, it was quiet. Did that mean the siren and skeleton had left? Tracey waited another two minutes to make sure, but sure enough everything had quieted down and there was no more chanting of “‘And the rise of the forgotten will come and punish your soul.’” He finally could breathe, but he still shivered from head to toe with fear. His entire body felt numb.
With shaky legs, he slowly stood up and made his way towards the door of the closet, staying as quiet as possible. Once there, he pressed his ear against it to listen for something, but he heard nothing. Okay, good. The coast was clear. Tracey could finally explore the ship and search for Alexandria and Gene. They had to escape as quickly as they could before the siren and undead skeleton returned. For another minute, Merlin’s apprentice thought up a plan before he opened the door and started his search.
With it in mind, he smiled and whispered, “All right,” to himself, “Don’t worry, Madam Alexandria and Gene. I’m coming.” And just like that, he lifted his hands and pushed open the doors of the closet. What he saw literally almost gave him a heart attack! The first thing he saw, from the other side of the doors, was the undead skeleton!
His bony, demotic face appeared from out of nowhere, and he yelled, “‘And the rise of the forgotten will come and punish your soul!’” right at Merlin’s apprentice!
Tracey screamed so loud that the entire ship shook. He literally could’ve broken glass with his yell. He tried to rush back into the closet, but it was too late.
The undead skeleton reached out and grabbed him with his bony hands. His sword was back in its case on his hip. One bony hand pulled Tracey’s own hands behind his back, and the other one covered his mouth. The skeleton’s demotic-looking face was right next to his. Since it was a demon that grabbed him, three, red scratches appeared on the fairy’s neck. Cruel laughter was heard from the shadows, and the siren appeared.
To Tracey she said, “You should see your face! Well done, captain! We’ve got him. Finally, he’s all ours.”
The young, ninja-like fairy tried to break free from the skeleton, but he only tightened his grip on him. Within seconds, his life energy started to drain from his body, but he tried his best to stay conscious. It was extremely difficult. Tracey’s vision blurred, and he had a pounding headache.
Just before he blacked out, a familiar set of eight Kraken-like arms emerged from around the corner and came within reach of the fairy, demon, and siren. “Gene.” Tracey weakly said under the bony hand. He made one last attempt to free himself but failed.
The last thing he heard before everything faded to white was the undead skeleton again announcing, “‘The oceans will fill with your blood. And the rise of the forgotten will come and punish your soul.’” It was after that he fell limp. It had taken a year’s worth of failure, but the time had finally come. The Octopus Man had officially caught Tracey. The only thing left behind was his shuriken. It was all alone, stranded in the shipwreck of the Kate, just off the coast of Bermuda.
43Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1etaiReG7e
End of Part Four: Bermuda
Final Word Count: 173,760
ns 15.158.61.50da2
