Siren's Treasure. Debbie Herbert

a quick peek over her left shoulder and found Orpheous mere feet behind and rapidly closing in.

      Her nemesis was gaining.

      Jet sped past the Dismals, a barnacle-ridden limestone outcropping, and toward the next hurdle of the race. At the entrance of the honeycombs she cast a quick glance backward. Orpheous grinned, displaying jagged, pointy teeth. His long cobalt hair and teal tail fin distinctly marked him as one of the rare full-blooded members of the notorious Blue Mermen Clan. Ruthlessly aggressive and muscular, his kind usually won most sporting events.

      Jet slowed as she slid through the first opening of a large coral with a series of slender gaps. Although beautiful, the hot-pink coral was razor sharp and could gash exposed flesh and scales, causing painful injuries. Each contestant had to maneuver through the marked portals without any part of their body touching the coral. If they did touch, one of the judges on the sidelines would blow a conch shell, signaling the contestant must start over.

      Halfway through the coral maze, the muted bellow of conch blasted. Jet’s heart tripped. She hadn’t touched, had she? She looked at the judges perched on a rock ledge twelve feet away, but they pointed to Orpheous and signaled him to exit and start over.

      “Liars!” he screamed, ignoring the stream of blood spiraling upward from a gash on his arm. “I did not touch. You are prejudiced against my clan.”

      Jet resumed swimming through the narrow twists and turns. She would win and take her place among the strongest and most skilled. Surely then they would respect her.

      A quarter mile ahead, the Wrath of Mer loomed. Already, her breath grew shallower in the methane-laced water and her gills flared, struggling to suck in more of the declining oxygen. A methane vent disturbed the water’s buoyancy under the mile-long towering rock ledge.

      The bubbling fields let Jet know what to expect. As her body hit the area, she propelled forward, as if powered by jet fuel. What a rush! Better than any runner’s high she’d experienced on land in human form. She luxuriated a moment in the sensation of near weightlessness.

      A mass of black stone was suddenly three feet ahead.

      She’d miscalculated.

      Jet abruptly swished her tail fin to turn but it was too late. She slammed into the rock with her right shoulder and tail fin taking the brunt of the blow. Searing pain radiated from her shoulder down to her fingertips and she drifted downward, fighting unconsciousness. The metallic scent of blood prickled her nose. Jet surveyed her body but didn’t see any open wound.

       Orpheous is near.

      He shot through the swirl of bubbles, almost slapping her face with his tail fin. He leered at her briefly, his hair a storm of blue, before shooting away.

      Jet clenched her jaw and thrust both arms forward. Her shoulder pain transformed to a numbing sensation. Keep going. Don’t stop. She swam out of the methane trap and came to the roofed cavern, selected for its strong crosscurrents.

      Piece of salmon cake.

      Orpheous entered the cavern and purposely whacked his tail fin against its walls before racing out. The wall appeared to disintegrate as dozens of disturbed gulper eels oozed out of its crevices, their long snaky bodies slithering into the churning water.

      Great. She would have to swim through a mass of pissed-off eels.

      She made it through without slowing. With her speed, she could overtake him en route to the Devil’s Well, an ancient, dormant volcano. But once inside, he would have an advantage.

      Jet kept up the rhythmic pattern of swimming that best suited her—extending her arms forward first, then crunching her abs and thrusting out her tail fin. At the volcano’s tip, she dived into the narrow passage with Orpheous close by. The light quickly dissipated and Jet extended an arm along the side wall to keep her bearings. Each contestant had to swim the five hundred feet to its bottom and collect a piece of lava rock.

      Halfway down, she realized something was wrong. Orpheous had stopped swimming and was moving upward. “Chickening out?” she asked. She swam closer to his vibration until she could make out the blue-white of his teeth.

      He exposed his jagged molars in a grin that was half snarl, half glee and held up something in his hand.

      Jet fumbled in the darkness until she found his fist, which was closed over a smooth, flat piece of lava rock.

      “I’ve got my token.”

      Jet’s mouth dropped open. “But how? We haven’t reached bottom yet.”

      “I brought it with me. Rules are for losers. Better luck next year.” He turned his back, dismissing her.

      Anger shot up from the tip of her tail fin to the top of her scalp like an electrical burn. Jet surged forward, bent her body in two and whammed her tail fin into the back of his scalp. A bubbling argh sound filtered down. The lava rock loosened from his grip and fell.

      “I won’t let you cheat me again,” she shouted, racing down with Orpheous hot on her tail.

      His voice vibrated close behind. “Ever ask yourself why winning means so much to you?”

      She frowned. “It just does.”

      “Look at you.” His tone was amused, condescending. “Hair so black it shines blue in the sun. So strong, so competitive. You’re nothing like Lily.”

      “Leave my sister out of it.” She hated hearing Lily’s name on his foul blue lips. “You’re trying to delay me with stupid chatter.”

      “True.” His voice was closer. “But the two of you look nothing alike. Ever suspect you are one of us?”

      One of the Blue Clan? Impossible. “Never,” Jet hissed. She swam faster, all the while expecting Orpheous to grab her tail fin and drag her down into the black abyss. At the volcano’s craggy bottom, she extended her fingers until they scraped hardened lava and extracted a loose nugget. Jet surged upward, passing Orpheous moments before he touched bottom.

      She pushed on, free of the volcano. Ahead, a crowd of merfolk perched on rocks, waiting for the winner to leap over Rainbow Rock and claim the golden trident.

      Jet had envisioned this moment for years. She gathered speed, dived downward and then thrust upward, breaching water. As she crested the rock, she savored the moment—the drops of water coating her naked breasts, the dark blue and purple tail-fin scales glinting in the afternoon sun and her sleek, muscled torso poised in a perfect arc before diving under the sea.

      She slowed and came to a halt at the winner’s platform, a tall, flat boulder where the head judge sat upon a chair of abalone shell, trophy in hand.

      She’d done it! Finally she’d won the grand prize.

      Jet held out her hand. Firth, a Blue Merman and former winner, was the honorary head judge. He examined the rock and scowled, blue lips twisting over sharp, pointy teeth.

      She looked past him and spotted her mother and cousins seated in the first row, smiling and waving.

      Orpheous swam to her side and Firth scowled at his fellow clan member. “You dishonor us. Yet, I must perform my duties.” He addressed the crowd. “Jet Bosarge is the winner,” he said flatly, then thrust the golden trident into Jet’s right hand.

      Her arm was still numb from the injury but she managed to close her fist over the solid gold trident, which nearly matched her height. Jet stomped the base of the trident in the sand three times and chanted, “As descendant of Poseidon, I claim my reward.”

      Instead of the thundering cheer Jet expected, the whistling and applause was decidedly lukewarm. Large swarms of merfolk swam away, moving on to the highly anticipated Siren Song event. Even her mother’s chair was now empty.

      “You know how this works,” Firth said, nodding at the trident. “On land, the trident will shrink to the size of a charm pendant. It contains a onetime wish, good for one year.”

      Jet