When Riley opened her eyes, she was met with the soft, grayed shades of the predawn day. Long dark fronds of kelp swayed in the current, drifting lazily back and forth across her vision. She took a moment to fully wake before giving her body a shake. Her gliders flared and her fins flicked as she stretched out muscles still lazy with sleep.

She winced as her hip locked, and a low hiss whistled through clenched teeth. She braced a palm on the sand and slowly twisted her torso until she felt the joint pop and instant relief spread through her body. It was hard to accept she would have to ask Lewis about it when she got back, but it could get her into serious trouble if left as it was.

Riley sat up properly and perched with her tail bunched beneath her in order to survey her surroundings properly. She had nestled beneath a shale outcropping that jutted over and created a tiny enclosed nook. Beyond the confines was the beginning of a kelp forest. The world was still swathed in the dulled shades of gray and fading indigo. It was still quiet a while before the light of dawn would fill the waters. She had fallen asleep when the moon was high, and after the few hours rest it was time to continue on. She had always slept more sporadically since striking out on her own – though she enjoyed longer rests on land – but was pushing herself more than she usually would now that she had a destination it was imperative that she reach in a timely manner.

She pushed off the sand and drifted out of the alcove into the kelp fronds. There was something both eerie and comforting about being surrounded by the thick plant tendrils.

As she swam, Riley kept her gliders tucked carefully against her sides and twisted her body to weave around the waving fibers. It was dim and relatively silent, the common sounds of the ocean muffled among the dark plants, and Riley kept low, her fins brushing the sand as she swam.

Eventually, the bank dropped away, but the forest stretched on. Though she chose not to dive deeper, Riley continued to swim cautiously, only accelerating her pace slightly. It was very easy to get tangled up in dense clumps of kelp like this and getting free was always more of a hassle than it was worth.

Though the calm was welcoming, Riley was cautious to keep her senses alert as she progressed. In an area such as this, the slightest sound or shimmer could attract unwanted attention, and with the field of view drastically reduced, a kelp forest could make an ideal place for a predatory ambush.

Her journey continued without issue and Riley began to relax slightly as her thoughts wandered. She could not help them straying back to Sophie and the rest of her newly discovered family – a notion that still sent shivers down Riley’s spine; she had a proper family – as she mulled how they were settling into the new home. Though houses and the concept of owning a space of land or water still baffled Riley and was not a part of Mer culture, pods did move to new territories and reefs all the time. Some moved by choice, others forced to follow new migration routes or rotate hunting grounds when human fishing thinned the schools too much for survival. Though the reasons varied, moving to an entirely foreign area was often tedious and stressful as the family group settled in and grew acquainted with the area’s hunting grounds and any dangers that may present themselves as a problem.

Though Riley doubted her family had to deal with the risk of an interaction with an aggressive predator or a hostile rival pod not keen on sharing resources, she did imagine there were other challenges and lots of work involved in a human rehoming too. She hoped things were going alright, and part of her wished she were there assisting rather than leaving them behind to make a journey to see a pod she was not keen on revisiting.

While she did miss her aunt and uncle, and had never harbored any qualms with being in their company, there were too many bitter memories of rejection and arguments for the reunion to be anything but uncomfortable. Ilienne would see to that.

Riley was ripped from her thoughts by a shrill shriek that echoed around her. Riley’s head whipped to the left, where the sound seemed to originate. She chewed her lip and her spines flexed involuntarily before she hesitantly turned in the direction and began to pursue the sound. It was risky, but she could not in good conscience leave without investigating when someone on their own could be in a serious predicament.

The cry came again, but was cut off abruptly with a bit of a strangle that made Riley tense. She could very well be encroaching on a predator-prey scenario. Mer were not often hunted by other species as a traditional food source and were more of an apex predator, but scavenger types would not hesitate on species if weakness was shown, and desperation or competition did breed incidences as well. Cautiously, Riley pushed through a few more tightly packed fronds onto the scene in question.

“Stop your caterwauling! Do you want to attract a threat?” an older voice scolded sternly.

“Or some assistance?” Riley said. She wanted to announce her presence immediately so that it would not spook them.

There were two Mer and both were tangled in the kelp fronds. The older – and owner of the voice – was in less of a predicament, with kelp coiled around the base of his triangular fin. He was twisted and ripping at it, but the strands were thick and knotted enough that it was taking him some time. His scales were a dark gray and streaked with white, and they traversed up to his ribs rather than tapering at the hips. His hair was silver with age and trailed down his back. It was so long that he had tied it back with what looked like the tentacle of a jellyfish. Riley grimaced. The free floating stingers had always grossed her out a little, and were best avoided to prevent nasty burns or poisoning. While she was not squeamish about getting near one, she could not quite imagine being struck with the desire to rip a tentacle free.

Across from him was a younger Mer that was hopelessly entangled in the plants. Her arms were suspended in wraps of kelp and her pale green tail was essentially strangled in the threads. Her pale blonde hair was slashed short and jagged around her chin, and her fins were a milky white. They hung limply from the base of her tail, swaying in time to the same current moving the kelp. She had tilted her head back almost all the way due to a frond around her neck that was likely pressing on her gills when her head was lowered.

The girl was young – perhaps ten cycles – and had clearly panicked herself into a worse situation. Riley wondered if the older Mer had gotten caught up while trying to help her.

“Go,” he urged. “We do not need your help, just move along.”

Riley regarded him calmly. His tone had been firm, but not nasty, just wary. Riley could not blame him for his caution.

“No,” the girl whimpered. “Please help.” She squirmed in the kelp.

“Stop fidgeting; you will make it worse,” the male instructed.

Riley left him to free himself and instead drifted up to the child. She wanted to at least free the girl of the strand around her throat. She parted her jaws and leaned forward to rip the frond.

“No, wait; the plant is sick,” she warned at the same time Riley tore into the kelp. Instantly, a vile, bitter taste coated her tongue and her nose scrunched. She twisted her head to the side and spat the piece out.

She warily eyed the surrounding pieces of kelp. Something was definitely poisoning them in some way to bring that flavor out. She suspected it would probably make any creature that took a good mouthful very sick. She needed a new plan.

Flexing her spines, Riley raised her arm close to the side of the girl’s face. “Try not to move,” she instructed. She kept her tone soft to avoid frightening her, but the girl still squeezed her eyes shut and whimpered softly. “I will not cut you,” Riley promised as she swiped at one of the kelp pieces holding her wrist aloft. The serrated edge of her front spine sliced easily through the strand, so Riley shifted to the next arm, and then down to tend to the girl’s tail.

“What happened?” she inquired in an attempt to prevent an awkward silence brewing further discomfort.

“A fishing boat drove us in here,” the girl explained. “We usually dwell on the far side of the shelf, but it has been very busy lately.”

“Human boats are clogging up more and more of the waters,” the older Mer grumbled. “Things were better back in the day when things were not so noisy. Wish the blasted beings would keep to the land where they belong instead of spoiling our waters.”

Riley was silent as she worked on freeing the girl from the kelp. She was inclined to agree in part with the elderly Mer. Fishing traffic forced a lot of Mer pods to move and flee, and uprooted many lives. It was dangerous to stay, but a massive hassle to have to leave, and could put people into situations such as this. But she could not hate humanity entirely, not when it had yielded such kind and accepting individuals.

It was not long before Riley was slicing through the last of the strands, which allowed the young Mer to wiggle free. Instead of drifting away, however, she threw her arms around Riley and squeezed her tight. “Thank you…umm…”

Riley chuckled at her hesitation and gently pried free of the embrace. “My name is Riley,” she introduced. “And you are?”

“Arryn,” the girl responded. “And this is my grandfather, Gondor.”

Riley turned to examine the older Mer again. He had gotten free of the kelp tangles on his own and now reached out to pull Arryn closer. “I appreciate your assistance,” he said finally with a dip of his head.

Riley dipped hers in response. “It was no trouble. You should probably find better refuge before the day truly begins to get busy.” She met Arryn’s gaze once more. “The next time you get tangled up like that, try not to panic or thrash; you will only get more wrapped up that way.”

Arryn nodded. “Okay,” she agreed.

Gondor patted the girl on the shoulder and jerked his head. “We should get going now. Thank you again,” he added.

Riley smiled. She hoped they would be alright now. If she were simply still roaming on her own, she might have stayed with them a while to ensure they would not encounter any further troubles, but as it was, she had a destination and a time limit, so she would have to trust them to manage on their own.

She stared at Gondor for a moment longer. Though he was older, his skin wrinkled with age, his gaze was hardened with a wisdom and determination she suspected was all they really needed to be alright. Not many Mer grew much facial or body hair, but Gondor has a short white beard waving in the current that looked a little odd, given she was not used to seeing it, but she simply widened her smile and nodded. “Take care,” she offered.

She watched them turn and disappear into deeper into the dense forest. Once they were out of sight, she continued on her way, back in the direction she had originally been heading. She was not sure exactly how far she still had to travel, but she was getting closer. The instinctive pull guiding her back to the pod of her birth was weaker than she had expected it to be, but she had managed to dredge it up from within enough to follow its guidance.

She had been travelling several days, and at a brutal pace that was beginning to take its toll. She was used to pushing herself to the extremes sometimes, but even she had limits and she made a note to find a place to stop, rest and hunt properly in order to replenish her energy. She wanted to press on, but would need her strength to continue safely and more so to deal with the pod that waited for her at the end of her journey. She hoped that the time away might have given old wounds time to heal, but she knew it was more likely that her return would tear them wide open, and she would have to deal with bloody, painful mess one way or another.

…

Riley had left the kelp forest behind quite a while ago. The sun was now high in the sky, though she was deep enough to barely feel it on her back as she swam. Her stomach rumbled and she knew she would have to feed soon. She was already altering her course a little towards a school in the same relative direction she was heading. She would have to eat on the way, as there was no place to safely stop to rest and enjoy her meal as she had hoped. The open water often yielded few safe places and odds were, she would have to continue on through the night until she reached another reef or shallower point in the water, unless she wished to dive to high pressured depths to sleep.

As she approached the large school of cod, Riley quickly realized she was not the only hunter in the vicinity. The ocean was alive with the lyrical calls and clicks of a pod.

Riley laughed in delight as two massive black and white bodies rushed past her into the fray. She trilled loudly. Orcas were playful beasts, but could easily grow territorial over a hunt and she had no desire to be the target of that scrap.

Several of the orcas responded instantly. She was alone, and therefore hardly a threat, and most of them were too distracted by their meal to truly care if she stayed or not. She should be fine to join them. She only wanted a single fish anyways.

With permission granted, Riley wasted no time in diving into the fray. The school was in a frenzy and Riley occasionally had to flare her gliders and pull up short to avoid colliding with an orca as it dove through the swirl of scaly bodies.

It was noisy in the center of their hunt as the pod used their echolocation to confuse and corral the fish into a tight ball to then dive through.

Not wanting to be in their hunting path any longer than necessary, Riley darted forward and clamped her teeth shut on a fish. She tensed her jaw until she felt the spine snap and the fish stilled in her mouth. She backed off with her catch to gulp down the entirety of her prize.

Another whistling voice sounded behind her – an incredibly familiar one – and Riley spun around with a delighted laugh as the nose of an adolescent orca bumped her torso. She sprawled against him and flicked her fins for balance as she rubbed her palm over his smooth skin. “Hello Charlie,” she greeted, her voice clicking as she raised it to the high lilt of the orca language.

“Bright Fish,” Charlie whistled in response. It made her laugh. Orcas didn’t have names in the same way that Mer did. Riley had given Charlie his name years ago and despite her many reminders that hers was Riley, he always simply called her bright fish. She guessed because of her vivid fins, but orcas were mischievous and there could be an alternate reason she wasn’t aware of.

Riley had first met Charlie a moon or two after she had parted ways with her pod. She was still young to be striking out on her own, and grew very lonely. Charlie had been very young as well, less than two season cycles. He had been separated from his pod and Riley stayed with him until they were reunited.

It had taken her a while to learn the language enough to converse properly. Orcas were not like most other dolphins; their speech was complicated and high, and they changed meanings behind words often enough to make her head spin. But she’d caught on eventually. She had not been allowed to stay with him after his pod was found; they had not cared enough for her prolonged presence, but every once in a while, when their journeys crossed, Riley would spend a few days with her old friend, rekindling the connection that never died no matter how much time passed, before they would part again.

“How was your migration?” she asked him.

“Less ice,” Charlie told her. “Fish still good though. Bright Fish okay? New scars.”

Riley nodded as he bumped her abdomen again. “I am alright,” she agreed. “I won the fight in the end.”

“Bright Fish should migrate with us next season. Come to ice water.”

“Maybe I will,” she agreed. Part of her had always wanted to see a frozen ocean, but she knew she might not be able to tolerate the cold as well as Charlie did. She lacked the blubber layer to insulate her.

“You will come now? Stay and hunt?”

Riley sighed and shook her head. It squeezed at her heart to know she still had to leave him behind. She never knew when the next time she would get to see him would be, or if there would even be a next time, but she still had to go. “No, Charlie. I cannot stay this time. I have to go back to my pod and I only have a little time to get there. Someone needs my help.”

“Bright Fish go now?” he whistled back. She pressed her forehead against his beak and nodded. “Will swim with you until the shelf.”

Her heart swelled at his decision. Orcas rarely strayed from their pods and though it was not too far to the next shelf, Riley was touched that he’d part with them long enough to escort her. “I would be honored for the company,” she agreed.

Charlie whistled in delight and dipped up beneath her. Riley yelped in surprise as he rushed to the surface, pulling her along with him. Her fingers curled tightly around his dorsal as he breached and she nearly slipped off the side of his smooth, slippery body. He cut through the water rapidly, spraying brine up in her face and making her sputter in between fits of laughter.

When he dove back down, she released the fin and flared her gliders. He could easily outpace her if he tried, and she had to work a little harder to keep up even though she knew he was slowing his pace for her, but she was delighted to swim with him again.

She may have to part with him before dusk now, but she vowed to seek him out after she was finished reuniting Luna with her parents. Charlie would likely be in the area a while still, and she wanted more time.