(ACT 1) Winged Mer
IMPORTANT !!! AUTHOR'S NOTE: This is my first attempt at writing in the dark erotica genre. I'm not a fan of the genre, but given its sheer popularity on many writing platforms, I am training myself to write it. This story is still an epic fantasy genre at its core, but with dark erotica as well. Content warnings in place. Please be mindful of the themes explored. If you don't wish to read or you stop later on, I understand. If you continue, you read at your own risk. First draft.
The Dark Empress. That is what they used to call me. For all the wisdom the Republic of Heaven claimed to possess, recognising the differences between what was dark and shadow compared to what was evil, was not one of their virtues. For that, our marriage was doomed from the beginning. I was labelled the enemy, and struck down by the one man who was meant to stand by my side.
- Fragment 3
Eleventh Age (Present time)
“Halt!” The guards bellowed from behind as I skirted around around a corner. “By command of the Prince Immortal, stop!”
“No!” I shouted back. “I saved your people from an attack! Why are you hunting me?”
“Stop where you are!” They ordered instead without an answer to my demand.
I ground my teeth, twisting out of the way of a citizen instead of colliding with them. They yelped in surprise, then cried out again as the guards crashed into him anyway and shoved him aside in hot pursuit.
Why why why did I catch the attention of the most unlikely of people? My human appearance was no different to everyone else. The magic and power I once commanded was almost non-existent. Yet even the slightest of magic drew attention, even if it was as mild as healing away a scrape upon a child’s knee. Magic was not unheard of, but nor was it common either.
This time was slightly different. A knife attack happened in the city’s Central Square. Likely an angry assassin against the ruling Prince Immortal. But the attacker targetted the civilians in the way first. I intercepted, got a knife wound to my stomach and broke the man’s neck, killing him instantly.
Nevermind having stopped an attack. It was the fact the knife wound to my gut did not hamper me and that I killed a man so easily, which was what drew the attention instantly.
Why do I never learn? I thought grimly as I wove between startled shoppers in the streets.
I should have hung back, stepped away. But I never could, not when ordinary civilians, innocent people, were in danger, especially when they hadn’t done anything wrong and were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.
It was that moral compass which earned me so many enemies over my extremely long immortal existence, so much so that I could no longer remember half of it.
“Cut her off at the Third Circle!” I heard one of the guards bark.
I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to laugh or weep. I just wanted to go home, back to the sea, where I could lay down my sword at last and the dark could hide and allow me to sleep until the universe’s timeless age came to an end.
“We can never afford her return to the sea. It will free and give Lithnemir power enough to stand as an equal to us. They can never be allowed a return to their former glory.”
That was what the Celestials said.
My single scoff under my breath was a bitter one. So many misunderstandings. So much resentment. Such painful . . . betrayal.
I continued ducking and weaving through the crowds of shoppers going about their every day lives. They shouted, squeaked and yelped as I ran past them, hotly pursued by guards. The city of Laeonna was a culturally vast and complex one.
In the confusion, it gave me a chance to slip down an alley, where the towering walls of the sides of the buildings stretched up high on either side, narrowing the view of the blue sky to a narrow strip of distant light. This was not a good place to be caught in.
I crouched down, before I leapt, high up through the narrow alley to break out into the air above the rooftops. My power may have been severely diminished to the point in no longer came to my fingertips when commanded, but my body was still strong. There were some things I could still do directly. Great leaps over immense distances and heights was one of them.
Atop the roof, I slinked over the tiles, between some fluttering washing lines and almost paused at a tiny, but beautifully laid rooftop garden.
This must be someone’s little sliver of tranquillity, I thought softly with fondness, listening to the bees hum as they flitted from one flower to the next.
For so many eons I tried to lay low, to just exist in the quiet and peace of the forests or mountains, because the sea was always barred to me. But Heaven always found my location in the end, wherever I went. Even as pathetically diminished as I was now, so faded that my old name was forgotten to history, Heaven were psychotic.
It should have been their memory that was fractured, not mine, I thought in silence. There were still many things I did remember. But there were also many things I’d forgotten. The timeline of my memories were scattered, difficult to find the order and reasons to why certain events happened.
The sharp and distant calls of the skyeels drew my attention, deployed from the watchtowers of the First and Second Circle. I returned my attention north briefly, for north was where I journeyed to. The desperation and longing in my heart was a deep one. An ancient one.
Let me go home. Please, just let me go home, I prayed to my God, my Creator, though I knew he could no longer hear my voice. Not for many Ages of the universe.
I inhaled a deep breath. It was a breath to help keep me awake, to straighten my shoulders from where they’d sagged and cowed. As each decade, each century limped by, my exhaustion grew, and what was left of my power weakened. I just had to get past the final mountain range on the northern horizon.
A great River Siron flowed through the grand and rich city of Laeonna, where it crashed down over the edge of the tiered plateau of land, and out across forested landscape of steep valleys before being met by the wall of snow-capped mountains.
As I exhaled, I pulled my internal magics forth and bled my visual appearance away. My body became invisible.
Even though the magics which were restricted to my body directly were the easiest to use and manifest – not the flashy displays of great tsunamis or lightning cracking through the skies – even this was now a drain and strain on my mind, feeling like butter scraped over too much bread, wherein once upon a time it required barely a thought.
I stepped past the little garden and to the edge of the tall, multiple storey building, peering down into the next alley as I calculated my best way to reach the river. Once in the wide river, I could swim along the bottom of its depths to the Great Waterfall and make my way from there without further interference from humans.
At the bottom of this next alley was a narrow gated pond – or canal, rather – instead of a pathway. The light of the sky refracted against the rippling surface like shards of white glass. From this height, I couldn’t judge how deep the water was. Therefore instead of diving into the water, I jumped down and landed quietly atop the surface of the water as if it were a solid floor, subconsciously commanding my essence and that of the water to alter its laws for me alone.
The water obeyed, recognising me as one of its own, few and far between though we were.
The thump of heavy booted feet from one end of the alley forced me to slip silently down into the water to hide. The ripples closed over the top of my head, and in the quiet and muffled darkness, I allowed my invisibility to slip away. The darkness of my long, black hair encompassed me like a cloak of shadow. Gills morphed from my neck to allow me to breath.
As for my legs, I kept them as they are. My mer tail was too long and great for such a small space. Instead, I elongated my pale – almost grey – fingers and brought out their webs to allow me to tread and manoeuvre in the water with enough flexibility and skill. The narrow canal of water was barely two metres deep, if that, and I was already five foot ten, almost five eleven.
I restrained the urge to cough. Not because of the transition between air to water within the lungs, but because the water was dirty, similarity to inhaling polluted air. It aggravated the lungs, tightening the chest as an asthmatic would suffer difficulty in breathing.
Regardless, the pounding of my heart eased slightly to be within the water once again, to feel its body encompass mine and hold me weightless within its domain. Protective and freeing simultaneously.
But this body of water lacked the whispered voice and soul of the sea, of the crashing waves and the deep roar and melody of its currents and storms. This one was silent. Dead. Save only the vibrations and scraping rumblings of human activity around the city. It was a man-made sound, a grating whine to my ears.
I moved through the water to the end of the alley, where it was barred beneath the surface by a rusted gate. I floated by the wall beneath the surface, and listened as a group of three guards stopped over the bridge.
“Think she was a mageborn?” One of them asked.
“Has to be. Who else can run that fast without magic while having been gutted?”
“Did you see the length of that knife? She should have bled to death by now!”
“Then why haven’t we found her?”
“Mageborn. Definitely. Healing spells and tonics.”
“I thought all mageborn were accounted for. There aren’t exactly that many of them.”
“Guess that explains why the captain wants this one brought in.”
Despite the severity of my situation, my expression relaxed with amusement for a brief moment and a wry smile spread across my lips. Me? A mageborn?
“Oi! You three! Why are you standing around? Did you see which way she went?” A fourth voice interrupted the group’s speculations. “She ducked into the alley one block away and we’ve lost sight.”
“Oh shit.”
“Yeah ‘oh shit.’ This order didn’t come from the captain. It came from the Prince Immortal. You know how serious it is when he makes the orders? Double time, people! Otherwise our families will be the ones suffering his wrath, then us. But he’ll make us watch first, and no one ever comes out sane after that.”
“Fuck!” They swore, then hurried away.
I floated by the bars, feeling my expression fall. Simply by merely existing, I indirectly brought destruction to those in my vicinity, no matter how much I tried to do good, to protect.
My turquoise teal eyes – glowing while in water – flickered down to my abdomen. The wound was still there, bleeding slightly. But in the murky brown waters of the narrow canal, the fresh crimson blended into the natural filth of the water.
I wish I could stay dead, I thought quietly.
It would have saved so much pain and sorrow for all, including myself.
But you won’t, because you have been wronged too many times, my deeper self whispered. You exist to fight. To protect. To plunge your hands into the filth so others may keep theirs clean.
My lips trembled, and I bit down on them to hold my grief at bay. What good did protecting others achieve in the end?
Betrayal.
People fear and hate that which they don’t understand, I thought with a heavy sigh. Those of my kind fell into that category.
I glanced back up to the surface, where the thin light filtered through the murky water. I’d heard of the Prince Immortal’s fearsome reputation from my travel through the land. He was a handsome glory, an unrivalled warrior, a terrifying dictator and brutal tyrant. He was cruel and nasty, and governed the kingdom with an iron fist.
Humans revered him as a god descended from Heaven. Perhaps he was. But he was not one that I recognised. However, he was most certainly an immortal, the only one in the world of Erida – besides myself.
Last thing I wanted was to be caught by him. I could barely outrun a garrison of humans. I had no power to contend against another immortal. I just hoped and prayed he had only noticed me as possibly being a mageborn. Nothing more. I couldn’t afford to be delivered back to Heaven as a bounty.
The very thought of it brought on a surge of nausea and dizziness as the fear paralysed me for a moment.
Just get out of the city, I reminded myself. Get out and make for the mountains.
I turned to the bars, and willed my body to Change its essence to that of the water, to flow through the bars. All water led to rivers, and all rivers led to the ocean.
Except this time, my intentions did not manifest in my power. It happened often now, wherein such Changes could not manifest because my mind itself was exhausted, unable to hold such searing and clear focus long enough to will the Changes of states-of-matter essence into reality.
My breath growled out. Now? Now it fails?
I turned my attention skyward. Only one option left. Therefore I climbed out from the water, standing upon its softly rippling surface again and returned my form to its normal humanoid. I brought invisibility back over my body, and then leapt back up to the rooftops.
Except once I finished the arc of my soaring jump, instead of falling, I switched to flight, feeling the weightless sigh of the wind and air swirl around my form. It was akin to swimming. Both the sky and the water offered the same freedom, the same thrill.
The same peace.
A mer was an entity of the water.
But I had mastered both domains. Both worlds.
Thrill, victory, and joy swelled within my soul. The sky had become my home in place of the sea.
Without hesitation, I continued to shoot upwards. The speed of my passage tore the water from my clothes and hair. My form of flight required no wings.
High into the sky and into the clouds I soared, feeling the mist caress my invisible face before I gradually turned my arc towards the north. I had to get high enough first to avoid the likelihood of being spotted and shot down.
Except just as I crested the first of the clouds, before I could even turn north, I was caught. Out of blue! Literally!
I grunted from the force as a powerful arm came right around my waist, pinning my arms to my sides and locked against a solid body. Before I knew it, it was immobilised.
I turned my head awkwardly from where I’d been bound, and my eyes snapped up in dismay to see who on earth captured me, despite my invisibility and being so high up in the sky, because even for immortals and Celestials, flight was not common.
My throat closed up, my muscles went rigid, and my heart dropped into my stomach. My invisibility fell away as my concentration shattered like a dropped vase.
It was a man, big, with broad shoulders, powerful torso and long limbs. His regal and militaristic attire emphasised a force of presence already present, suffocating with strength, domineering with unshakable will.
Intimidatingly is handsome face was an imposing beauty, able to win every woman’s heart regardless of the hard set of his angular, trimmed-bearded jaw. The wind whipped his shoulder length wavy hair around his head. The blackness of each strand complimented his tan skin tone, but clashed violently with the colour of his eyes.
Purple. Like lightning.
The terror, the defeat, crashed through my soul with disbelief. I knew who this man was. Up this high, there was only one who could have followed.
“How?” I croaked. “How could you see me?”
I’d been invisible since both before and after I hid in the water. Therefore had he actually been following me, sensing me, since the beginning?Or was he one of the rare few who could see through invisibility?
His eyes contained the power and emotions of the storm. The thunderous fury, the crackling temper, the thrill of raw power, and the joy and lust of freedom. His eyes were as illuminating as a flash of lightning, revealing all within its stark and jagged light. It was as hot and as searing welding metal to metal.
And that was what he did as my eyes met his own. In capturing me, I felt my heart sink with sickening dread. My fate and destiny had been jarred violently from its path and onto something else.
“Wrong question,” he spoke.
His voice was deep, it was clear, it was a commandment unto itself, and carried across the wind as if he were indeed a god, speaking from within my bones and rattling my very spirit.
“A mer cannot fly. Yet you can. Such an entity is unique.” A selfish cruelty tainted his words and warped his lips into the slightest of smiles. “You are mine now, little sapphire.”
