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I guess I owe it to this diary to tell my story as much as I can, and from the beginning. So long ago, it seems...
The day before I wrote that last entry and left, Cindy showed up at my place in Durem, and surprised me by suggesting we go to Barton Coast for the day. I wasn't at all unhappy with the idea!
At first, the day was very nice. We swam, sunbathed, had a picnic, and generally enjoyed ourselves. Until, that is, the spearfishing idiots showed up. Even then, we ignored them...until one came rocketing up the beach, yelling, "Look at this!" and dragging something. Something large, jet-black, and humanoid. A chill wave of fear crashed over me, and I was running toward him before I consciously realized that I was on my feet.
It was a sea-woman. Dead, with the idiot's spear through her chest. I stared down at the blank black face and empty eyes, and something seemed to snap inside of me. To others that face might seem as expressionless and unintelligent as those of the fish strung, forgotten, on the spear-line, but to me it was if it was a human who lay dead before me, her face twisted in agony. I dimly felt the presence of other people crowding around and yelling...nearly all cheerfully. The spearfisher was gloatingly saying, "Look at this! I didn't know sea monkeys came this big!"
Oddly, I felt no anger, or at least none like I had ever felt before...just a sort of sick, disgusted, rage. I felt as if all those around me were not of the same species as me, but some slimy, insanely violent, idiotically murderous monsters. Some creatures who could not be held accountable for their actions, but should be punished anyway. And at the same time I felt horribly threatened by this swarm of monsters that surrounded me, and a longing came over me for the group-mind of the sea-people. I might have plunged into the water and swam for the waters off the Isle, if Cindy hadn't come up behind me and put her hand on my shoulder.
"You numbskull," she said angrily to the spearfisher, "watch who you call a monkey. It was just as smart as you...or actually, I'd say rather smarter!" I knew she meant well, but the word "it" made me, for a moment, hate her almost as much as as I hated the numbskull she addressed.
Her words prompted the spearfisher to argue loudly with her, and so I was the only one looking down at the sea-woman's body when it happened. She seemed to shrivel, to dry out...and then the spearfisher, now angrily yelling, "So what does snooty Cindy Donovinh know about fish-brains?" gave Cindy a hard shove, pushing her backwards. Totally by accident, Cindy foot flailed out and kicked the sea-woman's body...and the body crumbled into dust. For one second, I saw the frail skeleton, made for a world where gravity didn't matter...and then that too was gone, and all that was left was the spearfisher's howls of rage.
Well, we got away from that unharmed, thanks to Cindy's sharp tongue, but I couldn't shake the feeling of being surrounded by monsters. I tried to talk normally to Cindy: yes, that was one of the sea-people, yes, I was upset, yes, I knew the idiot didn't know what he was doing, yes, I'd be fine, no, I didn't want to go home with her, no, I wasn't hungry, and could she please just drop me off at the Barton train station? Which of course she did. And I took the train back to Durem, and did some deep thinking, which led to my decision to go back to the sea-people. After all, if that "dream" I had had in the woods meant what I thought it did, I clearly was responsible for them. So I put the diary under the floorboard, and took Lady Luck to Cindy.
I did get her blessing before leaving. Grudgingly given, perhaps, but I guess I appealed to her sense of duty. "Just promise me, Dawna," she said, looking me in the eye, "if it turns out that the king is alive, give him our love and come back, ok?"
"And if he isn't?" I asked.
Cindy shrugged. "I won't ask you not to stay, because I know it won't do any good. Stay and be queen, and may you rule long and well. But just don't forget me." She started to cry, then gave me a quick hug and said "It's just like in all the fairy tales, and I hope it has a happy ending for you. As for those left behind... I'm glad I at least got to know I had a niece. I love you too much to blame you for what you are. Now go, and be happy! Don't worry about me!"
So I left, and by next morning, I was plunging through the sea near the Isle. It took me a long time to find the palace, and when I did, I was shocked by how beautiful it was. The gardens had been tended, and even the country around it looked groomed. All around was the happy buzz of thoughts...
I touched down in the gardens, and swam slowly toward the palace, admiring the beauty around me. I called with my thoughts, "I am here," and hoped the sea-people would understand. I felt their thoughts changing into a delighted welcome, and when I reached the huge, arched, doorless doorway into the palace, a group of sea-people were there to greet me. A small sea-woman floated out of the group and extended a webbed hand. "Welcome, king," she thought. That baffled me for a moment, before I realized that the thought I had always interpreted as "king" was actually "monarch", or "ruler". At that point its meaning seemed to shift again, into "queen", for the sea-woman was clearly addressing me.
"The..." I thought, meaning to ask about the king. But now that king meant queen, and queen meant me, what thought could I use? I sent an abstract thought, and hoped she understood.
"Our old monarch left us this past winter," she said, not surprising me. "He appointed me governor, and told me you would return. I am glad you have come back, for we are returning to our glory...and I have no objections to a queen who knows of the land." The water filled with laughter-thoughts and unflattering comments about the last governor.
So I was queen. I sat atop the highest tower of the place while the governor touched my right gills with a bundle of stinging seaweed, a ritual that had started when the jellyfish came, "to see that a monarch can rule through pain" as the governor said. It hurt worse than anything I'd ever felt before, but I bit my lip and didn't flinch, for I knew the sea-people would appoint me as their queen anyway, and I didn't want to disappoint them. Actually, it scared them, because what was meant to cause pain in a sea-person blistered off a largish patch of my frailer human skin. It stung constantly for days in the seawater, but eventually healed into a perfect star-shaped white scar, covering most of one gill. It didn't make it harder to breath, but it did make me look quite asymmetrical. But I was queen, and sat on a white marble throne, wearing seaweed robes like my people, while the crown the king had once worn was placed on my head by the governor. I learned the ropes of being queen, and was happy...for a while.
I learned that the Zurg were the mysterious beings the king had told me about in his last message. They had liked the sea-people, and had tried to get them to come to a watery planet they could rule. But the sea-people had refused to leave home, and so the Zurg, torn and corrupted by the violence of our planet, had left them. (After the incident on th beach, I could see the Zurg point of view very well!) Still, the sea-people were doing well, and the jellyfish seemed unable to harm them. The vaccine had worked!
But one day, months after I came, I began to wonder what was going on on land. I had lost track of time, but it must be near Halloween, and things always happened on Halloween. I kept wondering about the Von Helsons and the Sniper. So, that night, I slipped out of my bedroom, laid my crown on my throne, and headed for the surface.
Now, I'm busy, again. But I will write more!