Little Merman: Chapter 2

Kyz Los Nares lived nearby. She occupied a maisonette in the oldest part of Schenectady. The area was throwback Nostalgia—winding cobblestone streets and brick houses—but ancient features occasionally popped up, including the Gothic First Reformed Church. Not as old as it appeared but older than anything else.

The maisonette included a full pool in its front room and a canal to the Mohawk River. Siphons needed water the way humans required vitamin C. Not every minute of every day. But regularly, for survival and for health.

Kyz answered the door on two legs but signaled that Rhys and Lider could paddle their legs in the pool while she coyly altered in an attached jacuzzi-sized tub. She dove over the side into the larger pool with barely a ripple, her stem slicing through the water; her head emerged. Through the rippling surface, Rhys and Lider would make out the bright-green stem surrounded by tannish nectophores.

Kyz brushed back damp short hair. “Mum and Dad said you want more information about Brae.”

“Are you concerned about your brother?” Lider said, which was not the question he and Rhys had intended to ask. But it was like Lider to establish emotional connections and background.

“Not as much as Mom and Dad. Not at first. The RaykJanes aren’t unreasonable. You know, marriages for business reasons are typical with Siphons. Even with Los Nares. And they involve negotiations. That’s natural. Mum and Dad can be rather plebian. The RaykJanes won’t hurt Brae. In fact, they will likely get him a mate from one of the families in their network.”

“So you think the RaykJanes have Brae locked up—isolated?”

Kyz frowned, arms slowly churning the water, a habit of relaxation, not necessity. Siphons used their stems to remain upright, and they could breathe underwater. The “colonies” of zooids that melded legs into stems carried out many functions.

Kyz said reluctantly, “Brae has been gone awhile. I assumed the RaykJanes would come forward before the breach of promise suit stalled. It doesn’t look good for them—Brae’s disappearance. Now—”

She trailed off and flicked her stem, so she was propelled backwards in the pool.

“How did Brae meet Phillala?” Another Lider question. He didn’t add, as Rhys might have, Your mother said you introduced them.

Kyz said, “I’m engaged to a Sohm. Not my parents’ choice—they see Sohms as parvenus—but Sohms have a connection to the RaykJanes now.”

Rhys caught the faintest grimace from Lider. Los Nares resided in that uneasy strata of society whose members were more aware of proprieties than the classes above and below them. Rill Sohm was partners with Meke RaykJanes, true, but Rill and Meke had challenged family expectations—on both sides—when they got together.

Keyz tilted her head to gaze at the atrium’s skylight, “I pop down to see Jax, my fiancé, every few months. About six months ago, Brae and I stayed a weekend in New Amsterdam. Jax is a cousin—equivalent anyway—of Rill Sohm RaykJanes, and we ended up at some RaykJanes’ shindig. Phillala was there.” 

Keyz kept her eyes on skylight, short curls brushing the water’s surface. In deference to Rhys and Lider’s sensibilities, her chest was a smooth expanse of glittering scales.

She said, “Phillala is vivacious. I guess that’s the word. Attractive. Outspoken. Honestly, I wouldn’t have said she was Brae’s type. I guess she thought the same.”

“But they got engaged.”

Kyz didn’t quite roll her eyes.

“Nineteen-year-olds. And Siphons often stay home until marriage. I didn’t, but I’m engaged, and I have a position in the company business. Brae wants to do something different. I think he likes the idea of diplomacy. Meke ReykJanes went into the General Diplomatic Corps.”

“Meke still networks for his family,” Rhys aid.

“I know. I don’t think Brae understands exactly what Meke does. I think he met Phillala and thought she was what he wanted with the life he wanted. Have you heard of that human fairy tale, ‘The Little Mermaid’?”

Rhys said, “Not all Siphons are fans of the story.”

Lider muttered, “Rill isn’t.”

Rhys carefully held in a grin. Meke’s mate Rill was one of those Siphons who took advantage of temple connections to reach his own goals. He was apologetic in a way but he would never indulge in anything so self-defeating as regret. Or bad planning.

Kyz said, “The Little Mermaid collects a marble statue and places it at the center of her garden. She admires it every day until what the statue means, what it represents, becomes a longing.”

“An imagined life,” Lider said.

“I guess. Brae wanted the life that Phillala offered, the kind of life she seems to inhabit. She’s totally comfortable with all her privileges, you know.”

“What did she want from Brae?”

Lider didn’t sound snide but curious. Lider could do that.

“Brae is—honestly, he’s beautiful. Male beauty. Dark eyes. A firm jaw. Slender and muscular. He looks like a prince out of a nineteenth-century painting.”

By which, Rhys assumed, Kyz included the remote beings of Edmund Dulac and Maxfield Parrish. Though maybe she was thinking more of sturdy N.C. Wyeth protagonists.

“He’s quiet,” Kyz said rather hopelessly.

Quiet but intense, Rhys gathered. He caught a quick glance from Lider’s dark blue eyes. Lider was intense and insouciant.

“She broke the engagement over a month ago. We tried to get Brae to come up here, to stay with Mum and Dad or me, but he insisted on staying in New Amsterdam. And then he went to the Great Lakes Duchy. We haven't heard from him since.”

“You searched for him,” Rhys said.

“Yes. I went to his initiation temple. To other temples. To Los Nares in the area. I can give you a list. Temple officials have his name in case he shows up at one.”

Kyz had started the conversation with a matter-of-fact lack of anxiety. Now, her stem churned the water, a much more accurate indication of a Siphon’s mental state.

“Do you think he would try to undo his orientation?” Rhys said.

“Give up women for men? I’ve known Siphons who tried—but, you know, it only truly works with teens within weeks of their initiation ceremonies. Brae underwent his two years ago.” Another lash of the stem. “Mum and Dad’s idea—mimicking clans like the RaykJanes. I initiated with my fiancé, a sweetheart initiation, which is far more common with Los Nares. But that’s the point: sweetheart initiations are common. Mum and Dad wanted better. It wasn’t just taking Brae to that party that gave him unrealistic ideas.”

Yes, some blame there. And guilt. On both sides. Rhys didn’t even nod. Lider was the one who was good at resolving issues of remorse connected to condemnation and sin.

And Lider said gently, “No one knows for sure what has happened with Brae. But it sounds, ultimately, like he made a deliberate decision to disappear.”

“Yes. I suppose. He’s not a practical person. Maybe that’s just the way we see him, you know. Dreamy. But I’m not sure the alternative is better, if he intended to marry Phillala so he could live off RaykJanes’ wealth without making his own contributions.”

“Siphons aren’t opposed to practical marriages.”

“No. And maybe a purely practical reason would be a relief. Brae seemed to think he was getting a whole new existence with Phillala. Too much imagination,” Kyz said decidedly.

Rhys said smoothly, “We will find him.”

Lider didn’t frown but he bent his head forward, red-brown hair shading his eyes. He didn’t have much of a poker face. Rhys knew what he was thinking. Rhys was thinking the same.

We may not find him. We will find out what happened to him.