“Kapian, drive them away from the city,” Orion shouted.

“We are down three warriors and five sea dragons,” Kapian replied.

“Your Majesty, look!”

Orion turned to see an injured warrior on a bleeding sea dragon struggling to get to him. Both man and beast bore the wounds from the squid’s suckers. Orion turned his gaze to follow where the man was pointing. One of the escape pods was barely visible through the turbulent and ink-stained water. Thick tentacles were wrapped around the vessel, pulling it down toward the edge and into the deeper water.

“We do not have enough men to spare to save them. We must choose between the lives of a few or the lives of thousands,” Kapian said.

“It is the new Queen and your youngest son, Lord Orion. They fought to free my stag,” the warrior said in a weary voice.

Despair hit Orion hard. Kapian was right—save the lives of two and risk the lives of thousands? As a ruler and a warrior, his duty was to his people and his kingdom… but, as a father and husband, his duty was to his family. Never before in his life had he been forced to make such a devastating choice.

“We draw Architeuthis away from the city. If she goes, the others will follow,” Orion ordered in a thick voice, his gaze on the disappearing escape pod.

“Orion! I did not mean…,” Kapian started to argue.

Orion turned his head and stared at his Captain of the Guard with eyes devoid of emotion. A chill had crept through him as he watched the squid slide over the edge of the precipice and sink down into the darkness along with his heart. With the responsibility of power and leadership also came sacrifice.

“NOW!” Orion snapped, pulling on the reins of his stag and turning toward the colossal squid. “Attack!”

* * *

“Juno, we have to get this stone to your father,” Jenny said, frantically pressing the foot pedal.

The escape pod strained to break free before the lights began to flicker. Jenny’s gaze swung down to the console. They were almost out of power.

“No, no, no, no, no!” Jenny groaned, leaning her head down until her forehead rested against her hands on the steering wheel.

“What’s wrong? Why are the lights going out?” Juno asked.

Jenny lifted her head and looked out at the growing darkness. In the flickering light of the escape pod, she could see that they were descending along a long wall of rock. In frustration and rage, Jenny turned the steering wheel and pushed the pedal down one last time. Shock coursed through her when the escape pod suddenly rotated. The sound of a loud shriek echoed through the vessel. The tentacles holding them jerked for several minutes before falling away one by one.

“What just happened?” Jenny whispered.

She looked up through the top of the glass sphere with wide, confused eyes. The scraping of the suckers had etched deep grooves into the glass. The tentacle took its sweet time falling away.

Juno unhooked his seatbelt and climbed up on his seat to peer through the glass. Jenny undid her strap and cautiously stood up. She climbed up on her seat as well to see what was going on—and wished she hadn’t when the eerie round eye of the squid stared lifelessly at her.

“I think you crushed it,” Juno said, jumping on his seat to try to see more of the creature.

“I think I did more than that,” Jenny replied.

When she rotated the escape pod, she did it at the perfect moment. Not only did it trap the squid between the escape pod and the cliff, but it happened at a point where the rocks protruded. From what she could see in the dimming glow of the outside lights, the creature’s head was impaled on several long, sharp rocks.

“Uh-oh,” Juno said when the last of the lights flickered.

Jenny looked down at the console. She climbed down off her chair and tried to press some of the buttons, hoping there was some kind of battery backup or emergency power. When nothing happened, she hit it with her fist.

“Ouch!” she muttered, rubbing her bruised hand.

“I don’t think hitting it will make it work,” Juno said, sliding down until he was sitting in his seat again.

“It’s worked before, once or twice in the past, on a few things—my classroom stapler, the mouse that had been dropped a million times, my electric toothbrush. Never mind,” Jenny muttered when she saw Juno’s confused expression. She sank down into the seat and stared moodily at the console. “I’ll think of something.”

“Father will come for us,” Juno said.

Jenny could hear the uncertainty in Juno’s voice. They had both seen the same situation up above. She leaned back in her seat and stared up at the darkness. A small red light was reflected in the glass, its glow cast by the emergency light. There was no telling how long it would last.

Jenny began to shiver as the cold started to sink in. Until that moment, she had forgotten that without power there would be no heat—or oxygen. Fear gripped her, and she closed her eyes against the burn of threatening tears. She had no idea how deep they were or how far they were from the city. It felt like they had fallen down forever. The fear grew when the escape pod made a strange creaking sound and shifted.

“Jenny, look!”

Juno’s breathless whisper pulled her eyes open. Staring up at the glass ceiling, another reflected light had joined the red one. A confused frown creased her brow. She sat up and looked down at the floor. A soft, faint-green light with reds, yellows, and blues swirling inside glowed from the Eye of the Serpent. She must have dropped the stone without realizing it. Bending over, she picked it up. It felt warm in the palm of her hand. She closed her fingers around the stone and thought for a moment.

“Juno, can you breathe underwater like your father?” Jenny asked in a hesitant voice as an idea began to form in her head.

Juno started nodding his head. “Of course,” he replied.

“If your dad had both Eyes of the Sea Serpent, could he send the squid away?” she asked, looking at the small boy.

“It would complete the trident. All sea creatures will listen to Father if he has the full power of the trident,” Juno said in a confident voice.

“If… If there was a way out of the escape pod, could you take the Eye of the Sea Serpent to Orion… to your father? Could you do it without being caught by one of the squids?” Jenny demanded.

“I’m very small and very fast. The squid won’t even see me,” Juno replied.

Jenny could tell the little boy was getting excited. Was it right of her to ask such a small child to do something so dangerous? She stopped to debate the idea. If she didn’t and they stayed in the escape pod together, they would both die from lack of oxygen. At least in the water, Juno had a chance of survival.

Shivers began to rack her body. Jenny didn’t know if it was caused by the cold or fear—or a combination of the two. Juno was wearing less clothing, but he didn’t appear to be affected by the cold the way she was. It made sense that if they lived under the water, their bodies would adjust to the thermoclines they were likely to experience.

“We need to find a way to get you out of here without flooding the escape pod,” Jenny said, pushing up out of the seat.

“There is. Each year we must go through a training course. Father says it is to keep us… Well, he says something, but I just liked climbing in the escape pod and riding in it. This last time, Coralus took us, and he showed us how to get out if we needed to. Coralus is a lot more fun than Father. He let me drive and play with the arms. That is why I knew how to do it,” Juno said with a grin.

“Can you show me what you need to do to get out?” Jenny asked.

Juno nodded and slid off his seat. Nearly ten minutes later, Jenny gave the boy the multi-colored stone and a huge hug. Tears burned her eyes, but she refused to let them fall. She must be brave for both of them at the moment.

“Your skin is like ice!” Juno said, rubbing his small hands up and down her arms.

“Ye… Yes, I’m a lit… little… co… cold. I… I need… you to… find… your father,” Jenny forced out between her chattering teeth.

“I will. I’ll bring him back. He will know how to fix the escape pod,” Juno promised, sliding the Eye of the Serpent into the pocket of his pants.

Jenny watched the boy kick off his boots. All he wore were a pair of pants made out of the strange fabric and a vest. She was about to stand when he suddenly threw his arms around her neck and held onto her as tightly as his small arms could.

“I love you, Mother,” Juno whispered.

Jenny buried her icy face against his neck for a moment, unable to speak. Leaning forward, she brushed a kiss across his cheek and stood up on trembling legs.

She walked with Juno toward the back of the escape pod. In an emergency, two hatches could be opened—one at the top and one at the bottom. She decided it would be safer to use the one on the bottom. She feared that a sudden shift in weight could cause the escape pod to become dislodged from the ledge where it was precariously perched along the cliffside.

Not to mention, it would be impossible for me to close the hatch with the water pouring in, she wearily thought.

Her hope was that the compressed air in the escape pod would prevent the water from coming in from the bottom, something like the air trapped in a diving bell. She bent over and pulled the locking mechanism. Drawing in a deep breath, she twisted the release handle and paused. She nodded to Juno that she was going to open the hatch.

“Are you ready?” she asked.

Juno nodded. “I’ll be back,” he promised.

“Be safe,” Jenny said.

She turned the lever one more turn and pulled it open. The icy water that poured in around her ankles took her breath away. Juno held his arms by his side and stepped into the icy depths. The moment he was clear, Jenny did her best to close the hatch again. By the time she was able to get it sealed, the water was almost up to her knees.

“So… so… m…uch for the di…ving bell theor…y,” she stuttered.

She reached out to steady herself when the escape pod groaned and began to move. Jenny grabbed the seat in front of her and pulled herself forward toward the front. In the distance, she could see a faint green glow moving further away from her. Juno was clear of the escape pod.

Jenny closed her eyes and slowly sank down in the pilot’s seat when she felt, more than heard, the rocks giving way underneath the escape pod. The added weight of the water had done what she feared—shifted the escape pod. Her hands gripped the sides of her seat as the world tilted, and she felt the weightlessness under the escape pod again.

She swept past the remains of the squid. The escape pod bounced against more outcroppings of rocks, as it sank deeper along the ridge. Thrown from the seat, she tumbled to the back where she lay dazed in the rising water. One of the rocks must have hit the bottom hatch just right because the escape pod was beginning to flood again.

There was nothing Jenny could do until the wild ride ended. It happened faster than she’d expected. Her arms trembled as she pushed herself up off the floor. Wading through the water on frozen feet, she tried to seal the hatch again. A dark chuck of jagged rock about the size and thickness of a large tree trunk was jammed into seal. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t dislodge it.

Her fingers and legs numb from the cold, she waded back to the front and climbed up onto a seat. The water was coming in faster now. Jenny tried blowing on her hands to warm them up, but it was no use. Even her breath felt cold. She also noticed it was getting harder to breathe.

Pulling her knees up, she pressed them against her chest and wrapped her arms around her legs. She looked up through the top of the escape pod. Her breathing grew faster despite her attempts to remain calm. Her body was shivering so violently from the cold that she was amazed she didn’t fall out of the seat. She whimpered when the water reached the edge of the seat and continued to rise.

Jenny unfolded her stiff legs and tried to push herself up. It took three times before she was able to stand on the seat. By the time she was able to do so, the water was up to her ankles.

“I don’t want to die,” Jenny said in a broken whisper. “Please, Orion… I don’t want to die. I… want… to be… to be… a mom to… Dolph… and Jun… Juno. I wan… want to… be… I want to be… a wife… to you.”

Jenny’s sobs added to the shaking of her body. Lifting her hands up to press against the glass, she willed Orion to appear and save her. Surely she wasn’t brought all this way to die a ghastly death in the dark, alone and frightened? If the Goddess had any mercy—any compassion—she would use some magic to save her from drowning. Yet, the water continued to rise, moving from her knees to her thighs to her waist, then her chest, and no magic creature came to save her.

When the water reached her chin, Jenny tilted her head back and gasped in the small sliver of space where there was still some air. Her mind and body had become blissfully numb from the cold. The only thing keeping her upright was the water surrounding her.

A choked sob escaped her when the last, precious pocket of air filled up. Closing her eyes, Jenny tried to concentrate on the meditation technique to slow her breathing. Memories of her life flashed through her mind.

She thought of Carly, wondering if she had fallen into this magical world only to die, and maybe that was the reason no one here knew of her. Painful regret for their short lives hit Jenny. She and Carly had so many dreams they had wanted to fulfill.

I found my merman, Carly. I hope you were able to find your dragon, even if it was for just a little while like me, Jenny prayed.

Her tears mixed with the salty water. Jenny focused on Orion’s face. It was the only thing giving her a measure of comfort.

Finally, her burning lungs rebelled, and she drew in a gulp of water. Her body rejected it, struggling to expel the water and replace it with life-giving oxygen, to no avail. Each struggle brought more water into her starving lungs until there was no more air. Slowly, her body relaxed, and her eyes opened—blind to the darkness that surrounded her.