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Published 8/23/20
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Summer 1970

I threw my hands out in front of my face to shield myself from the image of the ground rushing at me at full speed. Then, a gust of air hit me knocking me back up into the air. I landed back onto the glass covered ground with a loud crutch. The glass sliced me while my right foot bent under me in an odd angle.

I looked down at my arms in a daze, the sleeves of the orange jump suit were ripped to shreds. My arms wandered up to the window I had been pushed from just in time to see a shadowy shape retreat deeper within the room. The next second Natasha was by my side and she was helping me to my feet.

"You need to get out of here now!" She pointed towards the cluster of trees beside the hospital. "There is a sea clift that way-"

"I can not go though the forest, I just fell from da sky!" I yelled, cutting her off

Natasha let out a long sigh." I know, I saw, that was my wind spell that just saved your ungrateful royal ass from becoming a fish pancake, I'm about to teleport out of here on my whirl wind, it can only hold one. You need to start running. And frankly, I'm done dealing with you today.

Natasha stood and began to walk away.

"No stay and help me get out of here! All I need in da ocean! Take me to it!"

Natasha stopped, her back still to me, "Yeah and I said go through  the forest. There's a sea cliff that you can use to access the ocean ."

"No you take me! You're a land servant of my family! You have to do as I say!"

Natasha looked over her shoulder. "I don't have a contract like Mr. Walters, I don't have to listen to all your family's demands. This was a job. A job I was paid to do which was to kill the boy that saw you and your sisters with." She gestured to the broken forms of the mother and son that laid only feet away from me on the ground. "A job I have just finished," she began move away again the wind suddenly picked up again and Natasha's feet slowly began to leave the ground."

"Wait. I see now, your contract with my family is made up of acts of services. How many acts of service do your ancestors have to do?"

Depending on what you wanted to from our family and who you were. Low level humans like Mr. Walters' ancestors usually had to create contracts of absolute servitude wish us in order to get what they desired. However, Natasha's family appeared to be that of serval powerful witches. They had more value and therefore could demand a lesser contract, that was on partial servitude. They only had to  perform a certain number of acts, or acts of services, before they fulfilled there contract.

Natasha let out a long sigh and stopped in her tracks . "Three...per royal family member."

I clapped my hands together. "Fantastic! I have used none. I will use one know...Natasha, I as per your contract to my family, I am using one of my set of request from you to get me into the oceans. Is this within your power?

"Yes," Natasha replied, somewhat begrudgingly. "Okay now if I need you need to get up, and we need to run!"

"Did you not see my fall?"

"Yes, again you would have been a fish pancake without me."

"If you saw my fall, dan you should know I can not run! Get da van, we will drive."

"Mr. Walters took the van and left, because you ordered him to take you to the hospital and leave, so he could build a house down in the cave for whatever reason. And he could not resist the compellment any longer, so he drove away and left me here to deal with you," Natasha said, her voice still calm.

"Why did you let him leave?"

"Because I thought a two hundred year old powerful mermaid could kill a defenses teenage boy by herself without falling out a window. Come on, the ocean is not far. We can just toss you in and you can swim away!"

In the distance, sirens wailed. We didn't have much time but Natasha was right, the ocean wasn't too far away. I could hear its soothing voice. I didn't dare call my sisters within it to me though...not with a hunter so close by and the ocean not within my line of sight.

I scowled are her, "Do you think that there would have been a problem for me? No, it became a problem because of the hunters they showed up!"

"Oh great hunters??? Can this situation get any worse!?" Natasha groaned.

Natasha grabbed my hand and dragged me across the pavement, over the grass, towards the forest beside the hospital. Each time she tugged my arm, I stumbled forward and I broke out into an awkward run, but my ankle was causing me intense pain with every step. It felt like I had a sharp piece of glass in my foot, that would jab the sole of my foot over and over again with each step I took. Maybe I did have a piece of glass in my foot, one could have gotten into my shoe after I hit the ground.

We made it into the forest and Natasha began to drag me deeper and deeper into it.

"Hey!" A man shouted from the edge of the forest,and both me and Natasha turned and we were instantly blinding by a beam of light. Even from this distance, I could tell that he was wearing a policemen uniform.
He turned away from us and shouted, " I have two unidentified females, that appear to be escaping into the woods. Stay where you are! Don't move!" he commanded.

"Natasha, something is wrong with my eh....foot. I cannot keep going."

"We have to! The ocean is just right past those trees!"she pointed towards the trees and let her hand fall tothe side. " I can't leave you until you get to it , because I'll get the urge to pull out one of my eyes if I don't fulfill my act of serve . That was literally one of the stipulations in the contract between my ancestor and your father, for them to scoop out their eyeball is they don't full fill their act of service. So keep moving!"  yanked me forward again and I fell forward again, landing on that same foot at an unnatural angle.

I looked up at Natasha who's calm demeanor had completely disolved away. Standing in the light filtering down from the trees, she looked absolutely frazzled and completly unhighed. "Come on! Get up! Get up! I don't want to go to jail because of my idiotic ancestors wanted some stupid magic from the sea, so they promised to tie all their descendants to idiots like you!"

I tried to stand, but this time my leg wouldn't even hold my weight and I once again collasped in a pile of pain.

Natahsa took out a silver object with glass ball at its end from a pocket in her long white dress, I instantly reconized it as being a channeling weapon, a tool witches used to channel their magic. She pointed it at the police officer. A strong wind began to pick up and all at once. It grew stronger and stronger, until rocks and fallen trees where flying throught air. One of those branches flew and hit the police officer in the head with a loud crack and he fell to the ground.

I stared in awe and slight terror as the wind began to swirl around us. "Stop the wind, you have defeated the police officer!" The wind was howling around us still and was only increasing in strength. I was digging my fingers into the soil to keep from getting lifted off the ground. My long hair wipped around me, making it hard to see my surroundings.

"You're royal highness, get ready for the ride of your life," Natasha placed a hand on my shoulder and in the next instant, I was airborne.

I flew high above the trees and then for the second time that day, I came rushing back down. But instead of the ground I smacked hard into the salty waves of the sea back first. I was sure what hurt worst, landing on glass or being tossed into the water like that.

Submerged beneath the blue green waves, I struggled to get out of the hideous orange jump suit so I could shift into my true form. The  tremendous amount of pain I was in currently in wasn't helping . After what felt like an eternity, I finally able to struggle out of the ugly orange jump suit and shift into my other form.

The pain followed me over to my other form was so intense that I began to see black spots on my vision, but I kept swimming. I had to get to Elizabeth. She was the only one that could save me at this point, she had to stab me with the hunter's knife again so I could heal. And somehow, some way, I made it to the cave entrance, sang the song to soothe the sea monsters that guarded it, and with the last bit of energy I had, I dragged myself to the surface of the pool onto the rock.

"Marina!" what happened to you? Isla's voice filled my ear. I felt her gentle hands wrap around my middle and drag me up on top the rocks. I was too exhausted to even answer her.

"She needs healed, Elizabeth come quick with your knife so I can heal her!"

Another pair of hands joined her in her effort to hall me up on the rock. A few moments later, I felt something sharp pierce my arm, and Isla began to sing the healing song.

"Marina.."

Elizabeth's voice sounded like music to my ears, especially after the day I had had.

"I know you must be in a lot of pain right now, but why did your servant guy bring us material and instructions to build a child's life sized playhouse?"

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The Boy's POV
Summer 1970

The monster looked up  at the window the boy had just pushed her out of. Startled,  he backed away quickly. He was terrified that she had just seen him just now. How was she still alive?  His brother  and mother she had just pushed out of that same window certainly weren't  alive. He could see there crumbled bodies on the concrete outside."

"Hey kid," a gruff voice said behind him. The boy jumped, startled by a strange voice.

The boy turned around to see a man with dark hair and eyes standing at the doorway of what used to be his brother 's hospital room. The man clutched his side and the boy could see that that beneath his hands a blood stain was forming . The man looked like he has been shot by a gun in his side."

"It's not as bad as it looks," the man said.

The boy nodded his head in acknowledgement.

"That was brave of you to push that monster out the window and get revenge for your family. But the fall didn't kill it, didn't it?"

The boy shook his head.

"How would like to get more revenge? Make sure that you kill for sure the next time you try?"

"I would like that very much sir."

A smirk spread across the man's face. "Follow me than boy, there is a lot of work for us to do."