Issue Eight: Beneath the Depths

BENEATH THE DEPTHS BENEATH THE DEPTHS

HAUNTED WORDS PRESS

HAUNTED WORDS PRESS

Haunted Words Press Issue Eight: Beneath the Depths

Published digitally September 2024

Edited by Halle Merrick

Cover artwork by Maryana Simpson: ‘Kraken Hatchling’

This magazine is copyright Haunted Words Press

Copyright to all work is retained by the original contributor

Any resemblance to real events or persons contained in the fiction work herein is entirely coincidental. Views and opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the editor.

Twitter: @haunted press

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Website: www hauntedwordspress com

Contact: hauntedwordspress@gmail.com

IINTRODUCTION NTRODUCTION

As with every Haunted Words issue, I’d like to start this off by saying thank you No matter how long you’ve been here - from our very first scream into the void, or whether you’re a brand new ghost in our legion, thank you We are so glad you’re here, because we would not be able to keep putting out issues and seeing such amazing talent without you

This is Issue Eight: Beneath the Depths, our second publication of 2024, and our eighth digital issue, which is insane! With work from seventeen immensely talented contributors that have chosen to home their words and their work with us, we’ve amassed short stories, flash fiction, poetry, and visual art, all brought together within the theme ‘beneath the depths’, and all aimed at a young adult audience We’ve got mermaids and misery, romances and rot, ghosts and graveyards, and we adore each and every piece published here

We hope you love this issue and the work within it just as much as we do, and we invite you to dive beneath the surface and take a look. Maybe you’ll find some buried treasure along the way Without further ado, welcome to Issue Eight: Beneath the Depths

- Halle Merrick, Editor in Chief

BBODIES ODIES DEVON NEAL

YA | FANTASY | ANXIETY

How foolish we are to trust bodies of water How many times did my bare childhood feet part the murky lake water where the sharp edges of stones slit at my soft soles, or glass teeth chewed near my ankles? How often did my fingertips skip like soft stones on the surface as I sat at the boat’s edge, life jacket like a strand of muscles at my feet, the water spiked with spines? On vacation, I walked among the thunderclouds of jellyfish, edging along the precipice of drop-offs, a riptide muscles tugging at my limbs, swallowing and swallowing and swallowing

WALK THE PLANK WITH WALK THE PLANK WITH SOFT FOOTSTEPS SOFT FOOTSTEPS ILA S

YA | FANTASY | SACRIFICE

‘Walk the plank. Walk the plank. WALK THE PLANK,’ chanted the sailors that Facia had once trusted with her life.

She could almost feel Captain Farlene raise an eyebrow as she stood there, shaking. One foot after the other. Just put one foot after the other, and it will be over soon.

She wasn’t a traitor, no matter what Zradit said, and Facia would stand by that for the rest of her soon-to-be-over life. Captain Farlene had saved her from the kingdom that had wanted to put Facia in its mouth and bite down just to taste the blood. Why would Facia ever, ever betray the Captain’s whereabouts to them?

Hopefully Zradit wasn’t the traitor. Please, please let the crew still be safe. Facia didn’t care that they turned on her so quickly, she didn’t, she understood. She really did. On the high seas, it was everyone for themselves.

The sound of her boots echoed against the wood, the wild wind whipping through her hair. Sea salt smacked her in the face, but she couldn’t do anything about it. The bandages were tied so tightly around her face that she couldn’t even blink She wouldn’t cry, not even in the face of death.

Facia blindly stumbled her way to the edge of the plank. Her hands were bound. Her crew had betrayed her, thinking she’d betrayed them

One foot after the other.

The impact of her body against the water almost seemed like mercy.

But then there was a song. It twisted through the seaweed and the bubbles of the currents, weaving its way around the schools of fish and riding along the backs of the manta rays.

The song felt like heaven personified, and Facia genuinely thought that she’d died a painless death, that she’d escaped the life that had collapsed from deceptions and lies.

Then the bubbles cleared. Facia’s mouth opened in shock, letting bubbles fly to the surface. She nearly choked at the sight of the most beautiful face she’d ever seen. Sapphire blue eyes stared into her dark red ones. The mysterious girl’s hair floated around her pale face like seaweed. The ocean had been merciful, but she seemed her saviour And her thoughts proved true, as the girl carried Facia up, up, up, to break the surface of the water. The former pirate coughed out water and gulped air desperately. Her eyes focused on the sight of a dim, stormy sky It passed quickly as the girl swam, faster than Facia had thought possible, towards a slim glimmer of land.

Facia was dropped on the beach in seconds. Her thoughts still swam, as if water had seeped into her ears and left her brain floating, but she knew that she had been saved But...by whom?

She rubbed her eyes quickly, trying to catch a glimpse of the girl before she left. All she caught was a glimpse of the dark green, seaweed-like hair that she’d spotted before, and the girl was gone.

‘Wait!’ Facia cried out, getting to her feet and running towards the ocean, towards her saviour, towards the sound of a song that wrapped itself around her heart and wouldn’t let go.

But as she stood there, all she could hear was the sound of the waves.

SSALT ALT

BEN RAMAKRISHNAN

YA | BITTERNESS | DEATH

i seek shelter at your harbours pray for solace in these waters i would die for you to let me in where my soul roams without borders you always said if ever i was lost to look up at the beacon in the sky to asylum in your lighthouse warm and safe and home at last

yet i am surrounded on all sides by infinite blue true like the leather on my broken compass but brother, unlike you (who was supposed to show me my way) there is no blinding light from a beacon or from the heavens up above and i am beginning to think that the heavens do not exist at all

i scream at the sky endlessly, ferociously like the beast i am as there is no longer a soul for miles to condemn me for my behaviour i taste the sourness of bile and blood and rage on my tongue stinging with the salt between my fingertips

waterfalls come gushing out of my eyes

more salt to join the sea

more salt for my open, bleeding wounds

more salt for my ever-growing vengeance

the waters are murky and blue turns to black the waves are choppy with tumult and the coming storm my rage could outrun any storm yet i am exhausted to my bones tired and jaded and livid, no shore to destroy if i wanted and so, i become what you want me to be the boy who disappeared sunken like a ship hitting rock bottom hair spilling all directions as i crash under blue turns to black turns to red i am salt lying on a marine deathbed

THE WATER WILL THE WATER WILL CLAIM US ALL CLAIM US ALL JOE BUTLER

YA | HORROR | CLIMATE

Before the ocean devoured most of the state, the long bar of dark, gravel-covered beach near my house used to be a parking lot. The water finally burst the banks, flowing up over the flood walls and makeshift barriers to consume highways and streets and towns and houses, until it finally came to rest just short of my house. Sated, it seemed, at least for a while.

My parents and I would walk the length of this ersatz beach up to a high promontory, where a single remaining office block overlooked the water; a tall, narrow building with mirrored windows that we referred to as the lighthouse. Once a day, every day, rain, or shine, we would walk to its weed-choked base and look out at the hungry iron-grey expanse. I would sometimes peer inside the old building, hands cupped to the grubby windows so I could make out the empty cubicles, and I would imagine what people used to do in there.

It was our ritual and I loved it.

Once, I found a shark’s tooth that had been disgorged by the tide; a serrated, brownblack arrow that filled the entire palm of my hand My mom said that sharks lose and grow back their teeth all the time. That they’re designed to just fall out. We took it back to the house and my dad drilled a hole at the very top of it, looped some string through it and hung it on my wall. I’d lie awake at night watching it as the moonlight caught its

dimpled edges, and imagine the terrifying creature one day returning to claim it. Circling my bed in the darkness, waiting for me to put my foot out of the covers so it could attack; wet smack of jaws snapping shut around my ankle.

A few years after I found the tooth, we were out for our routine walk along the beach. I was ahead of my mom and dad, weaving in and out of the ancient road markings when I found the body of a man washed up on the beach.

His pale skin was marbled with dark veins, and blackened around the hands and feet. It was so swollen, I couldn’t quite understand what I was looking at, at first, but then I saw a mouth, agape, black tongue lolling between white teeth, glint of a filling in the early light.

No eyes

Just two night-dark pits that seemed to hold my terrified gaze, making it impossible to look away.

‘He must’ve been dead a few days at least.’ I’d overheard my mom talking to a friend on the phone, hissing the words through partially closed teeth into the bulky plastic receiver, as if they were afraid my understanding of the facts might somehow make things worse

That night, I dreamt the dead man was standing outside my bedroom window He didn’t say or do anything, just stood there looking towards me with those empty sockets, the moonlight glancing off his wretched skin

The next time we walked the length of the beach, I felt a horrid thrill crawl up my spine as I passed the place where I had found him. My mom pulled me tighter as if she knew or felt the same thing herself.

The three of us stood at the foot of our lighthouse and watched the tide crawl out, revealing the pointed tips of the roofs and wreckage a little way out; great glistening chunks of concrete and exposed rebar and roof beams clad in long runs of bleached barnacles; thick mops of seaweed that hung down to graze the new waterline; noisy seagulls picking glittering fish from the artificial tidepools.

We never talked about the dead man, but it sat there in our collective memories like a festering wound. So, a couple of months later when three more townsfolk walked into the ocean my parents finally sat me down. They both sat across from me, stern-faced and stony, and they told me to never talk about it with anyone. When I asked why, they shut me down.

We stopped our daily walks and they instructed me not to look out of the bedroom window after I’d gone to bed I protested, telling them that I didn’t care about finding any more bodies (of course, I didn’t mention that I had dreamt of the eyeless man every night since)

Then, like a dam suddenly giving, more and more townsfolk began rushing into the water. First, an old man from out on the edge of town, then an entire family living in the farmhouse near the interstate The next day, it was the couple who ran the pharmacy

I asked why the sheriff didn’t do something about it, but my mom and dad just told me to stop bringing it up. Then the sheriff walked into the ocean one night and that was that Not long after he disappeared, the calls started

They were sporadic at first. I woke one night with a start to the metallic chime of the phone in the living room ringing in the middle of the night, the afterimage of the man with no eyes still staring down at me through the grimy window with his mirthless, terrible smile.

I couldn’t hear what my dad was saying on the phone; only the low mumbling bass of his voice made it through the wall. After the first call, I asked my dad who it was and he just waved it away.

‘Wrong number,’ he said in a tone that told me he would be answering no further questions on the matter.

The calls began to ramp up. Whoever it was didn’t just limit themselves to nighttime, but started to call throughout the day as well. My mom became nervous, which up until that point was something I’d never seen; her easy laugh and bright demeanour were suddenly shadowed

She used to view the fact that the old phone lines and infrastructure still worked as a gift, but after the calls started, she looked frail. I caught her staring at the now malicious hunk of black plastic and metal with a terrified apprehension, as if it might come alive and attack her.

My parents began arguing when they thought I was asleep. My dad wanted to get rid of the phone, but my mom wouldn’t let him

A week later, my dad finally snapped after my mom burst into tears when the phone started to ring. He yanked the ringing phone from the wall, the grey cord snaking up and out, ripping out chunks of plaster with it He stormed out of the house, cord dragging behind him like a demonic tail. I ran over to the window to watch as he stalked over to the cliff’s edge and launched the phone into the ocean, the wire arcing in the air

behind it.

He returned, sweat darkening his shirt at the armpits and lower back. Without a word, he dragged a chair over to the kitchen cupboard and climbed it, then stretched his arm into the dark space just below the ceiling and fished out a crumpled pack of cigarettes.

He and my mother both sat there in silence, smoke coiling around their wrists like ghostly manacles, their furrowed expressions looking in opposite directions, but seemingly considering the same unsaid thing.

I thought about asking about the calls again, but I knew they would never tell me. So, I left them to their malaise and went about gathering firewood.

He was sitting on the porch repairing my bike seat, wrapping softened leather over the older, weatherworn material. Looking out towards the wireline horizon, his expression faded out, softened as he said the words, assuming the quality that light does as a cloud passes in front of the sun.

‘The ocean will claim everything it once lost,’ he said.

Then, just like that, a second later, he was back to himself.

Not long after the telephone-throwing incident, I woke up early and decided to go on a bike ride I rode south across the concrete flatlands, broken up here and there by empty and fallen-down buildings, and light poles measuring out the distance. The constant hiss of the sea smashing against collapsed scrapers and apartments was a reminder of what had happened.

As I bounced along the ruined streets and overgrown back roads, I imagined what the state might have looked like before. The age of plenty, my mom had said. The Blessed Anthropocene, my father had recalled as we talked about the internet, and air travel, and ordering food to our doorsteps. All the food I could ever imagine, and they would throw half of it away. I thought they were joking until they showed me dog-eared photographs of landfill sites filled with mountains of wasted food. Whenever we talked about the way it was, which wasn’t often, I always had a single question on my lips, desperate to be asked.

If you knew what was coming, why did you have me?

I could never bring myself to ask it, maybe because I knew it would hurt them. Maybe they’d made a choice to take a chance on hope. But a feeling that they had done this to me, that they’d left me and others my age holding the bag for all their mistakes made me so angry. My birth didn’t bring absolution from what they’d been party to, only more blame They told me that they’d protested, that they’d stood in the streets holding placards and blocking traffic, but it was already too late.

The rumpled and wrecked landscape spread out as far as the eye could see, resembling a violently yanked tablecloth All of the past generation’s selfish history locked away in every spilt ruin that littered the spoiled hills and waterlogged valleys. And what was the point of assigning blame anymore when no-one would live to record it? Why get angry at all, when all of us would face such vast and terrible consequences because of the actions of so few people? It was too late for recompense We could only subsist in the now.

Still, as I wound between the artificial berms of overgrown cars and along the torn-up highway, passing signs for towns and cities now erased, I couldn’t help but squeeze the

grips of my handlebars tightly and grit my teeth at the thought of all we’d lost. A grief that had lodged itself in all of those that persisted and metastasized into something dark and awful and heavy.

I turned inland in a wide loop heading back through town on my way home. It hadn’t occurred to me at first just how empty the place was. I stopped at an intersection that was normally bustling with people, but saw no one. As the clank of my bike’s crank wound to a slow clicking, I noticed the sound of the wind. The gentle hiss of curled leaves scudding across the macadam. It felt eerie. An uncanny feeling pulled my gaze from the road to the rows of stores, the lights dark behind the glass.

I rolled up to the grocery store, normally manned by friendly, old Mr Navidson and his wife, but it was closed, locked up. When I pressed my face to the mucky glass, I could see maggots and fat, black flies busying themselves in the rotten food that had been left out.

I walked along the whole parade of stores, but they were all locked up and I didn’t see a single person It felt like I’d wandered into a strange dream, and I half expected to see the man with no eyes watching from some darkened window.

As I was about to leave, an old man emerged at the top of the steps leading into a squat, brownstone apartment building He looked skeletal, a creature caught halfway between this world and the next. Eyes, milky with age and bulging from his frail, yellowing skull. He clung to the metal railing with long, arthritic fingers and leaned out to address me

‘Thought I was the only one left,’ he said, voice trembling in his throat When he swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbed nervously in his thin neck like a pale bird taking a drink ‘Where is everyone?’ I asked, and he looked out at the abandoned street as if noticing it

for the first time.

‘Must’ve got the call. Damn phone’s been ringing off the hook for days. Wondered when my time would come. Been too long in my years anyway.’

‘Who called you?’ I asked. My voice felt far off, dislocated by some nebulous dread that had taken hold of my senses.

‘Used to be a much bigger town, you know?’ He gripped the rail tighter, wringing flakes of old, dry paint from the metal. ‘Much bigger. Way back when. Used to go to the top of the hill and look out at all the skyscrapers in that city and marvel at them. The wonder of them. That’s what we used to think, anyway. So clever we were, but we didn’t know shit.’

I knew enough. My parents had taught me that most of the state, most of the country, hell, most of the world had been swallowed by the rising ocean

‘We made so many mistakes, and we knew Knew what we were doing,’ the old man said, his rheumy gaze staring through me into a past I’d never known, like a rip in time.

‘That’s what they say, the voices on the phone ’

‘What do they want?’ I asked, afraid of what terror his answer might reveal

‘The ocean will claim everything it once lost,’ he said, his voice far off, as if reading from a distant script. Those words chilled me, punched a hole through my memory to when I’d heard my father say the very same thing he old man descended the steps slowly, taking them one at a time, and as I climbed to meet him halfway, hand outstretched to offer some assistance, he swatted at me.

‘I don’t need no damn help,’ he said.

We walked together along the main drag in silence for a little while, me pushing my bike, him shuffling along painfully slowly as we drifted out of town towards my home.

‘So much changed,’ he said. ‘Ain’t been out this way in a long time. Me and my friends used to go down to the beach, make a bonfire out of old driftwood. We would sleep on the sand, you know?’

He pointed east to somewhere I could imagine white-capped waves rolling over and around slowly collapsing frames of rusted girders. The steeple of some long-sunk church covered in a thick patina of bird shit.

‘Most of us didn’t really know the wrong we were doing,’ he said. ‘And now we gotta put it right.’

He stopped and leant against the hood of an abandoned Wrangler. I stood with him until a strange sense of uneasy urgency started to fill me He had repeated those same words that my dad had said after the first call. Then piece by terrifying piece it all started to slot together, and I took off in the direction of home as fast as I could cycle

I knew something was off as I crested the hill and saw my home As if there were a million invisible indicators that my brain had pieced together, but I was too slow to notice them right away Just that something was off Maybe it was the drawn curtains, the lack of movement behind the windows, no cooking smell or smoke from the chimney Whatever it was, it set my heart to thumping painfully in my chest, my throat to burning. I ditched my bike against the side of the house and ran around front. The door was half open, and I stepped inside I could feel that the house was empty, but I searched anyway.

I dashed from room to room calling out for them, the deepening worry flowering into terror with each unanswered shout.

When I had finished searching, I paced the kitchen imagining all of the possible scenarios why they might not be home, but none seemed plausible. They rarely deviated from their routine.

Then I noticed that their shoes and coats were still there by the door and nebulous worry morphed into a fear that stole my breath.

I ran outside again and to the edge of the cliff and scanned the broken coastline towards the beach, where a cloud of seagulls circled. I couldn’t understand what I was seeing at first, but in the place where I’d once found a shark’s tooth, lay a pale lumpy, tubular shaped pile of objects.

My brain was unable to comprehend the mass of flesh, like a vast tangled-up arm stretching out from the surf and far along the beach. As I stared, mouth agape, trying to parse this, I started to recognise human features in the melee; tangles of dark hair like sodden seaweed; the toothy recesses of slack mouths; skeletal limbs sticking out in all directions, pale pink bones jutting from bloated flesh It was the entire population of the town.

I took off sprinting towards it, despite the sour battery tang of acid climbing my throat. I must have known that my mom and dad were somewhere in that awful morass, that rotted throng. And as I drew nearer, I could hear something drifting on the air. Moans.

Maybe my parents were alive.

Beneath the static of the sea crashing against macadam, I heard my name being called over and over. A disorientating riptide of familiarity that crashed over me and pulled me closer and closer.

Then it moved and that fragile hope guttered in my chest.

I realised what my mind was having trouble understanding: it wasn’t a pile of bodies at all. They were all connected, conjoined into a single gigantic monstrosity.

Individual parts twitched and shivered, but a sort of undulation rippled along the whole of it, like the banded reticulation of an earthworm contracting and expanding. A long row of human mouths set deeply into a fleshy frill snapped shut here, another opened there, slow as the jaws of a Venus flytrap resetting. Constellations of grey, death-frosted eyes snapped open synchronously and rolled like marbles in disorganised, misshapen skulls, madly searching for something.

I felt another jolt of panic, like a bucket of ice water over my brain, and I was somehow closer again My name, now a bright and high song on the lips of the drowned being, sung just for me.

The giant twisted arm began to lift, first from a thousand exposed leg bones scraping against the concrete and pushing it up until it could move under its own steam, salt spray and a yellowish ichor flecking the blacktop beach beneath it. It raised high in the air, a supernatural punctuation mark against the rotten sky On the underside of it, smashed flat, were hundreds of faces turned sidewards, or embedded within the pale pink cushion of dense flesh All eyes were rolled and fixed towards me

Row upon row of mouths pressed into the underneath of it, vomiting a long stream of sea water as they fell open and joined the terrible and beautiful, ululating chorus.

The world tilted sideways, and the sky became the sea and the sea the sky, as I rolled down the steep bank and onto the beach, the sharp gravel slashing and jabbing at my elbows and wrists. Water rushed up and over me, and as I was submerged for a moment, all I could hear were screams from the ocean.

Gagging, choking, I got to my feet, both hands pressed over my ears as I fought to breathe air again.

The creature drew back as if readying to strike and, along its rumpled and bloody edge, I saw them both, their bodies conjoined, skulls and skin and hair, now one awful, twisted part of the mass.

My parents.

Their stitched-together mouths hinged open and they started calling my name.

Automatically, I put a hand to my mouth in shock and was taken by the song again. My legs betrayed me, pulling me along the surf, the water smashing against my shins, trying to tip me over again.

I grabbed at a bent parking metre and held on for dear life as the rest of my body attempted to march me towards the nightmarish creature

My fingers slipped across the wet surface, and as I took one shambling step after the next, I pressed my palms against my ears so that the panicked thrumming of my heart was almost all I could hear

Then I stopped My legs began to obey me again, as the mass turned, the eyes swinging away from me. I followed their gaze to the old man limping slowly down the beach. His mouth was working up and down, but I was too afraid to move my hands to listen

I didn’t watch what happened next. I didn’t need to.

Instead, I turned and ran back up the hill. I felt the thud of the gigantic mass slamming into the ground but didn’t look back until I was at the door to my house. I had fully intended never to look at the beach again, but there was a rising metallic screech that struck at my heart, like nails across a blackboard. I looked towards the thing and saw it had slithered further up the beach and was coiled around the lighthouse, constricting it, trying to pull it down. The building relented quickly and crashed over the edge of the cliff, emptying its contents of ancient desks, computers, and office dividers into the dull ocean.

Seemingly satisfied, the tentacle receded slowly back into the water.

As it slowly slid from view into the depths, I ran inside my house and packed as fast as I could; food and water enough for a few days, spare clothes, a fire lighter and the singleman tent that had been stuffed away in the back of my wardrobe

It was only when I placed the last item in the pack and my eyes lit upon the shark tooth pinned to my wall, that the maddening shock of what I had seen truly hit. I crumpled inwards, dropping onto my bed, and started to cry I pressed my palms to my eyes as I screamed, trying to loose some portion of the horror I had just witnessed from my heart I kept seeing it all again and again, each remembrance bringing with it new and worse details.

It felt like something had grabbed me by my ribs and shaken all of the air, and blood, and organs out of me When I was done, all I was left with was this deep and awful hollowness. I was empty, exhausted, but I knew I couldn’t stay. So, I got to my feet, shouldered the rucksack and tightened the straps It felt too heavy, too much, too soon, and I closed my eyes as I entered the living room again, not wanting to see the pictures of them on the mantle But the thing that lurked in the darkness of my imagination was

far worse.

I focused instead on the floor, following the familiar worn trail in the carpet to navigate my way to the door. What stopped me dead was the grey wire that lay across my path, leading to the kitchen. I froze, heart in my throat, fear dancing along the roots of my hair, as I followed the wire with my eyes. I found its origin sitting innocuously on the kitchen counter in a pool of stinking salt water clad in barnacles and draped in seaweed. The telephone.

I dashed to the door and, as I reached for the handle, the phone began to ring. A low dolorous, drowned bell.

And I was gone.

CHESIL BAY CHESIL BAY

DAISY BIGNELL

YA | FOLKLORE | GREED

The boys rowboat sleeps amongst the cattails, Rocking against the marshlands currents, Tethered to the rotting deck his Father once built, As rust inks the shallows crimson

Four lonely moons brought a man with a Godless heart to the Bay who told the boy of the maiden,

‘The townsmen have sharpened their hooks on her tulling skin, Cursed the Devil for the beauty of his sins. This mare - with the lungs of the deep ’

Before the haze of August’s sun he saw her, Bathing with the curiosity of the crawdads, Her coarse hair tucked disobediently behind pearled lobes, With eyes of innocence he thought the Virgin Mary would weep.

Drunk on wonder and moonshine behind a locked door, The boy sat on the splintered sill, Begging for the waters ripple to breath her dark skin, But it was the gulls, the northern pike, the fishermen haunting the waters

An early September morning brought death to the bastards door when he saw his fair maid strung up,

With the skin of a serpent and lungs starved of blue, His words once cursed with hope as if from the mouth of a babe, Lay dormant whilst his mind ran away.

THE HOTEL BATHTUB THE HOTEL

DANIELLE ROBERTSON

YA | HORROR | MERMAIDS

When I open the door, I see only the dark. It’s a deep darkness like ink against the eyelids that presses in with a stifling, humid weight And then I hear it

The click of nails on the tiled floor Scraping, clattering

The damp and heavy breathing of struggle The gurgling burble of water in the lungs

The slurping squelch of a torso dragging itself across the bathroom floor

The Mermaid is dragging herself out of the bathtub, and she is just in time for breakfast

The Mermaid appears, out of the gloom of the bathroom My eyes have adjusted somewhat to the dark, thanks to the thin outline of light seeping in through the curtains It is a dim reminder that life still goes on outside of this room That even in the hallway beyond the door, my family’s hotel is coming to life: the clattering coffee mugs, guests puttering at their doors in slippered feet The rustle of the morning paper

The Mermaid is grey and shimmery in the weak morning light Her gills fan and flutter uselessly at her neck like dying moths.

‘Another morning,’ I say in greeting, to remind her that she’s still here. That there is still water heavily salted by housekeeping, of course cool and deep in the tub. That there is still breakfast waiting for her.

‘Another,’ The Mermaid replies, but doesn’t finish her thought. Her eyes buffet about in her skull, adrift in memories. I try not to look at the place where her torso meets her tail, heavy and seeping against the tile. Her scales are flaking, shedding. They are gone in some places, rubbed down to the flesh.

I set her breakfast tray down and try not to rattle her or the dishes. There is tea in a shallow bowl. There are prawns swimming in butter and salt. On my first day working on this floor, the fishy smell stirred the contents of my stomach. But I’m made of harder things, now.

The Mermaid crunches through the shells. She takes a slurping sip of tea, propped up on one elbow Her fishy tail trails behind her like a stain, uselessly flopping with muscle memory.

‘Today the breeze smells like gold,’ I tell her. I was sternly told by my parents to remind her of happier times when her life was full of riches and an ocean of possibilities The Mermaid’s mind is like a toy on a string, now, prone to wandering off. It’s best to set the poor thing in a safe direction, to avoid any tumbles The undertow of madness is swift and unforgiving.

‘Gold,’ The Mermaid says. Her smile is coral. Her teeth are pearls. Her eyes cerulean, with specks of phosphorescence meet mine for a moment The jumpy motion of her irises stills, like a sailboat on a calm sea.

But the calm only lasts for a moment.

‘Cold,’ The Mermaid sighs. And I can practically feel it, the moment she unfurls.

The crash of the waves.

The sick spray of salt.

The Mermaid, dissolving into seafoam.

There is a sick rippling, a splashing anger, as she drowns again.

She is so close to shore, yet she is pulled back to the sea.

And the only thing I can do is take her dishes and click the door closed behind me.

UNCHARTED UNCHARTED REBECCA LOVEDAY

YA | GOTHIC | MONSTER

Here be monsters: doom foretold in faded ink on ancient scroll

The etching showed a foulsome fish; his blackened eyes devoid of soul His serpent spine, five whalers long could wrest a ship from man’s control with fins beclawed to shred the sails, with cavern-jaw to swallow whole

We must take heed, I begged the crew who sought the glory and the thrill of parts unknown, exotic beasts, another trophy for the kill. They mocked my fear: pathetic wenchgo scrub the decks. The wind blew ill as bubbles rose in swirling seas uncharted then, uncharted still

UNTIL THE DAWN UNTIL THE DAWN RUTH IRENE

YA | LAKESCAPE | DEATH

I walk through sunset colours, between the ruins of sand kingdoms having long been abandonedby their youthful buildersancient and lostimagined stories, left to time

Water reflects the kaleidoscope of memories, running to gether and mixing shades of the lights and shadows. And, like the tides, grief ebbs and flows within me

Waves rise up, swelling and churning - gnashing rabid teeth - before crashing against me with a hurricane force, which threatens to crush what little soul I have left.

A steady, blinking lightnot green, but gold -

atop the lighthouse tower

winks at me and seems to whisper, ‘come home’ as if somehow I can climb its ladder and find you at the top, gazing out at faint stars and a sagging moon, one too hunched and tired to rise, from kissing the waves once more.

And in-between the ebbs of calm the sands of time, like memories ingrained, begin to crumble like castles in the setting sun.

I step from shore to greet the waves.

To ride the waves until the dawn.

SSOVEREIGN OVEREIGN AZIA ARCHER

YA | FANTASY | RECLAMATION

RISING RISING JEANNIE MARSCHALL

YA | SCI FI | MYSTICISM

Gather round, young ones, I’ll tell you a tale of An old shaman steps onto sand, at a time when our people were innocent though first, they just stand there, the waves wild at heart, the oceans uncharted were not on our side rolling in, always grumble-hiss-whispering and we had little experience, less still of tech, only love kneeling down seems the obvious act to the ocean we turned, and it gave and it nurtured gnarled hands touching reverently we, the body-split children ‘bove grey-cobalt depths calling worship into the wise sea we were young then, we had yet to see, yet to learn inconceivable giants of old: reign supreme there are gods ‘neath the surface, the oneness-ones, they plate-skinned singers, who, all, blessedly are life-giving, are older than scores of our lives, stir and rise from the deep with a song and so teach us we all are the parts of a whole, all connected like water, they take the tale-offering, splitting the surf out there on the ocean, or roaming on land, we believe with scales, spines, tentacles, eyes like a door we are called to eternally pay our respects to the divers deep, one-beings, risen before.

CONDITIONED GREAT CONDITIONED GREAT RATES POOL RATES POOL

MARIGOLD ROWELL

YA | HORROR | GHOST

Aidan was just about to close the door of the motel room behind him when his mother called, ‘Nothing with caffeine, honey!’

‘Okay, Mom.’

He didn’t point out that she and Dad had both downed several cups of coffee after dinner. He chose his battles, and this one wasn’t worth it. Instead, he headed down the breezeway, his sneakers gritting on the concrete as he passed numbered doors, some with yellow light glowing through their brown plaid curtains, and some dark. Above the roof of the motel, the sky burned a sullen orange with the last light of the day. In somebody’s room, people talked on television, but the volume was too low for Aidan to make out what they said.

Two vending machines stood at the end of the breezeway, with a long, low ice machine between them, casting puddles of pale light on the concrete sidewalk. Xeroxed flyers had been taped to the cinder block wall over the ice machine, and a stark black and white face stared out at Aidan from each one. Closest to the soda machine was a girl with long, lank hair and wide eyes. She’d disappeared two months ago. At the top of the flyer in large letters was: MISSING PLEASE HELP! At the bottom was the girl’s name,

Kelsey Harrison. Underneath that, a 1-800 number, and a reward of twenty-five thousand dollars.

Aidan didn’t like looking at those flyers. They gave him the creeps. He glanced behind him at the deserted breezeway, now deeper in shadow, then he looked to his right, down the short, gloomy tunnel that led from the vending machines toward the concrete deck that bordered the pool. Fading glints of sunlight shimmered on the water.

The towering sign at the entrance of the motel parking lot had advertised a pool, along with free Wi-Fi, air-conditioned rooms, and Great Rates! but when Aidan’s family had checked in, the desk clerk had told them (before being asked), that the pool wasn’t available. Aidan had assumed that meant the pool had been drained. Apparently not. He considered taking a look, but the breeze shifted, crooning softly down the tunnel toward him, flapping the Missing Please Help flyers and carrying the smell of the pool. Not clean chlorine, but instead the green and mouldy stink of a clogged drain. Gross. He turned back to the soda machine and realised that a can of soda cost a shockingly cheap fifty cents, instead of the buck seventy-five he’d expected Unexpectedly flush with cash, Aidan bought two sodas: a Sprite and also a Coke, reasoning he could drink the Coke tomorrow

A stack of ice buckets sat upside-down on top of the ice machine, so Aidan grabbed one, inspected it for spiders, then opened the machine’s metal door.

There was a dead girl inside.

With a cry, Aidan stumbled back. One foot left the curb and he toppled backwards into the parking lot He landed hard on his butt, his teeth clacked together and gravel bit into his palms.

He had to be wrong. There couldn’t just be a corpse in the ice machine. There was no way in hell. He climbed to his feet, trembling. He wiped his hands on his jeans, and took a few steps back to the ice machine, close enough to see through the open door. No dead girl. Just ice. Weird shadows, creepy flyers, and being overtired from riding in the car all day. That was all it was. With his stomach flip-flopping, Aidan reached into the ice machine and grabbed the plastic scoop. Nothing happened. No ghostly girl re-materialized. No cold fingers closed around his wrist. Yet, he had seen her so clearly: she was as white as the enamelled inside of the ice machine, curled up with her knees hugged against her chest and her arms wrapped around them. Long white hair drifted over the ice. Her ashen, upturned face stared at Aidan with huge, colourless eyes.

Hadn’t she looked like...? He glanced up at the Missing flyers. Yes. The same girl. Kelsey Harrison. Same face, same pin-straight hair. Same wide eyes. The dead girl was nothing more than shadows and imagination

He scooped quickly, poured ice into the bucket, and slid the door of the ice machine shut. Then he wiggled both soda cans down into the ice, and walked back toward the room In the deepening dusk, yellow lights came on over each doorway Aidan glanced down at the ice bucket, and in every single facet of every single ice cube, the tiny face of the dead girl stared up at him He hurled the bucket away Ice cubes flew everywhere, bouncing and clattering. Both sodas went flying. The can of Coke hit the edge of the curb and burst, spraying foam over the tires of somebody’s blue Corolla The bucket struck the sidewalk with an echoing clang followed by a growl as it rolled in a semicircle across the concrete Aidan stood frozen with both fists pressed against his mouth He was almost certain he had not screamed. No doors opened. No one stuck their head out. He picked up the can of Sprite, miraculously intact, and the ice bucket, then walked into the parking lot and

scooped up the now half-empty can of Coke. He tossed both cans into the ice bucket, where a few remaining ice cubes still rattled at the bottom. He didn’t want the Sprite anymore. When he got back to the room, he set the ice bucket on the table with the four plastic-wrapped drinking glasses and the cable channel guide.

Ten minutes later, his mother said, ‘Aidan, I told you no caffeine.’

Aidan looked up from his phone. ‘I know. I was gonna save it for tomorrow. That’s why I got the ice bucket and the ice.’

His mom lifted the dripping Coke can. ‘This is half gone.’

‘I dropped it,’ Aidan replied. ‘There’s a big dent in the bottom. If I wanted to sneak a Coke, I wouldn’t have brought it back to the room, Mom.’

For a moment, he was sure he’d gone too far Even though he hadn’t meant to His mother’s eyes darkened behind her glasses and her mouth tightened into a pursed little line To Aidan’s surprise, his father came to his rescue He lowered his hardback military history book into his lap; the plastic library cover crackled as he closed the book, marking his place with one finger

‘Caroline, we’re all tired It’s been a long day, and tomorrow’s going to be another one ’

Aidan’s mother looked like she was about to snap back, then her angry expression collapsed and her shoulders sagged. She looked over at Aidan. ‘You’re right. That would’ve been pretty silly of you.’

‘It’s okay, Mom,’ Aidan said.

‘Would you do me a favour, though, honey?’

‘Sure.’

He anticipated something like, Just tell me the truth next time. But all she said was,

‘Could you dump out the ice bucket, and throw away the can, please?’

Aidan didn’t want to do anything involving ice or that bucket, but he did it anyway. He carried the ice bucket into the cramped bathroom, dumped the ice in the toilet without looking, and then chucked the Coke can into the trash.

The next morning, the dead girl appeared when Aidan turned on the shower. He backed up fast and collided with the sink, thinking thank God he still had his pyjama bottoms on. That made him laugh, but it came out as a choked cough.

The falling droplets of water fragmented the dead girl like a staticky old video broadcast But she was definitely there, wearing a drenched and ragged sleeveless dress that hung as limp as her hair. Her hands were no longer wrapped around her knees, but hung at her sides

‘Who are you?’ Aidan whispered ‘Are you Kelsey Harrison?’

The dead girl did not answer

He could ask her a hundred stupid questions and get no response, but there was one question she might answer, and she wouldn’t have to use her voice. His hands clenched around the edge of the sink His entire body felt cold despite the steam rising from the shower. His heart thudded heavily in his throat.

‘Where…’ he began, and then he had to clear his throat. ‘Where is your body?’

He felt dizzy and sick to his stomach as he watched the dead girl lifted one arm to point. Though her arm disappeared beyond the stream of water from the showerhead, Aidan knew where she meant. Past him and to the left. Toward the swimming pool. He hadn’t wanted to ask that question, and he certainly hadn’t wanted an answer. He nodded to the dead girl. ‘Okay. I understand.’

Shutting his eyes, he fumbled forward, slapped the shower wall, dunked his head as fast as he could, then wrenched the faucet off. He didn’t want his parents asking why he’d been in the bathroom with the shower running, if he hadn’t intended to take a shower. They wouldn’t believe him about the dead girl. They hadn’t even believed him about the can of Coke. Not really. They just hadn’t wanted to start a big fight after a long road trip.

Half an hour later, his parents were on their way out the door, when his mother turned back. With eerie Mom-prescience, she told him,

‘Stay away from the pool, alright? The desk clerk said it wasn’t open.’

‘I will, Mom,’ Aidan said.

She smiled. She still looked worn out and exhausted, as if she hadn’t gotten any sleep. ‘We should be back by early afternoon Lock the door Love you, kiddo ’

‘Love you, Mom,’ Aidan replied

He watched through the window as his father backed the SUV out of the parking space, and he waited to make sure they were really gone. Then he left the motel room, locked the door behind him, and tucked the key deep into the pocket of his jeans He walked

down the breezeway in the bright morning, past where the vending machines hummed softly, past the rustling Missing flyers, down the shadowy tunnel with its windowless grey-painted doors, to the swimming pool. Again, that funky stagnant smell rushed to meet Aidan, buoyed on the breeze. The stink seemed to ooze into his nose and throat. He could almost taste it: sour and mushroomy with a hint of sweetish decay.

Still in the shadow of the motel, the pool was peppered with dead bugs and cigarette butts. A rainbow sheen of spilled grease swirled on the surface, and under a scum of algae and floating leaves, the dead girl drifted just beneath the surface, looking up at Aidan.

He needed proof. A photograph. Then he would call the police. Stepping to the edge of the pool, Aidan pulled his phone from his pocket and held it out, aiming it down at the dead girl. Nothing showed up on the phone camera. Only the murky water. Then he heard a stealthy splash. When he raised his head, he saw the dead girl emerge from the water One dripping, bloodless hand touched his arm A chill sank into Aidan’s skin He recoiled, and realised he could not pull free. The dead girl’s milky fingers stretched into filaments that wrapped around Aidan’s arm and swiftly darkened from white to scaly greenish grey. Her eyes bulged in their sockets, becoming shiny and black. Her nose shrank to slits, while her mouth widened into a snout, her gums withering black and sprouting hundreds of needle fangs. She yanked Aidan close to her cold and rubbery skin, enveloping him in her froggy stench, and before he could cry out, she dragged him into the pool. Aidan thrashed and kicked, beat at her with his free hand, but he could not escape her sticky grip as she plunged deep beneath the water

On the surface, the green algae bubbled The leaves and the dead bugs and the cigarette butts spun in a frantic dance. Then the water calmed. The swimming pool lay undisturbed once more as the morning sun peeked over the roof of the motel, tinting the water an emerald green that was almost beautiful.

Marissa opened the door of her dad’s SUV, reminding herself not to stick her brand new sneakers in any of the puddles left by the recent thunderstorm. As she glanced down at the rainwater pooled against the curb, she gasped in horror. A face not her own floated in the dark water: a dead boy, fish-belly pale, his colourless eyes gazing up into hers.

THE MERMAID BREAKS THE MERMAID BREAKS

FFREE REE

LINDA CRATE

YA | FANTASY | MERMAID

you buried me in the depths not knowing i was a mermaid, when i woke i swam out of the shipwreck of us and into the surface;

i was sung back together by the moon and the sun & by birds, flowers, family, friends, mountains, sea shores, waters, trees, clouds, and stars that remembered my name

i was given new magic and new songs to sing, ones that never knew your name; and for good measure

i grew a new heart and threw the old one out so love could never make me forget who i was again

because i lost myself in you, surrendering all my power; and i won't allow anyone to break me again.

BENEATH THE EBBING BENEATH THE EBBING TIDE, WE SING TIDE, WE SING FAITH ALLINGTON

YA | FANTASY | LONELINESS

The town has a hundred names for what haunts the shore. We are horses sometimes, other times we are eyes and teeth drifting in the sun-speckled fog. Though the townspeople paint our image onto salt-tongued murals, still, we are shunned They warn their children not to call to the tide, in case we answer back.

But you–oh, you are braver than all the rest. Running along the dunes, yellow-horned poppies twining at your feet Your eyes casting nets of longing all the way to the starlit horizon.

Come, small thing, right up to the sea’s edge. Taste the salt on your lips and watch us dance in the moon-purled waters for you Whatever they say about us, you know in your heart that we are not monsters.

We will be your family. Jellyfish will ornament your hair and eels wreathe your body like the finest gowns Scuttled ships and sailors’ bones will give over their jewels for your fingers.

Hurry, before the ebbing tide returns to the deeps. Leave your cobblestone griefs behind and follow the threads of our song We’ll carry you home to seagrass meadows that flower beneath this eternal sky.

WEATHERBY’S PIER

THE DROWNING AT THE DROWNING AT WEATHERBY’S PIER

ARIANNA KANJI

YA | HORROR | UNSETTLING

so tie me to the weathered pole and send me floating away palms pressing into the sandy ocean floor until it gives out my head bobbing above the water, gulping for air do not save me

watch my frozen body reach desperately for land

a scream bottled deep where a model ship lies plastic and fake there is a kind of pity in those who beg for skeleton hands while trapped instead of merely peeling off their skin and crafting their own.

my dress flows and catches against the rapid rocks and i am merely a white flag fluttering in the wind

a sign of rabid intent and beastly claws the threat to wrap your news around the day the girl finally leaves a sign to little children and young women not to cross along Weatherby's pier

jellyfish arms stinging widely lathered in seaweed and salty hair

so painful to sightsee that your smile crusts over and your lips go sour

i sink down below the surface until my veins turn blue mouth chapped with brittle teeth

light reflecting on my reflection deep beneath the earth

cerulean, aqua, and azure a constellation of sunbeams fractured by church glass the abandoned shipwreck harbours a statue of a woman with a long tail and a piercing gaze but only one will ever be important does she know her scales don’t have to sacrifice their shimmering beauty to be considered worthy of fear? a mysterious figure reaches through the fog a ghost of a creature beautiful and mystical and ugly and brash features daunting, haunted by a reality that slips through her fingers like seashell dust you shout curses, hail sirens speak your mystifying words into existence tie yourself to a pole and sail out to sea drawn in by the tantalising voice of the barnacles crawling along your leg perhaps this is a warning perhaps i’ll go on to burn next time the water in my lungs evaporating into boiling air but the sandy feels so good against the long white tendrils of my body, untethered snaking along the ocean floor.

THE GRAVEYARD SHIFT THE GRAVEYARD SHIFT

JULIANNE ESTUR

YA | ROMANCE | MERMAIDS

Miriam doesn’t mean to find the dead boy beautiful The ocean is already full of beautiful and dead things. She shouldn’t be surprised by either. The water moves through this boy freely, like all of the ghosts that her family have led to the other side The shape of him wobbles. The colour blue penetrates him. She can tell what he looked like alive stark black hair and tan skin well-loved by the sun This boy would never exist in full colour again.

Miriam sweeps a thumb over the ring resting on her index finger. A gold band with a shiny pearl she had found nestled in a group of dark rocks

The boy opens his mouth and makes a choked noise

‘It’s okay,’ she says She’s grown up listening to her parents console the spirits they brought home, and she still doesn’t know what else to say. When her body was small enough, she’d stay curled behind her favourite rock as her mother’s voice remained strong and gentle, even if the spirit began to wail or curse as their memories returned to them Miriam would flinch, or cover her ears, or leave altogether There is no leaving now.

This boy is hers.

Her first. She dreads the sight of him.

His grip leaves indents where his fingers are.

‘You can’t drown,’ she offers. Not anymore. There’s little comfort in it, she realises. That’ll only confuse him, she cringes. It’s too late now. ‘Breathe.’

His hand loosens and floats down to the silver pendant around his neck. A crown.

Prince, she thinks, but there doesn’t seem to be any of those anymore.

This one is nothing like the last real prince from a hundred years ago, the one that her mother recalls vividly because of all the ridiculous requests he made before they passed him on.

‘What’s your name?’ she asks now, per her mother’s teachings, given while Miriam and her three sisters were gathered around her in a sunny cove where humans never came. Her mother paused beforehand, closing her eyes to greet the sea breeze. Miriam’s never figured out what they say to each other. She drew clouds in the sand while Selene asked questions and her eldest sister Venus glared daggers at Miriam for not paying attention The boy studies her without disgust or reverence. Only curiosity. Maybe he hasn’t yet remembered yet that creatures like her weren’t supposed to exist He doesn’t remember to be shocked.

‘Eric.’

‘Eric,’ she echoes. If she said his name, then he’d start to recall all the people who used to say it too

He bends forward, squinting He floats closer to her until they’re in waltzing distance

Once she had watched a pair of lover ghosts who had arrived together try to teach her parents There wasn’t much they could do, considering the lack of solid ground down here and her parents’ lack of human legs. Instead, the two couples decided to spin around until they were dizzy with laughter

Hands clasped behind her back, she arches backward so fast that she nearly goes horizontal.

‘...Pretty.’

She beats her tail upwards. The distance between them widens.

You’re a guide, her mother told each one of her children the day they turned eighteen. A light in the darkness, as she tied the seagrass around each of their necks. Hanging from it was a not-quite pearl. It was shaped and felt like one, but it glowed a gentle yellow from the inside, like a solid star. To this day none of them knew how her father made them.

As she floats backward, the not-quite pearl floats up until it’s in her view, ever insistent. She’s had it for three days now.

‘I’m your guide,’ she tells him

He follows her

Miriam takes him to the shipwreck If she couldn’t be at home, then she needed to be here.. The first spirit she guides, she has to do on her own. She’s known this her entire life She’s watched her three sisters leave one by one and come back with weariness and inexplicable joy.

When she left, they all hugged her even though the contact still made her stiffen. Even Venus pressed a kiss to her temple The day it had been Venus’ turn, Miriam crossed her arms and turned away because she was mad at her for a reason she can no longer recall. When it was Venus’ turn, she scouted the perfect place to host her first spirit beforehand, a clearing hidden by walls of thick grass, where school of colourful fish

passed through often. It would be a sight for sore eyes, she explained.

The shipwreck, meanwhile, is a dark carcass nestled in the light sands, and Miriam is here for herself. There’s a gaping hole in the side of it hidden by pale red curtains from a wayward houseboat. The curtains disguise all its hungry jagged edges, but it’s grown kind to Miriam, and Eric doesn’t have a body to cut anymore.

She first found this place after she ran off after an argument with her mother about Venus being so hard on her, to which her mother had told her to see it from Venus’ side.

There were only two crates, a wooden chest full of the most ornate perfume bottles she had ever seen, and the bones of a skeleton’s upper half. The skeleton she buried with nothing but her hands, because despite her reservations about the family trade, she’d feel guilty if she didn’t let the dead rest. It was easy. The bones were no one to her.

Now there’s also a rocking chair with a pale green cushion that has a rip right across the middle of it, clean, as if someone had taken a knife to it Atop the chest sits a porcelain music box where a man in white holds a woman in a pale pink above his head. Beside it are a collection of bowls and plants in glass bottles

Miriam swims to the top of the staircase most of it is caved in and opens the hatch Sunlight invites itself in.

Afterwards, she fills a pale purple bowl with cut seaweed. When she turns around, she sees that he has settled on one of the crates, one knee pulled to his chest, silent as she places the bowl next to him.

‘Eat,’ she instructs.

He picks up a piece of seaweed. When he lifts his hand out of the bowl he’s holding a pale light in the shape of the piece He can only take its essence The principle of what

spirits could and could not touch still remains strange to her.

The colours of him brighten as he eats. ‘It doesn’t taste how I remember it.’

It’s already starting. Remembering is both a blessing and a curse. A necessity either way. She could have already taken him to the other side, but part of their duty was to make sure souls departed with everything they owned, and down here, it was only memories. ‘How do you remember it?’

He hums. ‘With other foods, mainly. Like rice and meat. Or by itself. But it was crunchy. And dissolved on your tongue. It was her favourite.’

He picks up the final piece, rubbing the light between his fingers.

‘Whose favourite?’ Helping them remember was hard to mess up. Just keep asking questions It was mechanical and detached

He swallows It takes Miriam a second to see the slight tremble in his hand and his bottom lip caught between his teeth. She understands it like the water greying before a storm

He blinks and there they are, tears sliding down his full cheeks

‘My sister,’ he recalls

He lifts his eyes to her He looks as if he’s just waking up from a long slumber, and the night’s dreams have not yet slipped away from him, but he can feel it happening and can do nothing to stop it ‘Am I ?’

She squeezes her pendant in her fist It’s the coldest star in the universe

She tries to remember her mother and her father and her sisters, how gently they can deliver this blow. But she is not her mother or her father or her sisters. She’s the one who says she hates them when she loses her head in an argument. She’s the one who loses her head.

Prince. She looks away from him and nods.

She braces herself for the sound of him breaking.

It never comes.

This one cries small. He cries as if it’s eternally nighttime and there is someone next to him trying to fall asleep. He sits in a corner where the light doesn’t hit, reduced to a shadow of a shadow Only when she comes near him does she see it, the tiny tremors in his shoulders. Only then does she hear it too, his quiet mournful hiccups. She remembers all of the spirits that made her sick with their wailing, and how she doesn’t know how to help this one either.

She understands less and less about her family’s self-inflicted madness. It would continue until the end of the time because the ocean is their home, and their home is a graveyard.

Time passes, and it’s inconsequential.

This one, see, is kind. He cooperates by eating his food, crying politely, and remembering well ‘Sabine gave this to me ’ It’s his younger sister’s name, the first name he remembers

She’s fifteen. Three years younger than him. He taps his crown pendant. ‘She gave Ma a lot of grief growing up because she was always getting into trouble, but Ma’s always working, so I’d have to go and bail Sabine out.’

‘Aren’t you an angel?’ She’s half-joking, half-fighting to untangle the knots in her stomach. She doesn’t know what it’s like to make anything easier for anyone, but now she had to.

The two crates they’re sitting on have a safe distance between them. His legs occupy the space in between. He’s facing her. She’s facing forward, stretching her tail in front of her because it reminds her how much room there is.

The boy is still beautiful, but he’s also still dead, and it’s her problem. She doesn’t want to look at it.

‘No ’ He chuckles as if the notion is laughable It’s not ‘I was just doing what I had to ’

I get it, she says, only in her mind

‘The necklace,’ she reminds him only because she has to

‘She got caught shoplifting ’ He smiles It’s sad ‘I had just gotten into a fender bender I was exchanging contact info with the other guy when I got the call, and I just… went to her and talked them out of pressing charges I broke the news to Ma too, and she started screaming about how she didn’t come all the way to America for Sabine to throw it all away so easily But No, that’s not really important ’

Miriam chews the inside of her cheek ‘Everything’s important ’

She says it because it’s right, and maybe because she wants to believe it

She didn’t say it in English. Sabine was just standing there looking terrified and looking at me to tell her what she said.’

‘Did you?’

‘I did.’ His voice is quiet. Small. ‘She used her allowance to get this necklace for me the next day. She said I was a prince among men, or something silly like that.’

‘It’s not silly.’ Sometimes she found herself wondering what it was like, to be a strong rock at sea and not the petulant tide crashing into it constantly.

‘I lived a good life.’ One corner of his mouth forces itself into a smile. ‘I couldn’t ask for more.’

He’s going quietly, she realises. He’s making it easier for her when all her life she’s been dreading how hard this was going to be She should be relieved Grateful to him, even His sister is right about him.

Yet she looks at him and the slump of his shoulders, burdened by something like peace, or resignation, and she resents him for burdening her with it too

Her next words are out before she can think about it ‘You’re so weird ’

He blinks She resists the urge to pull her own hair Her mother finds her curls too unruly anyways, so maybe she’d do her a favour.

‘Cut it out.’ Before she knows it she’s looming over him. ‘If I were you, I’d be upset. You’re dead As in, you’re never going back up there again Are you even human?’

He sits there and takes it

‘I don’t get you.’

She seethes outside. Her normal safe haven is woefully occupied.

‘I’ve been thinking about what you said,’ the boy says to her sometime later, ‘and it actually made me remember more. So thanks. Seriously.’

Miriam fights the impulse to tell him to take his politeness and shove it. It’s coming off as gratingly fake, yet she’s relieved that she somehow stumbled into saying the right thing. ‘What’d you remember?’

‘This time I told her I was sad.’

‘What were you sad about?’

‘I think I was just sad In general? When I remember it I get this tight sensation here ’ He taps two fingers to his chest. ‘ like I was sad for a very long time. So I told her, and she told me that I didn’t have much to be sad about because I was so lucky, so it would pass, even though I get this feeling I’d been waiting for a long time for it to pass. She said I just had to be grateful ’

‘Oh ’ She’s suddenly aware of how her pendant is pressed against her skin, and how this boy was is a real person.

‘These few… Days. Or weeks, are messing with my head. Memories keep coming back to me all out of order ’ She allows herself to look at him and sees that he’s rattled For how long? ‘I know Ma loves me more than anything in the world, yet I can’t wrap my head around her reacting that way ’

The feeling of recognition sneaks up on her like the sun coming out. It’s a lonely life her kind lead. There were other families like hers scattered throughout the ocean who never wandered from their own territories. For her whole life it had only been her and her family. She’s never known this before, how affirmed she could feel in her own existence because she could see it in someone else, who was totally different yet similar to her.

‘She does love you.’ She doesn’t expect herself to say it, or how much she believes it. ‘Sometimes people love you in the way they think is best, even if it isn’t. And you’re allowed to be upset about that too.’

She thinks of her father and the drowned fisherman finding common ground in their knowledge about sea creatures, or Selene teaching a widow how to sing because she’d missed out on that dream while alive.

‘My older sister, Venus, has always been the toughest on me One time it got so bad that I left home for days until she found me herself. I never saw her cry like that. She told me she was always, like, worried about me being so temperamental and she thought that disciplining it out of me was the correct thing to do. But it wasn’t. I told her so. We went home, and both my parents said they didn’t intervene this time because they wanted us to work it out like adults. I don’t know if that was the correct response, and ’ Venus still gets it wrong sometimes Miriam gets it wrong more than she gets it right still They all get it wrong, and she still gets upset. As she grows older, she might get better at allowing those truths to coexist ‘What I’m trying to say is that I think I get it too ’

There’s an awestruck look on her face that makes her want to swim away

‘I think it’s cool that you were able to tell her that ’ He laughs It’s a tired sound A vulnerable one that she doesn’t know what to do with. But it feels better than all of their conversations before ‘You wear your heart on your sleeve, you know? I wish I could be

like that sometimes.’

The constant spats she got into with her family made her think it was an accursed trait to have. Hearing his admiration makes her wonder if it didn’t have to be such a bad thing.

‘I never got the chance to tell them how I really felt.’ He inhales shakily. She can see him fighting not to cry, and he wins.

‘I’m sorry,’ and she is. She’s also never felt luckier, to share this with him.

Eric is looking at her. She looks back.

‘My name’s Miriam.’

He pauses his pacing ‘Miriam,’ he repeats ‘I knew a girl with that name Or maybe it was Mira? Miriam rolls off the tongue nicer.’

Her tail flails through the water.

‘...Yeah.’ He closes his eyes. His face is made up of growing pains that would never pass now though some of his features have sharpened, there’s still so much softness ‘I remember now. She was my first kiss.’

She nods much slower than her racing heartbeat.

‘It was terrible.’ He chuckles. The memory is there, in his mind’s eye, where she can’t see it ‘But I don’t know It was also nice ’

‘I’ve never been kissed,’ is all she has to offer

His eyes crinkle when he smiles at her. They’re standing in front of each other now. He’s so close that she would be able to hear and feel his breathing, if he still did that anymore. ‘That’s a shame.’

It’s all he gives her. It’s enough to imagine. *

Time passes, and it’s gentle. Miriam likes unearthing him.

He’s the only one in his family who can’t sing, but he’s the only one who can waltz, and even then, he prefers an energetic swing dance. He won a swing dancing competition when he was younger and then immediately dropped and broke the trophy before glueing it back together because it made his mother sad, and now it’s on display in the living room. He likes to run, but he stopped running in the months before he can’t say before what, exactly, except they both know because his running shoes were beat up and new ones are too expensive. He liked the way those shoes felt when they hit the ground, and how each time, he could feel the power surge through him from the bottom of his foot up through his legs and the rest of his body.

Miriam’s always been content with her tail. She isn’t like some of her sisters; Doris takes pride in the way her blue scales are the same shade as the sky at dawn Miriam doesn’t consider her tail this deeply, and certainly not to think about what her life would be like without it But he tells her about running, and she finds she can imagine so much more than she thought she could.

He’s good, this beautiful boy prince.

She likes good and beautiful. She likes swimming to the surface just to tilt her head towards the sun She hates to watch it go in the evening

She likes his flat nose and how he constantly has to push his hair out of his eyes.

His hair is in his face now as he sleeps in the corner of the ship. She’s never known ghosts to need sleep. He must be at peace. If she could, she could sweep his hair out of his face. She swears she could do it with just the lightest brush of her fingers, without waking him. She could be that tender, if she tried.

Then he flickers.

Or maybe she blinks.

It happens only once.

Please, she pleads anyway, to no god in particular, because her kind does this work for all of them. A little more time.

Time doesn’t matter that much when you are dead or destined to live for centuries. They tell each other more (there’s always more to tell) It’s good

‘My mom wanted me to be a doctor,’ Eric tells her He’s rubbing his right eye He’s been doing this a lot lately.

‘Did you want to be a doctor?’ They’re sitting on the crates again, but this time, Miriam is facing him Her tail and his legs are in that cramped space between the crates together, untouching.

He freezes, as if he forgets how to be.

He answers before the unease can take root in her. ‘I don’t know.’ His hand decides his eye is fine too, so it is. “It’s good work.” He drums his fingers against the wood. She tries to imagine what kind of rhythm it would make. ‘Did you want to do… this?’

‘I don’t know.’ It feels good to admit it out loud, to someone who understands. Talking to this ghost feels better than she thought. Maybe she was starting to understand it all. Her mother has said it many times before, but it comes from the heart when she tells him this time, ‘It’s good work.’ ‘Touche.’

He closes his eyes. Only his mouth moves. It says, ‘I wanted to be a florist.’

He’s still tapping the wood She mimics him It’s a slow and relaxed tune that makes her believe they have all the time in the world. ‘The only flowers I know about are roses.’

‘They’re a good flower. We have a rose bush in our garden.’

She can imagine him, this beautiful boy with a handful of beautiful roses, and she wonders how long they last underwater *

‘How much longer?’ Eric asks her, as he tries to pull himself off the ground His body is still heavy with something.

‘Now it’s whenever you’re ready.’ He’s remembered all that he can. Now she can’t stop him from going The thought splits a cavern open in her chest She thinks of her family

and wonders how they can stand to watch their lovely spirits go, over and over again.

He makes it to his feet. ‘Not yet.’

His eyes have never been clearer.

‘Not yet,’ she agrees.

The water is grey, and Eric loses an eye.

One second, he’s looking down at his hands, flexing them. He’s shaking like he can still feel the cold. The next second, he rubs once at his eye, and the next

His right eye pops out of his socket and falls to the floor silently

There’s no blood Only a black hole Because there’s nothing inside of him at all

This is the inside of him

He slumps to his knees She wants to help him to his feet She wants to pick up his eye and grovel before him with it. Except she can’t do any of it.

There’s no body to him left.

The words fail her. His face twists with anguish.

And then Eric laughs. The sound is a crude racket that he regurgitates from the depths of his stomach Even when he hunches over to put his head in hands, it does little to

muffle the sound.

He flickers. Over and over. Each time the sound stops for only a moment and resumes a beat later. It’s a melody that someone has cleaved random notes out of. She scrambles backward until her back hits the wall. She presses herself into it as he quiets. He looks up at her and she sees him for what he is: dead, even as he was beautiful still.

Then he cries. Really cries. He cries like she does, like the force of it threatens to split his body apart. He shakes and writhes and every exhale is a half-scream. The tears flow until there could possibly be nothing left for him to purge. He continues anyway. She’s scared he’ll cry his other eye out.

‘I need to go.’ The words sound wrung out of him.

She leaves him

The water outside is dark and mournful Its silence gives her the cold shoulder The ocean, as much as it is home, could be apathetic. She was just another thing swimming in the belly of a beast

Down here, it’s more terrifying, more impossible, to exist alone

She wants to see her family and ask them what she should do

She feels her necklace again It’s still cold Yet unbreaking

The answer has been within her all along

That’s why, after letting time pass as bitterly and sweetly as it needs to, she goes back.

He has his eye again. She looks at him and sees him. The sharp shape of all she still doesn’t know of him pierces her, yet he is less inscrutable and more tangible than the day she found him.

‘You should be free.’ she tells him. ‘I won’t be the one who holds you back again.’

The storm in his eyes breaks. She wants to keep just this.

It’s already hers.

No plant dares to grow within ten feet of The Passage. Light, however, gets along fine. Unmoving spheres of it illuminate a path down the centre of the cave, completely apathetic to the dreary mood of the surrounding environment.

At the entrance, they’re close enough that the water could push her into him.

‘This is it,’ she tells him. Her voice is quiet. She always feels quiet here. ‘You just keep going until ’

He nods

‘I’m sorry, by the way,’ she blurts out She’s still not good at words, but these ones were always a good start. ‘I should’ve known better than to keep you for so long. I just thought you were neat Or something ’

His eyes widen before his whole face melts into a smile He looks the closest a dead boy

can be to alive. What a miracle it is.

‘Thank you, Miriam.’ He turns to her. ‘And it’s okay. I thought you were neat too. Or whatever.’

She swallows. Her throat feels thick. She messed up, she knows. Is it okay if she accepts his kindness? ‘I got I got you something. A parting gift.’

She fumbles around in the satchel around her waist for an embarrassing amount of time. She holds it out to him from one end, with her thumb and pointer finger. It’s a bracelet made of black thread, the ends chewed up. On it is a rusted flower charm. ‘I found it earlier. I thought maybe you’d like it?’

‘Thank you,’ he says. ‘Thank you.’

His fingers take the bracelet from the other side, and for a moment, they both hold onto it. This is the closest she’ll ever get to touching him. He tugs it towards him. She feels the tension in the thread increase as it’s briefly pulled taut, and it’s proof he’s real

The bracelet slips from her fingers He pulls it onto his wrist It’s more colourful and solid than the rest of him.

‘Go.’

He goes.

And she stays there. She remembers her family, all of the times they cried over goodbyes with spirits, how it had all seemed so unnecessarily painful There’s a hurt in her like someone scraping out her insides and leaving nothing but the ache of absence.

And yet, somewhere there is still a stubborn little piece of her holding on, that doesn’t regret it at all.

As she grows older, she might get better at allowing those truths to coexist.

For now, she holds the memories of him close to her heart.

For now, she leads herself home and lets her tears be an unburdening.

MARYANA SIMPSON

Cover Artist - Kraken Hatchling

Arapaima Illustrations (Maryana Simpson) is an illustrator from Malta who draws otherworldly creatures and magical beings. She loves drawing anything strange and mystical and draws inspiration from her love of adventures and folklore. She dreams of illustrating children's books and living in a countryside cottage with her cats for company. You can find more of her art on Instagram at @arapaima illustrations.

DEVON NEAL

Bodies

Devon Neal (he/him) is a Kentucky-based poet whose work has appeared in many publications, including HAD, STANCHION, STONE CIRCLE REVIEW, LIVINA PRESS, and THE STORMS. He currently lives in Bardstown, KY with his wife and three children. You can find him on Twitter/X and BlueSky @DevMinor. Bodies was originally published in DIVINATIONS MAGAZINE.

ILA S

Walk the Plank with Soft Footsteps

Ila S. is a teenage writer, poet, lyricist, and musician who believes that words really can make a difference Her goal is that her writing changes or heals at least one heart, and to show that life doesn't have to be a burden. She does her best to use her voice to advocate for mental health, against racism, and more. You can find more of her work on Instagram @ila.writes7.

BEN RAMAKRISHNAN

salt

Ben Ramakrishnan is a high school sophomore who is passionate about music, theater, and literature. When he isn’t writing, you can find him making music, performing onstage, baking up a storm, reading piles of books, or drinking iced coffee He is also the founder and editor-in-chief of VELLICHOR LITERARY (@vellichor lit) on Instagram. You can find him on Instagram @beniskindaweird and @benwritesalittle.

JOE BUTLER

The Water Will Claim Us All

Joe Butler (He/Him) lives and works in London, but dreams of living and working elsewhere. His writing has been featured in HEXAGON, PILCROW & DAGGER, STORY BITS, BANDIT FICTION, NEW ORBIT, GHOST ORCHID, and SECOND CHANCE LIT. You can find him on Twitter/X @writelikeashark.

DAISY BIGNELL

Chesil Bay

Daisy Bignell is an aspiring novelist, currently working on various creative projects as a Content Writer at Healthline Zine. Her work has been featured in SCRIBBLES, HAUNTED WORDS PRESS, HOT POT MAGAZINE, and THE LOOKING GLASS REVIEW. When she isn't writing she can be found in her local bookshop sipping on a bubble tea.

DANIELLE ROBERTSON

The Hotel Bathtub

Danielle Robertson writes character-driven novels and short stories. Her short fiction for teens and adults has appeared in online publications as well as print anthologies from QUILL & FLAME PUBLISHING, TERRORCORE PUBLISHING, and ONCE UPON A BOOK CLUB. Danielle received her BA in creative writing from SUNY Purchase, and she is a 2021 Tin House YA Workshop alum. She lives in New Jersey with her husband and their two children. You can find her on Twitter/X and Instagram @danjvrobertson.

REBECCA LOVEDAY

Uncharted

Rebecca is a writer and early years practitioner from Portsmouth, UK. Her poems and stories for children often tell tales inspired by history, nature and folklore and have appeared in TYGER TYGER, WRITING MAGAZINE, LITTLE THOUGHTS PRESS, PARAKEET, and THE DIRIGIBLE BALLOON. You can find her on Twitter/X @Beccabeccabecs, on Instagram @rebeccalovedayrhymelady or on her website www.rebeccalovedayrhymelady.com.

JAC MONEY

Beware the Whisper Fish

Jac Money lives in Naarm (Melbourne, Australia) with her dog Henry and piles of books. She spends her spare time drawing and reading, around a full time job in book publishing. One day she would like to meet a highland cow and befriend it. You can find her on Instagram, Threads, Facebook & TikTok @money jac

RUTH IRENE

Until the Dawn

Ruth Irene (she/her), originally from Chicago, is a mother to three girls; an admitted undergraduate degree candidate at Harvard Extension School, Harvard University; a tea addict; and adores her editor, Atticus, the fluffiest Ragdoll cat on the East Coast. She is an editor-reader for poetry in THE PERIWINKLE PELICAN, and has poetry being published by PERSEPHONE’S FRUIT, REDSHEEP, PARTIALLY SKY & others. You can find her on Twitter/X @RuthIre71704512 and on BlueSky @ruthirenepoetry.sky.social.

AZIA ARCHER

Sovereign

Azia Archer is a writer and artist living in Minnesota. She is the author of ATOMS & EVERS (dancinggirlpress) and is currently working on her first novel. You can find her online @aziaarcher via most social media platforms or subscribe to her newsletter at azia.substack.com.

JEANNIE MARSCHALL

Rising

Jeannie Marschall (she/her/any) is a garden hag from the green centre of Germany who enjoys hikes, foraging, crawling critters, and inventing tall tales with the best of partners Jeannie mostly writes colourful, queer SFFH stories as well as the occasional poem. Longer works are in the cauldron (ETA 2025). You can find her on Twitter/X @DjinniMarschall and on BlueSky @JeannieMarschall.bsky.social.

MARIGOLD ROWELL

Free Wi-Fi Air-Conditioned Great Rates Pool

Marigold Rowell (she/her) grew up on the East Coast, but drove out to California on her own, staying in many motels along the way. All of them were a little bit spooky, and most had a vending machine or two glowing in some gloomy corner She has lived in Los Angeles ever since, continuing to creep herself out, and hopefully her readers, too. You can find her on Twitter/X @MarigoldRowell, on BlueSky @marigoldro.bsky.social and on her website marigoldrowell.com.

LINDA CRATE

the mermaid breaks free

Linda M. Crate (she/her) is a Pennsylvanian writer whose poetry, short stories, articles, and reviews have been published in a myriad of magazines both online and in print. She has twelve published chapbooks. She is also the author of the novella Mates (ALIEN BUDDHA PUBLISHING, March 2022) and published a debut collection of photography Songs of the Creek (ALIEN BUDDHA PUBLISHING, April 2023). You can find her on Twitter/X @thysilverdoe, on Instagram @authorlindamcrate, and on Facebook Linda M Crate.

FAITH ALLINGTON

Beneath the Ebbing Tide, We Sing

Faith Allington (she/her) is a writer who loves the dark and whimsical and all the pretty rot Her work appears in various literary journals, including FLASH FICTION ONLINE, WATERWHEEL REVIEW, CEASE, COWS, and CROW & CROSS KEYS. You can find her on Twitter/X @faithallington, on Instagram @faithallington.writes, and on her website www.faithallington.com.

ARIANNA KANJI

the drowning at Weatherby’s pier

Arianna Kanji is a fifteen year old writer from Toronto, Canada who’s been published in over thirty different literary magazines. They’re also a blog writer for Brainscramble Magazine and The Elysian Chronicles They’ve been a short story writer for as long as they can remember, but have found a love for poetry during this last year. In their free time, they enjoy reading, playing the violin, and working on multiple unfinished novel drafts. You can find them on Instagram @ari.kanji

JULIANNE ESTUR

The Graveyard Shift

Julianne Estur (she/her) is a Filipino-American writer and a recent UCLA grad. Currently, she is writing a theater piece about a seance conducted by the members of a modern Spiritualist commune called Good Tidings, which is to be performed at Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2025 through Los Angeles Theatre Initiative. You can find her on Twitter/X @sundeitys.

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