Hi! Thanks for visiting my blog :) This is part five of a little story I'm writing. For anyone who is new here, I would recommend you start at part one and work your way through. Happy reading!
Alex and I are resigned to another long day of lugging wood into the ocean, attempting to make the Greni curious enough to talk to us. We expect to spend the whole day dragging wood to the beach and limp home digging out splinters, just as we did last night.
We don't expect to find the Greni waiting for us.
Yet waiting they are. At first, I don't even realise who they are. I don't know exactly what I expected, but I guess I thought the Greni would look noticeably different to us. At first, I think it's just a bunch of normal people gathered around the ocean's edge. Then, as we get closer, I start to see small differences.
The most obvious one is how they are dressed - or rather, not dressed. Ropes of what appears to be seaweed cover all the essential places, but so scantily that I still find myself blushing and averting my eyes. Alex's hand is tight on my arm as he realises, but I resist his tug as he tries to pull me back. This is what we wanted, after all - to talk to them.
The Greni wait patiently as we carefully edge towards them. There are three of them, two men and a woman. As Alex and I get closer, I see that they have gills, though their human breathing systems seem to work fine, too, as they show no discomfort at being above the water's surface.
We stop a couple of feet from them. None of us speaks for a second. At least they're not killing us on sight. I take a deep breath and break the silence.
"We wanted to talk to you," I say, trying to sound brave, but not entirely managing to hide the tremor in my voice. Alex squeezes my hand, steady and strong beside me.
"We guessed as much," says the taller of the male Greni.
They aren't attacking us, but they don't look very open or pleased to be speaking to us, either.
"We want to negotiate a truce," I say in a rush. "We know that the seas are rising and we know that all humans will die when they do. We've come to ask... please... isn't there another way? A way for us to live in peace?"
All three of them exchange glances which I can't read properly. Disgust seems to be one emotion in all of them, though.
"You come to us, now, human, when you are on the verge of extinction," the same Greni says, his voice hard and cold. "It is generations too late to make amends. If your kind truly wanted peace, you would have sought us out decades ago."
"That's not true!" Alex says loudly, and the female Greni hisses slightly. "Hardly any humans know of our past, or even know that you exist. I only found out a few weeks ago. Most go their whole lives without even knowing."
"That may be true for you two," the Greni says. "It may even be true for most of your species. It changes nothing. You two children are not the ones who can restore our lands to us. It is your leaders who know the history, who suppress it, and who do everything they can to make sure we stay in the sea where we were banished eons ago."
"Enjoy your last few weeks, humans," the woman says. The three of them start to glide back into the sea.
"Wait!" I shout, panicking. This may be our only chance to save our whole species. "Please, give us a chance! We'll talk to the leaders - we'll even take on leadership ourselves if we must. Just say we can negotiate."
The Greni pause reluctantly. The one who has been talking to us turns. "You are children. You couldn't wrest control of your land from your leaders, even if you did want to help us."
"We have magic," I say, breathless.
"We can raise an army," Alex adds. "If we need to take control, we will."
The Greni are now all fully facing us. "You would do all this to help us?"
"If that's what it takes to survive."
They exchange glances.
"Then come," the other male says, holding out his hand, which I see is slightly webbed. "Come to and have your souls tested. We will see if you really have it in you."
I exchange a glance with Alex, but we both sense that this is not the time to question. He takes one webbed hand and I take another.
We allow ourselves to be lead deeper into the sea.
To be continued
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