Chapter Six

'I need you to focus, Amera!' Athena shouted as the merchild took another battered hit to the chest, her body collapsing into the dirt as she wheezed through the pain.

'I'm trying!' Amera croaked, resisting the urge to curl into a ball as she raised her hands up to protect her face as Heracles' attack came without mercy. She rolled away, stumbling up to her feet as her heart thumped with the exertion of training.

They were in an arena, and Amera couldn't help but think the rows of empty seats taunted her as she made mistake after mistake, each slip up glaringly obvious compared to Heracles' practiced form. She'd been training with the gods for eight moon cycles, and she'd slowly started to improve, but it wasn't quick enough. Amera could feel the frustration radiating from Athena, it was like toxicity in the air, slowly getting thicker and thicker until it became suffocating. She was distracted as she watched the goddess turn her scowl to Eros, straining to hear the words spoken between them. 'She had shown considerable improvement over the last couple days.'

'That's great.' Eros quipped, catching Amera's eyes as she half-heartedly ducked away from Heracles, he mightn't have noticed the past tense in Athena's sentence, but it hadn't gone unnoticed by the merchild. 'Isn't it?'

The euphoria she had felt when she'd welcomed Eros back to the kingdom was quickly slipping away as she continued to eavesdrop. 'She improved the quickest while you were gone, Eros.'

Amera imagined him the way he had been that morning, the first trickles of light leaked into the sea, bathing him in a golden glow as she'd clung to him happily. She had spent hours listening to the tales he told, enjoying the softness in his voice. His tone was harder, lacking that softness he always used with her, and for the first time Amera could hear the power in his voice. 'What are you saying?' he demanded, anger simmering in his voice as he turned to Athena.

'I'm saying that you're a distraction we cannot afford to have. Poseidon is growing weary with the wait, he wants to send her up as soon as possible, but she'll be discovered on her first day if she isn't ready.' Athena ignored the flash of anger in Eros' eyes, turning her back on him as she prowled over to the duel.

'Then don't send her.'

Athena snorted back a laugh, 'Yeah, and who's going to tell Poseidon, one of the big three, that you're switching up the plan because you're in love.' Sarcastically mocking him for suggesting the idea. 'Whether you like it or not, Eros, that girl is going to walk on land, and you're not going to be there to rescue her every time she gets into trouble.' Slowly the arena changed, from that of the ancient colosseum, to a sports arena that was popular among the humans.

Amera's distraction finally caught up to her as she took a nasty hit to the thigh. Caught between the fight, the argument amongst the gods and the change of scenery she had become useless. Heracles stopped the assault on her at once, recognising that she was not in the headspace to continue. 'You do have to remember though, she won't be fighting people as strong and as trained as I am.' Heracles said as he came to stand beside his sister and Eros. The latter barely waiting to listen to what he had to say before jogging over to Amera.

Amera listened to Eros' voice as he gave her advice on her training, the words meant nothing as she listened only to the timbre of his tone. She enjoyed the touch of his fingers on the small of her back as they lightly feathered her skin. 'How come I can feel you touching me, but I can't feel anything that isn't happening in the real world?'

Eros, cut off mid-sentence about how she should focus on finding her centre of balance, smiled down at her, eyes twinkling in the bright lights of the arena. 'Because that's what I want you to feel.'

'So, I can only feel what you want me to feel?'  She giggled pressing up on her toes, so she was eye to eye with him, 'the grass?'

He shrugged nonchalantly, but it was undermined by the soft smile he couldn't hide, 'I wanted you to know there wasn't anything to fear.'

Amera's smile dropped and she gulped, pulling her hands away from Eros' chest so he wouldn't feel the shake that had started in them. 'So, when I'm in pain...?'

'Athena and Heracles only want you to understand how important this training is. I've got nothing to do with it. I promise.' He cradled her face in his hands, leaning forward to press a soft kiss to her forehead. His heart squeezed when he chose not to tell her that they had been holding back the pain at his request, knowing that it would only scare her.

'She doesn't focus when he is here.' Athena growled, watching as Eros picked Amera up, trying to entice a smile as she grew increasingly concerned.

'She is in love, and with Eros no less.' Heracles said with an elaborate roll of his eyes, 'It's no doubt that the kid has put a spell over her.' He turned away from them, so he wouldn't have to watch the sickening affection between the couple. He finally noticed the change of scenery, and with a sigh he stalked over to the bleachers. He preferred the replica of the colosseum more than the sports arena, but, just as the colosseum did, the sports arena felt familiar, if he closed his eyes he could still hear the crowds cheering his name as he defeated those who challenged him. 'It's almost like someone's put a spell over the kid himself, he's lost himself to loving her.'

'If he has, then he has lost his way, he is not the man I knew before.' Athena sighed, blinking away the image of the arena.

Amera tried to smile happily but she couldn't stop thinking about how Athena and Heracles were purposefully hurting her. It wasn't any different to Heracles beating her up for real, but, with Eros being in on it, it felt sadistic. As she combed Eros' face for any flicker of emotion that led her to believe that he wanted to hurt her in some way she almost missed the arena melting away into a white glow. 'Are we done for the day?'

Athena, bathed in white, turned stoically towards the young mer. 'You are of no use to me now that Eros has returned. I want you to go over all of your theory work before I see you next, I don't want you to forget what a bag is called when you're on land.' Athena snapped, scaring Amera enough to cower into Eros' arms.

Heracles and Athena blinked out of existence, leaving Eros and Amera alone in her mind, he twisted her in his arms and encouraged her to close her eyes. She felt his lips press against her forehead again, but this time she welcomed it, sinking into his arms.

She was cold when she opened her eyes. Amera always felt warmer in her own mind, in the fantasy world that Athena created, than she did in the ocean, and she wondered if that was Eros' doing. She stretched her tired muscles, cracking her neck as she moved it in a circular motion calling out for him when she didn't see him immediately.

'I'm here, baby.' She felt his fingertips trail across her skin, in the same path they had taken in her mind, and she shivered gently.

'I never asked you how your assignment went.'

Eros smiled lazily, pulling her down so they were both nestled on the sand comfortably in each other's arms. He'd been summoned to attend to his responsibilities, making sure the love of humanity continued to flourish. He'd explained to her before that he used Kathréftis to do most of his work for him, but sometimes he was personally needed to solve a complex issue. 'Boring.' He summed up, not taking his gaze from her eyes, trying to memorise their exact shade of blue as she gazed upon him with admiration. 'I missed you.'

Amera smiled giddily, elated at his words, reaching out to caress his cheek gently with the palm of her hand. 'Good.' Smirking she pushed up from his chest in one fluid movement, causing a cloud of billowing sand in her wake as she floated upwards in the water.

'Good?' he repeated, pushing up a little clumsily to follow her. 'That's all you have to say?'

Amera winked brazenly over her shoulder, a little daringly as her heart pattered out a fast beat. She paused at the door turning back to look at him, forgetting her concerns as she noticed the way he was looking at her. She smiled with her eyes as her lips formed the words; 'you'll have to catch me to find out.'

Eros snorted, breaking the bubble of allure, as air blew out from his nose. She giggled as she darted down the hallway, and Eros gave her a head start, enjoying the look of happiness and the sound of her laughter as she swam away. After counting to ten he followed, tracking the laughter as it led him straight to where she was fleeing. He regretted giving her the head start when he realised that he wasn't going to catch up to her unless she let him. As he burned the sound of her laughter into his memory, so he wouldn't forget it, he prayed she intended on letting him catch her.

***

Eros wasn't in the ocean long before another situation occurred that dragged him away. He was gone for moons and moons, resulting in Amera throwing herself into her training, remembering what Athena had said about her improving when he wasn't there to distract her. Heracles didn't hold back as much as he had been to start with, and her defence had vastly improved because of it. Athena decided in the second cycle of the moon that she wanted to show Athena what a university looked like, and they'd walked around the grounds as she explained to Amera what going to school would mean. The next day Athena took them to the shopping centre and Amera had been in awe at all the interesting sights she could see in one place.

When she was done with her training, Amera went to find her sisters. She found them sprawled upon the sun decks, close enough that if they sat up and reached high they would break through to the surface. Cove and India swum around the edges, dredging up cooler water to annoy their older siblings, their tinkling laughter a musical soundtrack as the mer's lounged int he sun. It worked because every so often one of the girls flicked a tail irately in their direction, and Amera was forced to weave around them quickly so she wouldn't be hit.

Nyneve propped herself up on her elbows when Amera finally settled into the shallow waters, her green and blue tail glinting prettily in the sunlights glare. 'What did you see today, sister?'

All Amera wanted to do was rest in the sunlight and relax her tense muscles, but when she saw her sister through her droopy eyes she couldn't help but answer the excitement on Nyneve's face with her own. 'Today we went to a place like our markets, but they're in huge buildings and they go on forever. It was easily the same height as the palace. Athena called it a shopping mall, she told me that hundreds of people a day visit them and spend the money that they've earnt over the week.'

Nyneve gasped, her eyes widening like saucers, her other sisters sitting up to listen to Amera's story, their interest piqued as Amera's excitement gave its own description. 'Hundreds in a day?'

'In some of the bigger groups of humans these shopping malls can cater up to thousands of people.' Amera was still in such awe about the buildings that it transferred onto her sisters who all listened, enamoured, as Amera went on to explain every small detail, from the moving stairs, down to the fabric bags some of the stores supplied their products in.

Larina was the only one who maintained a straight face, but her silence meant she was just as interested in what her sister was saying as the others were. Amera was busy explaining what a food court was, with its many different foods of culture and sticky tables that were never properly cleaned, when Larina finally got bored of the conversation. 'They are going to notice what you are before you can even see a shopping mall.'

Amera snorted, crossing her arms over her chest, glaring daggers at her sister's back. 'They will not.'

'You will be like a fish out of water. You cannot even talk about a shopping mall without sounding like it was a gift from the gods themselves.' Larina spared a lazy glance over her shoulder at her sister's crumpled expression. 'Who do you think you are, Amera. You are a mer-princess who has never spent more than an afternoon above the surface, you have never been close enough to land to even hear the humans, and you expect to blend right in?'

'That is why I am training, why I am learning.'

Larina snorted, gliding over to the edge of the sun deck, looking down over the underwater city as she considered her sister's words. 'There are too many human things in the world, you cannot hope to see them all before you are expected to start your assignment. What they should be teaching you is how to keep a straight face when you are in awe of something you should have seen a thousand times as a human.' Larina withdrew from the conversation, letting her sisters ask their questions, her eyes cast down on the people below her, a sudden smile appearing on her face.

Her smile wasn't humorous, but rather it was fuelled with a vindictive sort of entertainment. It took her sisters a while to notice her as she snickered under her breath, but, when they did, their attention slowly drifted towards her. 'What's so amusing?' Thalassa asked, flicking her tail so she sailed swiftly through the water to be by Larina's side. It took her a moment to spot what her sister had seen, but when she did she couldn't take her eyes off him, he swept the kelp farmers daughter up into his arms, their conversation more intimate than it should have been. 'Oh, Amera.'

'What is it?' Curiosity got the better of her and she hesitantly swam towards her sisters. She didn't know what she was hoping for, but, when she saw the way Eros was holding the girl, it hadn't been what was waiting for her to see. Her heart shattered, the splintered pieces stabbing at her chest, causing her pain.

Her eyes stung but she didn't want her sisters to see her eyes puff up and turn bloodshot with sadness, so she cleared her throat breathlessly and backed away from the edge of the deck. Not knowing where to look without the stinging in her eyes getting worse, she turned and swam away, her sisters calling after her as she took off with no direction in mind other than away.

She ended up in the cavern she had taken Eros too when she had first met him. There was a stale musk in the air that she could taste as she emptied her lungs of water. With no water to hide her tears they fell freely from her cheeks, disguised to her only by the fresh sea water still dripping from her skin. She heaved heart wrenching sobs, praying the crying would dispel some of the pain from her chest.

She didn't know how long she had been in the cave for, with no light to show her the passage of time, but eventually one of her brothers found her. By then though her skin had dried and the stinging in her eyes had changed to a dryness, her skin felt tight and crusty as the saltwater left behind a chalky residue.

Without saying anything Atlantic splashed her with water, letting the waves of water wash over the scales that had started to flake. He pulled himself up beside her, spluttering ungracefully as his lungs dispelled water. Finally, he sighed softly, chagrined, it was the only sound in the cave other than the gentle way the water lapped at the rocks as Atlantic's tail swished through it. 'Amera.' She refused to meet his eyes, but he chased them, moving so he stayed in her line of sight until she gave up and stared at his cheek. 'You are being foolish, people are worried.'

Amera palmed a rock, rolling it around between her fingers, feeling the rough dry surface prickle her tender skin. 'Is he still there?'

'Ero...' his words fell short at the whimper that left his sister's lips and he grimaced slightly. 'He was sent home, father has asked him to stay away from the palace.'

'So, I won't see him?'

The hopeful lit in her voice was not unnoticed by Atlantic as he lowered himself into the water, offering his heartbroken sister his hand, 'not unless you wish to see him.'

Amera hesitated, wondering if she wanted to stay hidden away in the cave any longer. Atlantic gave her the time she needed to come to her own decision, knowing he couldn't drag her flicking and screaming. Eventually she put her dried out hand into his smooth watery one and let him pull her into the dark depths of the sea, allowing her eyes to sting one last time in the comforts of the darkness.