Some rest before the final fight

Together, we looked down. The Abyss was quiet, but the hunt had stirred something ancient in my blood. The adrenaline of the fight didn't fade; it merely shifted into a different kind of hunger.

"We need a place to regroup," I told Ariel, realizing her eyes were showing fear of the deep. My voice was a low growl that vibrated through the water, startling a school of passing flounder. "Somewhere the current doesn't reach. Somewhere private."

Ariel nodded, her red hair floating around her face. "I know a place. My... my secret grotto. Daddy doesn't know about it. No one does except Flounder."

"Lead on."

She took us through a winding maze of kelp forests and stone arches, checking over her shoulder constantly to see if I was still there. I was. My massive grey bulk moved silently, a shadow trailing the princess.

We arrived at a large boulder that looked immovable. Ariel pushed a hidden lever - a piece of coral - and the stone slid aside. We swam through the narrow opening.

The grotto was a cavern of wonder, illuminated by shafts of light filtering down from the surface far above. It was filled to the brim with human artifacts, candelabras, silverware, paintings, and a massive stone statue of a human man.

I drifted into the space. I was almost too big for it. My dorsal fin scraped the ceiling of the cavern entrance. My presence filled the room, making the human trinkets look small and fragile.

"This is it," Ariel said, spinning around, her arms wide. "This is where I keep... everything."

I swam past the silverware and the corkscrews. I approached the statue of the human prince. I looked at its smooth, marble face.

"A human," I rumbled. "Is this your dream, Ariel? To walk on legs?"

Ariel floated near the statue's shoulder, looking wistful. "I've always wondered what it's like. To lay in the sun. To dance." She looked at me. "But you... you came from up there, didn't you? And you chose this form."

"Down here, the world chooses the fitting form for you," I said, turning away from the stone boy to face the living mermaid. "Legs are weak in the water. They drag you down."

I closed the distance between us. Ariel backed up until her tail hit the stone pedestal of the statue. She was trapped between the cold marble and the living shark.

"You fought bravely back there," I said, my voice dropping lower, becoming intimate. "But you are soft, Ariel. Your scales are thin. Your belly is exposed."

I reached out. My clawed hand cupped her cheek. The rough texture of my skin made her shiver, but she leaned into it, her eyes fluttering shut.

"Sharks don't hold hands, Princess," I whispered, drifting closer until my chest brushed against her purple seashell bra. "We don't write poems. We bite."

Ariel’s eyes snapped open. "Bite?"

"It's how we claim a mate. It's how we keep them from drifting away in the current."

I moved my hand down her neck, over her collarbone, and rested it heavily on her breast. The seashell was hard, but the flesh spilling out of it was incredibly soft. I squeezed, testing the weight of her.

Ariel gasped, her gills fluttering rapidly. "Is that... what you want to do? To me?"

"I want to mark you," I admitted. "I want every creature in this ocean to smell my scent on you and know that you belong to the Apex."

She didn't push me away. The curiosity that defined her, the same curiosity that made her collect forks and statues, was now focused entirely on the dangerous creature in front of her. She wanted to know.

"Show me," she whispered. "Show me the shark's way."

I didn't hesitate. I leaned in and buried my face in the crook of her neck. I inhaled her scent, sweet, salty, and aroused. Then, I opened my jaws.

I didn't tear; I nipped. I clamped my teeth down on the soft muscle where her neck met her shoulder. It was a controlled pressure, just enough to dent the skin, just enough to send a sharp spike of pain-pleasure through her system.

Ariel cried out, a muffled sound in the water. Her hands flew up to clutch my massive biceps, her nails digging into my tough hide.

"It hurts..." she moaned, but she arched her back, offering me more.

"It's supposed to," I growled against her skin.

I moved lower. I bypassed the seashell bra. I nuzzled the soft, pale cleavage between her breasts. I opened my mouth again and clamped down on the swell of her breast, my teeth scraping against the surface of the shell but sinking into the flesh above it.

I bit her tit. I shook my head slightly, a primal, predatory motion.

Ariel let out a high, keening sound, her tail thrashing involuntarily. The sensation of being preyed upon, of being tasted by a creature that could snap her in half, was overloading her senses.

"Please..." she begged, though she didn't know what she was begging for. " Ray... you're so big... you're so rough..."

"I'm just getting started."

I moved my hand down her stomach, feeling the muscles contract under my touch. I reached the point where her human skin merged into green scales. The waist. The transition point.

I slid my hand lower, over the smooth, slick scales of her tail. I found the ventral fins - her pelvic fins. I gripped them tight.

"In my world," I murmured, looking into her dilated blue eyes, "sharks have to hold on tight. Or the female escapes."

I pulled her hips against mine. The friction of my rough, shagreen skin against her smooth scales made a rasping sound. I let her feel the hardness growing behind my pelvic claspers, the dual reproductive organs of a male shark, rigid and ready.

"Do you feel that, Ariel?" I asked. "That's not a weapon. That's for you."

She looked down, her face flushed a deep red that looked purple in the grotto light. She saw how hard I was. She sensed the intent.

"I... I've never..." she stammered. "I don't know how..."

"Nature knows," I said. "Biology knows."

I spun her around, pressing her chest against the cold stone of the statue. I loomed over her back, my massive shadow engulfing her.

"Hold onto the stone boy," I commanded, grabbing her hips with my claws. "He can watch. But tonight... you belong to the sea."