"Recommendations?"
Jake watched the mermaids circle and click and whistle to each other, watched them maintain their distance but close the gaps between themselves until escape by simply flying upward would mean passing through a gauntlet of clawed hands and shark teeth.
He thought about the Shadow Step ability and whether he could pull Maureen and the crew through connected shadows to somewhere safer, then dismissed it as impractical—the energy cost would be enormous, and he wasn't sure the technique could handle that many people simultaneously.
"We fight," he said, because no other option was presenting itself.
"They're blocking our escape route, which means they want something. Either we give it to them, or we break through by force."
One of the mermaids at the circle's edge made a different sound—a long, musical note that rose and fell in pitch like a question being asked.
The mermaids didn't wait any longer.
