The smaller Ma Tuan stretched out his fingers and gently touched his brother's cheek. The scales felt cool, like the moonlight floating on the sea at midnight.
"Brother, why do you have scales and I don't?"
Zang Ming's eyelashes trembled, and his pupils shrank into two thin lines in the darkness.
He was silent for a long time, so long that the sound of the rain became blurred, and then he whispered: "...This is how I can protect you."
＊
It was a gloomy afternoon, the sky was so low that it seemed like it would fall at any moment.
Zang Ming and Ma Tuan squatted at the entrance of the alley and shared a green silverfish. The silverfish was roasted very hot, and Ma Tuan was so burned that he stuck out his tongue. Zang Ming smiled and used his webbed claws to pry open the other half, blew it cool and then handed it to him.
Then, the worshippers came.
They wore snow-white robes, their hems embroidered with dark golden ripples, like a group of ghosts rising from the seabed. The leading man leaned over, gently lifting Hidden's chin with his fingertips, examining the tiny scales on his face.
"Pure blood," the man said, his voice like the hum of some deep-sea creature. "Will you come with us?"
Zang Ming's first reaction was to grab Ma Tuan's wrist.
"Where's my brother?" he asked.
The man's eyes swept over Ma Tuan - an ordinary human child, without scales, without any special features, as ordinary as a speck of dust.
"He's not suitable."
Zang Ming's nails nearly dug into his palms. Ma Tuan stood there in bewilderment, not understanding what was happening, but he could feel his brother's hands trembling.
"Come with me, and you will all live a good life." The man continued, "The temple will give you everything."
Zang Ming stared into the man's eyes, which were as dark as the deep sea, bottomless. But he knew this was an opportunity—he and Ma Tuan would no longer have to squeeze into the leaky attic, nor would they have to share a sweet potato on an empty stomach.
"Okay," he said.
Ma Tuan looked up at him, his eyes shining: "Brother, are we going to live in a big house?"
Zang Ming rubbed his hair and said nothing.
The temple is as gorgeous as a dream.
Zang Ming was taken to bathe and change his clothes, wearing a white robe embroidered with silver thread. The servants respectfully addressed him as "little master" and brought him exquisite snacks that he had never seen before.
He secretly hid a piece of candy cake in his sleeve, intending to bring it to Ma Tuan later.
But when he ran excitedly to find his brother, he was stopped outside the side hall.
"He's not here," the maid whispered. "The Lord has commanded that you not see him again."
Zang Ming was stunned.
"Why?"
The maiden dared not look up. "Your bloodline must be pure... His presence will taint you."
Zang Ming's scales turned cold in that instant. He pushed the maid aside and rushed into the side hall, only to find that Ma Tuan was not there at all - they had locked him up in a small room at the very edge of the sacrificial hall, like hiding a dishonorable defect.
That night, Zang Ming smashed all the mirrors in the room.
The Lord of the Temple came to see him in person.
He was a pale-faced man with eyes like two pools of stagnant water. He told Zang Ming that tidal bloodline required absolute purity; any "impurities" would cause the power to dissipate.
"You must stay away from him," the Lord said. "Otherwise, you will all die."
Zang Ming stood by the window, looking at the lonely little house in the distance. Ma Tuan was lying on the window, staring longingly in the direction of the main hall, like an abandoned puppy.
"If I'm obedient...can he live a good life?" Zang Ming asked.
The Lord smiled: "Of course."
So, Zang Ming began to distance himself from Ma Tuan.
He no longer responded to his brother's call, no longer ate with him, and even when Ma Tuan secretly ran over to pull his sleeve, he shook his hand away with a cold face.
"Don't touch me," he said. "It's dirty."
Ma Tuan stood there with his hands still hanging in the air, as if he was frozen.
Zang Ming turned and left, his heart beneath the scales aching as if it were torn in two.
On the day Ma Tuan left, Zang Ming ran to the highest tower of the sacrificial temple and watched his brother's small figure disappear in the morning mist.
His nails had turned into translucent webbed claws, digging deep into the cracks in the bricks.
The tide roared in his veins, urging him to catch Ma Tuan back, lock him by his side, and never let him go.
But he didn't move.
Because the Lord said - the tidal bloodline is destined to be lonely.
The deep sea and the land can never embrace each other.
He originally thought that alienation was not that difficult.
But she no longer went to school with Matuan, no longer held her younger brother in her arms on stormy nights, and no longer even responded to the candy that Matuan carefully handed over.
But Ma Tuan didn't understand why.
He stood outside his brother's door, listening to the muffled, whimpering sounds coming from within—Zang Ming's scales were growing, blood seeping from their pale golden edges, like waves cut by moonlight. But Ma Tuan didn't know. He only knew that his brother's eyes were becoming more and more like the cold deep sea.
"Brother..." He knocked on the door gently, "I cooked some whitebait, do you want to eat it?"
The shadow leaking from the crack in the door moved slightly, and Cang Ming's voice seemed to come from far away: "...Stay away from me."
Ma Tuan squatted outside the door and buried his face in his knees.
＊
On a new moon night when he was fourteen, Ma Tuan packed his luggage.
Zang Ming had not returned to their childhood home for a long time, but now this empty and gorgeous room was filled with the smell of sea and medicine.
Ma Tuan stood at the door, looking at the small bed that once held two people. Now there was only a concave pillow with a few scales shining faintly on it.
He left a note:
"Brother, I'm leaving."
There is no "goodbye" written because the deep sea and the land will never meet again.
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