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Eric has waited for the day that Ariel bores of his rambling.
It usually only takes a minute of him sharing his passions for uncharted waters and the lands they know for people to go: “That’s great Eric. Now, don’t you have some princely duties to get to?”
Ariel listens to him like there is nothing else she would rather do than hear about his travels and what he’s learned. She is completely captivated by his many tales and eagerly wants to be educated by things that most would tire of in minutes.
It’s only after he’s been mind controlled into marrying a girl he’s just met, battled against a giant octopus sea witch and seen the girl he’s quickly fallen head over heels for turn into a mermaid does he realize why she was so enamored by his neverending blabber.
And soon, their positions are reversed as they sit in his study once again, Ariel sitting on his lap and running her fingers over the maps he had once taught her from.
“This is the Carinae Sea,” Ariel says, her voice soft and fond. “I ruled over these waters.”
“Ruled?” Eric repeats.
Ariel nods with a soft hum. “My father was the king of the oceans, protecting all those that inhabit it.”
Eric gulps. “I see.”
“The waters there are warm and were once crystal clear,” she says, smiling. “Though, with all of the shipwrecks that sank, the waters became murkier. My sister, Mala, loathed shipwrecks and their pollution.”
“Pollution?”
“When the debris dispersed, it crashed into coral reefs, destroying ecosystems beneath their weight and creating breeding grounds for invasive plant species that thrive in the darkness they provide.”
“I had no idea,” Eric whispers with awe and shock.
“Not to mention the homes that are destroyed.”
“Mermaid homes?”
She shakes her head. “No. Those living on the seafloor. Stars, cucumbers, snails, clams, bristle worms, crabs, they all have to relocate when ships overtake their habitats. Those who aren’t crushed beneath them.” Her expression saddens.
“My condolences,” Eric says.
Her lips turn up and she presses a kiss to his temple. “Thank you.”
“Will you tell me more about those who live in the sea? You listed some things I’ve never even heard of before!”
“You likely wouldn’t have seen them here above the surface,” she says with a chuckle.
Eric looks at her with wide eyed anticipation. “You can talk with crabs and seagulls. Can you talk to all creatures?”
“Not land creatures,” she says. “But in the sea, we are all a community. It’s confusing, the way you treat those we would see as equals.”
“So you’re equals,” he breathes. “Fascinating.”
“There is… structure. Those who have more of, what you would call, status. Those of royalty or in service to them. Those who represent their sectors of the seas. But we respect every creature.”
“Even unkind creatures?”
“Well,” she says. “They don’t respect us. And because respect is mutually earned, there are some that we must view as the threats they are.”
His brows shoot up. “Threats?”
“Not everyone is as benevolent as me,” she says with a small shake of the head.
“How do you travel from place to place?” he asks quickly. “If there are dangers?”
“Dangers are few and far between, and you know where they lurk,” she says. “As for traveling, we do a lot of it ourselves. Our tails make us quite fast, especially when we follow the currents, but there are many who will help you reach your destination faster. I know many kind whales who have given me rides between the seas.”
“You’ve ridden a whale?” he exclaims excitedly, jaw dropping.
“I’m sure I could introduce you one day.”
Eric flaps his hands with a high hum.
Ariel beams at him. “I take it you would like that?”
He nods, still humming elatedly.
“I’d like to see the waters from above like you,” Ariel says. “I want to be in a boat, feeling wind in my hair, watching the sky as it changes from blue to black.”
“It’s inexplicable,” Eric says. “The feeling of salt water sprayed on your face—”
“You feel the water on your face?” she asks, sitting straighter. “But you’re above it!”
“As the boat pushes through the water, the wake begins at the bow and becomes the point where the waves originate from, forming a line angled back from the bow causing the water to disperse and splash outwards from the position of the boat.” His hands are wildly gesticulating and he has to watch them so he doesn’t hit her with them.
“So the water goes up?” she says with intrigue.
“And out!” he says.
She claps with a bright grin. “I had no idea!”
“No words can compare to the feeling of it,” he says. “It’s unlike anything you’ve ever experienced, the boat gliding through the sea, the rocking of the waves, the taste of salt in the air.” He pauses. “You must accustomed to the taste of salt water.”
She pauses, her face scrunching with thought. “It’s not something you taste,” she says. “It is the way you breathe your air. It’s perpetual. Just something that is, not something you are aware of.”
“Did you taste the air when you first began to breathe?”
“I’ve tasted it before!” she says. “Merpeople have gills. When we take in water, the way you take in air, our gills do the work of your, oh, what’s that word again?”
“Lungs?”
She claps. “Yes! Lungs!”
“I can’t imagine tasting the air,” he says. “I suppose I only taste it when it is polluted.”
“The air can be polluted?” she asks with a curious gaze.
“Oh, definitely!” he says. “Fire emits smoke, and when there is a large quantity of smoke, something called soot is released into the air.”
“Soot,” she repeats, brows scrunching.
“Hm, how can I explain it?” He thinks for a moment but shakes his hand with an idea. “You know how when you kick up the sand beneath the water and it makes the water murky?”
She nods, urging him to continue.
“The smoke becomes something solid, filling the air with darkness and raining soot.”
“That sounds horrible!”
“It is,” he says gravely. “Which is why we must be cautious.”
“Fire is so much more complex than I thought,” she hums thoughtfully. “It burns but it… it dances. It bites. It blinds. It does so many things.”
“It’s astonishing the way you see the world,” he says. “Things that I overlook and you see with such wonder.”
“The world is wondrous,” she says.
“As are you.”
Her head snaps to look at him. A grin spreads over her features. “There are many things that I look at in wonderment, but you are what I look at in incredulity.”
“And what about me is so difficult to believe?”
She meets his eyes. “That I could ever have someone like you love me.”
He caresses her cheek. “Well it isn’t something I believe, but something that is an unequivocal fact.” He presses a soft kiss to her lips. “It is an honor to love you.”
She chases his lips and rests her forehead against his. “And it is an honor to be loved by you.”
They bask in each other’s presences for a moment before Eric pulls away, hands opening and closing. “How did the air taste?”
Her head falls on his shoulder and she laughs, curling into his chest.
“What?” he says. “What is it?”
“Nothing,” she says. “It’s just… wonderful to share wonderment.”