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Nothing could have prepared Aventurine for the moment when the curtain rises. The shift of heavy drapery reveals a large glass tank full of water. And within that…a myth come to life.
Floating gently within the tank is a creature like none other he has seen before. Its tail is long, mostly covered with silver scales that flash under the stage's lights, though the silver is interspersed with patches of inky dark blue. Almost seamlessly, the scales meld into the torso of a man with luminously pale skin. Along each side of his abdomen are several slits that must be gills and behind his ears are a pair of delicate fins the same silver color as his tail. His hair would probably go just past his shoulders were he not in the water but in this case the pale blue-silver strands seem to float around his head to form a halo. The creature’s eyes were closed but Aventurine is absolutely certain if he could see them they would be stunning.
After staring for probably far too long, he finds his voice and asks the stagehand that had raised the curtain, “why isn’t he moving?”
The older man shrugs, “something they put in the water to keep it quiet. Damn thing put up quite a fuss. Boss paid too much for it and can’t even put it in the show till it can be broken of trying to use that voice.”
“Voice?”
“You’ve heard the stories, right? Well, they’re mostly true. Creatures like that? Got a voice that can convince a man to do just about anything.”
“Oh.” Aventurine looks away from the stagehand back toward the creature in the tank. “Why’re you showing him to me?”
Chuckling, the stagehand goes to lower the curtain again and Aventurine feels a strange sense of loss when the tank and its occupant are blocked from view once more. “Guess the boss thinks your luck’ll keep you from doing whatever that one tries to tell you to do.”
Aventurine freezes. “He wants me to do the training?”
“Not got much of a choice, do you?”
The man has a point. Aventurine tries not to think of blood soaking into the earth, of the stink of his own flesh burning when the brand was put to his neck. He’d gotten his own ‘trainer’ then. He’d never thought he’d be expected to do the same to anyone else.
But…
Maybe the man who owned this traveling menagerie allowed everyone to just call him “Boss” but at the end of the day, Aventurine is under no illusions about his place here. He’s no employee. Boss is just another word for Owner.
He finally responds under his breath, “what is he even supposed to do?”
“Oh, don’t you worry about that,” the stagehand gives him an almost friendly clap on the shoulder, “there’s others who can teach it tricks and such. You need to break it first. Make sure it’ll do as it’s told.”
Aventurine looks down at the ground and thinks he can feel his neck burn, but says nothing.
“We both know you’ve got a streak of cruelty in you, yeah? Just play the part you’ve been given. You might even have a little fun.”
That’s what I’m afraid of. Aventurine thinks, then forces a crooked smile for the stagehand. “I’ll…try. I’ll figure it out.”
“Best get started, then.” The stagehand starts to walk away then turns back and frowns at him. “Don’t you get into that water if you don’t want to find out whether you can breathe in it or not. ‘Least not until that beasty learns how to play nice. Maybe not even then.”
Sighing, Aventurine just nods, “thanks for the warning. How do I wake him up?”
“Eh, give it a few hours. Sleepy stuff’ll wear off eventually.”
“Fine.” Aventurine thinks for a moment, “what did you mean when you said he ‘put up a fuss’?”
“Screamin’ and wailin’. Made the boys’ eyes and ears bleed what were bringing it in. Nearly drowned one of ‘em that got too close.” The stagehand snorts, “don’t know what it was thinking. Not like there’s any ocean here for it to swim off in. You’d best remind it just how trapped it is, eh?”
Remembering the manacles that no longer encircle his wrists but might as well still be there for all the freedom he truly has, Aventurine nods slowly. ‘Understood. I’ll…talk with him.”
The stagehand walks off then, muttering something about how dumb kids shouldn’t go around thinking monsters are worth treating like people, leaving Aventurine standing alone on one side of a heavy curtain and a beautiful monster asleep on the other.
With only a little hesitation in his movements, Aventurine sidles around one of the curtain’s edges until he’s once more facing the tank and its truly inhumanly beautiful occupant. A few hours, huh?
Having nothing better to do, Aventurine drags a chair near the tank and stares at the creature within it. Break it? Even if he wanted to, and he’s not so sure he does, he has no idea how he’d go about it. At the very least he’ll have to talk to him, find out what he wants that Aventurine can work with one way or another.
Idiot. He’ll want to return where he came from.
But that was a fantasy Aventurine couldn’t fulfill. The old gaffer was right when he’d said there was no ocean here. There wasn’t even one nearby. Amazing that the boss had shipped the creature this far inland, really.
He frowns and fidgets with an old coin, rolling it over his fingers again and again as he thinks. Guess we’ll need to become friends first. Then I’ll worry about the rest.
Caught up in his ruminations as he is, Aventurine almost misses the first hints that the creature was waking up. But as his tail flicks, the scales flash in the light and catch his eye. Curious, he looks up at the tank and watches as the creature slowly regains consciousness. When his eyes finally open–I was right, they’re gorgeous–they revealed a shining gold to contrast with all his silver.
With great care, Aventurine starts to stand and watches as the creature’s attention shifts to him. He glares through the water down at him, frustrated fury written in every line of his body.
Oh, this isn’t going to be easy.
Near the tank a bucket of fish in ice had been left. Aventurine’s gaze goes to the bucket then to a ladder nearby. On top of the tank a heavy grate had been locked into place so the creature really couldn’t go anywhere and if Aventurine was going to coax him into a chat he’d have to get him to come to the surface somehow, wouldn’t he?
“Hello,” Aventurine tries for a friendly greeting even if he isn’t certain his voice would properly carry through the heavy glass and water. The point is to go for a warm, harmless impression and he has to start somewhere. Of course, the creature’s expression changes not one iota but Aventurine hadn’t really expected it to. Not worrying himself about it, he instead goes to move the ladder into place, propping it against the tank before he grabs the bucket of fish and climbs his way up. “Hungry?” he asks down at the water’s surface through the grate where the creature could be seen looking up at him now. “You’ve gotta be, right? C’mon, I just want to talk, that’s all.”
For a time, there’s no movement from within the water but Aventurine has decided he’ll be patient even if standing on this ladder and having to smell stinking fish is most definitely not his idea of a good time. But eventually his patience pays off and he sees the shimmer of silver as the creature swims toward the surface. There is just enough room between the grate and the water for his head to be seen in the open air. For a long few moments they just stare at each other and Aventurine decides even with wet hair plastered to his head instead of floating like a halo, the creature is still unfairly beautiful.
When he eventually decides to speak, even his voice is beautiful. Despite the venom his words are laced with, of course. “I am no tame animal to do tricks in exchange for rotting fish.”
“Never said you were,” Aventurine responds in an easy tone. “I’m just offering some fish. No strings attached.”
The creature’s lip curls in disgust, “but where is the hook?”
It almost sounds like a joke and Aventurine has to force the laughter that bubbles up within him down somewhere in his chest. Instead he just pulls one of the fish from the bucket and drops it into the tank before backing down the ladder a few steps to put space between them. “See for yourself,” he calls.
There’s still hesitation and suspicion to be read in the creature’s movements before hunger seems to win out and he bursts into motion to snag the fish and retreat to the other side of the tank once more, sinking below the water. From his perch, Aventurine watches through the tank wall while the creature opens his mouth wide to reveal sharp teeth with which he devours the fish. A good reminder that he might be pretty but he’s still dangerous. Well… Aventurine thought about the various captured monsters and so-called mythical beings that made up this traveling show. Many truly were broken of spirit, resigned to playing their part. Others still required a certain kind of motivation. And then there’s me. He’s playing a part too, one of his own making.
After a few moments, he climbs the ladder back to the top again, gesturing toward the bucket to suggest he was going to offer another fish. It doesn’t take long for the creature to follow suit, breaking the surface once again to watch him with wary golden eyes.
“I’ve been thinking of you as ‘the creature’ in my head,” Aventurine admits, “which seems kind of rude of me, don’t you think? What should I call you?”
The creature smirks crookedly, “you would not be able to say it.”
“Try me.”
What follows is a string of whistles and chirps made to be heard over distances underwater and certainly nothing he with his human voicebox could ever reproduce. So Aventurine laughs awkwardly, “you’ve got me there. How about I just call you Sunday, then?”
The creature frowns and tilts his head. “Sun..day?” He raises his gaze to the artificial lights above them. “There is no sun here.”
He wouldn’t take it well if Aventurine told him he was captured on a Sunday so he tells a story instead, “it’s nighttime right now but we’re inside under cover. I’m sure you’d shine under the sun in the day. Hence the name.”
Appealing to vanity appears to have worked because the creature–Sunday, now–merely makes what Aventurine assumes is a gesture of acquiescence with a flick of his fingers, splashing the surface of the water. “Very well. If you must.”
Smiling then, Aventurine drops another fish into the tank, “and you can call me Aventurine.” Like Sunday, it’s not his name, not really. But it’s what he’s called so it’ll do for now.
—
Gaining Sunday’s trust remains difficult. Often, he has nothing to say to Aventurine and merely watches him with the silent gaze of a predator biding his time. Sometimes he doesn’t even come to the surface. So Aventurine acts as if he doesn’t care. He goes about his business, provides the creature his meals, sweeps the inevitable dust from the stage, tells the creature ridiculous stories about what life in the traveling menagerie is like. The funny ones, not the ones involving whips and chains and blood. He talks about amazing small town folk with simple tricks of sleight of hand with cards and coins. Eventually, he manages to have several of the menagerie’s craftsmen build a small platform for him to sit on beside the tank so he doesn’t have to perch on a ladder and it only took winning a few hands of cards.
On the day Aventurine settles down for the first time on the platform, obviously making himself comfortable and intending to remain put for a long time, Sunday comes to the surface and frowns at him. “You talk too much.”
Smiling easily back at him, Aventurine shrugs, “you don’t talk enough.”
That gets him a hiss in response and a lash of Sunday’s tail, “I have no wish to converse with someone who spends all his time telling lies.”
Resting his elbows on his knees, Aventurine leans forward a little and cocks his head. “Lies?” Some might find being called a liar a lack of progress but Sunday is actually talking to him so looks could be deceiving.
“Deceit is like…” Sunday frowns again, searching for the word he wants to use, “a cloud around you. Like…” his expression shifts to a beguiling smile and a tempting expression, “your own song to draw in prey.”
It’s the first time Sunday has looked at him like that and Aventurine is starting to see why someone might have gotten too close and why there needed to be such a sturdy grate between them. “A song, huh?” He taps his chin. “They warned me about your voice but you haven’t tried to use it on me, have you?”
“Are you asking me to?” Sunday looks amused, almost, and his tone is seductive enough without any magical compulsion in it. “I might ask you to shatter this cage’s lock.”
“You might?” Aventurine laughs softly. “So why don’t you do it?”
Sunday’s façade fades and he shakes his head, “you are like me. It will not work.”
Aventurine allows confusion to show on his face, “I’m just human, I’m not from the sea.”
When Sunday laughs at him, the sound is punctuated by little whistles and trills. “I see it in your eyes. In the magic that is woven through your deceit. You are not just anything.” He raises himself up a little more out of the water, wraps his fingers around the grate above him, and stares firmly up at Aventurine. “Tell me the truth.”
This is…not exactly how Aventurine expected their first real conversation to go but once again…it’s progress. So he throws caution to the wind and lowers himself closer to the metal that separates them, almost within reach of those grasping fingers. “Fine. I am human, despite what others liked to say about my people. But I was..blessed…by our goddess. That’s probably the magic you see.”
“Liked to say? And they do not anymore?”
Aventurine turns his gaze to the side, “my tribe was wiped out. I’m the only one left.”
“Ah,” the sound Sunday makes is almost completely unvoiced. “You are like me. You were captured too.”
His turn to laugh now, Aventurine gestures to indicate Sunday and his predicament, “I’m not the one behind metal bars.”
Sunday’s tongue clicks behind his teeth. “One does not have to be caged to have been captured. You are waiting for something.” He smiles then and it isn’t the seduction he’d suggested before, merely that of a hungry predator. “I will not have to ask you to break the lock, you will do it yourself.”
Aventurine smiles back, all teeth. “Wanna bet?”
Opening his fingers to let himself drop back fully into the water, Sunday makes the dismissive gesture he’s seen him make before, “I don’t need to.”
Conversation obviously over, Aventurine doesn’t bother remaining on the platform, clambering back down to the stage floor instead. From the tank, Sunday watches him impassively. Aventurine just offers a cheeky wave before he crosses through the curtains and out into the rest of the menagerie.
In many of the communities around, it is the height of harvest time and everyone who can work a field is spending all waking hours at such duty. As such, it is not really the time for a traveling show to set up on the edge of town and try to draw in customers. In a few weeks, instead, the hard work will be over and people will be looking for a way to celebrate before the winter comes.
For now, they have made their own camp in the wilderness which is what has given Aventurine the time to do his own work on Sunday. In the back of his mind he knows there is a deadline. The mythical mer-creature in the tank will have to be ready to perform by the time the menagerie begins to move toward the next town. He knows this. He knows what’s expected.
And yet.
“Boy!” The old stagehand that had first shown him the tank and its inhabitant catches him by the shoulder. “Boss wants t’ see ya.”
Never good. Aventurine curses inwardly but pastes an easy smile on his face, “then I guess I’m off to see the boss.”
When Aventurine enters the tent the boss uses for his office, the other man keeps him waiting, doesn’t acknowledge his presence, makes it clear that it’s not Aventurine’s time that matters. But he’s long since become used to this trick, has used it on others, and he doesn’t let the boss make him squirm.
Eventually, the other man sighs and looks up at him before gesturing for him to come closer. “I gave you a job to do, didn’t I?”
“You want the mer-creature to cooperate-” Aventurine starts but he’s cut off by a hand closing around his throat, a thumb digging into the brand on the side of his neck.
“No,” the boss hisses in his ear then jerks downward to force him into a facsimile of a bow. “I want it broken. I want it to never even think about using that voice of its own will. I want it to learn to smile and be pretty and do as it’s told. In short, I want it to be you.” With implacable strength he uses his other hand to press down on Aventurine’s shoulders, pushing him onto his knees. “I don’t want excuses. I want results. Now show me how sorry you are and you might not feel the lash.”
From his position on the floor, Aventurine looks up and keeps his fury hidden behind eyes suddenly wet with unshed tears and an expression of abject humility as he begins unlacing his owner’s pants and does as he is told.
—
In the morning, when Aventurine returns to Sunday’s tank, the creature is actually rather swift to come to the surface for breakfast. But he pays no mind to the fish Aventurine tosses in and instead looks up at him with something like concern in his gaze. “You’ve been injured.”
Aventurine sighs, “I’m fine.”
Sunday hisses, “you lie. You smell of blood.”
Closing his eyes briefly, Aventurine slowly lowers himself down to sit on the platform, his movements ginger as he settles into place. “Just upset the wrong guy. Nothing I’m not used to.”
“You were punished,” Sunday says after a moment, eyes narrowing. “Because of me?”
“Ugh. Yes. Fine,” Aventurine snaps. “Because of you. Because I don’t want to do to you what they did to me and they do to everyone else here they want to show off for the public’s amusement. Happy?”
“No.” Sunday’s expression is grave.
“Yeah, I thought not,” Aventurine grumbles, “eat your breakfast.” Only once Sunday is done does he add, “what does it sound like? When you sing?”
Sunday’s brow furrows, “I told you it will not work on you.”
Aventurine shrugs and leans down, closer to the grate than he’s ever let himself get before. “Doesn’t mean I can’t listen, right?”
Raising himself up out of the water, Sunday takes hold of the grate’s metal bars and looks him in the eyes. “I suppose you are not wrong. I cannot promise what will happen to anyone else who might hear.”
Laughing softly, Aventurine just shakes his head. “They put the heavy curtains around here to muffle the noise. Just don’t be loud. It’ll be fine.”
Sunday doesn’t respond with a verbal remark. Instead when he next opens his mouth it’s to softly sing a lullaby without any words and yet…it feels like a song Aventurine knows in his very marrow. Like being soothed by his mother as she rocked him in her arms in moments of quiet. Kakavasha he hears her murmur my beautiful Kakavasha.
Whether or not there is any magical compulsion in the sound affecting him, Aventurine hardly even realizes when he’s suddenly leaned down so far he’s bracing himself with his hands on the grate to keep himself from falling full against it, when his face is so close to Sunday’s through the metal it seems like those gold eyes fill his vision. Only when a gentle, cool touch brushes his cheek does Aventurine come back to himself, eyes widening as he scrambles backward. “I thought you said it wouldn’t work on me.”
Sunday’s gaze is solemn. “I did not tell you to do anything you did not want to do. Your despair is like a wound, of course you’d seek solace from it.”
Icy rage fills him then, seeming to bring clarity to his thoughts and washing away the after effects of the mer-creature's song, “you don’t know what I feel.”
“Did you not wonder how our enchantments work?” Sunday smiles crookedly, “we must be able to tell what our target is feeling in order to know what to tempt them with best.”
“Never again,” Aventurine glowers at him, “don’t you do that ever again. Not even if I ask.” I have enough people trying to control me.
“As you wish,” Sunday says softly.
Only after taking a few deep breaths does Aventurine manage to regain proper equanimity. He glances toward the heavy lock keeping the grate in place. “Why would you want me to break it, anyway?”
Sunday looks at him curiously, surprised. Perhaps taken aback by the sudden change of subject. “So I can leave, of course.”
Aventurine laughs, and if it’s a little rough and choked no one has to point that out. “You’ve got a tail, you can’t walk. Do those gills even work outside of water?”
Expression growing remote, Sunday slips back a little ways. “I may take another form, for a time.”
Wait….does he mean…? “You have a human form?”
Sunday’s eyes glint, “there is only one way for you to find out.”
Aventurine just stands and hisses as the movement causes pain to flare somewhere in his lower back, “maybe later. I’ve got things to do for now.”
—
Leaving Sunday behind, Aventurine’s mind works furiously as he walks through the menagerie, mentally cataloging each creature as he passes. Some of them, at least, might take advantage of being freed. Long enough to cause a distraction, anyway. The harpy, definitely.
When he later returns to the tank and its occupant. “Look,” he says without preamble, “just play along. You can do that, right? Pretend you’re willing to do what you’re told. Put on the show they tell you to. We’re going to a nearby town in a couple days. Things will be different there. More distractions. More people. If you want out, that’s when to do it.”
“Why did you change your mind?”
Aventurine smiles sharply, “who says I did? Of course, this all hinges on you actually being able to walk away from here.”
“I will be fine,” Sunday says in a firm tone. “Do not concern yourself with it. What must I do?”
Having to put on a show for the masses, act like one of those tamed animals he’d despised being compared to, and smile while doing it obviously goes against every one of Sunday’s sensibilities. But with the chance at freedom being dangled before him…even he is apparently not immune to temptation.
Once he agrees to play his part, Aventurine finally lets in the trainers who will teach him the tricks he’s expected to play.
Teach is, of course, a euphemism. Their whips are not just for show and they are quick to make use of them when he doesn't move swiftly enough. Even diving into the water can not provide him a respite when one of the trainers carries with her a device that puts out an electric current.
If Aventurine had not warned him of these things beforehand, Sunday would surely have grown to hate him as well as the other humans who had imprisoned him.
But he learns swiftly enough to eventually please his torturer-trainers by the time the camp starts making ready to move on to their next show.
When next Aventurine comes to see him, it is almost time for them to be on the move but for the first time that Sunday can remember, he is neither alone nor with the trainers. The man that stands beside Aventurine wears fine clothing and has a casually proprietary manner in the way he rests one hand on Aventurine’s shoulder in a firm grip. When he looks at Sunday, the mer-creature sees nothing in his eyes but calculation and greed and realizes that to that man he is nothing but an object to be owned.
In the man’s grasp, Aventurine seems almost subservient, cringing in a way Sunday has never seen. It’s almost more revolting than the tricks he’s been forced to learn. The part of him that is predator suddenly wishes to sink his teeth in that man’s throat and leave him to die without even the honor of being used for sustenance, lesser even than the rotting fish they’ve been feeding him.
“I’ve done what you wanted, Boss,” Aventurine says. “See?”
The man’s cold eyes narrow, “show me, then. Have it perform.” He gives Aventurine a little shove toward the platform as stagehands Sunday had not previously noticed set about raising the grate to give him room for the leaps out of water expected of him. His training sessions and now this little show have so far been the only times such a thing has happened but he knows without being told that trying to escape now, even if he shifted form, would be ill-advised. And he didn’t have to see the trainers with their ready whips to understand that.
So he swallows his pride into a cold ball at the center of his chest and performs the tricks he’s been taught. Swimming in artful patterns in the tank, leaping through hoops, jumping out of the water to catch a tossed fish, retrieving small objects tossed into the tank and returning them to Aventurine with an eager expression pasted on his face.
His kind is not given to vomiting but he wishes he could. Everything about this makes him feel ill.
And finally comes the greatest test of his self-control.
The so-called ‘boss’ orders, “have it sing a nice song. Something that’ll make the audience want to spend their money.”
Aventurine’s eyes widen and he glances back at Sunday. This wasn’t something they’d discussed.
“Uh…Boss…” Aventurine’s wince almost seems real and Sunday is glad he’s still on the platform and out of the reach of the man’s arms, “I didn’t teach him any-”
“Have. It. Sing.”
“Please,” Aventurine whispers under his breath, “we’re so close.”
The lump Sunday has to swallow seems to grow ever bigger. But with the grate still raised he can raise himself out of the water and onto the adjoining platform as if he’s perching on a rock in the sea like the sirens of legend. Beside him, Aventurine seems to stiffen in surprise, but Sunday focuses on the man watching them with steely eyes. Sunday smiles for him, honey sweet, and keeps the bitterness in his throat while he sings a gentle song that speaks of contentment and the desire to share what one has earned.
He is careful to keep the magic from his tone, as much as he wishes to entreat everyone around him, save Aventurine, to join him in the tank and sink below the water. The man called ‘Boss’, Sunday thinks, is not so weak, there is something that protects him from such enticements and so it would be a wasted effort.
That doesn’t mean, however, that his song has no effect on the listeners and even after the song ends it takes several seconds for the rest of his impromptu little audience to regain their wits and focus once again.
With a sharp smile, the boss nods, “good. That will do for now. Lock it up for travel. You,” he points at Aventurine, “come with me.”
—
In addition to the grate that keeps Sunday imprisoned, a heavy oiled cloth of some kind was placed over the tank and bound to it to prevent water from sloshing out as the cart that carried him traveled over land.
After a time Sunday cannot judge without seeing the light change overhead or feel the shifts of the tides around his body, the cart finally comes to a stop. He rises to the surface of the water to listen to people working all around as the menagerie becomes a place for people to see creatures they’d never imagined and be entertained by shows of many types.
Eventually people even come to his cart and he hears the sound of workers cursing and hammering and moving heavy things around until finally the canvas is removed from his tank and he can see what they’ve done. There are only three walls around him now with the fourth somehow removed so people can see into the tank without having to get close. There are, of course, still heavy curtains hanging ready to hide him from view if necessary.
But finally he can see out into the rest of the menagerie. Many carts similar to the one in which he’d been carried that presumably held many kinds of creatures behind bars and under lock and key. Tents scattered here and there for some purpose he could not fathom. Lights strung from place to place to provide a festive glow when the sun went down. People running to and fro as they prepare for the first night’s show. Several of them slowed their steps as they passed him by only to stare up at him in something like amazement.
It is hardly flattering, Sunday thinks sourly, to be gawked at like some oddity.
The heavy curtains are eventually moved to hide him from view and for the first time Sunday is grateful for it.
As time passes, the sound of people working fades and is replaced with the hum of many voices and shuffle of feet. Somewhere in the distance Sunday thinks he hears a man welcoming their guests to “The Great Oswaldo’s Magical Menagerie!”. Oswaldo, he decides, must be the man he’s only heard referred to as ‘Boss’. Moments later, someone mounts the platform alongside his tank but Sunday is disappointed to see it’s the trainer with the electric device. “Remember,” she tells him, “play nice, hmm?”
Sunday doesn’t bother to respond vocally, he just nods and casts his eyes down so she can’t see the anger that boils within him.
“Good boy,” she laughs a little. “Your audience will be here soon.”
It’s not just one show, Sunday quickly learns, it’s a series of them. Almost as soon as one crowd passes they are replaced with another and he must do everything all over again.
It’s exhausting.
And Aventurine is nowhere to be seen. Dread coils in Sunday’s guts. What happened to him? Had he broken their agreement?
But there’s nothing Sunday can do except perform. Over and over until the crowds begin to disperse and the lights slowly are extinguished.
The grate is lowered, the curtains hide his view once more, and someone dumps fish offal into the tank in lieu of the whole fish he’d been given in the past.
Sunday is almost too tired to care and just sinks down to the bottom of the tank, curling his tail around himself. I have become what I swore not to. He closes his eyes. I am a fool.
Perhaps minutes pass, perhaps hours before his attention is caught by the sound of someone tapping the tank’s glass. All he can see of the intruder outside in the darkness is a head of light hair and, he thinks, the flash of teeth when the person grins at him.
Aventurine? Hope begins to flicker within Sunday's chest.
Sunday hears the dull thunk of a ladder being leaned against the side of the tank then a metallic jangling as keys are tried one after another in a heavy lock.
The heavy lock.
Sunday lifts his head above water just enough to watch the figure almost entirely shrouded in darkness. “Aventurine?” he whispers.
“Who else?” The figure responds in Aventurine’s voice before cursing when he almost drops the keys.
“I thought you wouldn’t come.”
That flash of teeth again, “I promised, didn’t I? Ah, here we are. Come over by the platform. It’ll be easier to get out there.”
Sunday swims to the side indicated and waits for Aventurine to move from his ladder to the platform. “What now?”
Grunting as he wraps his hands around some of the grate’s bars, Aventurine manages to say, “can’t lift this thing all the way by myself. It’ll be a tight squeeze.”
Nodding his understanding, even if Aventurine wouldn’t be able to see the gesture in the dark, Sunday squirms his way through the opening provided, eventually coming to rest beside the other man on the platform. “Thank you.”
Aventurine lets go of the grate and Sunday can hear a breathless huff of laughter when he sits heavily down beside him. “Don’t thank me yet. We’re not out of here. Your turn.”
“My…? Ah. Yes.” Changing form is hardly easy and Sunday is far more tired from his ‘performance’ than he had thought would be but neither does he intend to let this escape attempt be in vain. He groans softly, fists clenching as his body shifts, organs rearrange themselves, scales fade away, and his tail splits into two legs. He doesn’t even realize at first how he’s sagged against Aventurine for support, breath coming heavy. Someone’s fingers are in his hair, he thinks dully, then just lets himself accept the soothing touch for a few moments.
“Can you put these on?” Aventurine asks and some cloth is placed in Sunday’s lap.
“These?” Sunday still feels slow and dull and it takes far too long to understand what is meant. Clothing. He means the clothes humans wear to cover themselves. “Yes. I…think. I have done it before. Once.”
He hears a sigh and then feels Aventurine take the clothing back. “I’ll help you. We have to hurry.”
With Aventurine’s help it doesn’t take long to get him dressed. He is hardly graceful when he has to climb off the platform and he finds himself borrowing one of Aventurine’s curses when he nearly tumbles to the ground on unsteady feet. Once he’s standing and reasonably stable, Aventurine peers through one of the curtains, letting a little moonlight in. He glances over his shoulder and seems briefly caught, staring.
“What?” Sunday has to ask. “Am I wearing it wrong?”
“Uh…no.” Aventurine looks out again, then gestures for Sunday to follow him, “it’s just you’re bea-... striking no matter what form you wear. That’s all. Let’s go.”
Frowning, Sunday follows as the other man leads the way through the sleeping menagerie. Something about that seems wrong, he thinks, and looks around more closely. In all his time having been among these people, he has never heard the place so quiet. “What happened here?” he murmurs.
Aventurine answers without looking back. “I found where they keep the stuff they used to make you sleep when they caught you. The other creatures are going to wake up first and find somebody unlocked their cages. We’ve got a stop to make before that happens.”
Unsure of how to answer, Sunday follows in his wake until Aventurine leads him to one tent in particular. The guards that would normally be standing outside it are both collapsed on the ground, completely asleep. Within is a man already bound tightly to a bed with restraints that appear well-used though something tells Sunday someone else is usually caught in them. There is a gag in the man’s mouth to prevent him from shouting when he wakes up and already he seems to be stirring.
Aventurine lights a small lamp and Sunday can see a sharp smile curl his lips. “Oh yeah. This guy is actually going to wake up first. He hands the lamp to Sunday then moves to straddle the man on the bed when his eyes open. “What do you think, Boss? How’s it feel?”
Wakefulness hits the man all at once and he jerks in the restraints, shouting muffled curses.
“Don’t worry,” Aventurine says in a smooth, almost oily voice, I’m not going to hurt you. Not really. I just wanted you to know,” and he clamps his hand like a vice around the other man’s neck, “you never broke me, you bastard.” Almost as if to punctuate that, a shrill inhuman screech pierces the air and Aventurine looks up, his smile returning. “Oh yeah,” he loosens his grip, “I said I wouldn’t hurt you but I promised the harpy she could have your entrails.” That pronouncement made, he leaves the doomed man on the bed and takes the lantern from Sunday, setting it aside on a table. “Let’s get out of here.”
Frowning, Sunday allows Aventurine to pull him out of the tent, “you gave me that lantern so I wouldn’t interfere.”
“Pretty much,” responds the other man carelessly, “I figured it was better to give yo something to do with your hands. Can you ride?”
“...excuse me?”
“A horse.”
Sunday sneers, “you must be joking.”
“Fastest way to get out of here,” Aventurine says with a certain almost manic cheer as the sound of other monsters and various creatures shrieking and growling and breaking out of their cages started to become audible. “Besides, I figured I’d set the horses free. None of them deserve to get eaten.”
It takes a little struggle but eventually they find a horse they could both ride together and Aventurine leaves the pen's gate open when they ride toward freedom.
“A river,” Sunday calls into the other man’s ear. “Take me to a river.”
Nodding, Aventurine turns them south of the town until they come up to the banks of the river that had passed through it.
Too exhausted to care about his dignity anymore, Sunday slides off the side of the horse and lets himself crumple into a heap on the ground. Aventurine is a little more adept at his dismount and the horse pays neither of them any mind as it walks away to crop at some nearby grass.
“You okay?” Aventurine asks with concern as he crouches beside Sunday.
“I will be,” mumbles Sunday, “help me with these clothes and get me to the water.” Somehow, and Sunday is not entirely certain how, it takes almost longer for Aventurine to help him out of the clothes even with the moonlight to provide its illumination, as it did for him to help him get them on in pitch darkness. “Is it so difficult?”
Aventurine laughs then, self-deprecating. “Maybe I don’t want to say goodbye.”
“This form is temporary,” Sunday says, almost gentle. “And all rivers lead to the sea. I must go.”
“I know that,” insists Aventurine. “Doesn’t stop me from wanting it to be otherwise. We make a pretty good team.” With the clothes finally removed, he helps Sunday toward the waiting water, his touch almost seeming feverish on Sunday’s cool skin.
Upon reaching the water, Sunday nearly collapses into it and lets out a relieved sigh as his body regains its proper shape. “Come here,” Sunday beckons the other man deeper. “I want to give you something.”
When Aventurine laughs this time, there’s a thread of something nervous in it. “You remember I helped you, right?”
Sunday hisses in irritation and beckons again, “I have no intention of drowning you.”
“Well, in for a penny,” Aventurine says under his breath as he follows Sunday into the water.
Once most of Sunday’s body is comfortably submerged and Aventurine is in at chest height, Sunday pulls him close, capturing his mouth with his. Aventurine stiffens in surprise at first but then kisses Sunday in return. He’s breathless and flushed when Sunday lets him go. It's enough for Sunday to want to kiss him again but instead what he says is, “that is only one of the things I wish to give you."
“Oh-okay,” Aventurine responds, sounding a little dazed.
Under the water, Sunday reaches down and smooths one of his hands along his tail until he finds the point at which a few of his scales had been damaged during his so-called training and thus come loose. With a careful motion he picks them free using the edge of his fingernails. Once retrieved he cups his hands around them and raises them to his mouth, murmuring a soft song to them. Aventurine watches in fascination to see the scales glow silver under the moonlight and in Sunday’s palms when he offers them to him. “Another song for you,” Sunday explains. “And if you ever wish to find me again, they may help.”
Eyes wide, Aventurine accepts the proffered gift, “but I don’t have anything in return…”
Sunday smiles, “is my freedom not enough?”
“Kakavasha,” the human says suddenly.
“...what?”
“My name.” He smiles and closes his fingers around Sunday’s softly glowing scales, “my real name.”
“Very well, Kakavasha,” Sunday says and can’t help reaching out to touch his cheek as he had done once before. “Goodbye. But may we meet again in calmer waters.”