Author's Note

Believe me, I'm just as surprised as all of you at the publication of this chapter. It's been such a long time since I posted "Broken Strings", and I had completely forgotten that I had this chapter written until I was sorting through the files on my laptop today.

So, given that I haven't posted in a while, I thought I'd post and share this second chapter, certainly it will provide a little respite from "How to Save a Life".

Enjoy!


Eric pushed Ariel with ease, steadily weaving through the many rooms and hallways of the palace until they reached the kitchen, whereupon Eric stopped the wheelchair before walking forward and rapping his knuckles upon the wooden door. When no answer came he pushed it open, peering round the frame to see whether the chef simply hadn't heard him, but the kitchen looked to be empty.

"What are you two up to?"

Eric jumped, spinning round quickly to see Carlotta looking at him sceptically from beside Ariel who was giggling quietly, presumably at his reaction to Carlotta's arrival. But instead of answering her question, the young Prince decided to ask one of his own.

"Lottie, do you know where Louis is?"

"Yes dear, he's just gone down to the market," replied Carlotta, "did you need him?"

"No, no we were just going to do some baking and I wondered if he was going to need the kitchen any time soon" said Eric, flashing Carlotta a smile. The maid chuckled, shaking her head as she recalled the number of times that boyish smile had gotten the young Prince out of trouble.

"I shouldn't think so dear, I'll let him know to leave you when he gets back, have fun." Sharing a smile with Ariel, Carlotta turned away, only to stop in her tracks and return her gaze to the Princess, a smile playing at her lips. "You make sure he behaves himself" she said.

Ariel's musical laughter filled the hall and she glanced up at Eric to see him rolling his eyes. "I'll try" she replied, offering Eric a loving smile, which he gladly returned.

As soon as Carlotta had disappeared round the corner, Eric once again stepped up behind Ariel and pushed her into the kitchen, lifting her up onto a stool at one of the work benches and proceeding to push the wheelchair to the side of the room so that it was out of the way. He scoured the shelf lined with recipe books containing various dishes from all over the world, which Louis often referred to when deciding what to make for dinner, though he had brought most of them with him when Grimsby had asked him over from France.

But Eric knew what he was looking for, and pulled it down as soon as he spotted it, blowing away the dust that had settled, the book having not moved from its place on the shelf for years now. He placed it down in front of Ariel, who had so far sat patiently, watching his every move, before pulling up a stool and sitting beside her.

"Do you want to choose something?"

Ariel was almost shocked at Eric's question; after all, he had been human all his life, surely he knew what was best to make, surely he had a favourite. Still she couldn't help her excitement as she pulled the book closer, opening it carefully so as not to tear any of the pages, wanting to view the whole thing, to read every page and examine every picture. It was clear that this was an old book, one that had been used many times before judging by the various stains and creases to the yellow rimmed pages, some of which had been folded at the corner. She looked back to Eric.

"Is this yours?" she asked, noticing what was unmistakably a child's handwriting and drawings dotted around each recipe.

Eric nodded. "Carlotta bought it for me when I was seven," he said, smiling to himself as he looked down upon his own childish scribbles. "We must have baked every one of them at least ten times."

Ariel smiled at the thought of Eric as a young boy, flicking through the book with Carlotta beside him, the two of them baking together. She imagined that it would have been a welcome break for them both, a way that Eric could forget about the hardships of his childhood, a way for Carlotta to provide him with happiness that had been so hard to come by back them.

Despite having tried a broad range of activities in the last year, baking hadn't been something that Eric had introduced her to; perhaps he had been waiting for a day like today, a day when there were very few other options of things to do. She had watched Louis bake before, and even helped Carlotta decorate some cookies for Christmas, but she had never actually made anything herself. It wasn't long before she came across a page that seemed different from the rest, the pages more yellowed, more littered with stains and tears than the others, making it obvious that this was the recipe that had been used most often.

"What about this one?" she offered, turning the book towards Eric. "Sm… sma… flod…" she narrowed her eyes, trying to make sense of the unfamiliar words and symbols before her.

"Små Flødekager" said Eric with perfect pronunciation, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. "It's Danish, it means small cream cakes." He pointed to each syllable as he said it, separating it so that Ariel might better understand. He hadn't taught her Danish, just the basics seeing as she'd been so keen to thank the shopkeepers in the language of their country; other than that there had been no need for it, everybody spoke English anyway and it was confusing enough for the former mermaid already without her having to learn an entirely new language.

"I think we'll probably have the right ingredients, let me go and check" he continued. And with that he stood, turned and disappeared through the door behind him into the pantry, leaving Ariel to look over the recipe. Cream, eggs, flour and sugar she recognised having seen them sold often when she and Eric took trips into the town, though eggs were the only thing she'd had knowledge of prior to becoming human; sugar she knew now to be a sweet version of salt, having learned the hard way that there was in fact a hidden difference between the two. She scanned the list of ingredients again, pausing on the last, trying to work out whether she ever heard the word used before… cardamom. Was it a type of food, had she ever had it before? She racked her brain, but was distracted by a loud clanging coming from behind the door that Eric had gone through.

"Are you alright?" she called, worried that he may have been hurt.

"Fine!" came a confident reply, the scraping and banging dying down. A moment later Eric reappeared, his arms full of bags, cups, spoons, bowls and other thing's that Ariel had never seen before. She couldn't help the excited squeal that escaped her as Eric laid out the ingredients and various utensils on the worktop in front of her, before sitting himself down.

"It's a nightmare to find things in there" he said, causing Ariel to giggle. She had soon learnt of Louis' untidiness when it came to maintaining the kitchen, with various pots and pans thrown all over the place every time he prepared a meal, she could only image how unorganised the pantry was. Still, it seemed to work for him, and what he served was always wonderful.

Ariel looked over the ingredients, as Eric set up a set of scales, balancing a bowl on the top of them.

"What should I do?" she asked, eager to help straight away.

"Um… you can measure out the sugar if you want to, it's that one there" he said, pointing to the bag of tiny white crystals and handing her a tablespoon and a small bowl, "and then the eggs need to go in with it." Ariel took the required utensils, and turned her attention back to the recipe, six tablespoons of sugar it said, and so she set to work immediately, often pausing to watch Eric as he measured out two cups of cream into a bowl and began to swiftly stir it with a utensil that she was sure she'd never seen in her collection of human things, the wooden handle splitting into several thinner metal pillars that curved round at the bottom to form a sort of messy dome. Eric seemed to notice her quizzical look, because he simply smiled and answered her unspoken question.

"It's a whisk" he said helpfully.

"What does it do?"

"Well, it… whisks things." The Prince paused, trying to come up with a better explanation. "It stirs things… like a spoon does, but it puts more air into what you're stirring."

Ariel nodded, understanding well enough. Sometimes she felt bad asking what things were and what they did all the time, especially when she could tell that Eric was struggling for what he deemed to be a suitable explanation; but her curiosity seemed to always get the better of her.

She finished measuring out the sugar fairly quickly, and then pulled the basket of eggs closer, before placing them one by one into the heap of sugar, counting five and then turning back to Eric who was just placing the bowl of what was now fluffy cream to the side.

"What now?" she asked excitedly.

Eric looked to be about to answer when he suddenly stopped, his gaze coming to rest upon the bowl of eggs and sugar that Ariel had prepared. The corners of his mouth turned up, and an easy smile graced his features. Ariel's brows furrowed in confusion, her eyes darting from Eric to the bowl and back again. She scanned the recipe again, wondering if she had perhaps read it incorrectly, but found it to only state what she had already done.

"What?" she asked, looking up at Eric, who had moved his chair closer to her side and was now sat only inches from her.

"You need to crack the eggs first."

Ariel froze. Crack the eggs? The recipe hadn't said to crack the eggs, she was sure of it.

"Why?"

"Because the shells would make the cakes crunchy, so we only need to use the inside" replied Eric.

Ariel shot an accusatory look at the round eggs nestled in their bed of sugar, and then sighed.

"I'm sorry, I've ruined it" she said, hanging her head.

Hearing Ariel's apology wiped the smile off Eric's face in an instant, and he sought quickly to cheer her up.

"No! No, you haven't ruined it at all," he said, taking the eggs from the bowl and placing them gently on the wooden table, "all we need to do is take them out, crack them, and put them back in. It's easily fixed my love."

He offered her a hopeful smile, desperately wanting to convey to her that there wasn't any problem, and that she needn't be upset.

Luckily, Ariel returned his smile, leaning forward on her elbows in expectation and resting her chin in her hands. She watched as Eric tapped an egg on the side of the bowl, before carefully pulling apart the two half's and letting the gloopy innards fall onto the mound of sugar. He held out a second egg to her, and pushed the bowl closer.

"Do you want to try?" he asked.

Ariel nodded after a moment, and hesitantly reached out to take the egg from her fiancé.

"What if I do it wrong?" Ariel asked, afraid that she really would ruin it this time. But Eric was quick to reassure her that it didn't matter, that they could always start again; and so, Ariel copied Eric's previous action, using the rim of the bowl to crack the egg, before pulling away the shell. Smiling to herself at having gotten it right, the Princess made her way through the remainder of the eggs, until five shells sat empty on the worktop.

"See, no harm done" smiled Eric, handing her a wooden spoon and watching as she cautiously beat the eggs and sugar together. At the same time, Eric weighed out the flour into another separate bowl, and placed it beside Ariel, eager to let her do the bulk of the preparation.

The young Prince found such joy in watching her experience new things. The delicate arch of her eyebrows and bottom lip caught gently between her teeth as she focused on the mission at hand captivated him, drawing him into an almost dreamlike state.

Ariel was momentarily interrupted from her task as Eric's lips came into contact with her temple. She closed her eyes in bliss, leaning into him slightly. Her leg was starting to hurt and she wished that she could prop it up, but that might mean that they had to stop baking, and she was desperate to finish what she and Eric had started together. So, the former mermaid focused on Eric's arms around her, hoping that he would be able to soothe her pain simply by holding her, as he had done on so many occasions already in their relatively short time together.

In her attempt to distract herself, Ariel shifted her gaze to the open recipe book, once again coming across that unfamiliar word.

"Eric, what's cardi… card-a-mom?"

"It's a spice, from India, which is a country in Asia" replied Eric, presenting Ariel with a bowl of small, green pods.

Ariel picked one up between two fingers and examined it carefully.

"And you eat them?" she queried, thinking that it seemed like an odd food choice.

"Not on their own, they taste much nicer when mixed in with other things. Louis uses them in his rice dishes mostly, but you can use them to add flavour to just about anything I think."

Sometimes it amazed Ariel just how much Eric knew. Even a year after they had first met, he was still teaching her new things every day. Then again, there were things which she knew the name of now without having to ask her Prince, and it always thrilled her each time she was able to demonstrate her understanding.

"So, we need to grind them up with a pess… pestle and mortar!" she exclaimed, recognising the equipment before her from their many visits into town, and noting that it was ground cardamom required for the recipe. She was quietly proud of herself for coming to this conclusion.,

"That's right!" Eric couldn't suppress his smile, it always filled him with such pride when Ariel did that, and made him so happy for her.

Pleased with herself, Ariel set to work crushing the little green pods, taking great care and casting a side long glance to Eric every once in a while for any indication that she had made a mistake. One never came.

"Is this alright?" she asked, when all that remained was a potent dust, angling the small, stone bowl towards her fiancé so that he might get a better look.

"Perfect!" he replied, "you know, I think you're better at this than I ever was."

Although she highly doubting that was true, a smile graced Ariel's lips, before becoming a grimace. This, in turn, wiped the smile off of Eric's face as well.

"Ariel? What's wrong?" He was more serious now, his love for her evident in his concern.

"My leg" was Ariel's quiet reply, and Eric immediately realised his mistake. In an instant he was on his feet, supporting Ariel gently so that she wouldn't fall.

"Will you be alright on your own for a moment, I'll be as quick as I can?"

Ariel nodded, hating herself for ruining their fun, for causing Eric to worry, and watched as he took off through the kitchen doors. This wasn't fair, she wanted so desperately to prove her humanity, to not be such a burden to Eric, and here he was running around for her. What's more, it was all her fault that she had broken her leg, all her fault that she had fallen. She had been so scared when the doctor had told her that it was broken, her initial thought in her panic being that she would never be able to walk again, that she had ruined her chance of being human after only a matter of months. Two tears slipped suddenly down her cheeks, and at the same time Eric returned, a cushion clutched in his right hand.

The Prince pulled up another chair alongside Ariel's and placed the cushion on top, before ever so gently, with her permission, lifting her broken leg and bringing it to rest atop the new support.

"Is that any better?"

Ariel let herself relax, and felt the pain in her leg subside somewhat; thus, nodded in response to Eric's question.

"I'm sorry" she responded meekly, throwing her fiancé off guard.

"Wha- Ariel I'm the one who should be apologising love, I should've made sure you were comfortable as soon as we got here."

Slowly, Eric brought his forehead against Ariel's, using his thumbs to tenderly brush away her tears.

"I love you" she whispered, looping her arms around Eric's shoulders, holding him in place.

"And I love you, my little mermaid, with all my heart."

It seemed almost impossible in that moment to go back to baking, but after a minute or two simply being close to one another, each periodically taking the opportunity to punctuate their love with a kiss, Ariel's gaze returned to the ingredients on the bench in front of her.

Eric, upon seeing that her attention had drifted, kissed her once more and slid back onto his seat beside her.

Following the recipe, Ariel added the cardamom she had crushed to the bowl of flour that Eric had measured out, before tipping the whole thing into the same bowl as the eggs and sugar that she had mixed earlier. With each step she glanced over at Eric, merely to affirm whether she was understanding the recipe, and each time her silent question was answered with and equally silent nod or smile.

A part of her felt bad that Eric wasn't getting to do much of the work, but as she began mixing the flour, cardamom, eggs and sugar, her Prince busied himself with buttering the muffin tin.

"Is this the longest is ever taken you to make these?" asked Ariel, wondering suddenly whether the cakes would have been ready by now had it not been for the series on minor setbacks that she had caused.

Eric smiled fondly and shook his head.

"Definitely not," he replied, looking up but not pausing his current task. "The first time we made them I threw an absolute fit, because Carlotta told me I was too young to crack the eggs myself."

Ariel felt her eyebrows lift; she hadn't pictured Eric being the sort of child to complain or cause any sort of trouble.

"The second time, or maybe the time after that, I put salt in them instead of sugar. It was an accident, of course! Poor Grim still ate the whole thing just to please me, but we ended up having to make them all over again."

That made Ariel smile, the image of Eric as a boy, watching his father figure and waiting impatiently to find out whether his creation was any good. Poor Grimsby indeed, she thought, her mind returning to incident with the pipe during her first day on land. As embarrassing as it had been, it was then that her acceptance into Eric's family had been verified, in her eyes at least. Eric had started this, when he had so kindly invited her into his home despite knowing nothing about her, and then Carlotta. Ariel still remembered how the housekeeper had fretted that day, how she had done everything imaginable to ensure that she—their new guest—was unharmed and made to feel comfortable and welcome. The way that Grimsby simply brushed off her ignorance had quenched any lingering fear that this wasn't where she belonged.

Now, here she was, creating something that was inconceivable in Atlantica, with the man she loved more than anything in this world.

They finished their respective tasks almost in unison, and Eric let Ariel fold the cream in with the rest of the mixture before they each took a spoon and began filling the muffin tin, deciding that they would each fill six of the twelve cups.

Eric finished first, having done it more times than he could remember, though Ariel insisted that hers would look nicer due to the fact that she had taken more care in ensuring that each of the six cups were identical, and held the same proportion of mixture as one another.

"Good luck little cakes!" exclaimed Ariel, as Eric slid the tin into the woodstove, the latter only then realising that he had neglected to start a fire prior to preparing the bake.

Ariel watched in awe as Eric knelt down and brought a small but growing fire to life before her very eyes. She thought back to the painting in her grotto, and beautiful as it had been, that small flame hadn't done fire as an entity justice. If she hadn't been warned against it by both Carlotta and Grimsby, Ariel was certain that she could watch the dancing and leaping of a flame for hours.

A soft growl from her stomach momentarily startled the Princess, and she shot an accusatory look downwards.

Eric chuckled. "They won't be long love" he promised, gathering the messy equipment and setting it down beside the basin; the washing-up could wait though.

Sure enough, within fifteen minutes—though it dragged ever more slowly as the smell of fresh baking filled the kitchen—their cakes were done, and Ariel couldn't help but smile as Eric placed the hot tin upon the table in front of her.

Only months ago, the former mermaid wouldn't have waited to try this new and unknown food before her, but now, and through several painful experiences, she knew to wait a while for it to cool down. She folded her arms across the table and rested her chin stop them, staring at the pale cakes and watching as steam furled through the air above them.

Eric recalled the number of times he had done just that as a boy, watching and willing time to move faster. Even now, to have to wait seemed unfair and so, to speed up the process, he prised two still steaming cakes from their moulds using a knife and lifted them one by one onto a waiting plate.

Ariel watched with unease as her fiancé risked burning his fingers.

"Oh! Eric be careful" she gasped, albeit mildly amused by his childlike impatience, which for once surpassed even her own.

The Prince appreciated the concern of his bride-to-be and, whilst the tips of his fingers did protest his decision, he concealed the discomfort and placed the plate teasingly between the two of them.

With a knowing smile, Ariel took the dinglehopper—as the utensil had become known, a sort of private joke between the young couple—that Eric offered her, before taking a piece of the cake closest to her, blowing the heat from it, and putting it cautiously into her mouth.

The sweet treat was still slightly too hot, but Ariel's focus was on the flavours, and she closed her eyes in rapture as the cake melted upon her tongue.

Seeing the delight that Ariel took from trying new things, often reminded Eric to take the time to enjoy what he had previously paid little attention to. So, instead of wolfing down the cake like he usually would, he copied the formed mermaid, savouring for the first time something that he'd had on countless occasions before.

"You know," he said, "I think these are the best ones I ever had."

Ariel's eyes lit up, although she had nothing to compare this first attempt too, she had to admit that the warm and creamy little cakes were delicious, no wonder they were a favourite of Eric's.

She met his gaze thoughtfully. "Do you think Grimsby and Carlotta would like one?"

Eric smiled, ever besotted by Ariel's consideration for others.

"I don't see why not," he replied, "it certainly wouldn't hurt to ask them."

With a new task at hand, both finished their respective cakes, and Eric retrieved the wheelchair from where he had parked it at the side of the room.

Wanting to encourage a little independence, for he knew Ariel to value having the freedom her father had once—perhaps understandably—denied her, Eric didn't immediately scoop her up into his arms as the former mermaid had expected him to.

"Do you want to try standing on your good leg?" suggested the Prince. He didn't want to cause her anymore pain, but rather she try when he was there to support her.

Ariel considered his proposal; she knew that if she said no, he would lift her into the waiting chair without pushing the matter further, but she so desperately wanted to prove that she could do this, if only to reassure Eric. So, with wavering confidence, she nodded.

Eric gently lifted her injured leg from where it had been propped up, and Ariel held it suspended above the terracotta tiles, the limb quivering only slightly with the effort.

She gripped the edge of the table, her knuckles white, and shifted until her uninjured leg touched the floor.

"What if I fall again?" she asked fearfully, doubting herself.

"You won't." Eric reassured her, placing his hand atop hers, the other lowering to rest upon the small of her back. "I won't let you."

Trusting the words of her fiancé, Ariel pushed herself up slowly, gradually lowering her full weight onto her right leg, wobbling in place.

"Eric!" she gasped, grabbing onto his shirt for further support.

"I've got you, love, it's alright." The Prince wrapped his arm around Ariel's waist, taking some of her weight and allowing her to lean against him.

Her next words caught him off guard, and caused his heart to ache.

"I'm sorry," she said, her voice coming to nothing more than a broken whisper. "I can't."

"You just did." Eric spoke softly, and guided the wheelchair behind her, lowering her to the seat before crouching to meet her downcast eyes. "I'm so proud of you."

A small smile graced Ariel's lips, moments before they were captured by Eric's in a tender kiss, and her fears chased away.