"King Triton, sir, I have set up today's lesson with the utmost care. First we shall cover his studies, and then move onto the ceremonial dan- ...sir?" A scrawny, nervous looking fellow followed the king with writing utensils in hand to the throne room located in the heart of the palace. The king seemed to be distracted by some thought in his mind, as he kept scanning the room for something of note.

"Sebastian." The scrawny merman stiffened, squeezing his arms to his sides.
"Y-yes sir!" he squeaked, a crimson tail swishing underneath him.
"Did I not summon my son to the throne room earlier?" Sebastian hastily checked the schedule he had made, nodding when reaching the correct page.
"What about yesterday's dance lessons?"

It took a moment for Sebastian to summon the dance instructor, and the king and servant were informed of Arel's poor performances, especially during waltz trials. The young prince had no rhythm whatsoever, and could not lead to save his life. Triton's thick gray eyebrows furrowed, his aged face looking even more distraught.
"Table etiquette this breakfast?" Sebastian shuffled through scoring sheets till he found the right one, and his face visibly paled.
"He scored a sixty percent today…" he whispered, a bit shocked by the result, himself.

"Go find him..." Triton ordered, his hands forming in the fists. His voice had quivered in anger, quite upset that his only son was doing nothing to prepare for the responsibility of the title of Crown Prince. Sebastian dip his head and turned around to leave.
"And one more thing, Sebastian…" Triton continued as his dutiful servant nervously turned back to face his king.
"I will not tolerate this child's behavior any longer!" he roared. "Arel will be a proper crown prince! Make sure of it." Sebastian apologized, then shot out of the throne room, still apologizing to the king as he swam. He accidentally bumped into many merfolk along the way, whimpering further apologies to his fellow people.

"Okay, Arel. It's not a big deal. It's just a rock. Yeah. And air. And maybe a land walker will see me, and-" The young prince shook his head as hard as he could, attempting to shake away all the worried thoughts. In a few moments, he lifted his head out of the water to scan the area for any land dwellers. Once the coast was clear, he lifted himself onto a large rock near the shore.
"Now that I'm up here…" Arel worriedly scanned the area again, making sure he didn't miss anything. Once he was finally sure to be safe, the young merman let out a breath and giggled. It was his first time breathing above the water!
"Maybe I need to be dry?" he questioned himself, looking at the pale green tail he was swishing up and down. He lifted his hand, and pointed his palm at the tail, focusing on the thought of heat, dryness. Like the sun that was shining down upon him. In a few moments, Arel could feel his tail heating up, and see steam evaporating just above the scales.
"I-it's working!" he shouted with glee, but instantly raised the other hand to cover his mouth. He scanned the area again, hoping no one was close enough to hear him. Back to concentrating.
"Just a bit more…" Arel felt like the scales were going to crack and fall off, but he kept drying himself until he felt like his body would split right down the middle. The young boy felt uncomfortable. He was starting to clearly feel a sharp pain in his lower half, as he continued drying off the tail. It was almost unbearable, but he continued drying himself off. If he wanted to walk around on land, he would need legs. The books he'd read to accomplish such a feat detailed that this would be a painful, but worthwhile process, as it quite literally split a mermaid's tail into two parts.

Arel stared in awe as he saw the scales fade in color until they were a pale creamy color. His caudal fin had completely changed and hardened into bigger, fatter hands. Or feet, as he had read. Curiously, Arel rubbed the new creation, shocked to feel the scales still there. Although, instead of lubricated, they were coarse and rough.

"I...I did it!" Arel cheered, shooting his arms up in excitement. Which was a big mistake. As soon as the arms went up, his body went down, and his back hit the rock with a loud plop!
"Ow...Maybe I got too excited...how do you even work these things?" Arel studied the new, puzzling part of him. Apart from books, he had only heard stories of merfolk who had done this before. They were able to get just dry enough to roam around on land. And ever since he was young, he dreamed of doing the same. Rubbing his back, Arel did his best to pick up his body with his arms. He succeeded in sitting on the newly created appendages, but grunted in pain, as he could feel nothing but soreness and ache in his lower body.

"Just a little more…" One foot after the other, Arel shakily stood, looking like he was about to fall at any moment. Each slightly movement shot pain through his body, and he couldn't seem to control the legs as they furiously wobbled in an effort to sustain balance.

"What are you doing up here?!" Arel's body instinctively jumped, and he fell backwards into the water. It was as if the ocean was restoring life to his tail as the scales fused back together, and the young prince with a soothed feeling. Arel's eyes locked with Sebastian's, and all relieved feelings vanished.
"Sebastian! You scared me~!" Arel smiled, and tried to play the circumstance off as innocent fun. Sebastian glared at the prince, hands on his hips. Arel didn't know why, but the secretary's beady red eyes intimidated him, and he knew he was in trouble.
"You are the crown prince!- Or at least you will be after the ceremony. Which only a few months away! Being officially titled Crown Prince is not something to take so lightly!" Arel crossed his arms, shaking his head.
"I don't want to be the new king! Something like that is so boring! I'm pretty sure Attina can rule over the sea. Just change the name to Crown Princess or something. She's good at being boss-"
"YOUNG MASTER!" Sebastian yelled with all his might, making the young prince stop mid-sentence, "Really, you shouldn't talk about Her Highness like that. I can't believe this...As the eldest son, you should be doing your best to uphold certain duties. Not, trying to walk on land before coming of age?!"
"I wasn't really-"
"I saw them. The legs. If you had been attending your lessons, maybe you would know they take years to strengthen. Not minutes."
"I- ...understand..." Arel hung his head in defeat.
"Now. We are going back, and you will continue your lessons, young master. I won't tell His Majesty about this. But please try to please your father from now on. He is not happy with your constant absences." Arel nodded, melancholically following the older merman back to the palace.

Later in the evening...

"And then, and then!" Adella dramatically paused, looking at each one of her excited sisters.
"Oh, continue already, please," Andrina urged the verdette tailed sister.
"He looked at me from across the hallway!" Adella finally shrieked. A hushed silence fell across the royal siblings, Adella's boy story falling quite flat compared to her excitement in telling it. "What's so great about that?" Arel questioned, his sisters sighing.
"Oh, you wouldn't understand, you're a boy," Adella rubbed his head like a little kid, to which he pouted.
"If you explained it to me, I might," he muttered.
"Oh, it's a girl thing! You won't understand any more if I explain it than you do right now. I mean, he looked at me. Directly at me. I swear I could swoon. I would fall into his arms right now." Adella dramatically fell into Alana's arms, both girls giggling at the prospect of romance. Arel sighed, laying back on Arista's bed.
"Nevermind all that romance, hooey, practice was amazing today! My horn sounded especially good! There's just one thing that keeps the band incomplete. Or maybe it's more like a troupe? Anyway!" The band obsessed, carmine tailed mermaid, Arista, made direct eye contact with her brother.
"Arel, sing with my band!"
"Ah, I don't thi-"
"You have the best voice out of us all-honestly it makes me jealous-but you'd be so good!"
"Well I-I suppose-"
"Awesome! Practice is every day at high tide-you can tell because the sea feels so big! And we practice for two hours-do you think that will be too much? Nah, you'll be able to handle it and-" Arel was about to snap at his sister for treating him like a guppy, when the oldest sibling intervened.
"Jeez, give the boy a break! He's probably stressing about the land viewing," Attina said, hands on her hips. At this, Arel perked up, finally interested in the subject.
"That's right!" One of his sisters gasped.
"You finally turn eighteen. In as soon as two days!" Another cheered.
"Are you nervous about the land viewing, honey? I can make you look gorgeous for your first time," Alana offered, swishing over to her brother, makeup sponge in hand.
"Ah, no, really, I don't need that," Arel nervously laughed. He smiled at his sisters, thinking of the viewing.
"I'm actually really excited. All of you have been to the viewing before me. I hardly know anything about the land and the land dwellers apart from stories! I want to see for myself!" he said, unable to hold back his excitement. The six girls crowded around Arel, happily sharing their experiences with him.
"You so totally cannot get caught!" cawed Andrina.
"Those land dwellers are scary! I've heard stories that they will kidnap and eat us! When I went up for my viewing I so thought I was gonna get caught!" rambled Arista.

"I think just a quick view is good enough. At least it was for me," sighed Aquata.
"But there's also something a bit ravishing about the land dwellers!" cooed Adella.
"I would hate to be there for long. The sun is so icky and it dries my scales!" complained Alana.
"Just, whatever you do, be careful. There's no such thing as a completely safe viewing," Attina finished. Arel shrugged at his sisters' advice, knowing his idea of the viewing was completely different from theirs.
"Anyway, I'm excited!" he said, before Sebastian swam into the entrance to the room.
"Alright, curfew your highnesses!" the secretary said, waving his hands to shoo them into their shells.
"Aw!" the girls cried, scattering about to put things away and prepare for the night. Arel left Arista's bed, and sped out the girls' window, despite Sebastian's complaints about impropriety, making his way to his own room just down the hall.

Laying down in the shell, the young prince tossed and turned, too excited about earlier success to lie still. It hurt like nothing he had ever done before, and still it was the most amazing this he had ever accomplished. To distract from these thoughts, young Arel tried hugging said tail, stretching, even counting mackerel in his head to try and fall asleep. Nothing seemed to work as his mind raced about all the possibilities for the viewing if he could only he could master balancing on the split tail thing he made earlier.

Slowing rising out of bed, Arel made up his mind. He was going to try again. Carefully, Arel went to the window and checked for any of the night shift guards outside. Once he thought the coast to be clear, he shot out of the opening, and straight down the side of the castle wall, down, down, down, to the city.

It was quiet at night. The normal hustle and bustle of the day was gone, and the streets were relatively empty. Arel had visited the city many times before just to skip class during the day. The atmosphere was very friendly then, a contrast to the strange emptiness clinging to the place at night.

Arel stuck to backstreet alleys with good hiding spots to avoid guards, before finally making it to the city limits, where he shot past the last town hut and turned his way to the rock near the shore. The rest of the ocean was still very much awake, as Arel passed some fish here and there. Even schools of fish. They were all minding their own business, only concerned with what was two inches away from their faces.

Arel broke through the surface carefully, deeply breathing in the fresh oxygen in the air. It was a strange feeling, and almost tickled, as the gills behind his ears didn't have to push out the ocean water. From this breaching point, Arel made his way to the nicely positioned rock and used all his might to pick up his heavy body and throw it upon the surface. The coarse stone wasn't exactly kind to his hands, no matter how well the rubbery skin protected from the elements, but the young prince anticipated the even greater pain of drying his tail.

And there he waited, drying, until he felt the barely familiar feeling of it splitting into two parts. It took the prince everything in him not to scream. The second time was worse, as he felt every little separation. However, Arel was still amazed as he focused on his fins turning into webbed feet. Even in the dark he could see the green scales fade to a soft peach.
"Merfolk aren't meant to be able to use these huh…" He wiggled his toes, and winced, trying taking the transition slower this time. He carefully rubbed his new appendages, hoping this action might soothe the pain. Unfortunately it did not.
"So drying makes the color fade…?" he questioned, rubbing the coarse legs harder. He stopped soon, though, a bit fearful that he would rub them right off, as they were so dry. His upper body felt fine. A little slimy, but not exactly wet.

"Should I try standing now?" Arel questioned himself, bending both legs and placing both feet on the rock. It was hard pushing himself up. Arel's newly formed knees simply weren't strong enough to support him, and he wondered how he was able to stand in the first place, no matter how shaky that first attempt was.

Arel groaned in frustration, not able to stand properly no matter what he tried. He leaned back on his arms and looked up at the full moon. A land dweller would definitely be able to see him this night, but the young prince wasn't thinking about that troublesome fact. He was thinking of a time long ago when his mother would just hold him in her arms, both of them looking at the watery image of the moon high above the sea. She would sing softly, the lullaby of the moon.

"Silver Light,

O so high…

Why won't my dreams

Be formed tonight…" Arel's voice rang out softly across the surface of the water, the very ocean seeming to want to hold onto the tune.

"Silver Light,

O so bright

Gently you gleam

In watery sight…" Arel stopped singing for a moment and giggled at the irony of this verse. Up on land the moon didn't shimmer with the current as he was used to. The young prince, a little more confident using his voice out of the water opened his mouth to begin the third verse when a shift in the water caught his attention.

Immediately on edge, Arel quickly dove into the sea, the legs fusing into a tail again. Something in the water just beyond the rock moved, and the young prince chased after the dark figure heading out into open water. It was too small to be something like a dolphin, yet too big to be a seal. And it was smart. Once the seabed dropped, it shot down further than Arel had ever attempted to explore. But he kept after the creature, determined to find out what it was.

The creature was fast and it swam in an unpredictable fashion, dodging rocks, plants, and other fish left and right. Arel struggled to keep up, but was finally able to corner it into a rather large hidden cave. Arel came to an abrupt stop before the creature, panting in exhaustion.

"Who...who are you…?" Arel demanded. The creature made no remark, its back turned to the prince.

"I don't...I don't mean any harm or anything, but you did just run away as soon as I noticed you, so…" The creature stepped into the light from the moon inexplicably shining down a hole in the top part of the cave. A set of dark, kale colored eyes stared back into Arel's deep azure ones. The young prince could make out a rough body shape and a face…

"You're…what is an undine doing out here?" The creature bared its sharp teeth at Arel, the gills on its neck flaring.

"Ah, I'm still not gonna do anything! Here, my name's Arel. Yours?" The undine stared at him before relaxing just a bit. The creature scanned for a way out, but pressed its back against the cave wall when no such thing could be found.

"Are you lost?" Arel asked, trying to get the undine to talk.

"Did you get separated from your pod?" Still, the small water creature remained silent, its dark tail nervously flicking back and forth.

"You can...understand me, right?" Arel asked another question, not entirely sure he could be understood.

"...I can…" Arel blinked in mild shock. The voice was soft, high pitched, and hardly sounded mature in any respect.

"You're just a kid," Arel mused.

"I am not!" the undine hissed, baring her teeth again. Arel studied the creature's form again, paying more attention this time. It was painfully obvious now that this was a female child, her coloring less vibrant than that of male counterparts. She was very small, her tail being the longest part. Her tail fins, dorsal fins and such were completely translucent, the rest of her body colored a dark blue. Arel found it interesting that the front of her body was a few shades lighter, perhaps to blend in better. She had long, wispy hair that seemed have a mind of its own. The tips were also a dull yellow, and her eyes were a beady green.

Before he was done analyzing the different features of the undine, she tried to whisk past him, but only succeeded in colliding headfirst with the young prince's abdomen when he moved to stop her.

"Wait," Arel coughed, the hit being harder than expected.

"I said I wasn't going to hurt you. Maybe I can help find your pod." The undine paused, not knowing whether or not to trust the stranger, but her stance became a little more relaxed after a few moments.

"Are you lost?" Arel questioned, rubbing his ribs. Her lips protruded into a frown.

"I'm not," she muttered. The young Prince shook his head, slightly amazed at the young creature's ability to be so prideful. Were all undines like that? He surely hoped not.

"I'm Arel. A resident of Atlantica. And you?" With those words, the young undine's body became tense again. Arel scratched the back of his head in frustration. How could he get her to trust him? Maybe open up to him a little. Then he had an idea. It would require a little cooperation on her part, but it could very well work.

"Wait here," Arel requested, holding a finger up.

"I'll be right back, but you have to wait here for just a second, okay?" The undine didn't confirm that she would stay, nor did she refuse the request. Taking that as acceptance, Arel exited the strange cave and swam back to Atlantica.