Four

Lunch was served at high noon in the castle of Atlantica; shortly before the hour, six of the sisters had made their way back to the castle, gossiping all the way.

"So, how'd it go with Stevie?" Aquata asked Adella.

"It was okay," Adella admitted. "It wasn't like a real date thing, though; he just wanted to hang out. It's cool, though; I can tell he likes me."

"The way you flirt, I'd think you were either leading him on, or you like him, too," Arista pointed out without hesitation.

"Yeah, back when you were thirteen, you said he was lame," Alana agreed, nodding.

Adella's cheeks went bright pink. "Oh, come on; that was so not what I said!"

"That is exactly what you said, as far as I recall," affirmed Aquata.

Ariel floated by, humming indistinctly. "Did you see the new orchestra Sebastian's putting together? I'll bet it's going to be fabulous!"

It was then that Attina noticed a marked difference in the room. "Hey, where's Andrina? She's never usually late."

"She was with us earlier," said Alana uncertainly.

"Yeah, I remember," Adella put in. "Last time we saw her, she took off like a school of anchovies was after her."

"But that was two hours ago," added Aquata. "We never saw her after that."

The doors burst open, and in came Andrina, looking ruffled but rather pleased with herself. "Made it."

All turned to stare at her as she straightened herself out. "Just in time," muttered Attina, glancing skeptically over as her sister whisked something bright out of her hair, tossing it behind a random, indiscernible rock. Aside from shortness of breath, nothing really seemed amiss; still, Attina continued to stare at Andrina over lunch.

"What is up with her?" Alana murmured in Ariel's ear.

Ariel shrugged. "No idea. Maybe she went for a long swim."

Andrina, meanwhile, barely registered the looks she was getting. In spite of having caught her breath, her heart was positively bursting with excitement over her new secret. Unlike yesterday, her plate was clean in a matter of minutes. Ignoring the astonished faces of her sisters, she hurried back upstairs to their room.

Just before coming in to lunch, she'd carefully folded up her bit of sail and stowed it in her pillowcase. Now, she cautiously took it out again, spreading it out over her blanket to examine it. It looked to be a very standard piece of sail, much like an ordinary blanket; it was almost big enough to be one. Gnawing her lip thoughtfully, she lifted it up; she might be able to do something useful with this. Rolling it into a tube shape, she measured it against herself, and discovered that, if she had something to tie it with, she could make a sort of bag to cover her tail with whenever she visited with Henry. True, he may consider it weird, but as long as he never found out, that was good enough for her.

Swimming over to the window, she leaned out and looked down. Just under the sill, a few long, thin strands of kelp were growing. Plucking one of these, she secured it tightly round the end of her makeshift sack. Upon tightening this, however, the kelp snapped.

"Not quite strong enough." Gnawing her lip, she made a search of the top drawer in the dresser. A thick, pale green hair tie might just do the trick. After wrapping it round the end, she had successfully created a cover that could slip over her tail when needed; all that was necessary now was a sash to hold it up.

A second search of the drawer provided a long belt of thick seaweed decorated with pearls that happened to be Adella's (merpeople wore belts sometimes, usually for show or carrying tools). Tying this about her waist, she was greatly pleased with the results. One look at herself in the mirror showed her exactly what she'd hoped for: a very human-looking torso with human's clothes instead of a tail. As long as she stayed sitting, Henry would never notice the difference.

The next day at ten, just before she entered the secret cave, Andrina slipped her invention over her tail. It was a bit harder to swim around this way, but she managed and got into the cave. Hoisting herself up onto a large rock at the edge of the shore, she sat, dangling the end of her bag in the water. She hadn't waited long before Henry himself slipped quietly into the cave.

"You alone?" he asked in a rather hushed voice.

"All clear," she answered cheerfully. She felt a glow of happiness as a smile broke Henry's face; why did it do that to her? "I've been standing guard for you."

Henry chuckled. "Thanks. Nice dress," he added, glancing at her new human clothes.

"Made it myself," she said, patting it proudly, which drew another chuckle from him. To him, she was sure it looked like a piece of trash washed up after a wreck; which it was; but she didn't care. To get off the subject, she inquired, "So, who was that who came by yesterday?"

Henry glanced a little guiltily at his feet. "Oh, that was just my dad."

"Oh? What did he want?"

Henry shrugged dismissively. "Ah, well, you know what dads are like."

"Boy, do I," she nodded. She had to wonder how Henry would feel about her if he found out she was a princess and not a commoner like himself. "So, what do you feel like doing today?"

Henry sat down beside her, taking off the long, black things that covered his feet so he could dangle them in the water. "I don't know; how about we just talk for a while?"

"Sure," Andrina consented, curious to hear of the human way of life. "So, what's your life like?"

Again, Henry looked uncertain. "Oh, well, it's nothing unusual; I live with my father in, ah, a place nearby; I lost my mother when I was little…"

Andrina stared at him. "Really? So did I."

"Oh." Henry gazed back at her. They shared a moment of silence. Then, he cleared his throat. "Well, anyway, I'm an only child, but my cousins live with us; they're a little… um, interesting, but I'm sure they mean well. It's a big enough house, so it's not too crowded."

This sparked Andrina's curiosity; eager to know what a "house" was, she asked, "What's your house like?"

Henry hesitated, saying dismissively, "Oh, you know, it's pretty big, but not enormous. I have my own room, and so does my father, and the cousins have theirs, so it's fairly… comfortable."

Andrina suspected there was more to it than Henry was telling her; but then again, she was a mermaid, so she could live with not knowing Henry's secret just yet. As she was more interested in all the peculiar things he had to talk about, she asked, "So, what do you do there?"

"Mostly I fence," he replied, "or ride, if it's nice out. My horse's named Major; he's a pretty easy-going ride, if you know how to handle him…"

Andrina didn't quite know what a "horse" was, but she knew what seahorses were, so she reasoned they must be something alike, only horses were assumedly much larger. She felt it rather odd that, in spite of their use of legs, humans seemed to prefer not using them whenever possible. Henry also spoke of something called "carts" (or maybe it was "carriage"; he mentioned both, and she had trouble telling the difference) that could carry more than one human at a time. Many of the things sounded similar enough to the things merpeople used, so she could hazard a guess at what they were for.

"Your life doesn't sound that boring to me," she told him at length. "My life isn't nearly as interesting as that."

"Well, what is your life like, then?" he asked good naturedly.

"Um, well," she began hesitantly, "I'm not an only child; I have six sisters—"

"Six?"

"Yep; it can be pretty wild sometimes. But our dad's cool with it; he's pretty busy most of the time, but he's been taking a lot more time for us now than he used to after our mother's death. Do you know, he actually banned music for a while?"

Henry frowned in confusion. "How do you ban music? Was it, like, from your house?"

Realizing she'd been dangerously close to revealing that her father was the ruler of a kingdom, she nodded, going with that story. "Yeah, he wouldn't let us play instruments, sing, or anything for years. It was ridiculous. I mean, not that anyone took him seriously or anything; when he was actually around, we wouldn't do anything, but whenever he wasn't there, nobody really followed that rule. It was my youngest sister who finally helped knock some sense into him, so he's doing a lot better now. He can still be weird with that sort of thing, though."

And so she did her best to explain what she could without mentioning anything he might not understand. As language was evidently not a barrier in this respect, she told him some of the ways of life in Atlantica; as if, by "Atlantica," she meant her father's "house." The stories about her sisters made him laugh; something she enjoyed immensely, for some reason; and led to questions about what it was like living with six people.

"Crowded, mostly," she told him. "And loud, too; I mean, Arista and Ariel cannot shut up; they were the ones who took right to music when it was allowed again."

"They sound like a lot of fun, actually," said Henry.

"Oh, they are," she agreed. "They're just the young ones, so they're more excitable."

Henry propped his elbow on his knee, resting his chin on his hand. "And what are your other sisters like?"

Andrina counted them off. "Well, Attina's like Dad; kind of a control freak, but she has the organization; Aquata's the brainiac, good with numbers; Adella has a thing with boys, Alana loves fashion, Arista is a little on the high side most of the time, and Ariel loves music."

"And what do you like?" he asked.

"I like swimming," she said truthfully.

"That I can see," he acknowledged, bemused. "Anything else?"

This was not a question Andrina was used to answering off the top of her head. In all honesty, she wasn't really sure what she liked. After thinking the matter over, she shrugged. "I like making people happy."

Henry smiled. "I'll bet you're a professional at that."

His words warmed her heart, and she glanced down, aware of the blush rising to her face. The light reflected on the water almost dazzled her eyes.

She was suddenly broadsided with a reminder of the time. "Oh, I just remembered, I have to be back before noon. I hope that's okay?" She looked up at him anxiously.

Reaching into his pocket-hole, Henry took out a tiny, gold-colored device very much like the compass. Flipping it open, he glanced at it. "Well, it's only a little after eleven now. We have time."

This time, Andrina couldn't keep herself from asking, "What's that?"

"What, this?" Henry held it out to her. "It was my grandfather's old watch he handed down to me."

"Wow, neat." Andrina turned it over, looking at it. It was very much like the compass; it had a cover that snapped shut, a round, smooth circle, and many tiny lines around the edge. But instead of one arrow, this had three, and only one of them moved constantly around, pointing at one mark at a time. She could hardly help turning it around and around, fascinated.

"I can see why you kept the compass," Henry remarked with a grin.

"Oh, sorry." Andrina quickly snapped it closed, handing it back. "I just… have a thing for that sort of thing, I guess."

"Well, that's cool," he said encouragingly, holding the watch to the light. "If you look there, my grandfather's name is written on it."

Andrina looked hard, squinting. "Ra… Ru—dol—pa—huss?"

"'Rudolphus,'" he corrected. "Names were a little different back in his time."

"I can see that. Shouldn't there be an 'F' there instead?"

"It's actually a 'PH'," Henry pointed out.

"I didn't say I couldn't read," she teased. "Maybe I just can't spell."

"I haven't heard you spell anything."

"Then, how would you know?"

Henry smirked. "All right, then, I'll test you. How many words can you spell in a minute? I'll time you." He held up the watch.

She readied herself. "Okay, but keep them short. And easy."

"Hand."

"H-A-N-D."

"Ocean."

"O-C-E-A-N."

"Salmon."

"S-A-L-M-O-N."

"Birds."

"B-I-R-D-S."

"Water."

"W-A-T-E-R."

"Uh, Yellow."

"Y-E-L-L-O-W."

His grin widened. "Glockenspiel."

"Cheater!"

They both laughed. "Okay, I'll give you a freebie for that one," he chuckled.