Riagen climbed steadily up the rigging, fighting the urge to look down. Mahkai was already scrambling into the crow's nest, and Riagen was determined not to be outdone. After weeks of pleading, the captain had finally agreed to let the boys have free reign of the ship – including the sails, mast, and crow's nest. The boys were wasting no time in taking advantage of their new freedom.
Panting, Riagen finally hauled himself into the crow's nest. Mahkai lowered the spyglass at his eye.
"Well it certainly took you long enough," he said.
"It's harder than it looks!" Riagen said defensively. "What can you see?"
Mahkai offered him a hand to pull him to his feet. "Not much. Lots of ocean. Lots of seagulls."
RIagen took the proffered spyglass. "We can see that from the deck."
"Yes, but think of all the ales you can tell the lasses back home, of climbing up to the crow's nest during a storm, to save the ship!"
Riagen considered this. "True."
They watched the ocean for about an hour, not talking often. Mahkai could tell something was seriously bothering his friend, and was patiently waiting for Riagen to talk.
Eventually, Riagen sighed heavily. "Why now? Why are we doing this now?"
Mahkai immediately understood. "I don't know. I feel like we're still children."
"Exactly!" Riagen said, starting to pace in the cramped crow's nest. "We haven't even finished school yet, not really. And our fathers are acting as if we're going to take their places tomorrow."
The thought made butterflies erupt in Mahkai's stomach.
"How can you be so calm?" Riagen asked suddenly, wheeling on his friend with an intensity that made Mahkai jump.
The tension drained from Riagen's shoulders. "Of course. I apologize. You're always calm. Comes with the territory, doesn't it?"
"Yeah," Mahkai answered weakly. "But if you feel any better to hear it, I'm terrified too."
Riagen ran a hand through his hair and laughed wryly. "Yeah. You're really the one who ought to be scared, aren't you?"
"Oh, please. We're in the same boat."
The countlessly repeated joke broke the tension, and they spent the rest of the afternoon in a basket in the sky in companionable silence.
It was very late when Assana was finally able to return to the shipwreck. Her tutors were piling on extra work to make up for the lighter workload from the past few weeks, and her father and sisters were surprisingly demanding of her presence, but she couldn't afford to wait any longer. She had to get away.
Assana's childhood had been filled with warning about the creatures that roamed the ocean after dark, and all those horror stories clamored at the back of her mind as she approached the shipwreck. She carried a bowl full of glowing algae that cast long, creepy shadows down the decks.
Swallowing the lump in her throat, Assana rushed past the shipwreck to the real source of her excitement: a cave. The entrance was tucked away, almost out of sight, and the only reason Assana had spotted it the other day was because of the changing angle of the weak sunlight. Now, in the dark, she struggled to find it. She slipped between two rocks, and disappeared.
The algae glowed ene brightler in the pitch-black cave. Assana's heart pounded in her chest as she peered into the dark corners, searching for the great white shark rumored to hide in every merchild's closet.
But no creatures jumped out to eat her. Assana shoved her light into every nook and cranny, eagerly analyzing how many human treasures she could store here. It was the perfect place for her to put her expanding secret trove, especially the new ones from the shipwreck. It was far enough away that none of her sisters would accidentally stumble across it, and she no longer had to run the risk of one of her father's men following her to the surface.
Assana had brought her bag of treasures with her, so she spent some time arranging them on the natural rock shelving along the walls. She didn't dare to go aboard the ship in the dark, instead vowing to come back during the day. But before she went home, there was one more thing she wanted to do.
Assana's head slipped slowly through the surface tension of the water, doing her best to go unnoticed. The nighttime air was significantly cooler, and the bright blue sky had darkened to a nearly black color. Assana had never come to the surface at night before, and adrenaline made the tips of her fins tremble. What kind of creatures roamed here after dark?
None, apparently. Not even the annoying white birds always trying to land on her head. But oh! Up above her in the inky black sky were thousands and thousands of bright lights, small and not as bright as the sun, but breathtaking in their sheer numbers. And behind her, she spotted what was undoubtedly the moon, crescent-shaped and pure white. And so…
"Stars," Assana breathed. "They're stars. And they're beautiful."
Assana could have stayed above the water all night long, gazing at the sky. But terror of being discovered – by humans or merfolk – eventually sent her back beneath the waves. Assana snuck through the halls of the palace and slid into her soft kelp bed in the early hours of the morning, and fell asleep dreaming of stars dancing across her ceiling.
Weeks passed. Assana's life fell into a structured rhythm, much the way life aboard Riagen and Mahkai's ship was. While Assana spent mornings in lessons with her tutors, Riagen and Mahkai ran around on deck, barefoot, slowly turning themselves into salty sailors. In the afternoons, they put on shoes and suit jackets and went belowdecks to talk numbers and figures and strategies with their fathers, and Assana suffered through lessons (or lectures) from her sisters or awkward, stiff meetings with her own father.
And in the evenings, they managed to sneak away to their secret places – the crow's nest, the surface, or a secret cave – cradled little white shells in their hands, and communicated across an ocean.
Assana loved these moments. Riagen and Mahkai were her only true friends in the world; the other palace merchildren had never been particularly close to her, as they understood all too well the boundary between servant and princess. She found herself telling them all her frustrations and fears.
"It's just…I'm the youngest of seven," she said. Tonight, she had gone up to the surface. According to Mahkai, a season called winter was falling over the land, where it was very cold all day, and the sun set sooner – which meant the stars came out earlier. "I don't know what my role will be. My eldest sister Cordelia will take our father's place, no question, and my other sisters will take roles in the council, or marry very, very well." Assana grinned as she remembered the last ball her father had hosted, and how one lord in particular had made Kenwei blush nearly as red as Assana's hair. "But by the time I am of age, the positions appropriate for a princess will be taken, and no one is interested in a match with the youngest princess."
"No good men, anyway," Riagen muttered.
"Exactly. So I wonder what the use of all my lessons is. When will I ever - " she stopped, realizing that her human friends would not understand her lessons about interspecies politics and the preservation of deep-sea algae.
Riagen laughed. "You're preaching to the choir here, Assana."
"What?"
Mahkai explained, "It's an expression. Basically, we know exactly what you're talking about."
"To a point, anyway," Riagen said. "Mahkai and I will take our father's places, of course, but they make it seem as if this will happen tomorrow. But obviously, that won't happen, and I don't understand why they are so insistent about it."
"While you don't have a role, we are so stuck in our roles that it's the only thing we can do with our lives. I will only ever be a younger version of my father," Mahkai said.
"Here's to teenage hatred of our parents!" Assana said, toasting her shell like one of the elegant glasses of bubbly she was only allowed to drink at fancy parties.
The boys on the other line laughed. "To no more lessons and lectures!" Riagen shouted.
"To choosing our own paths!" Mahkai yelled, sounding far away and feverish in his conviction. Assana started at the tone, and the smile slipped from her face.