Into the Darkness
Wednesday November 1st, 1480
Puffs of white appeared over Isle de la Cite and the surrounding Seine. The baker set a row of risen loaves into his oven, filling the bakery with steam. The blacksmith fed his forge. Mist flowed over the river, rising upward and rapidly fading. Outside, in the streets, the cobbles and walls sparkled with a dusting of frost.
The sun cast it's first yellow glow into an ever-brightening blue sky, raising the veil that shrouded Paris in twilight. The bells of Sainte-Chapelle sounded, announcing the matins. The first bell sent a torrent of pigeons out onto the streets of Paris. They flew over the bakery, through the smoke of the blacksmith's forge and over the butcher shop. Beggars and dancers meandered to their preferred corners and walls, pausing as the birds flew by.
Within seconds, bell-song flooded the streets as every chapel and church announced the rising sun. Their varied notes brought the city to life. Notre Dame's bells were the last to sound, her large bells drowning out the rest. Birds flew in droves from the north bell-tower and onto roof tops. Others circled Notre Dame, waiting for the bells to rest.
In the streets, a few artists, citizens and soldiers looked up to Notre Dame's bell-towers, finding the plain tolling discomforting. Notre Dame's bells were the same, the notes themselves remained unchanged. The matins, truly all of the hours, were less free and colourful for nearly a week. Rather, the announcement of each hour was simple, precise and methodical.
As the last peal sounded from Notre Dame, the birds flocked back to their towers. The faithful walked through the portals of Notre Dame for morning mass. The doors remaining open as citizens flocked inside.
Inside Notre Dame, mass had begun. An exhausted priest and two novices looked out over the nave, having raced down the bell-tower steps after their turn with the bells. The novices leaned forward onto their shaking knees. The priest leaned on a railing for support, his hands nearly bleeding and his shoulders aching. Sweat remained beaded on their foreheads, their cassocks and robes dampened, their arms and ears aching.
"Should we ring it?" The young novice questioned the old priest.
"Not yet." The old priest, Father Vanier, struggled to catch his breath. "We wait, and pray that he returns."
"And if he is dead?"
"We pray. It's all we may do." Father Vanier adjusted his robes. He gestured to the younger novice. "You, remain at the south tower entrance until the next tolling. Dion, you remain in the north tower."
"It's cold in there." The younger novice whined.
Father Vanier raised his eyebrow at the young man. The novice nodded.
"I will wait in the tower." He turned to step away, then paused. "Father, I don't know who I'm looking for. I've never seen him."
"You will recognize him." Father Vanier shook his head.
In a brightly-coloured wagon, in a corner of the square opposite Notre Dame, a Roma man sat in silence. He pulled puppets from his drawer, adjusting their buttons and straightening their woolly hair. His focus drifted to a hunchbacked shadow puppet. He turned it about in his hands, examining the shapeless face and sharp, exaggerated angles that made him. He sighed, then lifted the puppet up, away from the rest, setting it among a row of others. Like the others, it was of no use to him any longer.
Sunday, October 29th, early morning
Kelp and driftwood danced among the waves, casting shadows into the water.
A flash of red caught Ariel's attention.
"Contact between our world and their world is forbidden."
Ariel watched the lump sinking deeper. There was no wreck. There were no rippling shadows of fractured ships. Only one object, green and brown with a flash of red, carried through the water.
"What do you suppose?"
Ariel swam toward the sinking figure, a twisted shadow slowly flowing deeper. Bubbles escaped it while it rapidly approached the ocean floor.
It was a fish-eater, a terranian. Or, it appeared to be. His hands were tied, as was his mouth. He was limp.
Frantically, Ariel pulled the cloth over his head, freeing his lips. He did not speak. His jaw lowered, his chin falling toward his chest.
Ariel looked up, toward the surface. Linking her arms under his, she grasped him and swam steadily toward the sky, toward the bright, and forbidden, surface.
She forced his head above the waves, his back resting precariously on her shoulder.
Linking her arms in his, she carried him on her back, fighting to keep his head above the water. She scanned the ocean surface, searching for where he'd come from. A single ship sailed away from them. She grasped him around the chest, facing him.
"Breathe."
He remained limp.
"Breathe." She struck him in the chest. He gasped, a flash of colour showing through his pale skin. He choked.
Ariel looked around, there was no land in sight.
"Hold on." Ariel spoke to the unconscious man. "You'll be on land soon enough."
Pushing through the waves, Ariel struggled to keep him above water, to allow him to breathe. Occasionally, he would draw a shaky breath, causing her to pause.
"Contact between our world and their world is forbidden."
Her father's words echoed in her head as the waves crashed over her, and him. Water meeting air. Forbidden, yet heart-wrenching. She was familiar enough with the terranians, having observed them from afar. This one has come to her world, bound with cord and determined to rest on the ocean floor. She had so many questions. To ask them, she must find land. He must live.
"Keep moving." Ariel told herself as she pushed herself forward, toward a rocky beach. A secluded place where ships died and sky fish nested.
Low tide kissed the shore, waves pushing her through the littered waves. Fractured masts poked from the spattering of jagged rocks, piercing the turbid water in aggressive angles. Tattered sails erratically flapped and cracked against the wind. Slowing her movement was a fight, the waves seemingly drawing her toward the jagged poles and sharpened rocks. The weight on her back grew as the water's depth decreased.
The stony shoreline was harsh, as was the drop-off into the water. His weight increased as she forced him onto the rocky shore. He was cold, his lips blue. Carefully, she listened to the hand-like fins on the end of his legs. There was no pulse. Yet, he drew breath. She untied the knots that bound his hands, rubbing out the marks they left in his skin.
Exhausted, she rolled him onto his back and arranged him into what appeared a comfortable position in a patch of soil. She stretched her arms, glad to feel them moving normally. She looked to the terranian, who drew shallow breathes.
"What happened to you?"
Ariel pulled herself closer to him. He was weak, certainly not a threat. His hair was red and his skin pale, much like her own. That is where their similarities ended. Like all terranians he was half merfolk and half... half something else. She studied his face and body. Was he truly a terranian? He appeared different then those seen on ships, or on the ocean floor. No merman had such a strange shape. He looked decidedly more human, more fish-eater, than anything else.
Hesitantly, she touched his short hair with her finger, inspecting the sharply-cut ends. She traced her fingers over his face and lips. He swallowed. She jumped back, toward the water. For a few moments, his fingers pressed into the earth. He moaned, as if in pain. Then, he resumed his sleep.
Ariel approached once more. He wore covering unlike anything she'd seen before. He appeared lightly dressed in seaweed-like clothes, parts of his body covered with the thin rough substance. Tatters clung to his arms and chest. His legs were thicker than those of the crabs and lobsters, and were covered in layers of brown and white. Surprisingly, the skin of his legs and shoulders was paler than that of his face.
He shivered on the shoreline. As each wave lapped his legs, more chill crept into him. Ariel looked on, watching him tremble on the shore. She moved closer, lifting one of his hands. It was large, wrinkled and callused. It was also cold. Hesitantly, she felt his arm to the shoulder, feeling his muscles trembling. Every part of him was cold.
Sails. Terranians covered themselves in sails. Swimming carefully among the wreckage, she pulled every dry sail she could reach from the broken masts. They flapped about noisily, seemingly protesting their forceful removal.
Ariel returned to the shore, carrying the bundle of dry cloth over her head. She pulled away the shreds of wet fabric that clung to his shoulders and chest. She dragged him farther away from the water, the stone scraping painfully against her skin and scales. Carefully folding the sails, she tucked them between his shoulders and the earth. She wrapped him so that only his head remained exposed. His shivering slowly lessened.
She watched him intently. He wasn't so different. She watched his closed eyelids and the movement of his eyes beneath them.