Okay, I know I said one shots, but oh well.
The sea hisses softly like a sigh held back between teeth. Foam swirls on its silken way around my ankles, cascading in and out of the imprints of my feet. The rising storm breeze that picks through my hair, tossing it like a careless schoolchild throwing down their books after a long day. It must be tired of me coming by now. Or maybe it's tired of waiting.
Well so am I.
I race along the shore, hoping, searching for a weak spot, a flaw. Like digging before the rising tide, every inch I gain slides back on itself. I am left no closer to the sea than before, furious and panting.
Maybe if I return the curse in kind, something could be arranged. The possible repercussions make me shudder, but anything has to be better than this, right?
I ache to step into the sea again, to wade through the glassy green moldavite wrinkles of the surface, to tumble through the mirk far below, lungs burning and eyes wide. To feel something dark and forbidden brush my leg...
Scientists say the waves are caused by the wind, and the tides are caused by the moon. This is true, some of the time...
At the edge of the horizon a mountainous wave rears up, a cascading waterfall in the middle of the sea. I slowly count out six minutes before the remnants of the wave course all the way up to my knees. I shout my thanks. Can it hear me? How very kind to assist a land cursed creature. A wave of hope surges over me, from the tangle of my hair to the drying salt on my calves.
The "wizard" on the edge of town is a quack. He can barely see the fruit snacks. Abigail likes to pretend, but it's all parlor tricks. Emily has deep and verdant magic, but only for the land.
It is time to pay a visit to the real wizard in this town.