It was the middle of the night and he was supposed to be asleep. Instead, Jude was out of the palace and skimming along the bottom of the dark sea. Days had passed since his last excursion to the surface and he was starting to feel restless. Stef had been keeping a closer eye on him and Jude was thinking that she suspected that he had done something but couldn't prove it. Knowing that she was in asleep, Jude was taking advantage of his free time. There was an old shipwreck that he had been slowly working his way through. The ocean was starting to shift it and Jude knew that he was running out of time to go through it and find human artifacts and he always wanted to find things, try and figure out what they were used for. It was always the most entertaining part of his day.

He could see the ship up ahead and he went through the broken bow, bypassing the parts that he had already swum through. He reached a new room, moving carefully. He had good underwater vision, even in the dark, but it was not as good as it could have been. If he got hurt, if he was bruised or cut, Stef would notice and she would ask. He wasn't clumsy. She wasn't stupid. She would know.

He leant down and then he heard a noise behind him.

"Someone is where he wouldn't be. Why do you think he's here?"

"I don't know. Why do you think he's here? Should we ask him why he's here?"

"Oh, he hears us. He might just tell him."

Jude turned to see two long eels, twined close together, staring at him through the doorway he had just came through. His started to feel cold. So cold. Eels were the preferred sidekicks to witches, particularly, the powerful witch family, the matriarch of whom had been the ones to curse Jesus. Her eels were male but the two in front of him were female and he didn't know who they belonged to.

"Why are you here?" Jude asked them.

"Merman –"

"Man? He looks like a boy."

The eels came closer, looking him up and down.

"Merboy, why are you here?"

"That's none of your business. What do you want with me?" Jude demanded.

"We see you. We've noticed you."

"Our mistress has noticed you. You like humans. Human things."

"She could make you human."

"I don't do deals with witches. Get away from me! My mother –"

" – would love to hear about why you're in a human shipwreck in the middle of the night." The two eels exchanged a knowing look. "We won't tell if you don't. But just know that you have options. You can have what you want."

"What I want is to not be followed around."

"Well, you know where to find us, don't you?"

Everyone knew where the sea witches lived, in a deep, dark corner of the sea, as far from Atlantica as they could get without infringing on someone else's territory, a current swirling in the ocean above the cave, protecting it from unwanted visitors.

"I won't need you."

"You will."

"Leave!" Jude shouted.

"Why don't you leave? You're trespassing … A prince out of Atlantica? Anything could get you here."

"I'm not that far out of the city. You'd be found out immediately."

The two eels looked at one another. "Oh, we're not doing anything … Not until you want it done. You know, sea witches can do extraordinary things. Sea witches can give you your heart's desire."

"You don't know what's in my heart," Jude said scornfully. "Besides, death is death."

"Yes, true, life is for the living," the eels agreed. "But, when it comes to your life, we know what you want for it."

"You don't know me."

"We know you want to fit in more than anything. We know that you need more than what's under the sea."

"You don't know me and I am leaving."

Jude hated to leave the ship behind but he pulled himself through one of the broken portholes and swam back toward the city. He felt completely unsatisfied and there was no reason to. He had been disobeying his mother's orders but that wasn't something new or unusual. He felt guilt every time she mentioned it, but he, Mariana, and Callie had been sneaking around for so long that it didn't even feel like sneaking anymore. It was second nature to know when to leave and when to go home by the changing of the guard. He knew what times Stef slept best and he knew what times she would be restless. This was the life that he knew. And, yet, he had always knew that he was dreaming of more. And he wasn't thinking of other cities. He wasn't thinking of just branching out from Atlantica and exploring the other parts of the ocean. He was a prince in his own right – he had travelled, had swam the seven seas, had even braved Arctic waters. It wasn't the ocean that he wanted. It was land. It was always land. It was laying on the beach in broad daylight, it was knowing what toes were like, it was breathing in air. He wanted to hear stories about people, the way that the prince heard about merfolk.

Jude looked up. He had more than enough time left. He had left his room with intentions to explore the remainder of the ship for hours. He still had that time. Jude swam upward, his tail pushing him until he broke through the surface. It was so different during the night than it was during the day. Everything felt calmer at night and the cooler air helped Jude feel more alive. His heart felt more real in his chest. This was when he felt at his best. It was also when he felt most at peace, with real stars above him and the breeze.

Jude spun in the water when an explosion went on above him. Jude grinned wildly as he saw the pretty colours split the sky. He didn't know how humans did it but he loved the light explosions in the sky. They never seemed to hurt anyone – not like the explosions that came off the ships. He swam with his head above water to the source of the lights. He would recognize that ship anywhere: it was the prince's ship. There was lively music coming off the ship and Jude could see many figures, dancing and talking. It was dark and, so, Jude wasn't as nearly as concerned when he grabbed onto the rigging on the side of the ship, pulling himself up onto it so that he could overhear the conversations.

"Oh, it's the cake!"

A lively chorus of people exclaiming "Happy birthday!" filled the night. Jude took a peek onto the floor of the ship, through a small opening. He saw the shoes of many people, standing still, clapping along and, if he tilted his head, he saw Prince Connor, Lena at his side. Another explosion went off in the sky and Jude delighted in it all again. The way that humans celebrated birthdays was so different from the way that the merfolk did and Jude wanted to know all of it. He looked to the water, watching the way that the colours splashed across the waves. They were sailing further away from land, getting closer to over Atlantica. He thought of his mother, asleep in her bed, and he thought of what she would think of him now. Or of the eels that had approached him earlier.

He heard a sound above him and he hugged closer to the rigging, looking up. There was Prince Connor, one leg slung over the side of the boat as he looked upward, staring at the colourful explosions as Jude stared at him.

"I love fireworks, Lena."

"I suppose that's why you set them off every chance you get."

Fireworks. The colourful explosions were called fireworks. Jude mouthed the new word happily to himself.

"Yes, that would be why," Connor said and he laughed.

Jude couldn't help but smile at the sound of his laugh. He swung his tail a little as the prince called for another set to go off. The explosion split the night and Jude looked upward in as much awe as the prince did. For something with such a violent sound, they were so beautiful. It was times like this that Jude was absolutely convinced that his mother was wrong. A world that could create something so beautiful wasn't one that was entirely evil.

Jude was distracted when there was a scream from the deck. He pulled himself up a little to look and he sucked in a harsh breath. The deck was on fire! The deck was on fire! Instinctually, Jude threw himself into the depths of the water, knowing that the burning would never reach him here. But, it wasn't enough to dive down, to find the shimmers of Atlantica and go to sleep like he had never left his bed. There were people up there, people who might be in trouble and might be hurt. Jude didn't possess magic, like the queen did, but he knew that there was something more that he could do. He could get through the water, he could save people. He forced himself upward, keeping his head as close to the top of the water as he possibly could. He didn't want anyone to think that he was someone missing from the boat.

The surface was all chaos. There was fire, crackling explosions from the fireworks that the men had yet to set off, shouting from people in rowboats. He recognized the one panicked voice of Lena, calling out for the prince. It was then that Jude recognized the worry on the faces of the men in the boats: they weren't concerned about their sinking ship as much as they were concerned about the prince, being trapped. Jude let himself go down deep beneath the waves again. He swum beneath the wreckage of the ship, looking for something, any sign of the man that Jude had been watching for so long. The ship was slowly starting to sink and Jude dived lower and lower, trying to get beneath the wreckage.

And, there, was Connor, his leg trapped between two pieces of wood. Jude swam quickly, following the length of the debris, moving carefully so that his fin didn't get caught in anything. Connor's eyes were half-open but he was so utterly still that it left Jude terrified. He couldn't already be dead, could he? Humans couldn't survive long submerged – he knew that; he wasn't stupid – but he just couldn't believe that the prince had been underwater long enough to hurt him. Jude forced apart the wood, finding the knot that had gotten caught around Connor's foot. He freed the man and then grabbed him around the waist. He swam as hard as he could toward the surface. He had never been so grateful to get his head above water, juggling Connor so that he could get the prince's head above water too. It was hard to balance swimming and carrying someone else. Jude had never done it and it was so important to keep Connor so that he could get air into his lungs. Jude struggled toward the beach, not knowing if Connor was breathing or not. He could feel the sand scraping along the end of his tail and Jude knew that he was close. He was so close. And, then, Jude felt his hand touch sand. He gripped it tightly and pulled he and Connor up the beach. Finally, Jude was able to let him go, the waves still lapping noisily over the toes of Connor's boots. It was the first time that Jude had ever been on real land and he couldn't even take the time to enjoy it.

Instead, he leant over Connor, his hands hovering over the prince's chest. He had no way to tell whether a human was dead or alive and his stomach tied into knots.

"Please," Jude begged, shaking him. "Wake up! Wake up!"

But, he didn't.

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~TLL~