Ariel passed the evening feeling as though her head were under seven hundred more feet of water than it was. There was something she had to do, and couldn't remember what it was. She had been looking for…something…no, someone. She wished she could see Joe to help her untangle the mess in her head. However, whenever she thought of Joe, the pressure in her head seemed to get worse. It wasn't there when she looked at her sisters or any of the other guests, and only ever seemed to get better when she was looking at Ellian. Even then, there was something about him that seemed wrong somehow, but for the scales of her, she couldn't think what.
It was as though she was drawn to him by some magnetic force, and couldn't help but wonder how she hadn't seen so much more of him before. Everything about him was what she had been waiting for…wasn't it?
The confident way Ellian managed the staff was nothing short of regal. She'd never had so much authority over the servants in her own palace, and he simply commanded it—it was the kind of influence her sisters and father had, and the same kind that she'd never been able to master. Ellian wasn't just all hot air and bubbles, either. When he wanted something, it happened, and the efficiency with which he managed the announcement of their engagement set her fins on end. She didn't mind the jealous looks she was getting from all the mermaids in the ballroom, either. Wherever he swam, heads turned. He was all chiseled angles and jawlines. The skin of his face was smooth and flawless, even though some of his contingent and even King Exra had given him a hard time about it being too clear, which she thought was ridiculous. Even his long, spotted eel's tail was perfectly proportioned, and made her want to hide her own discolored tail. The more she stared at him, the fuzzier everything else in the room became. Ellian was simply handsome to a fault.
As they swam through the music of the ballroom, she enjoyed the envious stares of the nobles around her. Even the kuo-toa serving that night all looked as though they desperately wanted to be in her fins, and yet, as the announcements, the songs, and the congratulations passed through her ears, something was so very wrong.
"Princess Ariel?" Sebastian called her from her musings. "Princess, the high king wishes a word with you."
Ariel disentangled herself from Ellian's grip, noting with a small smile that he was as disappointed as she when she pulled away.
"If you will, Princess? Ah—alone with his daughter was specifically requested, Prince Ellian," Sebastian said, holding up a claw to stop Ellian from following her.
Ariel shot him an apologetic glance to let him know that she would return soon, and a confident grin spread over his face as he inspected her hesitance.
"Not to worry! A prince is patient by nature!" he proclaimed, running a hand through his perfect yellow hair.
Sebastian's expression was unreadable as Ariel giggled at Ellian's gallant bow. She was only happy at how carefully Ellian watched them as they swam off toward the throne room through the dregs of the ball.
As the ball drew to a close, the palace staff brought the event to its enchanting finale.
The main ballroom, adorned with its glittering bioluminescent jellyfish chandeliers that floated brighter to keep the palace lit as the sky faded to black, still echoed with the softer melodies of the musicians' instruments. Dancers, nobles, merchants, and royals alike mirrored the gentle sway of seaweed in the currents as couples paired off for one last song.
Cheers and applause followed her, the only of her three sisters who had announced a betrothal that night, and the music and smiles drifted after as Sebastian led her into the throne room where, for once, her father waited for her alone.
Ariel couldn't remember the last time had asked to speak to her privately. Through her murky bliss, every instance she'd broken palace rules in the past month flitted through her head.
She'd been out past curfew nearly every night to visit the surface, visited forbidden waters, pranked the guards with pufferfish pillows, and publicly disrespected her fiance over dinner. Gills fluttering nervously, she approached the looming tridacna throne, she almost missed her father's limp tail and sagging eyes.
Had he always looked so tired?
"Ariel," Triton boomed. Though the gray in his face pulled at her, Ariel couldn't help but wonder when she was going to get to see Ellian again…or was it someone else? Her head was pounding.
"Ariel, are you….alright, my daughter?" Triton pushed himself higher in his throne, his once heavily sinewed shoulders shaking with the effort. He held the trident with two hands as he steadied himself in his seat which she didn't remember him ever doing.
Triton looked… sick. Sicker than she'd ever seen him, and he certainly hadn't looked so haggard at the ball. Unless…unless she hadn't noticed. Ariel cursed herself, shaking her head for some semblance of clear thought, and in the rays of moonlight illuminating Triton' graying scales, her thoughts cleared a little.
"Father I feel…I feel foggy, like my head is full of silt!" Ariel surprised herself with her own honesty. "I don't know if an evening has ever gone faster."
"I've heard love can feel like that," Triton said, a wisp of a smile playing across his mouth. "When I was courting your mother, the days felt like months, and the minutes passed like seconds. There was never enough time with her, and you, precious Ariel. You are the only one of your sisters who really took after her. I had always hoped to put you closer to the kingdom so that someday, perhaps you could lead it as she did. The Red Sea is…farther than I'd hoped."
It was as though speaking took a toll on the King, and his chest heaved with the effort. As her sensibilities returned to her, Ariel could feel her brows knitting together on her face taking in the changes in the king.
"Father, are you alright? This isn't like you."
He held up a hand to dismiss her concern.
"Fine, fine," he said, blowing a weary stream of bubbles, and suddenly, she understood why he may have wanted to speak to her alone. She didn't seem to be in trouble…yet. He seemed exhausted.
"Young Ellian…you didn't seem to like him much over dinner, not that I can say I'd blame you. Although, perhaps you have seen his potential as I have. If he turns out like his father, he will be the best husband in the seven seas."
Ariel nodded; this was more usual. The High King was blunt as ever. "So that's why you chose to introduce him to me," she said.
"I had hoped he would have turned out more like his father at his age, but indeed he still has potential."
Ariel crossed her arms defensively. "Ellian is everything a prince should be. He is…he is…." but suddenly, Ariel found that she couldn't find a single defensible quality about Ellian. He had been insufferably rude, and apart from his dancing, and the feelings she'd felt earlier that evening, she'd disliked him because—Ariel gasped as the memory of dinner came flooding back into her head like the rising tide. He'd killed a cecaelia, and she didn't yet know who. Ariel knew most of the citizens hiding along the border, and kept their secrets well. There was no way an unpapered would have been caught in the open. Suddenly doubt crept back into her chest. She'd flirted with Ellian. Their engagement was announced!
How had this happened?
Triton chuckled weakly. "Then you've seen something I have not yet have the chance to. You always were so perceptive—almost magically so. Your mother was the same way. I can only count myself lucky that she saw something in me. Now, I have been advised to marry my daughters before…well, I am getting no younger, as you see."
Once again, Ariel raked her eyes over her father, though still sitting proudly, was still gripping the trident—not to wield it, but to support himself.
"Father, something must be wrong. You should have another century at least!" Ariel cried, eyes stinging with a little more salt than she was used to. "I can call the physician."
"Calm yourself," Triton hushed, dismissing her concerns with another regal wave, though this one held less rigidity than the last. "I have a few years in these oceans yet. I only want to see my daughters protected before I leave them. Ariel. Like I've asked every one of your sisters before you, are you happy with Prince Ellian? I might have promised a bride to the kings of the oceans for their assistance in the civil war, but I never said in contract that those brides were to be of my own sire. And of course, several of those kings, like Ellian's father, chose to take different wives when the time came. For several kingdoms, my contract is moot."
Her mouth fell open in a very un-princessly fashion, and she found her already-unbalanced head swimming again. "Did my sisters know? This really is just a suit? Then I could be…I could be free to choose? You'd let me?"
"Within certain parameters. Of royal blood, of course. Honorable. And, Ariel—" his smile was weak, but stern, "—you cannot wait forever."
Ariel could hardly believe her ears. "You seemed so…. Things just seemed different earlier."
"You really must learn to be diplomatic in front of foreign guests, Ariel," Triton scolded gently. "What is decided before advisors or even other kings is not the same as what is between family. If you haven't learned this as well as your sisters, then perhaps you're not quite ready to be married after all."
Ariel hung her head in dismay. "The engagement is already announced, father. Is there anything to be done if I'm not?"
"I am High King," Triton said imperiously, not a trace of the tremors in his tail reaching his voice. "It may take some time: a few delays for your ceremony, and when the excitement of it all dies down, it could be canceled completely. You were accepting him out of duty, then? You don't think…well, perhaps Ariel, you saw something of a future with him tonight? What you tell me now, you absolutely must be sure."
"While I know love is second to duty, Father, I don't see the potential in him like you saw in his father," Ariel said finally, and Triton' face, if possible, grew more grave.
"I will order a delay then, to your wedding. If you change your mind, Ariel…"
She shook her head, fins unfurling with resolve. "I won't."
Though she didn't know why, Ariel stuck to the moonlight as Sebastian escorted her back to her room. She'd danced with Ellian long enough that her sisters had long since retired, and even then, she didn't think she could stand hearing another round of congratulations. Speaking with her father still had her gills agitated, and she couldn't understand how the evening had gone so badly.
Losing her temper at the dinner table aside, she'd had far more than the obligatory number of dances with Ellian, and the more she remembered of his treatment of the staff, of the way he spoke to her about her training, and even of the way he disparaged the sciences that the kingdom of Atlantis shared with its allies, the more she disliked him.
Though she hadn't eaten or drunk much of anything, she could only conclude that the seaweed gel she'd had before dinner was somehow rancid. Nothing else could explain the way she'd felt looking at Ellian's winsome jawline, or beautifully-arranged yellow and black hair. She'd even found some of his stories funny—not that she could remember now what they'd been about. Looking back on her memory of the ball was like trying to see through an algae bloom, and as she sorted through the murk, her headache returned.
Ariel hardly noticed when Sebastian at last bid her goodnight at the doors of her room.
The kuo-toa had already come by to feed the soft bioluminescent orbs that glowed gently on their sturdy, coral nightstands, and the happy light they let off reminded her of the waxing moon above the surface. Although Ariel never kept her room too bright after sundown, there was still enough to see her bed, a work of art beneath the window, crafted from polished driftwood and adorned with shimmering mother-of-pearl inlays, its blue and green canopy drifted in the current that wafted in. Her sheets, made from soft seaweed fibers, beckoned invitingly, and though all she wanted was to curl up under them and sleep the vestiges of her headache away, it was a rare night that the waters above the palace were clear enough to see the moon and stars from the window. Something in her couldn't ignore the rest of the celestial progress she'd seen building up to the eclipse.
Ariel moved to her vanity, a stunning piece of coral shaped to resemble a spiny conch. Tiny, sparkling gemstones in its tips sparkled in the moonlight, and added a touch of magic to her otherwise dreary room. The surface was still cluttered with the sea glass vials and cases of the precious cosmetics her sisters had applied earlier. By some miracle, the polished brass mirror showed her that her deep red dress was still in flawless condition. None of the matching red pearls in her hair had shifted, and the careful rouge they'd painted on her cheeks still looked as fresh as it had when she'd started this disastrous evening. She looked older than she felt, more mature, somehow, and although she could admit her sisters had done well, she wished they hadn't made her look quite so pretty. If she'd arrived looking like her usual current-swept self, perhaps Ellian wouldn't have tried so hard.
Clearing the vanity's surface, Ariel replaced the cosmetics with the vanity's usual fare: a stack of star-charts, sextant, cross-staff, a pack of pencils, and the lunar charting she'd been working on since she could remember. As she glanced over the constellation charts and made some minor changes in her calculations, some of the stress of the evening melted away. Poseidon's dolphins still swam across the sky. The Kanaloa that appeared every squid season was center-sky. Charibdis' Pet Wobbegong made his nightly appearance in the southernmost corner of the horizon, and Lysander the Unfortunate Lover was bright enough to be visible through the surface waves.
As Ariel peered at her predictions, she noticed something new. Tiny points of blue shadow lined every ray of moonlight hitting the objects in her room. As she examined them closer, it was as though tiny blue threads were connecting everything the light touched.
As much as she would have loved to lose herself in her studies, seeing things in the moonlight was a sure indicator that she needed to sleep. Wishing the kuo-toa had stayed to help her out of the complex gown, she began tugging at the laces with a tired sigh, when she heard a sound like a clearing throat from the shadow behind her wardrobe.
The hairs on the nape of her neck stood on end. Ariel had had enough surprises that week.
"Who's there?" she demanded.
Her hand flew to the instruments of her vanity, and she seized up a cross-staff from the vanity, and brandished it at the shadow, which snorted at her.
To her great relief and shock, Joe melted out of the colors of the shadow, camouflage dissolving as he laughed.
"And what are you planning to do with that?" he chuckled, wading into the light.
"Joe!"
Looking at him now, the pressure in her head cleared, and the remaining silt that clouded her thoughts fell away in one crashing wave. Without thinking, she lunged forward and threw her arms around his shoulders. It didn't occur to her that she might be breaching some unspoken boundary between them until she felt him stiffen a little, but after one breath, he wrapped an arm around her waist, and patted her head gently.
"You're not going to beat me with a sextant, Princess, but you could always impale me with your tiara. Far pointier," he teased into her hair.
"This isn't a—" She groaned, and pulled away just enough to see his face. He looked better-rested than she'd seen him in ages, but there was an edge of something in his gaze that commanded her attention. His hair smelled of boiled spices and other things she couldn't identify, and seeing the familiarity of his furrowed brow, she couldn't help but relax a little. "Don't joke. I thought something had happened to you when you didn't come tonight. Did Ursula do something to you? Did Ellian?"
An angry rumbling sound echoed in his chest, and he glowered down at her. Unlike with others, though, his irritation didn't frighten her. If anything, his reaction made her feel that she might have an ally, at last.
"Ellian now, is it?" he said blackly.
She chuffed the back of his head gently, laughing genuinely for the first time that evening.
He raised a brow, and though the glower didn't leave, the hard line of his lips relaxed a little.
"If she did, would you go to her cavern and beat her with your tools for me?" he asked.
She laughed again, enjoying the feeling of tension releasing in her head.
"If that's what it takes to get you away from work. I was…I was worried." Hearing it aloud, she realized how silly it sounded. Joe was one of the more competent cecaelia. Of course he'd had a better reason than something having happened to him. He may not have wanted to come at all, and was here to pass along his regrets. Suddenly self-conscious, she pulled back, not realizing until she moved away that he'd wrapped a tentacle around her tail to keep her from falling, though she stumbled anyway.
He caught her wrist to keep her from tripping over the vanity stool, and instead guided her so that she plopped down
"Happy to hear you care," he said softly, leaning on one of the bedposts. It didn't escape her notice that he'd gone back to keeping his polite distance. "Ariel, do you remember what happened tonight?"
"I…" Ariel's head fell into her hands. "It was—Joe it was awful! There's a Cecalia somewhere, hurt or killed. Have you heard anything? When you didn't come, I thought it might have been you!"
"Looks like you at least have your head back, then," he said ambiguously, not answering her question. "Do you remember anything else?"
"I remember having to dance with my new betrothed." Her voice went quiet, and she felt a shameful blush creep up her cheeks. "Joe, I got engaged tonight, but I don't remember how. He doesn't care about anyone but his own people, and even then… I was sort of hoping to spend less time with him if you'd been able to…"
Ariel shut her mouth before she said something truly disastrous. It was wildly unfair to Joe to expect him to save her from something as silly as a few dances with a prince she might have been spending the rest of her life with, especially when he'd had something important to do.
"That's why you invited me tonight," he said bluntly, his mouth forming a hard line. She got the feeling there was something he wasn't telling her.
"Something happened, didn't it?" she pressed, when Joe spent a little too long in silence. He got up from the stool, and then sat down again, as though coming to some decision.
"I did come, Ariel." Joe folded his arms, looking agitated. He glared at her bedroom door, avoiding her gaze, and his voice went rough. "I'm only sorry I didn't come in time. Will you tell me about how you feel? Headaches? Memory troubles?"
Ariel straightened in surprise, gripping her sea-grass sheets in one fist.
"I have this headache that comes whenever I think about what happened after dinner, and ever since I got back from the ball, I've been seeing these blue lines in the moonlight. It might have something to do with the eclipse coming, but that doesn't make any sense, and—wait. You came? I didn't see you once!"
"The door guard didn't believe me when I showed them the invitations you'd given me," said Joe, holding up a hand to quiet her outrage before she could start. "No, no. I should have expected something like it. I didn't exactly dress for the occasion."
She gulped, noticing for the first time that he was still bare-chested, apart from his usual collection pouch attached over one shoulder. His lilac skin in the moonlight, so unlike any other species of Atlantean citizen, in combination with his white hair, made him look otherworldly. Joe was… a lot stronger than he'd been when they'd met, and she wondered how she'd never seen it before. How many trips had he had to take? How much distance had he had to cover? What was Ursula making him life that had turned his once boyish figure into something so—
"Ariel, I know it's hard, but you need to hear what I saw tonight," Joe said, evidently noticing when she'd lost focus, and she swallowed again, throat feeling dry despite the plentiful waters around them, and forced her attention back into herself. "That's better," he said gently, when she was collected enough to meet his deep purple eyes. "When the guard didn't let me in, I went around through one of the balconies, and saw the Eel Prince pull you into that corridor. Do you remember what happened there?"
Ariel shook her head. "No…" she said, letting her face fall into her hands. "I can recall it… but it's fuzzy, and any time I do, my head feels like I'm trying to use it to crack open barnacles."
"I thought as much," he sighed. "Your prince used a potion on you in the hallway—one of Ursula's. I was too late to stop him, and when the guards arrived, they assumed I was one of Ezra's contingent, and dismissed me."
"That—that sea snake!" she cried when he'd finished. "That's why I let him announce our engagement? Why I thought he was…I don't know what I thought! Anyway, it's not like the engagement will last. Father spoke to me alone tonight. It was like he was an entirely different person, Joe! He's going to delay the wedding until I don't have to marry him anymore. The eel prince didn't exactly make a good impression tonight."
However, Joe's reaction wasn't what she expected. "Entirely different…" he groaned. More agitated than before, he shot up from the stool, and set an anxious pace before her door, swimming the length of her small quarters several times as he spoke. "Of course he is… of course this could get worse."
"What do you mean, worse? I'll just tell the guards. I'll tell my father! Prince Ellian will be escorted out of the palace in disgrace!"
But Joe shook his head, raking his hands through his hair frustratedly. "I've tried to tell the guards—no, not even Adin believed me, Ariel, and if your father is acting strange, telling him may only make things far worse. Frankly, it sounds as though he's under someone's influence as well, which I can probably help you with, but right now, we don't have time. We need to get this curse off you before it becomes permanent!"
"Permanent," she said, taking in the seriousness in Joe's icy-purple eyes. "Joe, what does this potion do? What becomes permanent?"
"Ursula sold it to him as a love potion." Once more, Joe was doing everything he could to avoid meeting her eyes—pacing, even straightening the instruments on her vanity, and checking the door over and over again, as though convinced someone could be listening. "In actuality," he continued, "it's more of a mind-altering potion. Nothing in magic can make you fall in love, but it can simulate very strong feelings that will take you over. This one, Ursula set on a timer connected to sunlight. He got you alone in that corridor because the first person you saw once the potion hit your gills in the light of the sun, you would think you'd fallen in love with. Every time you see him his hold on you gets stronger. Then, in the light of the moon, it looks like things get weak enough for you to have your own mind again. It will get stronger in the day, and weaker at night, until on the third day after sunrise, its hold on you becomes permanent."
He gave a sharp jerk of his chin.
"As for the lines you're seeing…that's interesting. Only mages can see those. If you can see magic now, that's one whale of a side-effect that I didn't foresee…"
Any other day, the ability to see magic would have excited Ariel out of her fins, but the details of the curse had already sent her reeling.
"You're saying, as soon as the sun rises tomorrow, I'll be back in love with Prince Ellian? I'd do whatever he says…that would some kind of monster," Ariel realized in horror.
"And you won't remember that you're under a spell," Joe added, unhelpfully.
"Wait!" Ariel exclaimed, hope swelling in her chest as she rose from the bed and moved closer to him. "You said that the eclipse can ruin a lot of magic when it passes. Won't it make this potion just fizzle out like the rest of them? Why would it make it permanent?"
"Ah, that—"
Here, Joe looked truly uncomfortable, tentacles tapping on the floor as though he had been trying very hard to avoid this particular question.
"Perceptive as usual," he sighed, and she felt a pang of disappointment when he turned his face away from hers, still unwilling to look at her. "That's actually my fault. All my fault. Since you told me the eclipse was coming, I invented a new brewing method that seals magic and makes it stronger under the eclipse. If Ellian had gone to any other sea-witch, then once the eclipse happened, yes. You would have been free."
"It's a shame you're so clever," Ariel teased dryly. "And somehow I would wager that cleverness could break my curse. I'm lucky to have you."
Timidly, she reached out for his hand, and he jumped at her touch, clearly not expecting her to have come close. His chin snapped toward her, then, and he regarded her as though she'd gone insane. Her heart broke a little when she read in his expression that he didn't think she would want to be close to him after his confession.
"You didn't curse me," she said quietly, slipping her fingers into his. "You would never… You certainly don't choose to work for Ursula. You think I would blame you for her work? You're always protecting me and Krill…"
Her blue eyes met his purple ones, and though she could see his obvious guilt, they both understood that Ariel needed Joe. His connection to magic was perhaps the only one that could get her out of this—although the gravity of the situation was still sinking in.
Joe was often her only voice of reason, the only person who would never coddle or grovel to her for the sake of her status, and the mer who had the most of her trust in the whole ocean. While she'd always known she'd have to leave for a suitor eventually, her father had given her hope that she might not have to go so far, that she might even be able to choose—
She stopped that thought in its tracks. Joe was a friend and a protector, but he had never shown anything but polite respect for her, and he certainly never tried to get as close to her as Ellian had—or at least she thought so. Her memories of the dances were still somewhat fuzzy. At the same time, Joe was a clever, powerful Cecaelia, and the chances of him being interested in a mermaid whose only talent was astrology, and whose tact never measured up to her sisters…
She began to pull her fingers from his, but he held them fast, rising from the stool over her to his full height over her. She felt color stain her cheeks and felt for once grateful for the cosmetics that concealed her skin. All fins included, Joe was much taller than she, and had he leaned forward, could have put his chin on her head.
"You do," he said resolutely.
"Hm?" she asked, blinking up at him.
"You do have me," he said.
Her breath caught in her gills and under her fingers, she could feel the pulses in his wrist going faster than a whole shoal of mako.
Which is normal, she scolded herself. The man does have three hearts, after all.
"I can't fix this curse on my own, but I do know who can," Joe said urgently. He kept hold of her fingers, which made hearing him difficult over the hammering of her own pulse. "After I was thrown out of the ball, I went back to the cavern and ransacked the books Ursula keeps in the cavern for information on this spell."
"Wasn't that dangerous? She could have punished you for that."
Joe snorted, and muttered something that sounded a lot like 'not while she's drunk.' Then, a little louder, "the only sea witches better than Ursula don't work in Atlantis. They all moved for refuge in the depths ages ago when the paper laws were decreed."
By your father, he left unsaid.
"Then we're going to the depths," Ariel said. It wasn't a question. "And we have to go before the sun rises, or else…I probably won't go with you."
He nodded.
"Alright." To Joe's visible surprise, Ariel giggled in acquiescence. "But you have to turn around, first."
"You're not going? You need to come. I won't have the time to get there, and bring back a cure before the sun rises—"
"It's not that," she shushed him with one finger. "I'm going. But I'm not going dressed like some princess."
Cheeks staining themselves a light purple, Joe turned around while she cut herself out of the laces of her gown. It was a lovely dress, and the laces were easily replaced, but it would be far more noticeable than a plain sea-grass blouse. After snatching a purse with a few valuables from her night-stand, she let Joe lead her out the window.
They passed the kelp-beds unnoticed, tracing the usual path Ariel took to the surface. Ariel was impressed with how well Joe was able to blend in with so many surfaces. They didn't even see any guards until they reached the outer reef at the border of the palace gardens, though with the huge number of guests that night, Ariel forgot that the guards' routes might have been changed.
Neither of them saw any guards until they'd already been spotted.
"Stop!" ordered Pastian, chief of King Triton' guard.
She knew the voice before she turned around, finding his contingent at the tail end of their garden patrol. She didn't exactly have the guard's routes memorized, but with such a large grouping of them, she wondered how she'd missed them. The chief's contingent was about twelve guards, and in a brief moment of panic, Ariel's fins seized as she realized they'd never get away cleanly.
"Flippers." Ariel cursed under her breath, feeling Joe's hand immediately curl around her arm.
"Princess Ariel?" Pastian said a little more loudly. "Stop! The Princess! The princess is being kidnapped!"
"Swim!" Joe ordered under his breath, already speeding them up to a pace the guards could never catch.
Ariel forced her fins to unfurl as Joe pulled her forward with a speed she'd never be able to match on her own. Hopefully that meant that neither could the guards. Together, they sped over the garden wall, and practically flew into the citadel where the guards would have a difficult time following Joe's agility.
As they turned the corner into the winding streets of Atlantis, Ariel had time for one last glance backward, and instantly regretted it. The visor of one guard was lifted, as though he couldn't believe what he saw. The look of utter betrayal that Adin gave Ariel and Joe as they escaped boiled in her, but now there was nothing to do, and no possible way to explain.