A'N: When the moon hits your eye
Its eclipse coming by,
That's a Moray.
When potion hits your gills
And your prince struts in frills,
That's a Moray.
Then the prince gets some threats,
Losing his magic bets,
He's a Moray.
Now a cursed relic helps,
Him find her through the kelp.
Curse that Moray!
Yes, yes, I'll…show myself out. Enjoy the chapter!
Chapter 19 EllianPrince Ellian, Hunter of Monsters, Game-keeper of the highest order, and heir to the Aegean throne raged out of his quarters like a slug out of a pressure tube as soon as he regained his senses from Ezra's beating—no, his torture! His disrespect! No one had ever rattled him quite like that. It only served as a reminder of the sort of dangers he worked so hard to ensure remained under the proper control. He wasn't against dangerous things in the ocean—after all, he himself was it—but he operated under the correct protocol. The correct authority—his.
"Speaks to me that way," he growled under his breath as he shot past the statues in the Atlantean palace hallways. "How dare he! As if it was my fault the princess of his recommendation was a flight risk. As if the sea-witch of his recommendation didn't choose this path for me! Ellis!"
Ellis, his closest friend and advisor caught up to him in the halls, his green fins propelling his long body easily alongside Ellian, although he couldn't keep up for long. He wrapped himself around Ellian's spear, once more arranging himself to conceal the broken tip.
"You called, prince Ellian," he hissed, clearly still displeased with his treatment during Ezra's visit.
"We'll have either his head or his money soon enough," Ellian tried to soothe, but the effort was hollow. Ezra had made him look like a guppy in a tidepool.
"If the princess is missing, our position in the palace is precarious, princcce," Ellis grumbled.
"I am aware," Ellian snarled back.
"You should not trussst Triton's men to find the precious princesss," Ellian warned in his nasally scold. "They can ssserve, but clearly cannot hunt."
"I don't intend to," Ellian promised, preparing to exit the palace. Stirring an agitated wake in his tread, he raised his free hand to throw himself through the main doors, and found his palm already occupied. The orb Ezra had thrust into it was still clutched angrily in his palm. "Pesky octopus," he muttered, though as he raised his hand to shatter it, an image in its surface caught his eye. A grinning witch with living tendrils for hair and a smile of seduction and pitch leered at him for the briefest moment before vanishing into a whirl of intangible smoke.
"What was it Ezra had said before storming out? The words were garbled in his memory, but if he recalled…"
"The tentacled one said this artifact will guide you to the princess," Ellis reminded, giving the thing a nasty sneer.
Ellian recalled. Ezra had peppered his message with more explicatives and insults to his intelligence than the one line, but the meaning was communicated. Unfortunately, he hadn't exactly provided instructions.
"How do you work?" he demanded of the orb in the empty hallway.
The orb, unsurprisingly, remained silent.
"What do I do to operate you?"
As if more stubborn than before, the orb's non-compliance seemed to mock him.
"Perhaps an order, my prince," Ellis suggested, but if he weren't still so agitated, Ellian suspected Ellis might be laughing at him.
"Show me my Princess and that wretched tentacled aberration!" Ellian ordered nonetheless.
At the order, the orb actually snapped to. An image of his princess came into view, and although she was wearing a bland sea-grass blouse that made her look far less fetching than her crimson ensemble of evenings past, she was still quite the vision. Her long hair swirled alluringly around her shoulders, framing her face, neck, and waist as the currents moved. The circles under her eyes recounted a fatigue she hadn't had when they'd danced; but of course the poor dear was tired. A kidnapping could do that to a girl.
But then where was…
The cecaelian apprentice who had attempted to thwart his attempt to use his own product came into view much closer to the princess than he expected, and as the view adjusted to include both of them, his scales writhed in agitation, then fury. By the looks of things, she was sitting in his lap. Worse, she wasn't trying to flee or gouge his eyes out as the sea-witch led him to believe she'd react to the advances of other men. Instead, they appeared to be talking…and getting closer. Then, with some disgust, he saw one of Triton's guards through the orb's surface, but instead of doing his job, he appeared to be unconscious, or sleeping, if the intermittent bubbles floating from his upturned nostrils were any indicator. After a particularly large spurt of bubbles from the guard, Ariel fell over the cecaelian apprentice, her face far too close to his. Whether it was on purpose or by accident, he didn't care.
If Ellian hadn't been hot-faced before, his blood practically boiled now. He clenched the vision in his fist hard enough that if the orb had been made of anything less than A-grade quality Cursed Pearl, it would have shattered.
"Where do I find these traitors?" he demanded of the orb.
Dawdling a little, the orb then flashed him a scene of the dropoff, out by the reefs where he'd taken his hunting party not days before. Although he knew where to find it, it wasn't where the orb had shown the princess. As though sensing his doubt, the scene shifted, and then guided him over the edge, and downward. It wasn't much, but it was certainly enough to follow. Barely.
"Well, then," he hissed, fighting the urge to hurl the orb through the head of the nearest sea-glass statue of some historical mer. "It seems things are more complicated than Ezra let on. Of course they are. And of course, it's all left to me."
He gave the palace doors a good hard shove, and switched course to the barracks where his men would already be awaiting orders. From the emptiness of the halls, he'd gleaned that he was perhaps the last to learn of the princess's disappearance—but of course his men didn't need to know that. Ellis held on as well as he usually did to the spear as Ellian propelled them both through the entryway.
So much trouble over one boy. He shouldn't be too hard to track down, much less catch. Why hasn't he been caught already? For that matter, what was that apprentice thinking, betraying his own king? Ezra had a notoriously loose hold on his subjects, but still. This one was an accomplice to his personal sea-witch. What was that fool thinking, betraying his own king?
Ellian grumbled under his breath as he circled the palace grounds, picking up speed as he flew over the sea-beds, statued gardens, and rising towers of the palace.
"If it weren't for the octopus—both of them!—this would all have gone off without a hitch. My princess would have been the happiest she's ever been by now. I wouldn't be bad-off either, of course. We would have swam off into the fishing sunset…."
Ellis wisely remained silent for the ride.
The Atlantis barracks came into view, tucked appropriately away from the palace behind the boundary wall. The buildings were impressive enough, he supposed, although not nearly as impressive as the Aegean ones. The barracks themselves were a series of imposing stone arches and tunnels. Towering, spiral-shaped shells flanked the entrance, serving as ceremonial trumpets. He passed through them before any sentinels could announce his presence, and noticed a disturbing lack of personnel in his path until he came upon the central courtyard.
A wide yard contained racks of meticulously organized weapons and scale-linked armor in practical grabbing distance in an emergency; however, many of the racks were already empty. Nautical and kelp banners displaying the kingdom's emblem decorated statues of mer-warriors, captured in lifelike poses to all who entered of the kingdom's rich history and the valor of its soldiers. Right now, however, the statues outnumbered the staff of actual mer-men present.
"You there!" he barked, catching the attention of two very tired-looking night-guards next the practice dummies. "Rouse the Aegean party, and bring out every last soldier, guard, and mer-man down to the very last footman you've got left!"
The two mer-men blinked at him sleepily, as though they thought he was some sort of specter. He summoned his full coloring, and his tail snapped with what little electricity he had in his veins.
"Well, don't you know who I am? Move!"
That time, they responded, darting off in the direction of the sleeping quarters. It wasn't long before his own men came pouring out, and to his great satisfaction, he found that they were somewhat forcibly escorting two dozen of Triton's men—a few looking a little worse-for-wear, as though they'd been out swimming half the night.
He pushed down a smile. Day-break was already on them, and these mer-men deserved a little less sleep for failing in their duties. At least he wouldn't be the only one suffering in the daylight hours to come.
"Gather and see, men! I, Prince Ellian of the Aegean Sea have located your princess—and it is worse than we all have feared!"
Some of the more tired faces turned up to look at him.
"You've found her?" asked one of Triton's men.
"Where?" another demanded. "We'd already searched the whole city!"
One of his eels moved to silence the disrest, but he stopped them with a hand. It was too early to lose their attention. Ellian raised the orb over his head:
"Show me the princess!"
The orb obeyed, and Princess Ariel fluttered into view. Judging by her hair, she seemed to be moving quite quickly, as though she was hurtling down some violent tunnel. Her mouth and limbs were bound and gagged by a set of long, black tentacles. The evidence was better than he could have asked for.
"A rogue citizen of Atlantis, and a guard, one of your own have taken her! See this beast how he has her, and see how this mer-man brings shame to the colors of your king!"
A murmur of anger rippled through the crowd. His words particularly rankles ones with higher-ranking insignia on their gear.
"Look at the darkness around them. The currents! The ledges of the abyss! Men, he's stealing her away to the hidden city of the Depths as we speak! Long has the hidden city been the bane of the capital, lurking in our dark shadows, protecting creatures that threaten our children, hide our criminals, and steal our peace. Now, they're bold enough to take our princess, even enlisting the help of one of you!
"Although it seemed at first that this cecaelian perpetrator acted alone, how many monsters are lurking just below our fins who would have done the same? How many of us have long wanted to expunge these threats? How many of you are dying to recover the shame brought upon you by one of your own?"
It worked. Any fatigue the returned soldiers might have shown from their night's escapades was gone, quickly being replaced with pinched brows, twitching fins, and half-drawn weapons. Careful not to dislodge Ellis, Ellian raised his spear over the throng, matched by his own hunters, who returned the salute.
"Together! Today! We sally forth to kill the monsters! Follow me and we will not only regain our princess, but we will return with tales of glory, and the heads of those who would threaten us! For though they are strange, they are cowards! The light of day will find them down there in the dark, glinting off our steel!"
His ears were met by a roar of familiar approval.
"Gather your weapons! Prepare now! When we return to this barracks, it will be with tales of success, and in the company of our princess!"
Ellian had never seen so many tails flee so quickly, as Triton's tiger-fish mer, and his own eel-mer flew into action and their gear. The sound of clanking clasps, sheathing swords, spears, and harpoons clattered over the courtyard. Ellian knew watching their efficiency that the lot of them could be ready in minutes. Perhaps Triton's discipline wasn't entirely lacking.
"Prince, the Depthsss are difficult to navigate, but I sssense something strange from that orb. I strongly suggest you don't use it to find the princess—or if you do, as sssparingly as possible."
Ellis, who up until then had remained silent curled around his spear spoke, baring his teeth at the blank pearly sphere in Ellian's hand.
"Nothing has happened so far," Ellian argued. "Do you suggest a different way?"
"You are a hunter, princcce," Ellis pointed out. "Surely the usssual methods will do."
"Not with a crowd like this," Ellian spoke from experience. "These men aren't mine. They're going to need a little…show of power to know that I'm in charge—at least at first."
"Perhapsss not. I only warn," Ellis said, looking reproached.
"Ellis, I need you to stay and keep an eye on things in the palace. Stay unseen as much as you can, but watch Ezra and Triton."
"I was going to suggest the same, prince. Ezra did not strike me as one who waits…." Ellis curled his lips back when he said Ezra's name, as though trying to regurgitate something vile. "The guards are ready, prince. May Poseidon protect…"
"Indeed."
It took Ellian only a few hours to lead his eager rabble to the place he'd seen in the orb. In fact, they arrived so quickly, he could hardly remember the journey there. Finding the exact spot; however, was more tricky.
"When I saw it in the orb, I remembered it, so where is that trident-blasted spot?" he muttered so softly that his men couldn't hear him.
He had to keep them moving at a pace that didn't lose their enthusiasm, but Ellian was beginning to wonder if they'd already passed the place. It wasn't long, however, that his instincts kicked in over his memory. He was, after all, a leader, and leaders never did any of the work themselves on principle! It was simply principle!
"Fan out men, and search for anything out of the ordinary!" he barked, offering no explanation.
His instinct was rewarded in due course as it usually was. It was mere minutes before one of the guards approached him carrying a helmet just like the one on his own head.
"Prince Ellian!" the guard reported. "We found this by the ledge over there!"
Ellian's gaze followed the guard's pointing finger. The spot was exactly like what the orb had shown, if a bit more current-swept than before. In fact, the sand had since been stirred in strange, swirling patterns unlike anything Ellian had ever seen, and if there was anything that Ellian knew about strange sights, it was that investigation was the privilege of peons.
"Well spotted, man!" he praised curtly. And I should know spots, he added in his head. "Report! Are there any anomalies over that ledge? What do you see?"
Three more guards joined the first in investigating the ledge, until one of them tripped over his fins over something invisible in the water, and with a surprised cry, was caught by a vortex of force just like the one he'd seen carrying the princess in the orb. The guard was spun around violently, and to the audible horror of the guards scattered on the reef, was sucked downward into the abyss.
Ellian gave the orb a fond pat, seeing that it had been correct.
"Well men? After him! Downward!"
The day had practically vanished behind him, and Ellian had to credit the spiraling waters for being an excellent way to pass time. It felt like mere moments before the current spat him and his men at the base of a strange monolith carved to look like one of Ezra's hideous tentacles. Really, the thing was in remarkably poor taste, and there was nothing else around on the poorly-lit ocean floor to see. A streaming light pulsed from its tip, pointing in a direction to the right of where they'd just come.
"Prince Ellian!" said one of Triton's guards. His own guards had long been trained to remain silent unless spoken to, and the chattiness of Triton's guards had them curling a sneer at the interruption to the shadowy quiet.
"Speak," he permitted.
"We've arrived at the third tentacle, and the men have noticed strange words glowing on the sides. The guide light is already on, though. We can't make sense of what it means, your highness."
The third of its kind? Now that the guard mentioned it, Ellian had a murky recollection of having seen something similar, but surely it wasn't that day.
"You're mistaken. The current has only just ended," the prince cut off, and he noticed the slightest of twitches from his men, although they obediently said nothing. Something was off, he realized, reading the room, so to speak. "That is to say, this is still the first leg of our journey! If the guide light is pointing then we should continue on!"
"Your Highness," the guard said nervously, "the men are reaching their limits. If we are to have enough energy to fight what is waiting for us at the end of this path, they need to rest."
"And what if this mysterious guide light is gone by the time we wake?" Ellian snarled. He, too, felt like rest, but they'd only been up a few hours, no? Surely they could continue. However, his own limbs and tail were drooping like they'd swum all day and all night. It was insufferable to show this sort of weakness!
The guard gulped, as though about to disclose contradictory information. Ellian was familiar with the expression—it was just so rarely directed at him.
"There seems to be an answer for that. We've found another strip of a guard's uniform tied to the base of the monolith. It marks the direction we need to go, should the lights be extinguished. It is possible the guard who is tailing them isn't as loyal to the perpetrator as we'd thought. Perhaps he is aiding us to find—"
"An aid to a criminal is always a criminal," Ellian snapped, acutely aware of how his fatigue was nipping away at his temper. "Don't forget that once we've caught him!"
"R-right, sir… And the permission to rest?"
Ellian sighed inwardly. It wasn't as though they all didn't need it, and the men, themselves looked as though they'd been swimming a lot longer than the few hours it had taken them to find the abyss. It was odd, but perhaps was just part of the insidious magic that layered the dark waters. He, Prince Ellian, would be doing the whole ocean a favor once he got rid of the creatures who cast this sort of irrational hindrance.
"Five hours rest, no more!" He raised his voice to be heard by the rest of the guards, who nearly all groaned in relief—even his own. "Someone keep time, and rouse me no later than the last quarter! We don't know what sort of beasts lurk in these waters!
—Not to mention, this will give me more time to consult my more reliable source whether or not this accomplice of his isn't simply laying a trap for us," Ellian added so that only he and the first guard could hear.
He stroked the orb fondly, willing it to show him the princess—and only her. He traced her features, with one spotted finger, taking note that she seemed to be in a place not too different from the one he was in.
I'll have you soon, you slippery girl, he promised.
"Prince Ellian! Cecaelia ahead!"
Prince Ellian was swimming toward a vast underwater cliff-side, so expansive it seemed to reach out in either direction, and though he felt like he belonged there, and certainly as though his muscles had done the work to reach the place, a quick glance behind him showed him that the first—no, third tentacle monolith was nowhere in sight. There was only the tail end of the same kind of current that had brought them there earlier that day—yesterday?—and an empty sandy floor.
In short, it was not the place he'd fallen asleep. His men must have carried him, sleeping—he hoped at least in some dignified manner—to this area, but then, his men were nowhere near him, instead choosing to flank Triton's guards in an effort to keep them subtly contained, as he had ordered. Or had he?
"How many?" he heard his own voice shout back, to his relief. His instincts at least were still carrying him. Although his mind felt in a cloud, his body reacted normally, orders flying into his mouth like they usually would.
"Three, sir! Young ones. And some sort of escort," one of his men was speaking that time, providing him information in the shortest, and most efficient way possible. Something fuzzily reminded him that this guard was particularly keen, but although he'd travelled with him for…months? Years? Ellian couldn't for the life of him remember the mer-eel's name.
Just the heat of the moment, he told himself.
"Worthless," Ellian said effortlessly. "But a risk. Could warn the Depths that we're coming. Make sure they can't talk."
As one, his men drew weapons, corralling Triton's soldiers along with them into the moonlit valley. Something that sounded like mutiny in the back of his mind seemed to try to point out that the floor of the valley was covered in bones—mer-folk bones—but Ellian was too focused on the chase to give it much heed.
"Stop!"
An imposing mer-man with a gray and black mottled tail, and flared spines up his back darted in front of the terrified cecaelian children, holding up his hands in a peace motion, however; Ellian hadn't given the order to stop, and so his men wouldn't.
Before his men could take care of the little witnesses, the mer-man escorting the children seemed to realize they wouldn't listen, and like magic—like horrifying, blood-curdling, tail-singing magic—clenched his fist around a black spear that Ellian was sure hadn't been there before, and raised it level with his men. A spider-web of crackling violet lightning snapped from the tip. The horrid stuff avoided the children, but seemed to grab at each and every one of his and Triton's men. It wasn't enough to harm them, it seemed, but the sight and feeling of it certainly made them pause.
"Now, I'm sure we could have some words, Prince Ellian," the escort said calmly. "Surely you haven't forgotten who I am."
Now that he mentioned it, the escort did look familiar, and Ellian recalled his ugly face from the introduction dinner.
"Yes…" Ellian said, studying the creature. "Ah, the ambassador, no? Ambassador Deepwater? Dogfish?"
"Djeval," the ambassador said in that calm, unruffled tone. Ellian hated that tone on principle. It wasn't the tone of deep respect, or admiration, or even enthusiasm that was normally directed at him. It was the tone that only his father dared to use—the sort he reserved specifically when he'd done something he deemed naughty, or out-of-protocol.
"Ambassador…Djeval," Ellian said cooly, trying to radiate the same sort of paternal condescendance he'd seen in his own home, and failing miserably. "I was under the impression you were still at the palace."
"Ah, that." Djeval waved a hand dismissively. "I had been introduced to my princess, as requested, and so no further reason to stay—particularly after I was informed that some of my own denizens faced certain threats during the Archeteuthid season."
"Your denizens." Ellian narrowed his eyes over the cowering cecaelia behind him. "Then these aren't papered citizens of Atlantis."
"Mine," said Djeval, with such feral authority Ellian found himself swimming back a few feet before he could get his fins under control. Ellian's head registered that though Djeval kept a civil tongue, he hadn't yet chosen to lower his spear.
"As I said," Ellian acknowledged weakly. "Yours. Well, then, ambassador, on your way back to the city? Perhaps we can offer you…protection on your way back?"
Then he saw it, the slightest curl of Djeval's lips, as though he, like Ezra, had the uncanny, unnerving ability to tell when he was lying.
"I think not, prince. We would certainly slow you down. Children are not accustomed to traveling as fast as your pack." He said the word with enough venom that if he'd been swimming closer, Ellian might have caught gill-rot just from the bubbles issuing from Djeval's mouth. "Afterall, they've seen enough for one day, I think. We plan on resting once we're out of the valley. Look around you, little prince. Wouldn't you say this place…isn't safe?"
Ellian opened his mouth to argue, and would have, had he not seen the massive corpse that Djeval was now indicating with his spear.
"Dear Poseidon," he said under his breath. What he had assumed was an abnormally large bulge in the valley's floor, was in fact the largest architeuthis he'd ever seen. He hadn't know that giant squid could ever get that big. It was the stuff of nightmares. It was utterly gorgeous. He would have given anything to have hunted something like that, and here was Djeval, having killed the thing…alone? He swallowed. Perhaps he had not given Djeval the credit he deserved. The men beside him seemed to be realizing the same thing.
Ellian cleared his throat quickly, hearing the telltale signs that he was losing his authority in the men's rumbles.
"As we don't have time to hunt this sort of thing, if it has a mate lurking by," he said, half in disappointment, half in dread, "I don't suppose you would mind my men sharing a bit of your kill? It would be a shame to let so much meat go to waste."
That certainly perked up his men. Even moreso, when Djeval raised a hand in what he took to mean apathetic permission.
"Have at the thing," he said. "We have already taken what we will. Then, if you would allow us to continue our journey…"
"Of course!" Ellian said, waving his own men forward, who of course, in their hunger, forgot all about hunting a few young cecaelia.
After the men had cut several large, neat slabs of calamari from the beast, he led them as swiftly as possible out of the valley, and allowed them a camp as soon as the next opportunity allowed. Ambassador Djeval said nothing more as they swam away, only following them with a protective stance over the cecaelian children.
It was certainly puzzling why a man of his rank would be assisting that sort of little miscreant, Ellian thought. But, not a puzzle worth devoting his valuable time to.
After making camp at the base of one of those infernal tentacle-statues, his men seemed to forget all about the altercation and even their tiredness over many good bites of meat. It had been a close call. Had he not had such a very good distraction for them, Ellian was sure his hunt would have lost its steam, and Triton's brutes might have turned on him and his own. The path to the Depths was longer than he'd expected. Although he was sure this was only the third they'd passed, by the count of his men—all of his men—it was the seventh. It was certainly odd, as well, that Djeval had managed to get so far ahead of them if he was traveling so slowly. The man must have left right after the dinner. Odd, indeed.
Impatiently, he couldn't help but wonder how many more of these tentacle-statues were left on their path. He also wanted to see his princess. The occasional reminder of why he was suffering this humiliation and discomfort was good for the mind. So, while the men were else-wise occupied, Ellian found himself slipping away from the dim light of camp, cast by yet another of those eerie, pulsing guide-beams, and finding solace in the shadows away from the noise.
"Show me the way to the princess!" he ordered, feeling a relaxing dull hum slip over his mind as the images of her before a gaping gate to a city came into view. Ellian found that he didn't much care about the city itself, instead contenting himself to see that his princess seemed to have regained her senses, and was ordering her captor about on the wall, telling him to arrange himself in odd shapes along it for her amusement.
He heard himself chuckling at the amusement of it all, until something in his fuzzy head told him that the chuckle wasn't actually coming from him.
"Oh, she did a number on you, little prince. Artifacts of that caliber should have a warning label…Set of instructions, maybe." A lazy, languid voice echoed around the shadows all about, and Ellian couldn't see anyone, or anything in the darkness, until the creature was already on him.
Far too close, a pair of massive glowing eyes opened, momentarily blinding him. Just below those eyes, grinned a jaw with far too many teeth, set in a face of such inky blackness, Ellian might have thought it was the abyss itself he was speaking with if his father hadn't given him forewarning such a thing could exist.
"A devil?" Ellian scoffed at it, closing his hand over the orb in case its design was to take it. He could, afterall, always swim back to, or call for hsi men. Even a creature of this size surely wouldn't be a problem for so many. "Afraid my soul is already promised."
The devil seemed to grin impossibly wider. "Oh, I wouldn't dream of taking a soul so full of holes."
"I have no patience for riddles," said Ellian petulantly, earning him a laugh from the creature, which had taken to swimming a lazy pace around his position.
"No indeed," it said, amused. "I could have told you that. Couldn't have made it here without help—oh, so much help. She's getting more pieces of you by the hour. But look at you. Do you even remember the price for opening all those windows? Buying all those passwords?"
"I don't know what you're talking about," Ellian snapped, moving to head back to his men. Before he could make it even an inch, the devil seemed to have read his intention. With a flick of his enormous shadowy tail, which Ellian didn't even see until it had hit his body, flipped him back to face the devil eye-to-eye.
"Indeed you don't. Not anymore, at least. Here's the thing, little prince. You don't choose which memories you lose, and the more holes you poke in the mind, the faster they flow," said the devil. "You don't think you guided your men here by yourself, do you? That those beams of light guiding you all along the way, they just appeared? And how about that meat your men are eating? Killed the beast alone, did you?"
"Of course I did!" Ellian said angrily. "Who else would have?"
Then the devil laughed. A cold, chilling laugh that Ellian couldn't believe his men couldn't hear. "Worse than even I read, then. You don't know what you've lost."
Ellian could feel a throb in the veins above his eyes, and in his tail. He was sorely regretting having left his harpoon behind. Just one good jab at this devil's eyes would be enough to blind him forever—and then he couldn't follow him, or see these unnatural things he shouldn't be able to see.
"And what have I lost, Devil?" he asked, trying to distinguish between the devil's fins, and the shadows around them, searching for an opening to escape.
"Do you remember the friendships you shared with your men for so long? The creatures you've seen so far on your journey? The powerful enemy you seem to have made?"
Ellian raged, his voice rising to a shout. "What? Friendship with my men? My peons? I would never bend so far over as to be friends with them. They obey me, and that is no friendship!"
"She really has taken more than she should…naughty thing."
"Who's she?" Ellian said, at last taking the bait.
"An old acquaintance of mine. Echidna."
"And who is this Echidna?" Ellian demanded, trying to swim back to his men, and finding that the devil was pushing him further and further away from camp. Bile rose in his throat as the helplessness of his situation was beginning to dawn. He clutched his hand over the orb, the only tool he had with him.
"What does it matter? You wouldn't recall it even if I told you. Although she will certainly be pleased with you. Not only have you given her quite the snack, you've managed to take a good amount of Atlantis' defence force out of the city with you in the process. How clever."
Ellian let out a strangled scream of frustration, trying once more, and then again to swim past the devil, who playfully tossed him back all over again.
"What do you want from me?" he yelled at last, panting.
"Oh, nothing from you, little prince. You're quickly running out of things to give, but I'll give you a little prophecy for free. Take it for what it's worth." The devil turned a lazy loop over his head, eyes-over-teeth. Ellian found himself dizzy enough to fall, hands and tail to the sand. His head had the faintest bit of clarity, and he snatched at it, trying to keep hold of it before the fuzz could set back in. "You keep on your path swimming into Echidna's claws, little prince, and you'll pull many an octopus to his death as you please. But boy, if you can manage to hold onto the thought then try to remember: those tentacles will come back for you in short order."
Something hard in the silt brushed Ellian's fingers, and he grabbed up the piece of driftwood so fast he could barely register what it was. He stabbed hard at the devil, aiming for one horrible, glowing eye.
His makeshift weapon, and his hand, only passed through shadowy water, as the image of the devil melted away.
The devil's toothy chuckling continued to echo around Ellian's spinning head.
"Fate is coming for you, little prince. In short order, that which you bind will bind you in turn."
Then, even his shadow faded into nothing, leaving only the cold, dead water rushing into Ellian's mouth and gills.
As soon as his head cleared, Ellian shoved himself up, and swam for all his tail was worth back to the camp, and found himself more than twice as far away from it as he'd thought. If he hadn't had his history of hunting in the ocean to guide his sense of direction, there was a good chance he might have been lost in the eerie, open waters.
When the camp came back into view, he stayed warily in the light as he glared down at the orb.
The devil had been trying to thwart his hunt. How dare he! And for what purpose? The righteous indignation threatened to swallow him whole, and he found himself doing what he had so many times in the past days when the stress seemed ready to drown him.
"Show me the princess!"
Perhaps Princess Ariel had not come to her senses as much as he'd hoped. Princess Ariel was swimming down a sleepy street, appearing to have already entered the Kingdom of the Depths. Despite the lull of morning, the princess was calm, watching the shoals and cecaelian traitors swim by, but if that didn't irritate him, then what happened next fanned the ember of his discontent into a boiling rage.
The cecaelian apprentice once more overstepped his bounds, putting his hands on his princess, and pulling her into a shadowy corner of an alley while Triton's guard simply left them! Ellian was busy placating himself with promises of personally executing the little traitor, when the in the orb's surface, the apprentice pulled himself closer to the princess, and although the vision was unclear, seemed to kiss Ariel's face. Then, the image faded out, and would not return, but Ellian had seen enough.
He was going to just kill the cecaelian and have done with it, but now, he swore he would make him suffer. Creatively. That, at least, he remembered how to do.
A/N: Thanks for reading! What did you think of this chapter? More Ariel and Joe coming in the next. Probably tomorrow if Fate doesn't intervene.