When Ariel awoke, Adin was gone, and while that would usually have set off alarm bells in her head, Joe assured her that he had been adamant about scouting the city. Ariel didn't see how that would be helpful, but Joe was annoyed enough about the subject that she let it drop. Evidently, he'd vanished very early in the day, and not wanting to leave her alone tied to a bed in a disreputable inn, Joe had been forced to stay instead of hunting the city himself for a suitable potion master.
The moment she was awake, and had assured him through nods and gestures that she was indeed herself again, Joe removed the knots holding her to the spring-infested mattress faster than a cichlid with a chip on its shoulder. With a series of metal groans—and a few of her own—as the springs uncoiled from her rising weight, she let Joe help her off the wretched thing. If things went well, perhaps she'd never see it again.
"Last night?" she asked breathlessly, when her gag was removed.
"You didn't do or say anything too dreadful. Or if you meant: is it our last night to rid you of this curse, then the answer is also 'yes.'"
"Well that's at least…something," Ariel breathed. Joe was restless, and she didn't blame him.
Scarfing down the somewhat questionable biscuits Mrs. Cod had left for them, they began maneuvering their way down the winding hallways and rickety stair-wells that seemed designed for creatures with at least six legs. The corridors were a lot more crowded as the evening came around than they'd been that morning, and Ariel was beginning to see why Joe wasn't willing to just leave and lock their room door.
There were goblin sharks, fringeheads, and hagfish meandering down the hallway in the opposite direction, some of them carrying unmarked parcels that they hugged tighter to their fins as she curiously watched them go by. Ariel cringed when an enormous sea-spider made its way right over their heads. Shouts, scuffling, and odd banging noises muffled through the closed doors they passed.
"Watch it," grumbled an old shark she bumped into, trying to avoid the spider's legs.
"Sorry," she said quickly, but her apology only made it look at her more strangely.
"Come on, Ariel."
Ariel was relieved when Joe pulled her into him and moved them down the final stairway. The other guests seemed to part almost magically under his glare, although she herself still had to hang onto him to not get left behind.
When they reached the reception desk, an irritated tilapia, more gill-rot than tail, was arguing with Cod. Both were blocking the exit.
"I don't care what's going on in whatever cosa nostra you've gotten your fins tangled up in," Cod was saying. "You're a month behind on payment. Cough up or get out."
"What, you plan on making me?" the tilapia snapped. "Get outta the way. You want payment, I gotta earn it."
"End of the day. Pay by then or you're out on your gills."
"You gonna let kingy's watch in to evict me? That's ripe. Do that, and half your other fishies will never come back. Not to mention you never know what they'll do when they see your…collections." The tilapia cast a moldering eye over the dubious decor in the entry. Ariel had to admit the number of skulls, beads, and bottles of unidentifiable substances made the place look suspicious.
"By tonight," Cod grumped, at last letting the guest exit. At last he noticed them waiting—and good for him, too. With the twitchiness in his tentacles, Ariel wouldn't have been surprised if Joe had been considering tossing the pair of them out of the way. "Well my my, if it isn't the guests who actually pay up front. Suppose you need out, too?"
"At last," Joe grumbled under his breath, pulling Ariel toward the door.
"Actually," Ariel tugged him back. "We could do with a recommendation."
"I don't recommend other inns on principle," Cod shook his head as though he were trying to shake her words back out of his ears, and swam back behind the reception counter to scowl at them. "And don't even get me started on whatever potency potions you're looking for. As far as I'm concerned, I want my rooms to stay in as good a condition as I bought 'em, and more's the better if my guests actually decide to sleep for once in a blue moon. All that racket's enough to—"
"No," Ariel held up her hands for him to stop once the shock wore off on her tongue enough to speak. She didn't dare look at Joe. "No, no, no, that's not what I meant. I mean, we do need a potioneer recommendation, but not the kind that—that—"
Joe cleared his throat softly, and put his hand on her shoulder. "Let me, Ariel."
Mr. Cod fiddled with the bell on his counter, eying them suspiciously—particularly Joe, who in his current mood probably looked pretty imposing. "No need, no need. If you need a potion-maker, there's sea-witches aplenty up by Rooks and Row. For home-life you'll want old Bubbles for Water Purifiers, Temperature-control, and Pressurizers. Anything for the daily needs such as Camouflage potions, Memory-Eraser, and Sleep-Aids, are at Boots-and-Anchor. Liquid Chains, and Silencing Tonics—which I cannot recommend enough, by the way—you'll head for Nautical Novelties at the end of the row."
"I'm afraid we're not looking for anything that simple," Joe said when the old Cod had finished.
Ariel didn't think that any of those things sounded simple, feeling her fins curl up beneath her, the blue on their tips creeping up an inch or two.
Just how complicated was her problem?
"We're looking for a specialty brewer with a background in curses, and light-studies. If he knows a thing or two about mage-craft, that would be extremely helpful as well. He will also have to be the sort who gets enough business that his shelves are already stocked with ingredients. We're on a time-limit."
The cod stared at Joe as though he'd just given him a eulogic serenade.
"Hm, not often a guest practically requests Doctor Lophius by name," he mumbled under his breath.
"Beg your pardon?" said Joe.
"Doctor Lophius." Mr. Cod cleared his throat to be heard. "Nasty reputation. Used to work for the king. And a few dukes. Probably a surgeon or two."
"Sounds like he can't hold a job," Joe said warily. "Anyone else?"
The cod chuckled, dinging the bell irritatingly—probably in an attempt to get rid of them. "You won't find anyone like the good Doctor in the city, the kingdom, or any of the trenches," he assured.
"Doubtless." Joe was clearly fighting the urge to roll his eyes, but she knew he was aware that being impolite before he got his information was a bad idea. This wasn't the first mer she'd seem him interact with, but she was more glad this time than any that he was being thorough. "However; is there anyone else fitting my description? Anyone more stable?"
"Listen, octopus," Cod said, clearly unfazed by the number of tentacles before him. Poseidon knew he'd probably dealt with worse than Joe among his clientele. "You want a curse-specialist, you go to Lophius. He's not only the best, he's the only. At least, the only one who hasn't been driven out of town. We might harbor criminals here in this city, but we have standards."
"...Right," Joe intoned. "And where might we find this Lophius?"
Cod scratched his chin, rolling his eyes slowly from side to side. The sheer amount of time that took made Ariel more anxious than anything else he'd done.
"As I recall, he was sharing a place. Just off Pebbles street. Third tricot on the left after the odd-shaped rocks."
"You've been very helpful," Joe said insincerely.
"Anything for a paying customer," the Cod said, seeming relieved when he finally shooed them out the door.
Evidently, the city was home to a Pebbles Cove, Pebbles Drive, Pebbles Boulevarde, Avenue, and Circle. In fact, it seemed as though the city planners—if indeed any planning at all had gone into the city's infrastructure beyond lighting—had decided that if anyone was short on names for nearly anything, that Pebbles was the favored place-holder. After nearly an hour of swimming through what felt like half the city, Joe had taken Ariel to so many 'Pebbles' that she was becoming convinced that was all the city had.
It wasn't for want of asking directions either. Nearly everyone knew a Pebbles place to direct them to. Eventually, they simply started asking for Dr. Lophius. Ariel quickly noticed a trent. If the mer-men and maids they asked were wearing anything nice, owned their own place, or seemed remotely put-together, they had never heard of this Lophius fellow. If, however, they happened to ask a beggar, bouncer, or any of the street urchins, they all knew him, but spoke of him with so many grimaces and shudders they could hardly get a word out edgewise.
All the same, as Ariel and Joe swam down the busy streets, she couldn't help but marvel again at how much life there was down here. More Cecaelia than she'd ever seen darted about, selling freshly-made food-stuffs, buying flowers potioned to withstand the pressures, and there were even children torpedoing through the stalls playing what looked like a game of tag. With a stab of regret, Aya realized that she'd never actually seen any cecaelia children besides Krill in Atlantis, and wondered where they'd all gone—or if any were even there.
The only odd thing as they swam through the city was that, even though there were plenty of cecaelia around, everywhere they went whispers and pointing followed Joe. It wasn't the young workers who they asked for directions. Every one of the elderly fish and mer turned as he swam by as though seeing someone they thought they knew. It happened so often that Joe was starting to avoid the attention of anyone that wasn't firmly planted down.
"My good molluscs, could you direct us to Dr. Lophius. residence?" Joe stopped to ask a patch of tridacna wedged into a crevice by a particularly busy Pebbles shop."
"What's in it for us?" one asked, as the others simply clammed up.
"Your eyes get to stay in your shell," Joe said darkly, getting more irritated with every soul they asked.
"Noted," it said, clamping its shell closed tight.
Ariel sighed.
"What?" Joe said snappishly.
"Let me try next time," she said, taking his arm and pulling him away from the clams.
"Be my sodding guest," he grumped. "We're running out of time, Ariel."
"It's still barely after sunset," she tried to soothe. "Look, I swear we've been over half this city and at least we've managed to find Pebbles Street—"
"Assuming it's the right Pebbles Street. I've half a mind to go back and force that old cod to just take us there himself if he's so sure that's where he is."
"—assuming it's the right Pebbles Street, then we have to keep looking around here. Mr. Cod said it was the third tricot on the left."
"There are at least fifty tricots on this blasted street," Joe said waspishly. "And all of the rocks look weird."
"No, there are four tricots on the street," Ariel pointed. "The rest are seagrass banners. Come on. I think we're at least on the right track."
"Trust a princess to know her fabrics," Joe muttered.
"What did you call me?" she teased, poking him in the ribs in a spot where the gashes seemed to have healed over best.
Joe yelped and jumped away from her, clutching at his ribs like he'd been branded.
"Oh! Oh, I'm so sorry!"
Joe wasn't looking at her. His face was turned away pointing down the street, and he was trembling, clutching at his sides.
"Joe! Are you okay? Are you—"Pulling him to face her, she realized he was laughing. Ariel aimed a good punch at his shoulder. "Really, Joe? I thought I'd actually hurt you."
"You punch like that, and you think you hurt me?" he grinned.
"You've been grumpy all morn—evening. Ugh. Impossible to tell what time it is down here. You pick now to turn things around."
"Couldn't resist," he shrugged. "You know someday you're going to run out of finger if you keep poking me like that."
"Then I'll name the stub after you," she huffed, letting him pull her farther down the street. As they swam, the buildings were getting more sparse, changing from standing-erected shops and dwellings to sparsely-marked caves and tunnels in the rocks.
"An honor," Joe tipped her a sarcastic bow.
She did her best to hide her smile. It was terribly difficult to stay angry at Joe.
"Now, which one of these stupid flags they've got draped everywhere is a tricot?"
She squinted in the dimming lights as they swam away from the brighter bustle of the city's center. It wasn't as though the tricots weren't very much noticeable. For one, they hung white and stark along the rocky mountainside—albeit a very dingy, current-worn white.
After the third one they passed, there was a large pile of rocks the shape of a goblin shark with a sieve on its head.
"That…that is weird," she remarked as they passed it.
"Hm," said Joe. "It should be anywhere now, then. Look for a cavern. A cave. A large pile of bones. Something of that sort."
For being the supposed best in the city, Dr. Lophius' place was more than just 'discreet.' Nestled into one of the hundreds of crannies and caves, Dr. Lophius' place was nestled into a crevice with an entrance so small, even with Ariel's knack for spotting things, they swam past it three times, because it looked so vastly different than what either of them had been expecting.
At last, nestled into the shadows, a thick curtain of bone and tooth beads that perfectly matched the walls around it floated up from the ground. If anything, it was designed not to be found.
The only thing marking the entrance was a small driftwood sign that read: Lophius Residence, that looked as though it had been knocked down and renailed more than a dozen times. Joe knocked politely on the wall outside the bony curtain, but even after several minutes, there was no answer.
"Do you think…it's like with Ursula's place? You just swim in?" Ariel whispered, when the quiet corner of the chasm became too heavy for her to bear.
"We don't exactly have the time to just wait, and with Ursula's place she has feelers out that let her know when people are close. I'm not sensing anything like that here. You might have seen them, too, to be honest. If you can see magic line,s you should have seen them, too, if there were any out here." said Joewith a shrug.
"Shouldn't we have been seeing hundreds of lines in the city? There's obviously a ton of magic there," Ariel realized, confused.
"There are, but they're really faint. Probably tempered since there are so many that would bother in the city."
"Hm," she echoed him from before.
"There's nothing left to try. We can't wait," Joe concluded, examining the door once more for any indicator of the sort of 'feelers' or traps Ursula might have laid. Then, like a gentle-mer, entered the unknown first, and held the curtain aside for her to follow.
JoeA small tunnel with a woven entry-mat that read 'wipe your fins,' opened up into a sizable cave with four cauldrons on an enchanted stove in the middle—three of which were already bubbling with odd-colored sludges that Joe had never seen. One of them was filling the room with the scent of so much magic that his eyes started to water. Generally, the inside of a sea-witch's lair would have been homey to him if the curios lining the walls hadn't been so…strange.
The walls were covered in flickering luminous jellyfish, and shelves of sea-glass vials, each filled with shimmering concoctions from rare and potent ingredients. In the corner of the lair, a collection of pressurized bones and artifacts from ancient shipwrecks had been lazily dumped—evidence of this Dr. Lophius' ability to somehow get them down here.
Stacks of woven sea-weed fiber rugs lined any surface of the room that wasn't covered: walls, floor, and even some of the shelves. Joe would never leave four cauldrons unattended in Ursula's cavern, particularly when they sat so closely together, which meant that the doctor couldn't be far.
He continued to examine one shelf of sparkling liquids in colors he'd never seen brews, scratching his head. They were enchanted, but something about them was definitely odd.
"I wouldn't touch those if I were you, pretty thing," said an amused pile of rugs behind the cauldrons.
Beside him, Ariel gasped and yanked her hand back from one of the glowing jellies before she could pet the thing. Ariel was clearly as surprised as he when the rug-pile behind the cauldrons sat up.
Heaving a great yawn, the rugs fell into place as some sort of piece-meal garb as the half-angler merman wearing them sat up. The mer-angler's grinning head that emerged from the rags was full of teeth—ones that were far too long and far too many for a jaw his size. His long angler tail extended up and beyond his human waist, in a stripe of faintly glowing scales on his spine that ended in a glowing barb above his head. He was the kind of specimen that, drawn to his full height, commanded every speck of attention in the room. Now that he had drawn himself to sitting, Joe was shocked that neither he nor Ariel had noticed him at once.
"Are those more of those guests you keep bringing into my home? You put that sign back up, didn't you, Loph!" an accusatory old voice echoed into the room.
Joe caught sight of a grumpy old angler fish swimming across the hallway where they'd entered, before she disappeared into a back portion of the winding cave.
"Keep talkin' momma! You grew up in a time when property was all but free!" the disheveled angler-mer called back, running a hand over his head in another yawn.
Though she was out of sight, the old fish heard him plenty clearly. "You calling me old? I could turn you out into the trenches to live off the snow!"
"Have some tea, Momma!" the mer-angler retorted, before adding under his breath" "Mothers these days… But where are my manners? Allow me to introduce myself," he said, more lucidly than his manner of dress would suggest him capable. "My name is Doctor Lophius, Sea-witch of the Highest Order…or at least I used to be, but that's a story for another time. My pets didn't sting you, did they ma cherie?"
He extended a gentlemanly hand to Ariel, who to Joe's horror accepted it, and let him turn her fingers between his.
"No sting-marks here, although…An interesting set of lines you have here, cherie. Royalty, very keen, magical sight? How interesting…You my dear, are the princess they've been looking for, if I'm not unduly mistaken. ."
Lophius tipped an annoying wink at Joe, holding Ariel's hand just a moment too long for his liking. Joe felt a familiar pang of something in one of his hearts when she blushed under Lophius' scrutiny. Seeing the anxious twitch in Ariel's tail, Joe reached out and reclaimed her hand, and kept it in his.
"I'm immune to stings," Ariel stammered, twitching even more than before.
Whether she was aware of it or not, Ariel's fingers tightened around his own.
"Oh, I'm sure you're immune to some stings, Princess," said Lophius, his toothy grin getting wider by the second as he raked his eyes over the two of them. "But the fact that you've got that rather nasty curse on your fins proves that you're not immune all the way down—am I wrong?"
Ariel put a hand over her heart protectively.
"How did you know who I am?"
"I've got a bead on all of the 'current' events, if you catch my drift," Lophius chuckled, continuing to rake his bulging eyes over Ariel's middle. "But, my my! I must say, this little curse is quite the work of art! So many layers."
Lophius got up from his seat, and swam around the two of them, admiring Ariel from every angle. The sound of his teeth click-clacking together as he examined her made Joe's hair stand on end.
"Sun and moon active, astrologically timed, oh, so specific. Why, I haven't seen a magical signature like this since Queen Incirratta herself….but of course, her descendants were all killed off in the war, don't you know…or so we all thought." After another turn about Aya's head, Lophius swished back to his perch behind the cauldrons, and heaved a sigh. "Well, since you're not foaming at the gills just yet, I'll assume you really weren't stung. One less complicated thing to happen to you ma douce. That particular brand of jelly you nearly had a brush with is very friendly, unfortunately."
"Unfortunately?"
"Very friendly," Lophius pointed at one of the jellies, who under closer scrutiny was bonking around a small square of water as though imprisoned by an invisible box, and was still trying to swim toward her. "Lovely species. Light up the place, no?"
Joe cringed, suddenly aware exactly how many of the jellies were in the room.
"You didn't want to just use a simple lighting potion? Or algae?" he questioned stiffly, subtly using one of his tentacles to maneuver Ariel away from one that was posted just above their heads.
"They secrete a crucial ingredient for regeneration spells—anyone who's ever lost a tentacle knows that." There, Lophius gave Joe a disturbingly knowing grin. "The problem is it's usually verrry expensive. Hey, voila! These lovelies work faster than finding actual mandrake plants underwater. The only problem is, the creatures themselves are terribly venomous…found that out the hard way, I'm afraid—poor unfortunate soul that touched them last!"
The way Lophius laughed made Joe question whether the 'soul' in question had lived.
"Jellies that secrete mandrake juice? Those can't exist," he said flatly.
"Well, they couldn't until last week," said Lophius, giving the jelly near his head a prod.
"Oh!" Aya put a hand over her mouth. "That's extremely illegal. Blending species?"
"And clever…" Joe mumbled, examining the invisible boxes. "If they're real."
"Well, I didn't get my practitioner's license revoked for nothing," Lophius winked as though having one's license revoked was in fact, more impressive than the license itself.
Joe had to admit the blending methods he could see in the jellies' magical lines had been very skillfully-woven.
"Seems I'm among a cecaelia with taste." Lophius' hypnotic eyes widened when he at last fully took in Joe "You, young man are a whole 'nother basket of interesting. But I suppose that's a basket for another time. You're working on quite the deadline. So, what can the doctor do for this…lovely young couple?"
"How do we know we can trust your work?" Joe demanded.
Lophius might have exceptional magical perception, but something still didn't sit right with him about the artifacts on his shelves. "If you're the talent your reputation says you are, how did you get…here?"
Lophius smirked at him. "Well you see my dear mother back there is an angler, and my father was a very stupid fisherman."
Joe glowered.
The doctor huffed, rolling his tail over a stack of rugs and reaching over to stir a cauldron that had begun to bubble threateningly.
"Young man down here, there's a magic that nobody can crack down well enough, and that is real estate. One must adapt as a matter of course, but you'd know all about that, wouldn't you?" He gave Joe another of those unnerving, toothy grins.
"Then the potions you have here—?" Joe began.
"Fake," said Lophius, with a charismatic shrug. "But I didn't need to tell you that, now did I?"
Aya made a small sound of concern, and Kai gave her hand what he hoped was a comforting squeeze as he glared down Lophius.
"Oh, don't give me those looks." Lophius rolled his voluminous eyes. He gave the ladle sticking out of the nearest pot a lazy stir, and a stern tut when it made a territorial fizzing sound. "You try running a magic shop in a city where eeeveryone knows a bit of magic. Suddenly everyone's a critic. People don't believe you have enough magic in these parts if you don't put a little song and dance in it."
Ariel took her hand and replaced it on his shoulder. "You said you can see my curse. Does that mean you can fix it?"
"Well, the easiest back door to curses is always true love's kiss?" he waggled his glowing lure at them like one might use eyebrows.
Ariel made a small strangled sound that only Joe could hear. He tried to ignore the strain it wracked on his pulse.
Lophius let that little gem hang in the water between them and swam over to one of his cabinets for empty vials. Joe and Ariel shared a look of mutual discomfort, though there was something akin to nervousness, or disappointment in Ariel's expression that Joe couldn't quite read.
"That's completely unproven," said Joe through gritted teeth as Lophius sailed back to his perch behind the cauldrons.
"Oh, I've never put much stock in it either," Lophius assured, with a jaunty wave of his ladle. "I mean, one only needs to look at my mother to know it's a lost cause, and apparently, completely unnecessary."
"I can hear you, you son of a two-legged bass!" shrieked his mother from the other hallway.
Lophius heaved a dramatic sigh aimed at the back room. "Mother's a lovely, dulcet creature, yet no one but that mad fishermen has ever sparkled an eye at her. Shame, really. Waste of perfectly moisturized scales."
"I can see the family resemblance," Joe muttered so that only Ariel could hear, and her silent giggles reassured him that she at least wasn't too nervous to pay attention. "The curse?" he prompted, a little louder.
"Oh, don't you worry my clever young mage. I can break it all right, and since you both can see a little more than my average customer, I'm gonna let you peer behind the curtain. Explain to you how the sea cucumbers are sliced, if you will."
He motioned for Aya to swim closer, and with two of his long, spindly claws, reached out and plucked one of her black hairs and let it float down into the last empty cauldron.
"Success guaranteed, cross my hearts!"
Dr. Lophius made a slashing motion across his chest, and then across a place just below one bony hip. Then, he produced a locked chest from behind a sea-grass tapestry of a much younger angler than his mother on the back wall. From it, he pulled a book clearly labeled 'forbidden' in bad handwriting, and pried open its water-eaten cover.
"Delicious!" he cried with a look that with his huge eyes made him look crazed after a few minutes' reading. "As I thought… This looked like one of Ursula's originals, but it certainly wasn't her signature. Such a manipulative little thing she used to be. I love it! Oh, how many years since I've had a puzzle so complicated."
Joe knew an up-sale when he heard one.
Even if Lophius looked genuinely excited, a cure complicated enough that Joe and Ursula both didn't know how to brew it—plus a little something extra to get around the moon-potency ingredients he'd added—was custom work, and custom work was expensive.
"The price?" Joe asked, bracing himself for the answer.
He knew what Ursula would charge for work like this, and if Lophius asked for less than his blood, or one of his tentacles, he'd be shocked. Lophius might fairly demand a piece of his soul, considering the time-limit in place.
"I've brought enough jewels to cover the cost, Joe," Ariel added in, producing the pouch she'd brought from her room. Even if she'd used some of her jewelry to pay the inn-keeper, the pouch was still bulging. "You've already gone to enough trouble for me."
Joe shook his head sharply. The thought of using Ariel's treasures, or anything really that came from Triton, rankled. "Ariel, I could have prevented all this trouble. The tab here is mine."
Already heating the enchanted bubbler beneath the cauldron with Ariel's hair, Lophius' bulbous eyes gave Joe a piercing stare over one of his too-wide grins. "From the looks of you, you're probably used to giving up your fair share for a contract, but I have more cecaelian bobs and ends than I'll ever use. As for jewels?" He managed to show a few more teeth. "Not my style, lovely thing."
Ariel's face fell. "Then what—"
"For heavy hoodoo like you have on you, ma belle, there's very little that is certain. So, I'll make you both a little deal. Something's telling me that you two are going to accomplish very interesting things very soon. I'm going to get you right as sea-snow. When you two get back on top, you just remember your friend down here at the bottom. Nothing you can give me now, it seems, but I'll take some credit. Owe me a favor."
"Ask them to get your sorry tail out of my living room!" Lophius' mother cried unhelpfully from the back, earning nothing but an eye-roll from her son.
"—And of course I wouldn't mind a bit of new real-estate," Lophius sighed. "Are we agreed?"
Joe hated the idea of an open-ended contract, particularly with a mad thing like Lophius; however, it wasn't as if he had anything but his own parts to bargain with, and if Lophius wouldn't accept Ariel's jewels…
"Deal."
Joe reached out a hand. Lophius' palm glowed a sickly yellow as he took it, and the magical lines bound their fingers with one brief shake.
Lophius raised his ladle over his last empty cauldron.
"As they say, Carp Diem! Oh, I'd swim back a bit now, lovely." He motioned to Ariel.
A sound like miniature drums and the rattle of bones filled the waters, and just in time, Joe's tentacles seized Ariel round the middle, and pulled her back from the massive flash of boiling water that shot from the cauldron when Lophius added the first of the ingredients.
"Oh, yes!" Lophius cackled. "She does have some magic in her, the little slink!"
He began to hum a jovial tune as he chanted over the ingredients, and despite Lophius only having two arms, Kai couldn't help but marvel at his speed.
"Something old, something new, something borrowed…" Lophius tossed the required ingredients into the last empty cauldron with the kind of abandon one might have toward an ex-lover.
There was moonstone—presumably to counteract his own eclipse-proof spell—lionfish-heart blood, and fresh sea-grass, but he also added a vial of sludge that looked so old it might have belonged to Poseidon himself, a button from his own shirtfront, and an entire beaded necklace that probably belonged to his mother.
The scent of ancient magic and heat blasts overwhelmed his senses, and he could only imagine what they were doing to Ariel, who, he realized, was clinging to his chest as the bubbles and chanting rose higher. Despite her discomfort, however, Ariel's curious eyes stayed trained on the process, and Joe knew this was likely her first time witnessing magic being created.
Watching her wonder now made him remember the first times he'd seen Ursula work, and how he'd naively begged her to teach him. The water crackled with energy as the doctor commanded flames that didn't burn within the cauldron. The colors in the room were more vibrant; ordinary objects in the room came alive in the light, and the gentle excitement from the princess brought Joe back to a time when the world was filled with limitless possibilities.
It had been so long, but in the moments of watching the magic—of watching her, he remembered that glimpse into the realm of the mysterious and unknown, and that feeling of being on the cusp of discovering a secret hidden from the world.
Back then, her magic was nothing short of beautiful to him, and the things it did for the mer who came to her were even more so. Ursula had taught him how to purify patches of dirty water that always seemed to accumulate over the packed city buildings. Then, he learned little tricks like pest-repellent, barnacle cleaning, and how to make food last a little longer when the winter currents shifted each year. Everything from itchy scales to helping hatchlings sleep, she'd eventually allowed him to make for the mer who visited—until the later years. Until, that is, Krill had come to stay with them.
When Ursula had brought Krill home, he'd been too young to tell him what had happened to his family, and Ursula had been far too angry to. She had taken to muttering about a newfound interest in the throne, which the Joe of then hadn't understood. Eventually, her claims had gotten wilder, saying that she was a descendant of Incirratta herself, and that Titus' trident belonged to her by right. Before then, she had never been so angry with his rule.
It was then that her spells had changed as well. Though they would still get a stream of customers for Joe's small-pence work, Ursula would occasionally get a visitor just for her—but only when they were truly desperate. She stopped taking money, demanding instead things like a mer's voice, their faces, or any parts that made them not a pure-blood fish. Year by year, Ursula had grown more demanding of him and Joe, less like herself, and more dangerous to the mer who visited her.
Now, however, the lively tune, the masterful presentation as Lophius tossed ingredients into the cauldron with the flair of a bartender, the feel of the room was an entirely different, homespun version of the magic that Ursula claimed was all-important. This magic felt happy, and alive. It was almost enough to make him forget how Krill needed him, almost enough to wipe away the regret of his lack of attention in how he'd dealt with Ariel's would-be suitor, and it was certainly enough to remind him of the real place he had once held in Atlantis. It reminded him of how badly he missed having a home. At last, it made him realize that the only place he ever really feel peace was next to Ariel, and it had been that way for quite some time.
As the thought traced itself across his mind, Joe felt something crucial in himself shift, as though a tumbler that had long jammed in his head was finally falling into place.
Oh no… he couldn't help but think. The thought couldn't be ignored, and it couldn't be lied away. It also complicated things beyond his control.
In a way both Ariel and his own fate had been determined before they were born. He would have to move away from Atlantis regardless of her choice. He did have Krill to take care of, and needed to get him out of Atlantis before any more close calls happened. Both of their freedoms were restricted, and yet in some ways he had more than she. He could choose to leave. Even Ariel's temporary leaving came with a great risk. Triton would eventually find her. His feelings ultimately didn't matter. Ariel had ties and responsibilities that she wouldn't be able to sever on her own, and the likelihood of her asking for help to do so, of making the allies she would need to do so, was about a slim a chance as him suddenly sprouting legs.
"And finally, something blue…" Lophius paused his work over the cauldron. Watching him brew, Joe realized he'd gotten lost in thought long enough for Lophius to finish his work. Fortunately, the process had been dazzling enough that the likelihood of Ariel noticing his change of mood was low. "Princess, if you will? I'm afraid you'll have to give something up, but I can promise you, you're ready."
Joe was reluctant to let her go, thoroughly expecting the peace he'd managed to enjoy to shatter when she let go of him; however, it didn't.
Ready to intervene should Lophius try anything, Joe tracked Ariel as she sat on the stool Lophius offered, where she held up her tail fin for him to examine. Joe couldn't hold back a surprised noise in the back of his throat when Lophius summoned a magical bubble, and collected the last of the blue coloring from them. Ariel's tail was now a full, shimmering crimson, and though he couldn't tell whether it was the flow from the cauldron or the heat from the enchanted flames, Joe's face felt suddenly too warm, and the room too cramped.
She's a princess, he reminded himself bitterly. Nothing will ever—could ever…
"Oh, you'd be surprised what fate can throw your way, young mage," Lophius said suddenly, and attention snapping back to the doctor, Joe wondered just how long he'd been quiet, and just how long Lophius had been staring at him. He was almost sure he hadn't said anything aloud.
"Not to worry, not to worry," Lophius chuckled. "Now…"
And with that, he dropped the bubble into the cauldron, and the blue flash that filled the room sent Ariel scuttling back to Joe's side. Joe covered Ariel's eyes with a hand, and his own with another as the bubbles grew brighter.
When the room was at last tolerable to look at, Joe found Lophius ladling the tiniest bit of liquid from the bottom of the cauldron into a slim sea-glass vial.
"That's all?" Joe asked, hardly believing his eyes. He had never seen such a small bit of potion left after so many ingredients.
Lophius tutted at him, and muttered something that sounded an awful lot like 'young mage.'
"Magic does have a way of condensing some brews, and this one is…special," he said as he capped the vial with a tight-fitting sponge. "Now of course, before you accept this, you'll need to know that accepting a potion from me is magically binding. You will keep your word."
"If you had any doubt I would, you wouldn't have brewed it," Joe pointed out.
Lophius shrugged, waving the bottle. "Full disclaimer," he said, placing the little vial in Ariel's hand.
"How does it work?" she asked.
"I'm so glad you ask, little belle, because this potion does have a few small provisos. I'm sure your…friend here won't be surprised considering his personal touches in your curse."
Joe stayed quiet, wondering how exactly Lophius knew it was him who'd brewed Ariel's curse, but didn't argue.
"You'll need to drink this potion under full moonlight, and you're in luck. There should be just enough of that tonight—plenty of time to break the curse before effects settle in deeper. However; the only place in this kingdom you'll have access to natural light is at the top of the Dutchman's Observatory, and you'll have to catch it at low moon. Should be a ten minute window of the stuff. Plenty of time."
"And this observatory would be…" Joe led.
"The highest point in the kingdom. You'll have about an hour until the moon even comes into view. Go through the old lava tubes by the Cozy Cod. Should get there with time to spare."
"Fortunate we know exactly where that is," Joe muttered.
Lopius took Ariel's hand once more, and placed the sealed vial in her palm, curling her fingers around it carefully.
"That's still a while away, would it break the curse to just drink it as-is?" Ariel asked hopefully.
"'Fraid thanks to the unique nature of the curse, without the moonlight to seal the deal before the eclipse, my brew will be thoroughly useless—well, not useless. The cure would lose all of its potency once the eclipse passes. Everything would come right back on your head, lovely one. But, an hour's swim shouldn't be a problem for either of you, should it?"
Slowly, Joe shook his head, looking from Ariel to Lophius. He almost couldn't believe his eyes. They'd made it. Ariel was holding her cure. While it hadn't exactly been easy, he'd expected it to be more, well, impossible.
"Well then, we'd best get going," he said at last.
"And don't come back!" shrieked Lophius' mother.
Lophius gave Joe a final toothy grin. "Once you're back on top, don't forget your friend from the bottom. If you succeed, and I suspect you will, looking at you, young mage, you'll have a whole lot to offer more than just me."