She swam off, unheard, unseen.
This time she would be prepared. She took a bag, the kind artists used to carry their tools, and packed the few things she thought she would need. Carefully kept clothing, rescued from a trunk sunk when its ship capsized. Waterlogged but not worn. It had been so long since she had been up on land that it took a while before she remembered how to put together a complete outfit. Dress and apron and underskirt…The number of layers of clothing humans wore was insane. Would anyone even notice if she forgot an undershirt or underpants?
Also she had to remember to bring money—every kind of coin, just in case. Last time Eric had paid for everything. This time, should need arise, she would have to provide it for herself.
Then Ariel settled herself into the vanity and shooed away the decorator crabs, a little impatient with their crowding presence and constant need to help. She could remove the crown herself, and would not be taking off the golden conch. She shrugged out of the heavy mantle that hung heavily from her shoulders and gave her an older, more regal appearance. It was immediately whisked away by two mackerel who would clean it and hang it properly on a reef to stay wrinkle-and anemone-free.
She pursed her lips and blew on her golden shell—low, not enough to arouse alarm. Flounder came swimming out of the depths, where he had been waiting, giving her some privacy.
She flowed her hand across her body, like a tide: It’s time.
Flounder nodded and swam next to her. Together they rose.
They moved almost as one unit, his body bending back and forth in the middle, her tail pumping up and down in almost precisely the same rhythm. After a few minutes he ventured:
“It’s just like old times, isn’t it?”
Ariel turned and gave him a smile: so rare, these days. She had been thinking the exact same thing.
When her head broke the surface this time it was less revelatory but still exhilarating. The little gull was almost exactly where they had left her.
Ariel realized she didn’t have a sign for gull.
“Great,” the bird said. “I was really hoping you would come back.”
Ariel blinked. What a weird, banal thing to say.
“Yes, well, and here we are,” Flounder said, a little flippantly. “And by the way—this is a secret mission. No one should know about how the queen is leaving her kingdom to pursue matters on land…especially matters involving her father. Especially with the sea witch Ursula involved.”
Jona stared at him.
“Kingdom? Or queendom?”
“What?” Flounder asked, exasperated.
“The mer are ruled by a queen. Shouldn’t it be queendom?”
“No, that’s—well, I guess so. Maybe. Does it matter?”
“It does if you’re the queen,” the bird pointed out.
Ariel had to hide her smile; she would have laughed, if she had the voice for it.
“I will fly ahead and find Great-Grandfather,” the gull said, correctly guessing that her new friends were losing patience, “so we can prepare a diversion for the few guards left at the shore. We should arrange a signal so I know when you’re ready to emerge onto dry land.”
Flounder watched Ariel’s signs carefully and then translated. “A fleet of no fewer than…thirty-seven flying fish will arc out of the water at the same time, heading west.”
“All right, I will look for thirty-seven of the silver, flying, hard-to-catch, rather bony, but oh! very tasty fish, flying to the sunset.”
“What’s that in gull?” Flounder asked, translating Ariel’s curiosity.
The bird squawked once, loudly.
It sounded like every other squawk.
Then she took off into the high air without another question or sound.
Ariel jerked her head and she and Flounder dove back under the water. They kept fairly close to the surface, skimming just below it.
She could sense the approach of land—taste when the waters changed, feel when currents turned cool or warm—but it didn’t hurt to keep an eye on the shore now and then, and an ear out for boats. The slap of oars could be heard for leagues. Her father had told tales about armored seafarers in days long past, whose trireme ships had three banks of rowers to ply the waters—you could hear them clear down to Atlantica, he’d say. Any louder and they would disrupt the songs of the half-people—the dolphins and whales who used their voices to navigate the waters.
Even before her father had enacted the ban on going to the surface, it was rare that a boat would encounter a mer. If the captain kept to the old ways, he would either carefully steer away or throw her a tribute: fruit of the land, the apples and grapes merfolk treasured more than treasure. In return the mermaid might present him with fruit of the sea—gems, or a comb from her hair.