His hair was much longer, caught back in a loose ponytail.
Although he had a worn, salt-faded cape over his shoulders, Ariel could see the trappings of rank beneath it: a crisp white shirt, several golden medallions, an unbuttoned but very fine and tight waistcoat. Below a fancy, wide belt of almost military lines he sported an incredibly well-tailored pair of trousers that obviously did not give as much freedom of movement as the old Eric would have liked. His boots were worn and seemed like an afterthought, like the cape, thrown on at the last moment. For disguise, or to protect the better clothes.
He kept staring across the ocean as if waiting for something. The tiny boat was anchored, Ariel realized. As if he had been there, or expected to be there, for a while.
“It’s so nice out here, isn’t it, Max?” he murmured. “It’s so quiet. You can almost hear…Almost hear…”
Ariel’s eyes widened. She saw the tuft of an old furry ear lift up above the side of the boat.
Hesitantly Eric pulled something out of his pocket. At first Ariel thought it would be a pipe—it seemed appropriate for someone of Eric’s current age and station. But as he placed it to his lips she realized that it was a tiny instrument. Smaller than the recorder he used to carry around with him, and fatter. More like an ocarina, the instrument humans used to play in the days they still talked to animals and merfolk.
He took a breath and waited for a moment.
Then he played a few notes. Quietly and slowly.
Ariel’s heart nearly stopped.
It was the song she had sung after she rescued him, the song that had burst unbidden out of her heart as he lay there, unconscious. It described the beauty of the sea and the land and the mortality of humans and the wonder of life. It had poured out of her like life itself.
Hearing it again was the sweetest pain she had ever experienced. Far deeper even than having her tail split in twain for legs. It coursed through her whole body, hurt and recognition and pleasure all at once.
He played only the first dozen notes, then trailed off. Listening.
Waiting.
Ariel opened her mouth, willed the notes to come out. She closed her eyes and tried to squeeze them from her heart, from her lungs. Didn’t love break all spells? What was the good of it otherwise? Please, please, Old Gods. Let me sing…just this once…
But all was silent.
“Mmrl?”
Max’s little questioning noise caused Eric to blink, and Ariel to curse.
“No, I know I didn’t use it in the opera,” Eric said as if he were answering a much more coherent question from the dog. “I know, it would have been perfect. But it didn’t seem right somehow…I needed to save it for…for…”
He blinked suddenly and smiled at himself.
“That sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it, Max?” He grinned and scruffled the dog’s ears. Ariel dipped lower into the water, melting at his smile. Still! When he smiled it was like the whole world was smiling, his lips pulled the sky like a rainbow, the sun danced in laughter. She felt utterly helpless and stupid. Queen of the Sea! Brought to her fins by one silly smile.
Eric sighed. “Thanks for joining me on these little expeditions, Max. I know they wear you out. But out here, it’s almost like I’m…clearheaded. Or slipping deeper, into another dream. One or the other. They’re the same. Oh, I don’t know.”
He sighed, clenching his hand around the ocarina in frustration. For a moment Ariel thought he was going to hurl it into the sea, as he had his recorder so many years before. But he brought it to his lips and played the dozen notes again, letting them die into the breeze.
Ariel didn’t try to finish the tune this time. Tears leaked out of the sides of her eyes and trickled down her cheeks, joining the briny sea.
Finally Eric put his ocarina away. “Come on, let’s head back before the missus decides we’ve been out on our walkies too long.” He pulled the anchor and took up the oars, expertly turning the little boat around with no wake and little effort.
As the prow swung out closer to Ariel, Max began to shuffle to his feet.
“Mmmrrl?”
He tried to look over the side of the boat, sensing that something was off.
Ariel dipped low into the water. She doubted the dog could see very well now, much less through the matted locks over his eyes. He put his nose to the air, sniffing…but Eric was rowing away, back toward shore.
Ariel watched them go, the old dog and his master on the tiny, tiny boat—the man who once commanded a ship as large as a castle and the heart of the sea king’s daughter.