Part of Your World (Twisted Tales)(42)

“I’m sorry, what?” he asked.

“It will,” she hissed louder.

“You’ll forgive me, Your Highness, but you have given me no proof of that. I see no reason to make deals with a princess who dresses prettily but lacks any strategic ability.”

“You refuse to deal because I am a woman?” Ursula growled, perhaps a little loudly, in her own voice.

“On the contrary,” Iase said, patting her hand and then removing it from his arm. “I have had many dealings with fine women I respect. Including at least one pirate captain. It is you, personally, Princess Vanessa, whom I am hesitant to entrust the resources or future of my country with.”

The two were silent for a moment, looking into each other’s eyes. His were steady and dark; hers glittered strangely.

Ursula wished she were underwater. She wished she had her tentacles. She wished she had her old necklace. She wished she had anything she could smite him with—frankly, a large piece of coral would have done nicely.

First she lost her stolen voice, and with it the charm and forget spells that made dealing with the humans around her easier. Now it looked like she was losing a potential—and very powerful—ally. Not only would this be a severe setback for her war plans, but her failure would be the talk of the court. She would look weak and pathetic and incapable of mustering the help they needed to conquer their neighbors. And the weak were devoured. It was the way of the world.

“Thank you for your honesty,” she finally whispered.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Oh, never mind. I need some tea for my throat. Join me?” She indicated the bubbling teapot: this gesture was perfectly clear, even if what she said was not. Flotsam was suddenly at the desk, laying out a pair of beautiful Bretlandian teacups, golden spoons, a fat little jar of honey, and some lemon slices.

“Don’t mind if I do,” Iase said carelessly. “Feel a tickle in my throat myself.”

She put the pretty gold strainer—not silver, no no, never silver; when prepared properly the metal had the power to negate certain desired effects of a potion—over his cup and poured, and over her cup, and poured. Strangely grey liquid came out, neither opaque nor completely translucent. It was precisely the same color at different depths.

Each person doctored the drink the way he or she liked: lemon, two lumps…Ursula put a candied violet in hers—one that had a silver dragée as its center.

“Good for the throat, eh?” he asked, holding the cup up to toast her. “To life!”

“To friends,” Ursula whispered over the rim of her teacup.

He raised his cup again before bringing it to his mouth—but waited until she sipped before taking a draught himself.

She watched him, the grey liquid pouring over his lips and into his mouth…and he swallowed….





On the fourth tide she was back at her lagoon as promised.

Flounder leapt into the air, flipping himself like he hadn’t since he was small.

“Ariel!! Talk! SAY SOMETHING!” he cried.

She smiled, feeling her cheek tug to one side the way it used to when she was indulging her best friend. She closed her eyes and put her hands in a student-y clasp, reciting:

“There was a young guppy from Thebes, whose fins would often grow—”

“Ha-HA!”

Flounder leapt into the air again.

She laughed, too, and ran into the water to hug him, unconcerned about her clothes. They were uncomfortable and hangy and close anyway, much heavier than what mer chose to wear. Flounder cuddled and leapt and nuzzled her like a puppy before recovering himself.

“Tell me all about it!”

So she did. And it was strange, telling a story with her mouth. She let her hands do some signing. It would have been uncomfortable keeping them still.

“Wow,” Flounder said when she was done. “That’s all…crazy.”

Jona dropped silently from the skies and landed on a nearby rock with the delicacy of something that wasn’t a seagull. “What did you learn in town?”

Ariel sighed and sat down in the shallow water. A warm breeze picked up the tendrils of her hair that were sticking out of the head cloth. She wrapped her arms around her knees, feeling young and exposed.

“I learned it is the wrong season for cal?ots. I learned about tattoos.

“I learned that Ursula is using Tirulia as the jumping-off point for her private empire, seizing land from neighbors who probably aren’t strong enough for reprisals, and that she is antagonizing other, larger powers. I learned that the town is full of soldiers. I learned that twenty-three of them have died in her crusade and yet dozens more boys go to join up because of the promise of gold for their families and the gold buttons on their uniforms.”

Flounder gulped. Jona let out an avian hiss.

“And all I can think of are these two things. One, I am in some ways responsible for those twenty-three who will swim no more.”

Flounder started to open his mouth; by long habit Ariel just held up a finger to silence him.

“Two, I think about what I would do as ruler of Tirulia. If I were Eric, thrown into this mess now. Human politics and life seem far more dynamic than mer. I’ve never had to deal with anything like it in my time as queen. Nor has my father. Nor my father’s father.”