As night fell, Venus swam back to the docks after the commotion subsided on the surface. Instead of hauling herself up, she stayed beneath the wooded path atop the sea and listened to the conversations from the burly men hauling barrels and boxes around.

Hearing a familiar squeaky voice, she swam over and peered through the cracks in the wood to find Scotty chatting away with Captain Caspien. “She was wearing a blue silk dress and had lovely lavender eyes just as you used to describe her! Then she jumped from the boat and shifted before my eyes! I’m sorry Captain, I didn’t mean to look but the moment I saw her dress shift into her tail I realized I’d committed a grave sin…”

Caspien didn’t answer making the air around them grow dark. And for a while, it seemed like they would just leave it at that until heavy footsteps approached them. Venus ducked down, forgetting that without the sunlight to reflect off her tail they couldn’t see her.

Looking up through the sea foam, Venus spotted a blurry red-suited man jauntily stepping up to the two men. Slowly coming back up she wrinkled her nose at the smell of the air.

“I’m looking forward to seeing you lads in Arla again.” James patted Scotty on the shoulder and sneered, “for the last time, of course.” Scotty scooted away while scrunching up his nose and wiping his shoulder clean from any smut he thought James would wipe there.

“Bah!” Caspien scoffed, “over my father’s dead body would they let you cross the border. You’d be blown off the sea right when they see your flag.”

Looking between the two men, James raised an eyebrow and pulled his gloves off nonchalantly mentioning, “not after I present them with my trump card. There are a million reasons why they should kill me and my men the minute we sail even within a mile of your boarder but I’m sure they wouldn’t when I tell the king I have something that he may need.”

James laughed waiting for their schoolyard response of, ‘we’ll see about that.’ But only silence reigned around them. Pulling back his coat, James flipped open a gold pocket watch then looked up at the sky. “I’m sure you lads have a lot of loading to take care of so I’ll leave you be for now,” he sighed. Turning on his heel he walked down the dark darks while waving his fingers in the air echoing, “until then, lads!”

Leaving the two purple coats behind, Venus trailed James’ footsteps beneath the docks while trying her best not to splash around too much. He stuffed his watch back into her inner coat pocket then called upon two men. As they scurried over, James’ face stayed flat as the boards he stood on. He said in the lowest tone he could muster, “before we leave I need you, men, to find a broad for me.” The two crewmates shook their heads without questioning and paid careful attention, “she wore a-” James started to cough uncontrollably as he tried to describe Venus to the men.

From below them, she couldn’t help but smile at the fact that her spell still hadn’t worn off. ‘Serves you right,’ she thought to herself as she dove back down and away from the docks. ‘Now that there are people actually looking fr me there’s no way for me to just swim away from this encounter. I should take this as a sign to find the answers I need before disappearing for good.’ With that one last thought, she dove deeper and deeper below the surface until she could see the faint ruins of a city coming into view. Fish swam in and out of the cracks crumbling the foundation while a moss-like plant crawled up and around the walls of the buildings. Without hesitation, she swam through the overhead arch with the name ‘Baia’ carved at the top.

The sand around her floated up as her tail flipped through the water pushing her down the ominously empty hallways. Touching the walls, the cracks lit up making it easier for her to see her surroundings. She was in a room with chipped baby blue walls and a chandelier floating around the top while still connected to the ceiling. Ripping open the drawer closets to her bolted down desk, she plucked up an earring covered in a mold but shaped just as the one Caspien dangled in front of her face earlier in the day. Wiping away the green muck, orange and yellow as the sunset piece of flimsy fabric was uncovered proving Venus’ suspicions of Captain Caspien to be correct.

“Although I may not know you now, I know that we’ve met before but how?” She flicked her finger at the wall with her spell hanging in the water but only sparks appeared where the images of her past were supposed to be. She tried again and again but her memories had been sealed by someone making her forget where she met the captain before.

Swimming out of the drowned city of Baia, she swims all the way back to dry land. Instead of the docks, she came from right offshore to an alcove and transformed while laying in the sand alone. Before she could get up on her own, a hand clamped down around her arm and dragged her farther up the beach. Her eyes went red as she opened her mouth to sing but stopped at the sight of the man standing above her. Giving her best mock smile she asked, “and how have you been on this lovely night?”