The Undersea Queen lived in the middle of a city in the Undersea, in a palace that towered over everything else. If I’d been impressed with the cottages of the sea-witches, they were nothing compared to the city buildings, and even those paled in comparison to the palace. With pillars that towered over me, statues of mermaids in every alcove in between on the many-stepped entrance, it was a reminder that I was very far from home. I was completely out of my element as I followed Madame Rhine and Madame Noemi through the large, arching entrance and into a corridor lined with painted tiles in blue and white, with soldiers in golden armor lining the walls. 

I felt sick to my stomach—the last thing on my mind was the path into the Queen’s throne room. I glimpsed the marvels of the mermaids on the walls, out the windows, but I couldn’t really enjoy any of it. Not with what awaited me. 

The way everyone was so deadly serious about it, that’s what told me that I’d gone in over my head. I’d gotten my first glimpse of it in Madame Rhine’s cottage, with Dominique’s warning. As I waited for the large gate of intricate gold to open in place of doors to that grand final throne room, I found myself wishing I’d heeded her warning. For all that Dominique disliked me, that warning did seem to come from a genuine place.

But it was too late—with a tap of their golden tridents against a spot on the floor painted with a blue room, a bell chimed and the gates opened, and suddenly Madame Noemi gestured for me to go first. 

I tried to gulp down my fear as I took the front of the party and entered that grand throne room, where the Undersea Queen waited for me. 

The throne room was filled with stained glass windows that all cast this pale blue light, like moonlight thousands of leagues beneath the sea upon the figure in the central golden throne lifted high above the floor. The way her pearl-laden headdress caught the light, she had a shining halo over her black curls and tan features, was a moon in her own right. She wore white silk trimmed with gold that flowed over her silvery blue-green tail, speckled with scales of pale lavender that matched the fin at the end of her tail. 

Perched on an arm of the throne was a boy mermaid, a mer-prince, I guess. He wore a sleeveless teal tunic that showed his arm and flowing white silk detached sleeves, all trimmed with gold to match his own headdress with jade horns that glowed fixed into his jet-black hair. He had a similar tail to the Undersea Queen’s, with the silvery blue-green and lilac fin. Unlike his mother, he had turquoise blue markings on his skin.

He had to be her son, from what I could tell. He was beautiful, in a way that felt intimately familiar to me. 

As I swam forward, I locked eyes with him, and I could see the realization hit him at the same time. We’d met before—he was Talu. 

The way he turned his head subtly to the left, then to the right, I could see it was another case where I needed to pretend I’d never met him. Which was weird that it had happened twice, but whatever. I wasn’t going to get him in trouble. 

Along the sides of the throne room were flocks of courtiers, in eccentric brightly-colored hats and clothes that reminded me of tropical fish like where Mom grew up. Their voices dropped to beautiful whispers, their eyes locked onto me almost unblinkingly as I swam forward to a sigil on the floor at the center of the throne room.

When I reached there, Madame Noemi and Madame Rhine alike bowed their heads. I hastily did the same, but it didn’t stop my face from feeling like it was on fire and like I’d messed up royally. 

“Your Majesty, we present Madame Noemi Moondeep and Madame Rhine Tidedancer of the Silversurf Village.” A herald’s voice carried in almost sing-song, melodious as it bounced off the windows and high arches. “They have brought the Princess of the Twilight Tides.”

The what?

I guess I liked the title, if I was to have one, even though I had no idea what that was about. 

Madame Noemi and Madame Rhine straightened, and I quickly did the same, craning my neck to look up at the Undersea Queen. Her expression was unfathomable, and I had no idea if I left a good impression or not, or if she even liked me. Talu was practicing a similar expression, although it didn’t quite meet his beautiful turquoise blue eyes. There was some kind of emotion there, but I wasn’t sure which yet. 

“To the Princess of the Twilight Tides, we announce Her Royal Majesty, Empress of the Seven Seas, the Mistress of the Tides, the Voice of the Ocean, Queen Amphrite VII of the Undersea, and her son, the Crown Prince and Heir to the Siren Legacy, Prince Tiberius.”

Queen Amphrite sat up straighter in her throne, preening, almost with her imperious gaze. Talu—or Tiberius, I guess it was now—had schooled his features to match his mother’s so much more closely, so I couldn’t read him at all now either.

Silence persisted for a moment, and I wasn’t sure if I was the one who was supposed to start talking, but I also couldn’t find voice to speak at all, surrounded by all of those people watching me with what felt like hostility mixed with the kind of curiosity you gave a gross but cool-looking bug. 

Queen Amphrite tilted her head and was the one to finally shatter the silence. “You are certain, then, that this is the Princess of the Twilight Tides?”

“The very one, Your Majesty.” Madame Noemi smiled. “My colleague, Madame Rhine, saw her power for herself. And indeed, she is a human without a drop of mermaid blood, or that of any other seafolk.”

I silently noted the question about other seafolk for another time, another place.

“I suppose it does align with reports of increased sightings of Fathoms,” Queen Amphrite sighed. “I had hoped that particular prophecy would not resurface in the time of my reign, or my son’s.”

“We can only do what we can in the times we are given, Your Majesty.” 

Queen Amphrite nodded, and looked to Prince Tiberius. He raised a hand to cover his mouth and whispered something in her ear. She looked back to me, and I saw the first spark of emotion in her dark eyes. Curiosity—but not the dehumanizing kind that the courtiers were regarding me with. I guess something like hope was there, too.

“Most interesting,” she murmured. She straightened her posture again and Prince Tiberius withdrew. “The Crown Prince has vowed to be the one to teach you our ways and take you under his wing, so that you may fulfill your destiny.”

“Th-thank you,” I managed to stammer out, so quietly I feared she might not have heard me at all.

A small smile reminiscent of the Mona Lisa’s curled up her full lips. “I hope you are all that our prophecies promise, Princess of the Twilight Tides.”

“Me too,” I said, before realizing that probably wasn’t the best thing to say here.

Not that Queen Amphrite seemed upset by it—although it did cause the whispers of the courtiers to rise in volume, but not enough for me to make up fully what they were saying. They were more like the dull roar of the ocean tide on the beach at sun’s high than anything else. 

“Thank you for your efforts, Madames Moondeep and Tidedancer.” Queen Amphrite nodded at both of them. “My stewards will ensure you are rewarded handsomely for your find.”

She then looked to Prince Tiberius. “You may escort the Princess out.”

She turned back to the witches, that mysterious gleam returned. “I will be concluding my court for today. I have matters that must be discussed in my chambers.”

With that, Prince Tiberius swam forward and tapped my upper arm, a clear question. I nodded, the invitation for him to slip his arm into my elbow and guide me away.

Once again, I was led down a labyrinth of corridors of pillars, high arches, mosaic floors and stained glass windows. More people filled the halls now, and more of them were looking at me. Had word already spread so quickly? Prince Tiberius said nothing, his gaze held straight in front of him and his expression now perfectly copying his mother’s. 

Finally, my swim with Prince Tiberius came to an end when we entered a room with a proper door, not one of those golden gates. It was clearly some kind of living room or what a sitting room might be called in an old-fashioned period drama, the kind that Mom liked to watch with Lena. Except it obviously had an Undersea flare, with coral and shell shapes to the ivory furniture, the shaped glass windows, and the fluttering translucent gauze that caught the current. 

Once we were there, Prince Tiberius’s features softened again, resembling the boy I’d met on the beach again, the friend I’d watched Pearly the dragonling fetch a conch shell with on the surf. 

He placed his hands on my arms. “Thank you for not revealing my identity. Either time, actually.”

I shrugged. “It’s your secret.”

I glanced up at him. “What do I call you, by the way?”

“Oh.” He blinked, as if my question had surprised him. “Talu will do. Even my mother calls me that, in the privacy of her own chambers.”

“So Tiberius is like your prince name?”

He tilted his head, a smile playing at his lips. “More or less.”

He let go of me. “That went well, all things considered.”

“I had no idea what was even going on,” I confessed. “I don’t even know what a Princess of the Twilight Tides means.”

He pressed his lips together for a moment. “I’m sorry—someone should have explained that to you. I think my mother just needed to make a display of it.”

“What do you mean?”

He let out a long sigh. “Things have been tense for a long time. There have been a lot of cracks forming, and my mother doesn’t have the time or the resources to mend them all properly.”

“I don’t understand.” I was beginning to suspect I was stupid, with how often I felt left int he dark when the mermaids talked. 

“It’s a long story.” He smiled wryly. “Politics often are.”

I tilted my head. “I could see that.”

“But I’ll tell you about the Princess of the Twilight Tides—and more eventually,” he added quickly. “We should have plenty of time to discuss plenty of things, now that you’re recognized by my mother and you aren’t Lumi and Kei’s little secret.”

He glanced around him, and then drifted over to a little dresser-table kind of thing. From it he withdrew a necklace with a single pearl upon it. He cupped it in his hands and let out a low hum. The pearl glowed the same bright blue of his eyes, shining for one moment like an underwater star.

Then the light died, except for a small glimmer of blue that was within the pearl’s glossy depths that I knew wasn’t there before. Talu opened his eyes and looked to me, suddenly shy. 

“Do you keep pearl necklaces like that on hand all the time?” I asked, deciding to go for the least weird part. 

He shrugged. “I enchanted it to make a small portal to back here, whenever you’d like.”

“Wait, you can do that?” 

He widened his eyes.“Did you think that this place was just somewhere you could travel to, in the same physical space as the oceans that are graphed extensively by your scientists?” 

The familiar feeling of fire surging up my face as I turned away returned, along with the suspicion that I was just stupid. “Yeah, kind of.”

“I didn’t mean it like—“ A blush crept up his porcelain cheeks as he glanced away. “The barrier you saw around where Lumi and Dominique live? It’s actually a portal.”

“Really?” I couldn’t believe it. “But it’s there all the time!”
“It is, but only our kind can access that.” He looked down at the pearl necklace in his hand. “This will only work for you, but you can use it any time.”

“This is all so crazy,” I muttered as I reached for it. I looked back to him, suddenly nervous for no good reason. “Are you sure?”

“Positively,” he said, meeting my eyes.

I took it from him and managed to clasp it in one go, which I supposed was a nice small refutation of my lowering opinion of my own intelligence. 

“It suits you,” he said, before turning away and floating over to a window, his arms behind his back. He looked rather princely in that stance. 

“So what’s the story with the Twilight Tides?” I finally asked. “And me being the Princess of it?”

“It’s an old story,” he answered without turning around. “From before there was an Undersea, when there were many fragmented kingdoms of seafolk and more marvels and terrors ran amok.”

I decided to seat myself in one of the shell-looking armchairs. The cushion inside was nice and soft. 

He looked back to me, as indecipherable as the Queen again. “One of these wonders and terrors was the Twilight Tides. An ancient, primal source, some thought of it as a representative of the souls of the merpeople, the heart of the magic in the ocean. More a myth than science, but remembered all the same.”

He then drifted closer to me. “Do you remember what you saw the night you fell in?”
I nodded, the words heavy in my throat. “A Fathom, right?”

“Yes.” He joined me at a seat opposite of me. “No one knows where they came from—we think the deep, maybe from the Twilight Tides themselves, or maybe some opposing force for it. Back in those days, it was said that the oceans were overrun with them.”

“That sounds terrifying.” I shuddered to remember what I’d seen.

“Then came a human girl, said to have the heart of a mermaid,” Talu continued. “She commanded the Twilight Tides, used them to vanquish the Fathoms and seal them away.”

“What happened to her?” I had a creeping dread in my stomach—those kinds of stories never ended well for their heroes.

“No one knows.” He seemed to realize the same problem that I did as he spoke the words. He reached for my hand. “But don’t worry—we’ll make sure nothing happens to you.”

I didn’t pull away. “But you think that I’m this Princess of the Twilight Tides because I can randomly become a mermaid?” 

“And because of what I saw you do that night.” His eyes were so intense, I had to look away. 

I sat up straighter. “You mean that I killed the monster?” 

He furrowed his eyebrows. “I hope that doesn’t upset you?”

“It doesn’t,” I assured him. “I guess I just—I don’t know. Never mind.”

He decided not to push the subject further. “Madame Rhine also detected that power. And we have been seeing the Fathoms more lately.”

My stomach churned at the thought. I was going to have to defeat more of those monsters?

“Don’t worry.” He gently squeezed my hand and returned me to the present. “You’ll havre me and many others fighting by your side.”