With Mal shed of his metal, Lucien smirks at me in an unspoken plot as he cries, “Heave, ho!”

We crash into the water face-first, dragging Malachite down with us. Salt floods my ears, my nose, the ocean so much warmer with the sun on it. It’s not bathwater, but it’s close, and the sensation of the tide pulling and pushing is perhaps the closest my unremembering Heartless arse can come to recalling what being a child in a crib was like. Malachite squirms, and I let his ear go, Lucien releasing his arms, and we surface, the waves tossing us as playfully as we splash the beneather’s face relentlessly the second he comes up.

“Stop!” Malachite snarls, eyes blinking rapidly with the assault. “Stop, stop it! I’ll duel the both of you!”

“Revenge is sweet!” I tackle him from behind and smack my mouth. “And a little salty!”

Lucien stops splashing, and there’s a moment where Malachite glares daggers into him, me hanging like a monkey on his back and grinning around his shoulder. Lucien’s smirk lights up his handsome face as he dares to flick one last tiny bit of water onto Malachite with two fingers, and Malachite explodes, scrabbling for the nimble prince as he swims away. I’m too heavy to swim with, and Malachite claws for me.

“You flirty little shit! Get off me!”

My shrieking laughter echoes up the beach, Lucien’s light taunts sending Malachite into a hilariously frothing rage as he tries to swim after the prince with my added weight. At some point I decide to let go and allow the boys to kill each other, Lucien’s taunts turning to pleas and Malachite gloating as he gives the prince a terrible underwater noogie.

And I just…float. The sun beams in the blue sky, blue-green sea rising up to kiss it. The water in my ears mutes the world, covers it in a muffled, gentle blanket so that all I can hear is the sand swishing and the sound of the air in my body moving in and out. I feel so small, in such a big ocean. In such a big world. Vetris had been my everything for so long, and the forest before that. Always confined to cramped spaces, wasn’t I? But I’ve seen more of Cavanos now than ever. More of the world than ever.