Listen, And The Stars Shall Speak

For Your Daily Jelp Needs

"She's insane!" Joy announced as she stormed into the Pavilion. Glory looked up, taking in her daughter's shocked expression and her flaming scales.

"I take the meeting didn't go well, then" Glory assumed.

"Go well? She told me the only way she would let him go is if I- if I-" Joy paused. She couldn't bear to say the awful words out loud. Glory and Deathbringer looked at her expectantly. "If I kill Shore and the girls and bring their bodies back to her as proof." A heavy silence slammed down on the room.

"WHAT!?!?" Deathbringer exploded. "She can't possibly be serious!"

"Trust me, she is."

"There has to be something else we can do." Glory insisted, wracking her brain for anything they could use.

"Like what? She probably has him locked up in one of the Seawing palaces, and we have no idea where either of them are." Glory grinned.

"Actually, we do."

"Hello Kelp." Coral said with a wicked grin.

"Coral," Kelp replied with a nod. He looked awful. There was blood on his scales and one of his eyes was black. But he still refused to crack and give up any information Coral desired- specifically the identity of the spy he had been speaking to.

"You are an awfully stubborn dragon."

"I like to think it's one of my best traits."

"I spoke with your wife today." Now this got a reaction. Kelp's eyes widened and he shot up.

"What did you do to her?" He growled. If she hurt Joy- if she dared.

"Relax. All I did was offer a way to get you back." Kelp snorted. How dumb was this dragon?

"Well that's a stupid mistake on your part. Joy would do anything to get me back." Coral looked at him, her face actually showing a bit of sympathy. Kelp stared back, slightly confused. Why did she look at him with such a pitiful stare?

"Actually, she turned me down flat." Coral admitted ruefully. "I had barely finished speaking and she yelled no. It wasn't even that difficult a task if I'm being honest, but she didn't care at all." Kelp's face remained blank, refusing to give away any kind of emotion.

"You're lying." he seethed. Coral shook her head.

"For once, I'm not. Sorry Kelp, but it looks like you're going to be here a while." With that, she left. Kelp sat in the corner of the cell and pondered her words. Could it be true? Could Joy really have turned her down?

No, he insisted. She wouldn't do that. She loves me. She wants me back....Right? He sighed, knowing it was no use. Coral had planted a doubt in his mind, and he had nothing else to do but to run with it, no matter how much he refused. She is not going to leave me to die here, she's not. His mind warred with himself, trying to fight off the horrible ideas the doubt had created. Kelp think! If she really doesn't care, then surely there would've been some sign that she doesn't truly love me. He thought through his memories of Joy, closing his eyes to see them more vividly. A grin slowly spread across his face as memories flashed in his head.

The smile on her face as she pulled him onto the dance floor, even though he knew he'd fall.

The way she laughed as he made dumb jokes.

The day they had skipped their classes at JMA and had swam in an underwater lake all day. He remembered how she had laughed and splashed him with water.

The terror in her eyes as Pineapple slit his throat and she cried, begging him not to leave.

The way it felt when she curled up next to him and let him wrap his arms around her.

The fact that he was the first dragon she looked for in a crowded room.

All the times they had danced in the night, swirling and spinning to music that wasn't there.

The look in her eyes as he kissed her for the first time.

"I love you." she had blurted one day as they laid on a rock. It had been the first time she had ever said the words.

"I love you," She had whispered to him just days after she'd been stabbed by Pineapple.

"I love you." The day he had proposed and they laughed about crazy things.

"I love you." The day that Shore had hatched.

I love you," she had joked, just a few days before their wedding.

"I love you." She had assured him, every time he left to meet with Geyser,

"Three moons," she had declared one night. "I love you."

Kelp grinned, the doubt gone from his mind. Coral couldn't break him. No, nothing could break him. Not as long as Joy was there, and he was confident that she always would be.