Ursula's Beginning

36. Sure, she's got everything

Ursula had to give a repeat performance a year later. This time it was a single child--a brown eyed, brown haired girl they named Aquata.

Ursula had concluded, through the course of her yearlong training under Ephram, that Triton and Marielle were going to have seven daughters. Cosmas and the other prophets agreed--a convergence in predictions that pleased the High Priest greatly.

She had come to trust her dreams as full of valuable information; after all, her dreams had shown her the eels before they found her. She had seen Nepp's dead body in a dream, and Alphon's violence towards Ganeon with a book--representing the scholarly knowledge that Ganeon had wielded against his brother--before that drama had unfolded. And now, she was dreaming again and again of Marielle prodding Triton to sign seven scrolls. There was one scroll for each of their daughters. She didn't see the children in these visions, but the connection of the scrolls to the girls was something that Ursula simply understood as part of that dream's universe and context.

At the same time, she kept swimming through two memories in her sleep. They appeared as snippets wedged between other dreams. One was Ganeon talking to her at Triton's coronation feast. As his lips moved, she could only hear the chatter around them. The clink of glasses and the laughter of the crowd drowned out his words. The other was Nepp speaking to her in the hours before his death. Again, she could see everything perfectly, but could not hear what he was saying.

Most nights, she dreamed of the dome of the temple caving in, the entire structure reduced to rubble. Merfolk were screaming and staggering about. Then she would catapult into wakefulness, her heart hammering away in the narrow bed she slept in at Dismas and Melisande's home.

She began to connect the crumbling temple to her frequent dreams of Queen Marielle. "She's eroding our way of life here," Ursula said to Ephram after months of nightmares. "The temple is a symbol of what makes Atlantica so different from the other kingdoms, and here she is, heralding from the most anti-cecaelian kingdom there is and constantly introducing her customs into our waters. She's dangerous!"

Ephram shut her down so forcefully she knew she couldn't speak against Marielle again if she wanted to become High Priestess and regain the influence she craved. "No one but you has foreseen any danger connected to Her Highness, child, and you are not yet able to separate fear from fact!" he had snapped. "Your personal dislikes will color all the soothsaying you do until you become more experienced." His tone held a warning and there was a steely, severe look in his eyes she had never seen before.

After that, Ursula dropped the topic with Ephram and resolved to check the influence of Marielle by herself in due course. So she carried on quietly, striving to appear ever more serene and dignified in front of everyone despite the mounting hatred she felt for Queen Marielle. Only Ganeon knew her true heart and shared her sentiments.

They sat through dozens of concerts featuring Marielle, at King Triton's insistence. Every holiday, every birthday, every gathering with foreign dignitaries, Sebastian and the Queen inflicted another performance onto innocent victims.

They watched as clam shells became all the rage for the females of the kingdom.

They listened to the Queen carry on about the thousands upon thousands of pearls given to her and her daughters by the oysters of Atlantica.

They witnessed the installation of more art that celebrated Her Grace.

But none of this compared to the outrage they felt when they learned of Marielle's fondness for visiting the surface of the ocean. She loved to sunbathe, to stargaze, to watch ships come and go. Like her father, the Pacifican Elder that had supported Alphon's bid to establish relations with the humans, Athena Marielle seemed to think land dwellers weren't all that dangerous. And worst of all, her favorite time to engage in this recklessness was around major events in the kingdom--her own way of celebrating.