Mermaid AU! Mermaid AU!! I have been working on this picture for literal years. I mean there was a big break, first after the flats cuz rendering was not my friend, then it took a long time to want to do backgrounds, but here it finally is!
The key ties into those pressures of royal life I mentioned before (you know, like years ago, you remember that, right?). When she was a baby, Rhen's parents were lost in a shipwreck, along with the box containing the royal sigma ring that has been passed down through the Pendragon line and verifies Rhen's right to the throne. All that was recovered from the wreck was Rhen herself and the key to the box. Without the ring, contenders to the throne have grounds to oppose Rhen's upcoming coronation. She has few loyal companions she can trust. Galahad, an old friend of her mother's, is one of them. (I am going crazy imagining an Alicia Galahad friendship, this would be impossible in canon, someone save me😭)
If only there were someone who could search the ocean floor for a locked box, hmm?
