#changing waters

What rests deep in the ocean? Mermaids? Monsters? Magic? All that and more.

Far below where any human can survive, there is a kingdom called Jiol. Kostas is a 14-year-old sorcerer who resides there with his mother and friends, but it is not their home. A home is filled with love, not fear and death. It is merely where they try to survive while the royal guards, the Patrollers, constantly raid the village. They kill anyone with tails, webbing, or fins—anyone who mutated for this underwater existence.

What rests deep in the ocean? Mermaids? Monsters? Magic? All that and more.

Far below where any human can survive, there is a kingdom called Jiol. Kostas is a 14-year-old sorcerer who resides there with his mother and friends, but it is not their home. A home is filled with love, not fear and death. It is merely where they try to survive while the royal guards, the Patrollers, constantly raid the village. They kill anyone with tails, webbing, or fins—anyone who mutated for this underwater existence.

“You’re not doing it right!”

“What do you mean? I did the same spell you did.”

“That is not a dragon.”

The two Jiolans looked at the sand in front of them. Kostas’ sand dragon looked a lot like a sand eel, its sinuous form slender, except it had a pair of flippers at the first quarter of its body, then another pair three-quarters of the way from the end. Its tiny maw had sandy baleen threads, and it coiled around Kostas’ neck, as if insulted by the small dragon in front of it.

Adara’s dragon was shaped more like a whale, its form thick and round. It had long claws with webbing between the six digits, its teeth were pointed like a shark’s, and it looked like it wanted to bite the eel-dragon in half for being rude. 

“Claudia said that dragons were adorable, had four limbs, and would devour evil-doers. Eels are adorable.”

“Claudia’s adorable is weird. And my chubby dragon is much cuter than an eel. How big would an eel have to be to devour something evil like a patroller?”

“Maybe they can unhook their jaw?” Kostas frowned, then set his dragon back down in front of Adara’s. “You really think that can beat mine in a dragon dual?”

“Afraid to lose? We won’t know until they fight.” 

Adara grinned when he snorted. She traced the dueling ring in the sand with her tail by swimming in a quick circle. 

“Look, first one to knock the other out wins.”

“On three?”

“One… two… three! Fight!”

Kostas’ dragon went on the attack first. It wrapped itself around Adara’s dragon’s hind legs, an attempt to pull it to the side, but the sand dragon dug into the substrate of the ocean floor with its claws. Furrows were left as it was dragged an inch back, but then Adara’s dropped its weight and squished Kostas’ under its larger body. 

Then Kostas’ dragon was on the defensive. It squirmed to get out of Adara’s dragon’s hold, its lean body wiggling from side to side. Adara’s dragon tried to bite it for a better hold, but it used its fins to dodge and smacked its opponent on the nose. Adara’s dragon opened its maw in frustration, its roar silent as the shifting sands it was made of, but Kostas’ dragon had squirmed out of its grasp and was now circling again. 

By this point, their concentration was starting to ebb. This kind of hydromancy was difficult, even if the amount of sand being manipulated was small. Actually, that might be why it was so hard. Restoring buildings and shaping sand into a formation was simple. Maintaining a shape as his magic fought hers was difficult, the small dragon wanted to crumble on impact, but if he let it she’d win.

“What are you two doing?”

Claudia’s question was the last straw, both dragons dissolved into sand. She had apparently approached unnoticed while they were focussed on their magic.The sorceress' face was neutral, her opinion of the spellwork a mystery, but there was a hint of a smile in the twitch of her lips. 

“Training

“Dragon dueling.” 

Adara’s answer was only a beat behind Kostas’, but they were both obviously chagrined by their loss of control. 

“How about you show me this training with dragons?”

Eager to show off their spell, the youths reformed their hydromancy creations. The dragons swam proudly around Claudia, showing off their fins and their bodies as she cooed at them like they were loppies. Embarrassed, the young Jiolans made their creations swim back to the brawling circle. Unfortunately, they were still tired, and their dragons lost their shapes again at first contact with each other. Sand drifted to the ocean floor.

“Not bad.” The sorceress’ grin was clear now. “But I always pictured dragons like this.”

She copied the spell they had used, but her greater skill made the beast at least twice the size of the youth’s. Claudia’s dragon was akin to Adara’s, a large, wide beast with claws and sharp teeth, but it had odd protrusions from its back. The membranous sand shifted, and the dragon suddenly had two billowing sail-like arms at its back that nearly dwarfed the rest of its body. The young Jiolans did not know what to think, having lived their lives near the ocean floor.

“What are those?” 

“Wings. Dragons had them in the oldest stories, but sea-dragons had wings too. I’m pretty sure I mentioned wings earlier.” She glanced at Kostas.

He blushed when Adara stared at him. How to say that he had not mentioned the wings because he had no idea what they were? They were so strange looking! They were too large and awkward to move properly through water.

“It doesn’t matter! Last round, both of yours against mine… Let’s make this circle bigger.”

When Danae found them an hour later, Kostas eagerly told her about their win against Claudia, briefly admitted that it had taken them ten attempts, then returned to a play-by-play of dragon dueling. 

It gave her an idea.

~~

The next day, Danae led Kostas and Adara just outside the village to a craggy trench in the sea bed. Coral formations had been raised with hydromancy to add a layer of difficulty, and loppies were idly munching on their mixed vegetable feed in certain open areas, a living obstacle along the obvious path. Hermi and Claudia waited at the start of the trail.

“Welcome to advanced dragon training.” Claudia announced. “Each participant has three attempts to make it to the final. The fastest to clear the race gets an extra attempt in the final against our final adversary,” she gestured at Hermi, “and you can work together if you all make it that far. No swimming above the obstacle trench or you lose an attempt.”

“You’re doing it too?” Kostas asked his mother.

“I am.”

Kostas and Adara shared a glance, suddenly much more relieved. Facing Hermi with just the two of them was too intimidating to even consider. With Danae and Claudia, they may have a chance. The former vizier pretended not to notice and swam to the mid-way point to observe. Claudia formed her sand dragon, then Danae. Kostas was proud to see that she had accepted his eel-shape as a superior design, but instead of flippers Danae’s had stunted claws with long nails, and its maw was a horrifying circle of row upon row of teeth. 

“Mom!” 

“You’ll see.” She smiled. 

“Oldest first!”

Claudia grinned at Hermi’s shout, and summoned her dragon into being. It was slightly smaller than yesterday, but still large enough that it would be an inch from the narrowest sections of rock. The other contestants swam up to observe the first dragon as it went through the obstacle course, cheering for Claudia. The old sorceress was still probably their best chance at beating Hermi. The large dragon dashed through the obstacle course with a cocky whip of its tail, occasionally using its claws to bounce off the walls and spiral through the water. This backfired when it got to the cluster of loppies who had gathered around the remaining snacks. It flared its wings once, trying to intimidate them out of the way since going above the maze was against the rules, but one of the loppies whacked the sand creature with its tail without noticing its threat display. The dragon was slammed into the cliff wall and crumbled. 

“Bubbles!” Claudia scolded.

“Reset!” Hermi shouted.

With a rueful grin for getting caught in her own trap, the sorceress resummoned her creation, and this time cleared the obstacle course easily once the loppy cluster was disbanded by a wave of fresh treats.

Next up was Danae, whose sleek dragon easily ran through the obstacles. Adara and Kostas watched carefully, memorizing the path she had taken. Kostas’ small dragon was more maneuverable than Danae’s with its flippers, and it raced through the obstacles without having to slow for a second. He grinned at everyone smugly, he must have been the fastest up to this point. When it was her turn, Adara tried to mimic the path, but her chubbly dragon was less maneuverable so she had to slow down to take the same sharp turns. Still, she cleared it on the first attempt and high-fived Kostas.

“Fastest gets to use their extra life against the final boss first. Congratulations Kostas, you get to face Hermi first.” Claudia reminded him, much to his consternation. 

Hermi nodded, a mischievous twinkle in her eye as she cast the spell in front of the others for the first time. A dragon slowly rose from the sand, its body long like a giant serpent’s, but it had shoulder blades and hips. Long sinewy legs extended from those points, the paws webbed up to the sharp numbs of nail at the ends. Its tail extended twice the length of its body up to its hind legs, a wide fin at its end. Instead of a simple eel’s jaw, it had a giant skull with horned frill, with more sharp nubs framing the top, and its sharp teeth were the size of Kostas’ leg. The four hydromancers stared at the apparition in awe for a moment, long enough to notice that the whiskers at the dragon’s nose swayed with the sea water, then abruptly moved independently. Kostas and Adara exchanged a glance, then glanced at Danae. The woman shook her head, she had not mentioned this event to Hermi. The three then glanced at Claudia, who looked like she may be regretting her choice to invite Hermi to this ‘training event’.

“Kostas.” Hermi reminded the boy. 

He sent his dragon forward bravely. It swam up to the behemoth and tried to wrap itself around a leg like it had done to Adara’s, but the prehensile whisker on the dragon’s mouth smacked it into the ground before it could reach its foreleg. It crumbled.

Danae tried next. Her dragon went around Hermi’s swimming as quickly as it could to reach its hindlegs, but the serpentine tail whipped around sharply, smashing the dragon to pieces in mid-swim. Adara and Claudia just shook their heads, their dragons were way too slow to have a different result one-on-one. With two remaining attempts for the women, and three attempts for the youths, they had to think about their approach.

“We’re going to have to work together.” Adara whispered. 

“Hermi, pretend to be deaf for a few minutes, please!” Claudia shouted.

Hermi sighed, but turned her back and pretended to inspect her dragon for imperfections. Her lips twisted into a small smile as she wondered what strategy her opponents would come up with. Claudia had promised to follow the younger Jiolan’s lead when they had talked about arranging this event. It would be a test for the sorceress’ pride to not suggest this trick or that.

Five minutes later, they were ready. Kostas’ and Danae’s dragons darted forward, twisting to either side of the behemoth just out of range of its whiskers and claws. Adara and Claudia’s approached warily, darting forward just long enough to test the range of the tail. Adara’s was briefly sucked into the vacuum created by a sharp whip of Hermi’s tail, but Claudia’s grabbed it and the dragon pair barreled out of the way of a follow-up kick.

Hermi frowned as she glanced back at the front of the dragon. Danae’s was missing, yet her hydromancy had not revealed that her dragon had hit anything. Where had it gone? But then Kostas’ dragon went on the attack again, it grabbed a whisker and gave it a sharp yank before releasing, annoying the dragon into trying to bite the smaller creature in half. It crumbled, but Adara’s vengefully bashed into the large dragon’s side and stunned it for a second, allowing Claudia’s to bite its hind ankle and leave a gaping hole of sand before it recovered. Hermi’s dragon thrashed, whirling to go after the slower pair, but Kostas had already reformed his and he bound the free hind leg to make the dragon drift closer to the sea floor. 

Then Danae’s dragon emerged from the sandy bottom, a loose pit of sand that whirled as the sandy teeth tore apart the previous structure to make an even deeper pit. With Kostas’, Danae’s suddenly grabbed the forelegs, and Claudia’s whapped the face of the dragon with its wings, the flared expanse blinding its peripheral vision. It tore off one of the wings, but Danae’s dragon bored through a foreleg in time to distract it from finishing off the large dragon. Hermi’s dragon thrashed in anger, but it could not release itself from Kostas’ hold and Danae carved through its other foreleg, making it tumble into the pit. 

Hermi gave a pleased ‘oh’ as she saw Claudia’s and Adara’s dragon plummet from high above her creation, obviously intent on its spine. She considered whapping them out of existence with the tail, but then went to attack her tethers instead. The combined weight and momentum of Claudia and Adara’s dragon slammed into the sandy behemoth’s spine. The two smaller dragons crumbled, but so did their opponent.

“We did it!” Kostas and Adara cheered as they hugged each other, then Danae, then Claudia, then each other again. Finally, they attacked Hermi with their cheer. 

As Kostas and Adara swam away triumphantly with Danae, intent on a celebratory snack, Claudia swam over to Hermi and gently pulled on a small strand of the older Jiolan’s hair.

“You took it easy on them.”

“It was a good strategy. We wanted them to think as a team.” Hermi answered vaguely. “It is better that they feel success together than struggle apart, and they realized that almost immediately.”

“They are a good team.” 

What rests deep in the ocean? Mermaids? Monsters? Magic? All that and more.

Far below where any human can survive, there is a kingdom called Jiol. Kostas is a 14-year-old sorcerer who resides there with his mother and friends, but it is not their home. A home is filled with love, not fear and death. It is merely where they try to survive while the royal guards, the Patrollers, constantly raid the village. They kill anyone with tails, webbing, or fins—anyone who mutated for this underwater existence.

What rests deep in the ocean? Mermaids? Monsters? Magic? All that and more.

Far below where any human can survive, there is a kingdom called Jiol. Kostas is a 14-year-old sorcerer who resides there with his mother and friends, but it is not their home. A home is filled with love, not fear and death. It is merely where they try to survive while the royal guards, the Patrollers, constantly raid the village. They kill anyone with tails, webbing, or fins—anyone who mutated for this underwater existence.