It's only through effort and practice that Araceli doesn't laugh. "It won't bite, I swear it. There are no sharks in the rum."
As if to prove the point, she takes a long healthy swallow of her own as she listens, still scarcely able to wrap her mind around such a thing. "We used to be able to go between water and land easy as we pleased, then whatever caused the sundering? Anyone on the land was on the land then and could only dive for as long as they had breath in their lungs and enough to get back to the surface. Those in the water...we see glimpses. Merfolk that come when a person is drowning to take them home, storm hags that lash the land and water with lightning, sirens that sing so sweetly you won't shed a single tear when the hull splits on the rocks. I don't think we ever had immortality, not like you. When we die we go back to where we truly came from and we'll live out the rest of our lives beneath the waves."
What happens after that is less clear, Araceli wants it to be a surprise.
"You're doing better than Sina and we tried her on watered down honeyed wine," she teases, "but it's an acquired taste. I started as an infant so my mother could get some sleep unless it was a rare night when my father's ship was in the port."
no subject
As if to prove the point, she takes a long healthy swallow of her own as she listens, still scarcely able to wrap her mind around such a thing. "We used to be able to go between water and land easy as we pleased, then whatever caused the sundering? Anyone on the land was on the land then and could only dive for as long as they had breath in their lungs and enough to get back to the surface. Those in the water...we see glimpses. Merfolk that come when a person is drowning to take them home, storm hags that lash the land and water with lightning, sirens that sing so sweetly you won't shed a single tear when the hull splits on the rocks. I don't think we ever had immortality, not like you. When we die we go back to where we truly came from and we'll live out the rest of our lives beneath the waves."
What happens after that is less clear, Araceli wants it to be a surprise.
"You're doing better than Sina and we tried her on watered down honeyed wine," she teases, "but it's an acquired taste. I started as an infant so my mother could get some sleep unless it was a rare night when my father's ship was in the port."