Arron Murphy could not believe how fortunate he was to be accepted to

that university. The one that was near the beach that had the perfect
lagoon for racing rowing sculls. This was the same university that was
known for the number of buxom beauties that seemed to exist in all the
sororities, and worked the shops and cafes and bars in the nearby mall.
There was the smell of fall in the air, brick and granite buildings.
University lawns idyllic to the inlet that lead to the lagoon The
perfect mix of a mediterranean climate and a classic ivy covered ageless
institution. Arron was exited, Not only one he selected for the frat
house that had the most members of the racing team, He was picked to be
the next Coxswain by none other than Buck Hickam himself.
Buck had attended the cross town rival preparatory school. He was a few
years older than Arron. Arron had never won a race against him. Now
they were to be team mates. Buck was going to take him under wing and
train him to be his successor. There was however one catch.
Buck always bet the new initiates, that they might meet a mermaid, after
the first trials were over and the crews selected, this would also be the
location where they would have a swim and a bit of a getting to know each
other party. To make the deal more fair that it was not a set up, the
location was to be secret. This way no one could put on a costume and
swim past the club.
"You mean merman?" asked Arron.
"Tradition has it to be a mermaid." Buck put emphasis on the word maid.
Look bud, I did this myself when I became captain and Coxswain. It is
all in good fun. There is a fabric store in the mall that has the
perfect fabric for the tail. They pretend to not know what it is for,
but they get the right stuff anyway.
Now here's the trick, You get ready at the old abandoned boathouse, on
the estuary to the inlet to the lagoon. Have a waterproof case for your
mobile. I'll text you the gps coordinates where to swim too.
Now Arron was an up and comer. His frat was also one of those who
produced the leaders of tomorrow, today. People who were going to do
something in the world. Unlike the old boy frat that sometime held weird
costume parties with the sororities. This boarding house collective was
was into tech. In most ways it was not even a traditional frat. It was
more of a maker/hacker communal space. None of that greek letter stuff.
This was about pure science and engineering.
Arron was a perfectionist. He watched a number of You-Tube vids on how
to be a mermaid. Others were on how to make up to look like a doll with
big eyes, by using toriodial contacts lenses. Arron likes a challenge,
and these were cheap, and came with a kit that had all the stuff needed
to cosplay one's favorite anime character, a search on his mobile
indicated that these would be available in the local mall, which also
shipped mail order worldwide, Click now pick up in person.
Arron saw that the name of the shop was something like Spells R Online.
Arron clicked the order. There was also a listing, under the "people
also added to the cart header," for a water resistant mermaid wig and
glue, with remover. Arron liked to keep his hair short, almost shaved.
His face was a bit on the effeminate side, so he felt the skinhead look
suited him. Usually he wore a straw boater or some other classic
chapeau, which helped give that preppy look. He liked polo shirts and

tweed jackets. Arron clicked the add coupon code for the wig.
Arron thought the mall looked a bit rundown. It had recently changed
ownership several times. Supposedly it was now part of a large Hong Kong
real estate conglomerate. A whole wing of the mall was being demolished.
This was being replaced by a strip mall with high density housing in the
upper floors. The big department store anchor had been bought by the
competitor, then closed several years later. The new stuff looked like
it was made with a cookie cutter, Or a kid making sandcastles on the
beach.
Arron searched the maze that made up the mall for the fabric store. He
thought it was in the old part that was being updated. A collection of
vertical delineators were tied together with caution tape. These are the
weighted orange plastic tubes that are often seen around construction
sites; but no one knows the name of. Some of the caution tape had come
off one of the delineators folded over onto itself. This made the tape
look like a string. Arron picked this up to attach it back to the thin
wobbly orange post, with the phallic looking knob on the top. The tape
would not attach to the knob as intended. He felt compelled to follow the
loose caution tape. It lead through twists and turns, where the new
construction bordered the worn down seedy parts of the mall.
The delineators ended In a part of the mall, he did not quite remember.
There was a shop with the name of the place to pick up the cosplay kit
and bonus wig. This part of the mall looked a bit dark. Like it was lit
by torches and open flame brazers out of the corner of the eye or behinds
ones back. The light seemed to flicker. The door was made of wood.
Like the torches he though there was some sort of diamond leaded glass
windows like would be on a fairy tail cottage. Was there was a thatched
roof? Above the roof there was a sign proclaiming:
SPELLS R US.
Letting go of the caution tape, Arron opened the door. A bell rang.
There was a familiar cosy feel to the shop. Merchandise was arranged
haphazardly onto plain wooden shelves. One shelf held nothing but
seashells, On another were fishnets, both for catching fish and wearing
on the leg as stockings, Next to this among the corks, starfish, sea
horses, and dive weights were bottles that looked like they held
perfumes and other rare and costly liquids. Some looked like case
bottles, and others old wine and rum bottles, all looked hand blown or
made from a cast iron mold with the seams showing.
Behind the counter was an array of beach paraphernalia, umbrellas in
ludicrous striped patterns. Buckets and shovels that the children of E.
Nesbit would use on an outing the the beach in Edwardian England.
Swimsuits of dated and past vintage were on the racks. Another case held
nautical instruments, Sextons, theodolites, slide rules, and for some
strange reason, a barber chair. Arron was not quite sure how the latter
even fit into the case.
Arron Murphy, One mermaid cosplay kit and bonus wig and waterproof glue
and remover, said the man behind the counter. He was wearing a classic
19th century diving suit with a big brass helmet. The next moment he was
wearing a robe and wizards hat.
"How did you know, ... oh you got it from the near field RFID on my
mobile."

"Arron, I am a wizard." The wizard waved his hand, then mumbled,

"Technology, it used to be magic."
Continuing the wizard said, "Oh nice, you prepaid through your phone
account. I really do like spellPay, make it much easier than what is
under your hat. By the way nice hat, I'd like to get one of those
someday. Always had a soft spot for an art deco concourse 'd elegance."
Arron's package was on the counter.
"There you are. All set. You may notice some discomfort when the water
activates the gel glue for the inside the wig cap. If you rinse with
included remover it should come off with no problems.
"Now is there anything else I can get you?" asked the wizard.
"Can you direct me to plainMOd fabrics and crafts, I need to get some
fabric to make the tail," answered Arron.
"Oh you can get that here, even better I already have one made up. You
may have noticed we are having a fall special on nautical themed items
and Pirate booty. I am surprised you did not order the one on the web
site." The wizard mumbled something to himself, Arron though it sounded
like search profile parameters.
"I though it a bit too expensive for a one off gag. Under the water no
one sees the tail clearly anyway, as long as it flows."
"Tell you what, I'll trade you that classic hat for the tail," suggested
the wizard.
Arron though for a moment, then said, "Why not, Saves a trip to the other
store, I never liked the political view that the owner of plainMOd
crafts tweets anyway."
The wizard held up the rubber mermaid tail.
"This tail is made from a special merskin translucent latex. Ultralight
and will hold up to the abuse of being brushed against rocks or the rough
bottoms of swimming pools. It is stretchy and will conform the body to
appear as half ichthyoid."
The wizard added a bottle to the package already on the counter.
"Be sure to use this special sea rose lubricant to help pull the tail on,
Failing to do so may make it difficult or impossible to get off."
The wizard continued the warning,
"I also advise against swimming in the
rather competitive place, and a lot of
and into the night. be sure and be out
cave, at sundown. And while and early
not recommend it. "

tail after dark.

marine life tend
of the water, or
dawn swim can be

The sea can be a

to feed at dusk
in a protected
tempting, I do

Arron thanked the wizard and looked once again over the items in the
shop. In the window, that would be if the shop had windows, was a statue
of a Minotaur, half man half bull. Arron wondered were he had seen this
before.

Once home, Arron watched the online videos, how to put on the makeup and
toroidal contacts. Feeling satisfied, he downloaded these to the mobile.
Double checking that he had the complete kit Arron went to the
abandoned boathouse.
He thought he had plenty of time to spare. Once in the boathouse he
found a wooden crate to sit on. Using the camera in the Mobile, this now
acted like a mirror and guided him with the makeup. There was also for
some strange reason a mirror with a crack in the lower right corner that
went up at an angle about 8 inches or so.
Even with these tutorials, time passed in random fashion. Arron's first
reaction was to put on the tail and try it out. Get in some practice
swims. The face in the Mobile and the mirror looked a bit cartoonish.
The tricks worked, his eyes did look bigger and were a completely
different color.. Under his clothing he and managed to put on the swim
bikini. patterned with fish scales and the shell pattered bikini top.
Surprisingly these had actually fit.
The tail seemed to be made out of some sort of high quality rubber. It
was really stretchy. The outside was patterned with fine fish scales.
This was colored in a somewhat natural color that seemed to catch the
light and refract it into a color, that while not grey was a bit of gold,
blue and green.
Having heard stories, Arron carefully followed the instructions. He used
the special lubricant, which made the tail easy to slide on. This was
gong to be his first practice swim. For this swim, he did not put on the
wig. Nothing really happened, He slipped into the water and sort of
splashed around getting the feel of the rubber tail. How his legs were
held together by the fabric. Feeling that he had practiced enough, Arron
returned to the jetty and hoisted himself onto the dock. He found the
seam at the waist and the tail slipped off.
Next was to try the wig. There were instructions to lather the gel glue
into the hair. Arron did not have much hair, so he rubbed int onto his
scalp. Checking the time on his mobile, he saw that the time was running
late. As he had already put the lubricant on when he tried out the tail,
He did not bother to apply more. It looked like the bottle was empty.
He threw both bottles in the bag into the abandoned shed. His mobile he
placed next to the plank on the jetty.
This time the tail did not seem to slip on so easy. He managed to get
his feet into the pockets of the monofin. Then with effort, slide the
tail over his legs. As his fingers pulled at the fish scales, it almost
felt like the scales were alive and attaching themselves to his skin.
Time was running short. With a strong grunt, Arron pulled the last part
of the tail over the bikini swim bottom.
Arron felt a slight tingle in his groin. This tingle went down to the
tips of his ankles, like an electric shock. He was well aware that
mermaids do not have Vaginas. That part of the anatomy being fish.
Having heard that the weird store in the mall had a reputation for
turning college students and professors into buxom bimbos. Arron felt
that at least he would not have to worry about having female vagina when
he transformed back.
Slowly the shifting started. Instead of inflating his hips shrunk down
Smaller than the thickness of a child's wrist. Watching it was like

seeing a balloon deflate. Most unexpected. His now erect member

pulsating protruding bulge under the fish scale patterns of the bikini
bottom His waist now no bigger than al child's wrist. The pulsing
member made a strange bulge, then began to shrink into itself. The
scrotum pulled tight underneath. He was going to be a realistic looking
mermaid with the sex organs of a female fish.
Somehow he had always imagined mermaids had the hips of a woman with the
leg bones fused together or extended into vertebrae. Instead the whole
lower half of his body below the now tiny hips shrunk down and flowed
into the large fluke, the muscles, and tendons knitting together into the
ribs of the powerful tail tip. The fluke was completely prehensile in
ways Arron had not guessed at.
Above the diminutive fish bones that had once been his hips, legs and
feet, new fish vertebrae and hundreds of tiny fish ribs wrapped about his
liver kidneys and intestines. These elongated under a network of
ichthyoidian muscle that extended into the parts of the tail where one
would have expected thighs of a more mammalian creature. Only his
stomach remained above the transition between human and fish. A new
organ formed from what had been the appendix. Arron felt and would
discover that this was a swim bladder. That would be used to maintain a
neutral buoyancy.
Then a burning sensation happened in his throat. Something felt wrong,
his nose was still connected to his lungs. What was happening to his
mouth and esophagus. New muscles, tendons and connections formed around
his vocal coords, that would allow him to still talk, and make sounds
underwater. Each breath through the nose he took, seemed shallower like
his lungs were contracting and merging together shrinking into half
their space.
Something in his flat chest began to build up. Under the seashell print
of the bikini swim top, The areola of his nipples swelled to the size of
large coins and pressed through the flimsy fabric.. Then a hard
calcified pattern matching the top merged into his skin. As the
transmutation progressed, this developed growth lines like a scalloped
sea shell. Arron had not realized that mermaids could not remove their
bra tops, That this was an exoskeleton covering the intakes for the
gills he was now growing. Grow this did, The new structure must be at
least a D cup, with deep cleavage hiding the flesh colored scales that
were the intake to his new fish gills,. A fine moss like growth below
the shells that were now firmly part of his body protecting the outtake
of the gills.
In horror, that he was
need to get wet, soon,
oxygen in the air. The
nerves on the fish part
pull himself to the end
quite as planned.

becoming a fish, he realized that he was going to

the new gill tissue was reacting to the rarefied
scales on the tail were fully connected to the
of his flesh With great effort, Arron managed to
of the jetty, then flip into the water. Not

Now he knew that the tail was the real deal, that he was in fact half
fish. Why had this not done it before? As he reached out to push
against the planks of the dock, the slenderness of his arms took a
moment to comprehend. There was also some slight, almost invisible
webbing at the base of his now decidedly female fingers. The arms still
had power to lift, but they were delicate in shape and form.
On hitting the water, there was a fierce burning in his scalp, like the

wig was melting into his head. Some toupee glue. The wizard had warned
him that the super gel was water activated.
Many times Arron had entered the water, or fallen off the shell skull.
As much as he liked water and being around it, the shock of the water
always bothered him. Gulping like the fish he now was he felt the water
rush into and fill the gill tissue. The new muscles in the back of his
throat reflexively closed. Then the water disappeared, he felt dry.
Like he was floating in free fall.
His vision blurred for a moment, then the world came clear. Had he been
able to see his face, His eyes were much bigger, That the Anime contacts
had become real and the makeup used to make his eyes look larger merged
into the actual tissues and structures of his face. What had once been
human skin had changed to some sort of fibrous material. It still
reflected light as skin does, but it was more open and less hydroscopic.
Would not puff and wrinkle as one does too long in the water.
No transformation is ever really complete, as long as we live, and
continue to age. This one had reached a plateau. Arron was a mermaid.
As true a mermaid as ever existed.
Flexing the new mussels in his tail, and instinctively adjusting his
buoyancy, he, or to quote Orlando, she pushed towards the ceiling that
was the sky. Breaking free of the tension at the surface, It felt like
she had stuck her hand into the nozzle of a large vacuum cleaner. Her
gills now full of water, the nasal passages opened and she could breath
once again. It was an entirely new sensation. Powerful. The new fish
genitals tingled at the base of her fluke as she pushed back to the
jetty. Hiking herself up onto the edge of the dock, tail still in the
water she was able to recover her mobile.
So much for additional time to experiment and practice, this time she was
running late. Had the outfit been simply a costume, it would have been
impossibly exhausting. Now phone in hand, in it's water proof case, she
entered the GPS coordinates and swam to the rendezvous point where Buck
new crew would be waiting for the initiation ritual. Holding the phone
in one hand, she guided herself through the inlet of the estuary into the
lagoon.
Everything went according to plan. She swam up to the bottom of the
shell and gave it a few taps with her tail. It was still strange not to
feel the density and pressure of the water. More akin to a soft breeze
and stiff wind. The party was in full swing. She flipped over on her
back and lazily swam past buck and the other crew member on the shell.
Buck was in stitches laughing. "Well I'll be boys, we have a mermaid off
the port bow," he called out to the crew. "Pay up, and Greet our new
found friend. Arron, you outdid yourself, most initiates just put on a
mono-fin and a cloth tail. You certainly take the cake. Guess you will
make coxswain after all."
"Come on in the water is fine." Was that really her voice? With only
half a lung and that primarily to work the human vocal tract, she was
taken aback at how high and girlish it seemed to be. Almost a musical,
yet abrasive quality to it.
If Buck noticed the falsetto he did not act on it, instead the whole
shell tipped over at his command with a bit of help from the mermaid that
was formerly Arron. The splashed around and played water games. It was
a great party. Arron was the hit of the event, No one could really

believe it was actually Arron in the mermaid costume. She was able to
prove herself by knowing all the details of who was whom and how they
reacted to each other. When anyone asked why she was continuing to speak
falsetto, she would reply technology. After all it was sort of a
wearable tech that she had on, even if it was magic.
The students lost track of time. The sun grew low in the sky. With some
effort The former Arron remembered the wizards warning not to swim after
sunset. Gotta go, she said. Buck offered to swim back with her. "That
tail costume, must weigh a ton," he remarked.
"No, I will be fine," her new melodic voice warned him.
"Nonsense, I need the workout. Brian, you are now acting cox." He
looked at the mermaid. I can not really call you Arron, How about I
call you Ariadne as you lead he way back." It was not a question.
"I said, I was fine, You go back with the crew," said the newly
christened Ariadne. "I have a powerful tail, that can propel me as fast
if not faster than the shell."
"Sorry, As your cox and captan, I can not let you swim alone, you have
been in that getup all day. You must be exhausted."
Ariadne looked down at the water surface. "If you insist." She dove
down and revered her mobile from under the rock ledge, where she stashed
it. "But you have to carry my phone back, as this outfit has no
pockets."
She really did not know what would happen when she attempted to take off
the tail. The changes were much more than she had expected. It had
taken quite a bit of time for the fish parts to grow out of the human
parts. The reversal time must be accounted for. The orb of the sun was
just starting to touch the horizon. She could wait no longer. Buck was
a strong swimmer, he would slow her down. It would be necessary to swim
at his pace as she could not abandon him, now that the crew had followed
orders and was halfway to the opposite side of the lagoon.
The slow swim would help her get more aquatinted with the new fish parts
of her body. She was also more aware of the life under the sea. The
lagoon was coming alive. In the swim over, she had noticed a few fish
here and there, now she was aware of the bottom dwellers. The murky
parts of the water looked more like clouds and mist. She was also aware
of sounds and vibrations that went well beyond hearing. With each flip
of her new fish body it felt more like flying than swimming.
While playing with the crew, she had allowed a few of the members to
brush up against her tail. It was a different sensation. Thrilling.
Especially when Buck accidentally brushed his hand against the sensitive
part at the impossibly small base of her fluke where the fishy sex
organs were. Now what had once been her legs shrunk down into tiny fish
bones and her feet and extended toes almost 1/5 of her full body length.
Her mind could ripple through these in the most fantastical of ways.
Two thirds of the way to the abandoned boat house, Buck began to tire.
The sun had set, there was still a fair amount of twilight. Ariadne
slowed down and broke the surface. They had been swimming close to the
shore. It was shallow enough for Buck to stand up. His feet sank into
the soft muddy bottom oozing up between his toes. The bank was heavily
vegetated and over hung the inlet. Everything had orange and purple

tinges to them. The sky was still an intense blue. White wispy clouds
were in the distance.
"You really seem to be able to hold your breath. I had always taken you
for a bit of a wimp, when we competed against each other. Now that we
are on the same team, I can not believe you lost so many races."
Something slithered past Bucks leg. "Did you feel that? Oh I forgot you
are wearing a rubber tail. There is something swimming down there.
Let's get moving."
Back in the channel, the currents seemed to increase. It was more
comfortable for Ariadne to swim under the surface. She still wanted to
keep the illusion that she needed to breath. The current in her mermaid
state, felt like a genteel breeze as it swept across her body. the
breeze became a wind that began to pick up into the force of an even
stronger wind. The inlet to the estuary was tidal, and they were
swimming against the tide.
When her head dipped below the surface, she was aware of shadows and
shapes. Large ones things in the sea that hunt at night. It was now
night. Buck was not doing too well. The shore at the point was
overgrown and too hard to reach. They were being swept by the tide into
the deeper part of the estuary. Buck's energy was failing. His once
powerful strokes were dwindling into a survival treading of the water. A
dog paddle. His legs were not moving.
Ariadne knew the symptoms of drowning. She told herself not to panic.
To her the tide was gusty like a gale force wind. Her powerful tail
could hold her against it. Buck was starting to slip below the surface.
His reflex caused him to black out. His arms drifted out into the classic
drowned man pose.
"I am a mermaid," thought Ariadne, "I can do this." She grabbed Buck by
his waist and swam with all her might. They could not make the inlet,
there was a secluded beach that they could reach. Her prehensile tail
pushed against the wind that was the current of the tide. Sheer
determination pressed her to ignore the black shadows that seemed to be
seeking out a simple snack or two.
The shallows made it hard for her to pull him, so she pushed Buck up onto
the beach. Herself she lay beside him. Exhausted. She pushed him as
far onto the sand as she could. It was the first time since she was out
of the water since she became a mermaid. Buck was beside her breathing
what water he had swallowed he had coughed out. The sky was ablaze with
stars. It was still early enough that a new moon hung low in the west.
It reflected along the lagoon. There was color in the view. Subdued
subtle colors of the night.
Fully out of the water Ariadne reached down to the merge between the
human looking part of her torso, and the fish part. The scales were
alive. She attempted to slip her fingernail into the gap to remove the
tail. There was no gap. She tugged and pulled on it as best she could..
She reached up to see if the wig would come off. The glue "remover" was
still at the abandoned boathouse in the bag by the jetty. She regretted
that she had not used the "lubricant" to put on the tail. The wizards
waring about swimming after dark was just that. Friendly advice. His
little trick was to include the tail lubricant. Without it using it,
she would be a mermaid as long as this body existed.

There was nothing else to do. She could not stay dry. Slipping down to
the waterline, she let the wave lap over her. Parts of he slept through
the night. The formerly human parts. The fish parts did what fish parts
do. She realized that she was going to be hungry in the morning. Before
break of dawn, she slipped into the water and set out in search for food.
The hunted became the hunter. She also learned that, there were small
things in the water, planktons, algae, that she had been ingesting that
helped sustain her.
Not venturing far, she would check on the sleeping Buck between her
exploratory foraging expeditions. In doing so she found a convenient
outcropping that she could lay on to watch over him. The waves would
break across this as she sat upon her curled prehensile tail. Evoking the
image painted and sculpted by artists throughout the ages. The dawn
reviled a secluded beach. Buck awoke shortly after the first light.
Af first he looked disoriented. Then he saw Ariadne. On the rock
outcropping. She was still tugging at the separation between fish and
human. Hoping he would not notice.
"Why are you still in your tail?" It was not really a question. "I
should have known, You must have gone to that shop in the mall, The one
that seems to produce an extraordinary number of buxom beauties."
A small wave swept across them both. She looked up with her big
expansive eyes. She had no words to say. Deep in her heart she could
hear the siren song calling out.
Buck sat down, in the soft sand as another wave flowed around him. "You
see, my name was once Brenda, I was naturally a Buxom beauty, and had
been taught the wrong things in life, about the gift I was given. I
wanted to compete. There was one thing I could no do an that was to
swim. So I found that little shop, and though I would be the next Ethel
Merman. He certainly likes his little jokes, Quick, into the water
someone is coming "
Behind the fern bracken at the edge of the beach was a floating beach
umbrella, in the most hideous striped pattern. Below this carrying a
wicker basket. Was a man in sunglasses, wearing a bathrobe and a
wizards hat. He planted the umbrella into the sand at a rakish angle.
From the basket, he pulled out a stripped beach chair, much to big to
have fit. Now he was wearing Arron's straw boater. The stripes on the
beach chair clashing with the umbrella. Removing his bathrobe, he was
wearing only his boxers in the appropriate Hawaiian print, his dark
glasses and straw hat. He sat down in the chair, then pulled out an
even more hideous beach towel which he laid down at the base of the beach
chair, Then unpacked all sort of beach toys, pails, buckets and stuff
for building sandcastles. These were all laid out in mathematical order.
The last thing he pulled out was the latest summer bestselling
blockbuster novel.
It was evident that he was here to enjoy the day at the secluded beach.
A moment or two after settling in he looked over to the rocky outcropping
where Ariadne and buck were hiding.
"Why Hello there, nice to see a few sea creatures decided to stop by."
Buck/Brenda, I have your selkie skin. You will not be able to be Brenda
again, but I think that you have learned your lesson, to be careful what
you wish for.

"Ariadne, my dear Ariadne Clearlake, where will you lead us to this time.
Actually I have left a string line, for you to follow. It leads to a
nearby sea cave, which will make you a nice home. There are also three
wrecked ships in the area, from different eras, where you will find all
that you need to decorate it. Your time will be rather busy I am
afraid, as you have a job to do. Which is to prevent some of the college
students from drowning. You see some of them, who come to me for my,"he
cleared his throat and it was hard to make out what he said," sometime do
not have the brightest, intellect. Not that I had anything to do with
it, naturally."
The wizard pulled the skin from the bag and gave it to Buck. Who had no
choice but to put it on and become a bull seal. The wizard returned to
his beach chair and book. He looked up from it, lifted the shades from
his eyes and said, "Oh one, more thing, You will like this. Naturally
in this state, you can not be together. However, as per the standard
magical boilerplate, taken as read, you both take your human form, for
the three days when the moon is full."
It was evident that the wizard had nothing more to say. Dipping under
the waves Ariadne felt for the string, It was just as the wizard
promised, It lead to the cave and the three ships, The string also
continued to lead on. Back to the secluded beach. Ariadne peeked up
above the ceiling that was now her sky. The wizard was on the beach,
singing to himself some sea shanty, like a little kid building a
sandcastle, with turrets and a moat, for some strange reason the castle
looked a lot like a shopping mall.