[Kalypso]

The warm sea breeze, the smell of salt in the air, the sound of the waves as they crashed against the shoreline. It calmed her soul in a way that words and comforting touches never could. It reached inside of the heart of her and soothed her spirit. All of her cares and worries seemed to melt away in the face of the vast, infinite horizon. Kalypso came closer to the waters edge, feeling the coolness of the wet sand beneath her toes and then the chilling rush of water as it swept around her paws. She couldn't help but smile down at the water, happiness blossoming inside of her to chase away the darkness that tried to wrap around her  mind. 

Calmly, confidently, she padded forward until the waves lapped at her chest. The coldness of the water was enough to make her gasp in surprise but not enough to take her breath away. The strong push of the ocean threatened to topple her over but she dug in her paws and held her ground. This was a familiar game that she and the sea played together, one of her favorites. Would she win or be pulled down?When the wave passed she pushed forward until her feet left the ocean floor, and she swam. 

Another wave began to cress and Kally took a huge gulp of air before she ducked her head and dove beneath it, feeling the water rush around her and then it was still again. She swam parallel to the beach to a calm spot of water protected by a small outcropping of rock and cliff. Here the water wasn't nearly as brutal as the waves near the shore were. Down beneath the surface she went again, tilting her head back until her body followed slowly behind in a leisurely spiral. Kalypso danced and she moved with a grace that was lost while she was ashore. Doing acrobatic flips and tricks between breaks for air her heart soared and she truly felt alive. 

She was one with the ocean. 

But even sea goddesses have their limitations and she was about to run out of energy so using the last of her stamina she headed back towards the beach. When she reached the shore she pulled herself from the water slowly, letting her body readjust to being on land again. She hated this part. Her body was water logged plus it had become so use to the buoyancy of the water that she felt ten times heavier than she normally did. It almost felt as if someone had turned the gravity way up. Kalypso shook her pelt to shed a few pounds of water before collapsing into the sand, not caring that it would stick to her wet fur. A quick dip would wash it away anyhow. 

She loved the sand in her fur. The warmth of the sun on her pelt began to dry her and the ocean whispered its songs. Kalyspo would have fallen asleep if it hadn't been for the sound of sand crunching beneath paws as someone approached. The young Navigator lifted her head to peer up at her new companion, lifting a paw to brush away most of the sand from her face to see who it was.

"Hey! Wanna swim?"

T R O U T

Like her adopted sister, Triteia was completely spellbound by her new home. Where she had once been reluctant to leave their old territory, the change in environment removed her from all the reminders that tormented her; the lingering stink of ash that resurfaced during windy days, the accursed Ash Forest that served as the graveyard for both childhood and sisterhood, and the lake that had once been used as their refuge from the flames. The new territory was so widely disparate that there was no comparing the two homelands. The sun, the trees, the ocean. Fathomless waters that spanned further than the eye could reach. It was new. It was interesting. It was unspeakably, inexplicably precious to her.

Seeing Eros die on the beach, maimed beyond recognition by some bloodthirsty beast from the ocean depths, had served as a sobering reminder of their new home's unpredictability, but remarkably, the experience did not compound Triteia's existing trauma in the same way that Raikov's outburst, the wildfire, and Baal's betrayal had. Either way, she was careful to avoid that particular stretch of shoreline, and she eyed the furthest reaches of the ocean with a newfound degree of caution. But she still returned, undeterred - and though she couldn't completely rid herself of the memory of that wretched day, her fascination with the beach was unspoiled.

Triteia padded along radiant white sands, the tide rolling in and out like the earth's palpable heartbeat. Strewn among the sand were tiny, crystalline seashells and prismatic fragments that seemed to glitter in the sunlight, like hidden shards of some great shattered mirror. Sometimes Triteia would find tiny, gelatinous blobs washed ashore that she would tease with her paw, and sometimes, from her vantage point on the beach, she could glimpse little fish flitting in and out of sight within the shallows. She knew that deeper into the ocean, there was a kaleidoscopic tangle of brilliant neon colors that fish easily gravitated to, but she had yet to investigate it, and had only seen it from afar.

Coming to the ocean relaxed her, and the beach was a short distance from her hut. It was a harmonic arrangement. She could smell the sea salt through the dilapidated walls of her home, and it soothed her. Triteia wasn't the only one who came to admire the ocean, as she often encountered many a stranger wandering the beach, but today, she recognized a familiar face lounging like a starfish in the sand. Her mood brightened at the sight of her adoptive sister, and she quickly rushed to greet her.

"'Hoy!" Triteia crowed, skidding to a stop. If she inadvertently happened to track sand all over the prone young woman, she'd grimace apologetically through her shit-eating grin, her distinctly mischievous look sabotaging her sincerity. "Oi Kaly, what're ya up ta?"

She invited Triteia to swim with her. Triteia chanced a glance at the ocean. The waters appeared deceptively peaceful; a tranquil blue shade near identical to the sisters' shared turquoise hues. She faltered, remembering Eros's heaving half-corpse on the beach.

Looking at the ocean from a distance was radically different from wading into it. She thought briefly of formulating an excuse -- but determined not to humiliate herself in the eyes of her impressionable younger sister, Triteia banished that kernel of uncertainty with a victorious grin. "Yer on," she said. "Lemme jes' take care a' this."

This, meaning the hand-crafted tail attached to her body, which she was loathe to sully through any exertion. After surveying the beach for any would-be thieves lurking in the jungle, Triteia untied the strip of leather securing it, allowing the appendage to fall, and reverently draped it over a rock. Next came her necklaces, though they were crafted from hardier material. She placed them on top of the tail. Now stripped of her few accessories, Triteia turned to face Kalypso, a playful glint in her eye.

"Well, let's--" and before she finished that sentence, she charged for the ocean, barreling through her persistent voice of reason (which grew increasingly panicked in her ear), her common sense and her hammering heart, and crashed against the incoming waves, sea salt and foam flecks flying haphazard, head snapping forward like she was locking horns with the tide. The water surged past her head, and within moments, she was underwater. Fish scattered in her wake like confetti.

The ground was swept up from underneath Triteia's pawpads, and she was overcome with the feeling of being suspended in midair. If she had any concept of the notion, she would have compared it to being on the moon. Triteia paddled and floundered, realizing that her kicking paws easily kept her aloft, and catching her heel on the sands, she propelled herself back towards the surface. Triteia broke through the surface, flinging her sodden wet mohawk about in a crescent of water as she wrenched her head free. She took a breath, leaned back to collect herself, and once she realized that she could bob on the surface, she flashed a grin at Kalypso. For all her dramatics, she was floating a mere ten feet away.

Triteia reflected wryly on her reviled nickname, and the significance it had unknowingly held when it was bestowed upon her.

A I D E N

Running back and forth with the waves had become a fun activity in his lonesome hours. He laughed and made a barking sound as the waves chased him again and he ran from them further up the shore. He ran as fast as he could at his game but sometimes the waves touched his paws and he yelped at the cold.

He was having fun and enjoying himself, until he ran out of steam.

Collapsed on the sand he caught his breath, heaving it in as he rested his body, full height but needing the weight he was still young to look at, but definitely no longer the size of children, and far too dangerous for a child’s mind. His green eyes were on the lookout for playtime and he soon got up, slowly walking the beach as his tongue hang out.

The beach was usually not that empty, it seemed like a gathering place for others to join, a place to seek tranquility and peace, but for Aiden this was a playground and those who came along were playthings. The boy was chasing his own shadow for amusement as he came across something fun. Two wolves swimming in the water by themselves and seemingly enjoying it. Aiden almost hopped in to play the dangerous shark with them but something caught his eye.

Something sparkly.

He walked to the rock on which treasures had been left and his young tailed wagged happily while the owner was under water. There were soo pretty. He looked at the necklace and reached out to touch it, not really realizing they belonged to someone else and he wasn’t really a greedy kid either, he didn’t know much of treasures but they were something he had never seen before and therefore caught his eye. He had never seen handcrafted items before. Maybe? Maybe he could try them on?

He wasn’t aware whatever or not the two women had noticed him by now but he reached out to grab the necklace and try it on, just to see what it felt like. Just to play with it a little, play dress up and pretend.

"Oi Kaly, what're ya up ta?" Triteia sprayed sand against her damp pelt as she skidded to a stop beside Kalypso and she gave her sister a mock-sour expression. She didn't mind the sand, she was already mostly covered in it anyways and it was easy to was off. Her adopted sibling was just like the rest of her siblings to the point where Kalypso didn't even consider Triteia adopted. She was just the same as Florie, sisters for life.

Triteia accepted her invitation to take a dip and took a moment to detach her tail. It was beautiful and tailor-made by one heck of a crafter whoever it was. There was obvious attention paid to every little detail and it was gorgeous. Kalypso didn't like to think about the story of how her sister had lost her tail, didn't like to think of her Captain being capable of such monsterous acts. She knew that everyone had a bit of darkness in them but she preferred to see the light.

Kalypso pushed herself to her paws and waited patiently for Triteia to take off the rest of her accessories, eyeing them with a touch of envy. One day she'd trade her strips in for some nice accessories, she just wasn't sure what she wanted to get yet. Her sister turned to her, those golden eyes twinkling with mischief and Kalypso gave her own lopsided grin in return. "Well, let's--" Triteia charges into the crashing waves head first and Kalypso pauses for a moment to admire her sisters courage, launching herself full force into the ocean's current without reservation. Kally bit her lip and watched anxiously for her sister to surface, blue eyes searching the waves for Triteia's face. She heaved a sigh of relief when she broke the surface a few yards away.

"You're a natural!" Kally calls out with a laugh. There is movement out the corner of her eye and her head whips around to see a little grey and brown put pawing at her sisters accessories and Kalypso frowns. She doesn't want to yell at the young boy because she doesn't want to upset him but if her sister saw him touching her things she probably wouldn't be very happy. The blue girl creeps quietly as she can through the sand to sneak up behind the little pup. "You know, it's not polite to touch things that don't belong to you." Kalypso says, trying to channel her inner Eremiel as she puts on a stern but soft tone.