Neria, when she was small, sometimes asked her Nurse why there were no Atlanteans to be found any more. The question would bring forth a sigh. "Well, that's old history, child. Very, very old. It goes back to the time when the first Atlantis was lost. Only just over half of the Elder Folk voted to retreat to the depths of the sea, changing themselves permanently to do so. The rest insisted on going off to live on the Land, wild and uncivilised though it was." Anger would come into her voice then. "And I can't believe any of them survived long enough to have descendants, when you look at the way the Land People behave now! When they're not robbing the sea to feed themselves, they're dropping their rubbish into it. And now it's great towers with their legs stuck in our sea-bed, and horrible machines digging holes, and great explosions...It's a wonder there are any of us left!" But then she would add, with another sigh, "Maybe they got mixed and changed as much as we did, and forgot altogether that there had ever been any other way. There were never that many Atlanteans to start with; and some died of grief, they say, while others lost their powers and started to live for a shorter time. And they intermarried, of course. Well, you can see for yourself, for it's all too plain: although one of my grandfathers was a true Atlantean, the other was definitely a fish!"
It was true that she had a tail, instead of legs like Neria. And her fingers were webbed too. But then, almost everyone around the palace was either mixed, or wholly sea-creature, so that it was Neria herself who felt like the odd one out. "You're like your father," Nurse would always say proudly.
"And my mother too?"
That invariably brought pink up under Nurse's scales, and a swish of her tail as she found something else to do. It was because (Neria knew) the Sea Queen was not allowed to be mentioned. She had died young, so that Neria could only dimly remember her; and her early death had been such a tragedy that nobody (not even Neria) had seen the King smile since. Her name was never spoken. Neria had heard it whispered, however, that her mother had come from the Seal People, who were part of her father's kingdom despite the fact that they often lived partly on the shore. Some of the Seal People had magical powers of their own and could change into Humans if they chose, and then back again. Neria's dim memories were of no more than dark eyes and a pealing laugh...and she knew that her father had waited long, long years before he found himself a bride; which made it an extra sadness that he had lost her so young.
Sad or no, it was the King's job to heal, and judge, and protect the Sea Kingdom. He was the final arbiter on everything. His voice (which was not really a voice at all but more like an echoing rumble, sounding within one's own head as all the sea-speech did) could rouse storms when he chose, and make all the creatures of the sea quiver and rush to obey him.
Even his powers were weaker than they had once been, for part of his magic had been lessened with the loss of one of the Magic Stones. These had been brought from Old Atlantis: the Stone of Power, the Stone of Law, the Stone of Invisibility (which kept things hidden from the sight of strangers), and the Stone of Renewal. It was the last of these - whose special property was to heal and make new again - which had been lost; though exactly how was another of those subjects nobody ever mentioned. Its absence meant the Sea King had to work harder, and put out more of himself, so that he was always busy and sometimes tired. So Neria did not see a great deal of him when she was growing up, though he made time for her when he could. When she was little
he would sometimes take her on his knee and let her tangle her fingerss in the seaweed which grew in his beard, and chatter to him about what she had been doing; or she would meet him in a palace corridor and he would stop to speak to her and lay a broad-fingered hand on her head by way of greeting. He was a distant, if kind, figure to her, but she loved him, as automatically as she breathed the deep clear water around her.
And her childhood was certainly happy. There was always Nurse (who was also the palace housekeeper) to cosset and care for her, and all the undersea creatures to be her friends. She played tag with her father's seahorses, catch-as-catch-can with the squid, and even the swordfish
guards (who looked fierce but were stupid, if loyal, and very greedy) were kind to her. There was a strict rule that she must not swim too far from the deep waters were the palace lay, but otherwise she had a great deal of freedom.
Sometimes she would find an old wrecked ship to explore. Now and then she might even dig pieces of bright shiny gold out of the sand, if there were any the scavengers had missed. She would use the gold to bribe the swordfish guards (who loved anything shiny) to let her look in the Magic Mirror which stood in one of the palace corridors. Through the mirror one could see into each of the different rooms in the palace,
and her favourite was to look into her father's throne-room when he was receiving a deputation. It was amusing to watch the different sea creatures coming to him for a judgement, or for help with some problem. Often, she supposed, it might be a problem with and Land People and whatever they had been doing lately to cause trouble to the Sea Kingdom - though since one could see, but not hear, through the Magic Mirror, she never knew exactly what was being talked about.
So time slid by, and Neria barely noticed that she was growing up. She knew that she was sometimes bored, however, and restless, for it was not very interesting to help Nurse around the palace; and old games had begun to seem childish. Her explorations began to take her further from home than she was really allowed to go. And that was how things began: the circumstances which, in the end, would change her life beyond imagining.
She was swimming around a wreck one day (though it was too new to be interesting) when she thought she saw something move below her. Peering down into a dark hole, she saw a shape outlined in the dimness - and then, the feeble slap of a fin, just as if something were making a last weary struggle. Swiftly she dived down. A bright eye turned feebly towards her; a smooth skin gave a sudden warmth against her hand. Why, it was a dolphin!
Dolphins were never seen in the Palace waters, for, being air-breathers, they preferred to swim nearer the surface. According to Nurse they were strange and foreign creatures too, and far to friendly with Men to be trusted. Neria had never met a dolphin in person before - but here one was, and trapped inside the wreck by a chain which had tangled around his muscular tail. She must free him quickly, for here under the water for too long, he would drown. He seemed to understand that she was trying to help him, for he lay still as her fingers worked to unloop the heavy chain. He was weakening with every moment, poor creature, and she could see it by the way his eye was beginning to dull...but at last she had him free. Then, since he was almost too weak to swim, she set her arms round him and urged him out of the hole and upwards, swimming for both of them.
Together they broke the surface. He was wallowing, barely conscious - but his airhole contracted suddenly, and a little jet of water shot out of it. Then his mighty tail gave a slap on the water. His muscles rippled, and when Neria looked, his eye, brightening again, was peering mischievously round at her.
And then she realized something which, in her urgency, she had not noticed. Her head was well above water. But she felt no discomfort. Even when she gulped and drew in a quick breath, she still felt none. She, the Sea Princess, who had always lived at the bottom of the sea, was breathing - air!
"I can breathe like you, dolphin! I can breathe under the water and on top of the water - isn't that strange?" The dolphin made a chittering noise, grinned at her, and slapped the water again with his tail, splashing her. He was looking stronger with every moment.
"It's no use, I don't understand your language, for you're not part of my father's kingdom, are you? You and your cousins the whales were here even before we were, and have stayed separate. Well, I shall talk to you just the same. It must be because my mother came from the Seal People that I can breathe air as well as water, for I know from my history lessons that the true Atlanteans chose not to, when they changed themselves!"
The dolphin leapt away from her suddenly, then turned, obviously inviting her to follow him. A moment later they were racing. It was exhilarating to swim half on top of the water with the dolphin sleekly at her side. It was only when Neria raised her head and saw the shape of an island rearing out of the water not far ahead that she stopped racing and trod water abruptly. Land.
The dolphin came back to her, looking puzzled. He seemed to think that she would want to go to the island. She explained to him (for he seemed not to know) that she was not a Human, but belonged under the sea. He understood, she thought, and chittered back at her in his own language, though what he said she did not know.
"Isn't it quiet up here on top of the sea!" she told him, looking all around. "How do the Land People manage to live without music around them all the time? Why, without hearing the fish all singing their different songs, and the currents ringing in the hollow shells,
and the crabs and lobsters clicking and tapping, it's like being deaf!"
He gave a soft chitter and a whistle, and she went on. "Nurse says Men have forgotten all about Sea Magic, and that the very few who remember think it's something to be afraid of, or just a story for children. I don't know how she knows that considering she's never been up here, but still. I wonder...Wouldn't it be better if they did know about us? That there are people who live under the sea? We can't be so unlike, for when I saw a drowned sailor once, he had a face and arms and legs and hair much like I do. And you thought I was human at first, didn't you?"
He must have thought she was looking too serious, for he flipped her over with his tail so that she fell under the water with her arms and legs flying in all directions. It made her laugh - but being under the water again reminded her that she had come to a forbidden place, and ought to go home again. The dolphin came with her as she went into a deep dive, and they swam together until they were almost as far as the Palace waters. He made a tiny whistling sound at her then, and left her to go on alone; almost as if he knew his presence with her might cause awkward questions.
But there were no questions: everyone must have been too busy to have missed her. And she went out to meet the dolphin again the next day, swimming where she hoped to find him, finding him; and for days after that. He showed her new places to explore; he swam races with her (without forgetting half-way through that it was a race, as the fishes did); he led her often to the surface, and then would rise up and dance on his tail, 
making her laugh and seeming to laugh back when she couldn't copy him. The first time he took her to swim amongst the rocks near the shoreline, Neria was half afraid, but nothing bad happened. The rocky shore didn't look threatening or dangerous, merely empty and quiet. Neria did not think it particularly beautiful compared with the crystal underside of the sea, but rather dull and harsh-looking.
One day, the dolphin flipped her right up on to a sandy beach, and then lay in the shallows laughing at her. Neria struggled to her feet, feeling strange and unsteady without water around her. The ground, though it was only sand, felt sharp and hard. She went back into the water quite quickly, feeling much safer there - but after that, once or twice she came out of the sea on purpose and practised walking on the land. It was amusing and a challenge to make herself at home in a different element. And it was only a game...
That what she was doing was forbidden, she was well aware; aware, too, that it would make her father deeply angry. If he ever found out. She had once thought him all-seeing - he was, after all, the King - but it seemed there were things he didn't find out.
Then one day the dolphin suddenly wasn't there any more. Neria looked for him in all their usual meeting places, but he didn't appear. Nor the next day, nor the next. Neria was worried at first in case it was her father's doing, but nothing at all had been said...and then she started worrying in case her friend had got caught or hurt. She listened everywhere for news of him, but heard none. Life went back to its old boredom.
Then, after a time had passed, he was suddenly back again.
He was a little larger, a little sleeker. She hadn't thought about his age, but it occurred to her now that he was young - like her. He had left when the storm seasons started (though storms never touched the deep waters where the Palace was) and he had probably gone to join his own people in some distant part of the sea, ruled by laws of his own kind. Now he had come back and was prepared to be her companion again; and things were just as they had been before.
Not quite the same. Thinking about the dolphin swimming in other waters with his own people made Neria feel wistful. He had others like him and a group to which he belonged. By the reckoning of the seasons, she was now seventeen years old, and she knew as she looked around her that she, like her father, was one-of-a-kind in the Sea Kingdom.
Perhaps that was why, when the dolphin left for the next season-of-storms, she started going to the surface on her own, even in wild weather. 
Sometimes she would even swim surreptitiously near to boats, out in the dark, to listen to harsh deep voices above, and catch a glimpse of Human shapes moving about on the deck. She was curious...but careful, particularly of the nets which trailed astern or were flung from the sides. And she couldn't go out often, because Nurse was always finding things for her to do, and scolding her for being far too sleepy in the mornings, and telling her that she was the Sea Princess and should start taking on Responsibilities. But out she went, just the same, when she got the chance; and still nobody saw her or found her out.
Not yet.
TO BE CONTINUED.
