They dove together through a sea incredibly pure. Schools of fish darted past them, and Jon grabbed at them only to miss and crash snout-first into Karyn. He tried to speak but stopped before opening his mouth underwater. Instead they grinned foolishly at each other, then surfaced for air. No words were necessary.
Jon led the way through shallow water. Just above the sandy seabed, they rushed through strange waving plants at a school of angular fish. The fish scattered as Jon swiped at them, but Karyn swerved from a hiding-place behind a rock and got into a wrestling match with a big one. Golden scales and a few of Karyn's whiskers scattered before Jon could instinctively grab the fish's thrashing tail with his feet. They heard a tiny snap in the water.
Karyn struck an un-otterlike victory pose, and they made for the surface.
Simply by willing it, Jon shifted back to his human self. He stood on all fours on the sand with an otter Karyn and their fish. The wind chilled him through his clothes, which had reappeared wet. "Karyn, come on and change. We'll build a fire." He could already smell what this golden thing would be like slow-roasted over a campfire. But Karyn scored a line down the fish's middle with one claw and chomped into the front half, raw!
He made a face, but the meal didn't seem to bother Karyn. With a shrug he shifted again and joined her, munching on the tail. Not half bad, and with a spicy taste. They were quiet together on the shore, and then back in the water. Jon watched Karyn sidelong, protectively, and the rippling patterns of the light along her.
They crossed what looked like an underwater road, a long stone stripe across the seabed. Jon swam to one of the coral-covered shapes that stood by the road like pillars, and ran a webbed paw along it. The sharp coral scratched him and flaked off to show marble underneath. He showed the pillar to Karyn and they understood: this was a place that had vanished from somewhere, populated by the descendants of fish also banished by the stone's power. Had it been a good or an evil person who had sent these things here?
Jon and Karyn swam in the ruins of an outcast city. And from a crater in the sunken road, a voice was crying for help.
