"It makes me dizzy just thinking about it."

Dying red stars are sprayed across the surface of a bloody sea.

"I can hardly believe that the world wasn't always this way."

She leans into his chest and smiles.

"I'm so happy."

Wadanohara loves her sea. She loves the way that it glitters at night, the taste of salt, the viscera that drifts in the current. She loves how, for some reason, whenever she wants something it just seems to appear. She loves the people, the vague, faceless, amorphous people and the smiling drifters who pass in and out of her castle.

She loves Sal. More than anything. She desperately, desperately loves him. She's not quite sure how it started; she has very few memories these days. All she knows is that when he calls her name, she runs eagerly to his side. She knows that when he lifts her chin to look at her, there's a comforting certainty in those red eyes of his. She knows that he knows what's best for her. That's why she always, always, always says "yes."

She remembers some things. When she was young, in the far-distant past, the world was blue. It didn't smell of rust. Back then, the world was different, with different people and sounds and colors. She remembers Samekichi, for better or worse. She doesn't remember who he is, exactly. She knows that he's bad, probably; that's why he's locked up. She knows that Sal likes to play games with him that involve knives and a lot of squelchy noises. She also knows that she wants to see him smile.

"Sa-me-ki-chi," she says, lightly touching the door of his cell. "How are you feeling today?" He doesn't respond. She pouts. "Are you hungry? We had cake yesterday, and I could bring you some." He lies silently on the ground, staring at the ceiling. Is he dead? Will they have to get a replacement? Sal can probably find a replacement if Samekichi dies. Sal can do anything.

She unlocks his cell in a burst of red magic. She sits on the floor beside him, and places her hand on his chest. There's definitely a heartbeat. She prods his cheek with her forefinger. He blinks.

"Hey, how about a smile?" she strokes his head with her left hand, moving carefully around the fin. It somehow feels different from Sal's... Maybe it's because of the matted blood in his hair. "It's okay, you don't need to be sad."

Maybe she's imagining it, but she feels him shiver slightly. She shifts, so his head is in her lap. He doesn't resist. She keeps finger-combing his hair. Clots of blood drift out and disperse in the water.

"You're getting special treatment," she says, hoping that this will elicit some response. It doesn't. "Usually, only Sal's allowed to do this."

"Stop," he says, in a voice hoarse from disuse. She smiles widely.

"You are alive!" she exclaims. "I was worried about you."

"Stop talking. Leave me alone."

"Just let me finish fixing your hair-"

He rolls out of her lap and shakily sits up. "You aren't Wadanohara. Leave." His voice is trembling. His face is contorted into an expression she doesn't have a word for.

"I am Wadanohara," she says, straightening her back. "I'm the Red Sea Witch, Wadanohara.

He falls silently against the wall. No matter how she tries to make him, he won't look at her.

That night, when Sal kisses her, her heart doesn't pound the way it usually does. Even as she lies beneath him on his bed, she feels nothing. She doesn't have it in her to respond to his touch. He notices.

"What's wrong?" he asks as he runs his hand across her cheek.

"Today, I visited Samekichi." His face falls, but he doesn't stop. He moves on to the top button of her dress.

"Why do you feel the need to see him?" he asks. The dress falls open. "Aren't I enough for you?"

"It's not about that," she says, looking at the ceiling. "Something about him bothers me."

"Nothing should bother you." His face twists slightly before reverting to its usual wide grin. "Nothing can bother you."

"Looking at him reminds me of something, but I can't figure out-"

Sal kisses her before she can finish the sentence. His petting becomes more rapid. Wadanohara still doesn't have it in her to react. As soon as their mouths separate, she feels the need to continue explaining.

"When I see him, I remember when- ah!" Sal bites her shoulder. "When the sea was blue... I remember faces I don't- I don't recognize, and-"

"Is it really the time to talk about such unromantic things?" he asks as he unlatches her bra.

"I'm afraid," she says, still looking at the ceiling. "I'm afraid that there's something I don't know."

"Darling," he says, smiling kindly. "There's nothing in this sea that you need to know that has been hidden from you." He kisses her again before finally getting to the point.

Afterwards, she feels dirty for some reason.

"The sea used to be blue," she says to Samekichi the next day, after Sal has already left. For some reason, Samekichi has a lot more blood in his hair, and smeared across the front of his shirt. She thought she'd gotten all of that out. How strange.

"Go."

"The sea was blue, and it was full of people I don't know anymore... You were there, right?" She unlatches the door again and joins him sitting on the floor.

"Please, just leave me alone."

"I want to know what it was like, before now." She reaches out to take his hand. He flinches.

"You aren't her." He shakes his head. "You aren't her, and you need to leave."

"I remember you," she says, desperation creeping up the inside of her ribcage. "I remember you, and I don't know why."

He makes that strange, contorted face again. She doesn't like it. She doesn't want him to make that face. "You can't. He changed you."

"Who changed me?" She hasn't always been this way?

"Go away." He trembles. "Leave me alone, I don't want to look at you."

"Why do you hate me?" she asks quietly. His back heaves up and down. He makes an awful noise.

The two of them wander their kingdom, hand-in-hand. Sal seems to be on edge; he keeps on looking at her, as if to check if she's still there.

"What was I like when the sea was blue?" she asks.

"The same as you've always been." He steps over a carcass. "Sweet and small and beautiful."

"Was there anything else?"

"Kind, clever, graceful." He smiles at her. "As always. Why do you care what it was like when the sea was blue?"

"I want to know more about the world."

"I can teach you all you need. And you have your books."

"I want to talk to other people." She gazes at him hopefully. "I want to learn what other people have seen." His face twists into a sort of agonized grimace.

" T." He holds her hand painfully tight. She stands on her tiptoes and kisses him on the cheek to calm him down.

He's silent and miserable for the rest of the walk.

"It's not you," Samekichi says, again. "It isn't you anymore." He's on his side, staring at the wall.

"I want to know about the Blue Sea." She leans forward, staring at him intensely.

"You're a monster," he says.

"I need to know who I was before I became who I am."

"You're trying to trick me," he says.

"I won't be able to rest until I know."

"You're hurting me," he says.

"Look at me," she whispers, reaching out and grabbing his hand. "Please, at least look at me."

He stares at her in wonder. His face twists again, but he doesn't make that sound, or heave, or do any of things he usually does.

"You're her, aren't you?" he says. "You're Wadanohara."

"It makes me sick, thinking about it."

A melting moon, the smell of iron, and the creeping feeling of uncertainty in her gut.

"To realize that the sea was once blue."

She takes a step backward, out of the bedroom.

"How dare you do this to us?"

Her memories are hazy, still. But now, she remembers faces. And because she remembers faces, she can not forgive him.

"He told you, didn't he?" Sal snarls. "I knew I should have finished him off when I had the chance."

"He told me nothing. I remember what happened." An ocarina plays a soft melody in the back of her mind.

For a second, he hesitates. Then, he laughs. His mouth is an ugly gash in his face, she realizes. "You don't remember anything," he says. "He planted some thought in your head and now you believe it's real."

"You killed all of them," she says. He takes a step towards her. She takes a step backwards. "I didn't even get to say goodbye."

"Why are you so certain that this is true?" he asks. "What do you mean, 'I killed all of them?' Who are you even talking about?"

"The girl with the yellow streak in her hair," she says. What was that girl's name? What if she is wrong? "And the man who married a lobster."

"You've been having nightmares again, haven't you, dearest?" Sal asks, reaching down and cupping her cheek in his large hand. "He's been taking advantage of your fears."

"I haven't- I haven't been having nightmares!" she says, pushing his hand away. "I know, I know, that there were people in that Blue Sea, and I know that you killed them all!"

He lifts her chin and looks deeply into her eyes. "If that were true, wouldn't I have killed you too?" A sudden sense of calm fills her body. What was she angry about? He puts his other hand on her waist and draws her close. "It hurts me to think that somebody I love so much thinks I could do such awful things."

They kiss, the bedroom door closes, and everything is right with the world.

Wadanohara is the Red Sea Witch. She loves that position. She loves the smell and taste of the ocean, she loves the blood and the bones and the security.

She loves Sal. Wadanohara loves Sal desperately, more than she can even comprehend. She doesn't want to ask questions. Questions hurt Sal, so they're bad. She wants to spend the rest of her life with him. She will spend the rest of her life with him. After all, there's nobody else who understands her, and nobody else who understands him.

Wadanohara loves being the Red Sea Witch.

Samekichi is making that noise again. She wishes he would stop.