Follow Her Lead

by Ice Star

Chapter 2: Lies and Song

"Aria," Nata whined, "You're getting food all over your heart, that's yucky!"

Next to her I scoff and wipe the bits of fish, and whatever else I put in this, off my heart. It's the red thing that looked like a crystal that both Nata and I have on our chests. Our breakfast, which is the same thing as the dinner we ate, is a bunch of seaweed with mashed fish and whatever else was lying around that was fit for us to eat wrapped inside the seaweed. Nata is not supposed to know that some of the stuff we eat has a face, so I made it look as face-less as possible and told her that any of the red that drifted through the water that was a result of the fish being mashed was a cool sauce... or something. She believed me, too.

"Happy now?" I grumble between a few more mouthfuls. She smiles and claps her hooves together, having finished her own fish wrap that definitely wasn't fish, nope.

I must admit, that was a good catch on Nata's part. The thought of anything happening to our hearts is awful. We can use them to channel magic when we're older, and a bunch of other stuff Aunty said that I actually paid attention to because, magic! This wasn't just any magic either, our magic worked through our voice, and since Aunty had taught us both how to sing - which is probably how she ended up with a siren's name - Nata and I were so excited. I tried to sing others into giving me pearls and treasure from the skeletons of old ships that I'm too young to go near, and Nata... well she tried to make her starfish get married. I don't know how.

There were two downsides to this power. The first was that it only worked on ponies, who just had to live in the Overland instead of down here like anyone practical, and the second was that we couldn't just sing, we had to make others do stuff with our words as well as our voices. Yet, it couldn't just through lying like I do, or Nata telling everyone they're pretty and hugging them. We only knew a few kinds of songs, as well, lullabies from Aunty, the wordless shoo-be-doo melodies that she sang, and the 'inappropriate' songs sung by Overworld sailors that I may or may not have gotten Nata to repeat.

Nata really took to singing, too. She had the talent, but I had the words, even if I still can't get things to rhyme just right, more often than not. She'll sing everywhere, including here. She's just smiling and singing some nonsense song as we recline here, on a small outcropping that overlooks a peaceful reef that's just waking up, and so late, too. I bet it's because it's filled with lazy fish.

There are colors everywhere, and it is still kinda cold from the night where we hid in some nice anemones. No one really lives anywhere around here, except a lot of fish, since there aren't enough resources to support many villages, and a few hours west for any swift swimmer you'll find an abyss or two. Those aren't exactly welcoming. I've never seen one, but I've heard that they're scary and dark, and that there's krakens and mean squids, or something else that I'd rather not meet and it would probably scare Nata.

She doesn't have to worry though, there's not a kraken that I wouldn't hit for hurting my stupid cousin. I could probably take one on anyway, but for now I'll just stay with Nata and try to make sure she doesn't try to marry any more urchins to starfish. Nata's real weird like that.

I think we swam far enough yesterday, and I would have made us go on longer but Nata's scared of the dark and I'm sort-of-not-quite-maybe-just-a-little bit scared of what could be in it. I just needed us to get far away from our old cottage so that Nata's distracted and someone else, who has never met us, might know where to find a pony. Why can't they live in the water like everyone else? Don't they know how stupid that is? Ugh, this is going to be so hard having to look after both Nata and myself.

Wait, where's Nata? She was here just a moment ago!

"Aria look, I found a fishie with foals!"

I whip my head around, and sure enough, she had wandered away and was cuddling a rather annoyed fish to her cheek, and singing 'fishie' over and over again, like that's going to do anything.

I swim over to meet her and tell her to let the fish go. The fry that Nata had seen hover for a few moments before hiding nearby. They have a good reason not to like me, since I'm very tough.

She tries to make big eyes and garbles something about the fish that I can't understand. We still have to go a bit farther if I want her to forget this place fast enough. If I look back the way we came it still looks a bit familiar, maybe Aunty had taken us here before to gather something. She really hated gardening but I never asked why. Or maybe she just never answered, ugh why's everything gotta be so complicated?

I must be frowning because her lip starts to quiver and that's not good, because I don't know if i can handle Nata when she's sad. She's such a baby that it's easy to make her upset, but when she does start to throw a fit, she really loses it and I don't think she's even there anymore. A lot of the sailor songs tell of banshees which are like dead whales, but mean or something, and they make a lot of noise but it's mean cause they just screech everywhere. Nata is a bit like that, except she just can't control anything. Whenever I told Aunty this, and said that Nata had lost her mind again she got real mad.

I can't risk Nata getting upset because something could catch us, and that would be bad. I had lied to everyone in the nearest village the last time we were there, telling them that if Aunty kept getting sadder and no one could help her, even if she had let them, that Nata and I would come live with a friend of hers that I was sorta alright with. Again it was a lie, I know that Nata has a daddy that isn't dead, and he is going to take Nata, and I'll find him all by myself. I'll deliver Nata to her home and we'll be fine, and if he doesn't like her I'll bite him like I do whenever one of the village colts called Nata stupid. Most of them liked her and told her she was pretty, and only I could call her that but only if Aunty wasn't around.

Nata's stopped looking so sad but she sill won't let the fish go so I smiled a little bit and tried to act like Aunty, but without calling her Sonatina.

"Nata, listen you've gotta put the fish down, it doesn't like that. You wouldn't like that if someone did that to- oh gods Nata, stop I think its eyes are bugging out! Drop the fish! Drop her!"

Okay that last part wasn't very Aunty-like but Nata does let go of the fish with a whimper. "Why couldn't I have fishie?"

Oh... well now I've gotta think of a good answer. Asking about how the fish felt probably won't work since Nata has such a hard time telling what's 'mean' and what isn't.

Come on Aria, think of something.

Nata looks at me questioningly.

All I need is one good lie. One good lie.

"Are fishies bad?"

Huh?

"Bad for what Nata?"

"The game, we're playing a game, silly! D-did I lose?"

Oh, right the 'game'.

"No Nata you didn't loose, but you... you got a strike. Fish aren't allowed to be hugged in the game."

"Sorry!"

"It's alright, you only got one strike so far. You can't win if you get a lot of strikes, but do you wanna know how you can get less strikes?"

She looks a bit confused. "So, less strikes... I can win?"

"Yeah. You just gotta do one thing, 'kay?"

I get a nod from her so its sinking in.

"You just gotta listen to me. I know all the rules."

Nata makes a happy squealing noise. "Yeah! I'll do it, for realzies. Umm... but Aria what's the game called?"

"Err... 'Follow My Lead'. It's super fun, now we have to keep moving. For the game. Now just keep swimming, or else we won't get anywhere."

She's forgotten about the fish entirely, I can tell and I've lived with Nata and Aunty for years. Although I do regret telling her the swimming part, because now she won't stop singing about that.

Ugh, Nata!

Comments

[Moka Mcdowell]

Nata: Just keep swimming, swimming swimming... lalalalala

[Sky Sunset shimmer]

7332738 you read my thoughts.