Chapter 98: Perfect Beauty

After several blocks, Arthur realized how stupid it was to run. He was hurtling towards the biggest conversation of his life, and he had no idea what he was going to say or what he really wanted. All he knew was that he needed to talk with Mizu.

As Arthur slowed down, he started thinking through how their last interaction had ended. He hadn’t seen Mizu since the drawing. And he had been upset enough that he left her in the crowd, a certified jerk move, and then he had intentionally avoided her for another day or so. So before anything else, he owed her an apology. A serious one at that.

Afterwards, he needed to hear Mizu say what she thought of the expansion. He thought he saw a glimmer of disappointment when Milo’s name was called instead of hers at the drawing, but the whirlwind of events in the past few days meant that he wasn’t sure what was real and what wasn’t.

He made it to her house, finally, and knocked on the door, standing outside of it with his hands in his pockets. She didn’t come. He knocked again. There was no answer.

“Oh, there he is. The mysterious disappearing boyfriend.” Onna appeared behind Arthur. “I told her to go beat you up a dozen times. Oh, no, she said. He’s just having a hard day, she said. You’re lucky Mizu is so understanding. And now you show up, without so much as a peace offering.”

“You think I should have brought something? A gift?” Arthur looked down at his empty hands. “I didn’t think of that. Should I go get one now?”

“At this point, it’s fine. Just go find her, dummy,” Onna said with a chuckle.

“Slight problem there,” Arthur said as he pointed at the closed door.

“She’s not here, and she’s not with you,” Onna said, opening the door. “Do the math, Arthur. And tell Lily I said congratulations.”

—

This time, Arthur let himself run. He made it to the central well pretty fast, only to stand outside of it like an idiot once he realized he had no way of actually getting through the heavy metal door of the utilitarian structure. It was minutes before the door finally cracked.

“You’re that guy. You aren’t actually a monkey, right? Mizu got mad at me for saying that you were once,” a rattish 20-something demon woman said. “What’s going on? Are you looking for her?”

“I am. Or no. The monkey part is up to interpretation. But I’m here for Mizu. Could you tell her that I’m here?” Arthur asked.

“Tell her yourself.” The rat demon opened the door a little wider and motioned him through. “Nobody is working today. I think she’s the only one down there now. Just hanging out and looking at the water. Now that you’re here, I don’t need to keep her company anymore.”

Arthur nodded thankfully and ducked into the staircase. It was dark, as always, with a sort of healthy moisture that hung heavy in the air. As he descended towards the sound of roaring water, his chest suddenly felt small. His heart began beating faster and faster.

At the bottom, the main well room had changed since he saw it last. Bigger channels lined the walls with water rushing through them, more runes glowed on almost every surface, and an even more powerful flow of water gushed up from the ground.

“We undersalted your meals, introducing blandness where you had a right to expect rich flavors.” Mizu’s voice echoed in the room before Arthur saw her.

“Come on, that one can’t be real,” Arthur said. “I refuse to believe it.”

This was Mizu.

Mizu laughed, and the sound echoed off the walls, scattering over the sound of the water like a ray of light. Just like that, Arthur’s heart slowed down. He didn’t know why he had been so worried. All of a sudden, he was sure that things would be alright in the end.

“It’s not. I made it up to see if you’d notice.” She patted the stones next to her. “I owe Onna two coins now.”

“I thought you’d be mad at me,” Arthur said as he slid into his assigned spot. His strategy was to be honest first and then figure out things out afterwards. “For ditching you at the drawing. I didn’t mean to do that, by the way.”

Mizu shook her head. “No, I understand. Everyone there was pretending they didn’t feel any fear about the change. You were honest. I was glad. Because I was scared too.”

“You didn’t get called. In the drawing, I mean. I thought you would,” Arthur said.

“I didn’t,” Mizu echoed.

They sat there for a while. Arthur felt Mizu’s hand slide over his on the stone. It was cool.

“What do you like best about this place?” Arthur asked. “I mean, I know it’s neat overall. But you spend a lot of time here. What should I focus on?”

“There are the runes,” Mizu said softly. “Do you see the two different kinds that we use?”

“I didn’t. Lily could probably tell, but it’s honestly all the same to me,” Arthur said honestly. He understood runes as some sort of magical hieroglyphs. Even though he could see that they were distinct from each other, it all looked like a bunch of random symbols.

“Here.” Mizu took Arthur’s hand, and used his finger to trace the lines of one rune around the various sharp turns and corners of the pattern. “This is a runist pattern. It’s powerful. They carve them into the stone so the runes can gather and carry large amounts of majicka. It’s strong, but not subtle.”

“And these?” Arthur moved his hand to a more elegant, gently curved shape. “Weller runes?”

“We call them runes. They really aren’t. It would be more correct to call them static spells. They aren’t carved into the stone in the same way. They grant power to the stone while at the same time taking power from it. It’s a softer approach. A gentler thing,” Mizu explained.

“They work well together.”

She set his hand gently on the stone again, putting her hand over it again. “They do.”

“So that’s your favorite? The runes?”

“And the water. But the water is the same as water anywhere you find it.”

Arthur looked out at the giant inverted whirlpool of water crashing out of the ground with enough force and pressure to supply the entire city with water, carefully controlled like a captive beast of great power.

“Just the same. Right,” Arthur said, not believing her.

“No, really,” Mizu said. “Water is… it flows. It crashes. It stands still. It freezes and falls. It nourishes. But it’s the same everywhere. It’s water. I could be happy anywhere that has it.”

“That’s everywhere.”

“It is.”

“And that’s all you need?”

“Not all.” Mizu looked at him, her eyes sparkling. “There are other things.”

“So,” Arthur said.

“So.”

“Would you… if I was going, which I’m not sure I am yet, but if I was going to the frontier, to start a new town. Would you want? With me? New place?” Arthur was completely aware he was running out of words and was powerless to change things. It took every ounce of his energy to let out the next three words. “Go there together?”

Mizu smiled at him, mildly, as if waiting for something else. He had nothing.

“I think there’s water there,” he said, finally thinking of something while wilting under her gaze.

“Okay,” she said, patting his hand.

“Okay?”

“Yes. Okay.”

Arthur was stunned for some period of time. He would never know how long. Luckily, Mizu liked quiet waits.

“Just like that?” Arthur said, coming back to himself again. “I just asked you to go to the literal ends of the world with me.”

“Arthur, I’ve been doing that,” Mizu said.

The water in the room had been pulled up from deep underneath the ground. It had probably laid dormant for eons before it was rushed out of the room, following one of several channels that led to the various neighborhoods of the city. Arthur had no clue how the water would be used, whether it would be treasured or used as part of a simple routine. But he knew that when the water touched the dim light from the runes and sparkled, it was the prettiest thing he had ever seen. That one moment of perfect beauty made everything worth it.

They stayed there for a while, quietly.

“Mizu?”

“Yes?”

“I never really know what’s going on in our relationship, do I?”

“Never.” She pressed the side of her head against his shoulder, and hugged his arm a little tighter. “Not once. I really like it.”