Emory led the way down the damp and dripping lower hallway to his swimming cave, and wondered again what he was doing. He'd never had a guest down here before, except Rita apparently, and he hadn't known that until minutes ago. She must have crept away one of the few times he'd invited her for lunch.

Sneaky faun.

Still, Midge's steady personality relaxed Emory, even if he hated the changes she brought with her presence. She wasn't overly nervous and shy, but she wasn't gregarious and dramatic, either, and when she spoke Emory found himself compelled to really listen.

Besides, Emory wanted to see more of what this strange creature might be capable of. It wasn't often one discovered a new species, let alone a species who didn't even know what it was, aside from essentially nothing.

"Your queen must be an idiot," Emory remarked, stopping briefly to ignite the two torches on either side of the entrance to the cave. He never lit them for his solo swims, but he'd had them installed just in case. Turning back to her, he almost startled away at how the blue flames leapt and danced over her skin, expanding the shadows beneath her cheekbones to near-ghoulish proportions.

Midge didn't agree or disagree, just looked at him through her flat grey eyes and waited for him to explain.

"Who creates something they don't understand and then just assumes it must be useless without fully exploring the possibilities?" Emory shook his head. "Her Majesty ought to suffer the consequences of enslaving her own children."

"What consequences would those be, for a Queen of the Faewild?" was all Midge would reply, still carefully neutral.

Emory shrugged and stepped through the open cave entrance, waiting for Midge to follow him before he made his way down over the slippery stone steps to the pool itself. The cave was a naturally-formed structure, perpetually warm and humid, and dimly-lit by the blue flames in the doorway. Still, the whole room held a gentle blue glow due to the bioluminescent algae that covered the cave walls and the bottom of the pool itself. A soothing ambiance to Emory, at least, and he hoped Midge liked it.

From the expression on her face, she did; she looked around, eyes wide and barely listening when he answered her question. "I don't know, exactly. But she ought to be careful, if the Raven Queen has assigned me to the case."

"Hm." Midge didn't acknowledge his veiled threat. Instead her bare feet carried her in front of him down the slick steps, moving with an unnatural grace and speed. It was as if stepping into the cave had activated her, somehow, and she sped all the way down to the pool itself, squatting and dipping her fingers into the glowing waters of the massive underground pool, then holding her fingertips up and examining them.

Emory followed her more cautiously, his heels slipping out from under him once or twice, until he arrived at her side. Kicking off his shoes and removing his heavy outer robe, he sat down at the side of the pool at her side and let his feet kick down into it. There were no steps leading into the pool itself, no deep end or shallow end; just a deep, clear pool and the burbling underground spring that fed it, gushing from the wall in the back of the cave.

"The water's so warm," Midge murmured, dipping her hand deeper into the waves and swirling her spindly fingers back and forth.

"It never gets that cool here," Emory said, kicking his foot up a bit higher and watching the blue droplets drip back down to plop against the surface tension of the pool. "I won't be swimming today, but feel free to jump in, if you wish. What is it exactly that happens when you're in the water?"

Midge was silent for so long, just staring into the deep blue pool, that Emory thought perhaps she was in a trance of some kind and had not heard him. Just before he repeated himself, however, she spoke.

"I don't know what happens, exactly. But one of the children in the village was playing with these little toys from the mainland; they started as tiny, insignificant wads of sponge, but when placed in the water, they began to expand until they resembled real creatures."

"Make-a-Monster kits, aye, I've seen them," Emory agreed, already getting an idea of where Midge was going with this. "You feel like the water helps you grow into yourself?"

"It's not just the water," Midge confessed in a whisper, her eyes darting up to Emory's. In this light, they gleamed a pure crystal blue; a reflection from the algae, it must be.

He was captured by their radiance regardless, only looking away when Midge abruptly slipped all the way into the water with a splash. She kicked out away from the wall in a smooth glide, her long, spidery limbs highlighted against the glow. Then she flipped over to her back and spread out her arms, her gauzy dress clinging to every narrow angle of her body and floating in the light.

If it wasn't just the water, Emory wanted to know what it was, but he had a feeling Midge would tell him, in her own time. Meanwhile, he watched in fascination as Midge drew in a deep breath, and with the movement of her chest, spidery fingers of blue began to creep up into her fingertips, into her toes, swelling her sunken skin, plumping it to a pleasant roundness and granting it a dewy shine that made it difficult to look away.

The more she breathed, the more stunning the effect, until Emory had to flinch and look away from the bright glow of her strange, alien beauty.

"It's this whole island." Her voice floated just above her body, a whisper that somehow carried and echoed against the walls of the cave.

Emory forced his eyes back to Midge, lifting his hand to shield them - as if that would help. She bobbed upright in the water, now, only her head and shoulders emerging, and even the lank grey hair that hung limp at her shoulders began to curl, the tips soaking in the same blue color as her skin, enriching and brightening to a halo around her head.

Right now, in this moment, she resembled one of the shy, yet stunningly gorgeous nymphs who were bound to protect certain rivers, lakes, mountains, bodies of land and water in the Faewild. But if she were a nymph, when she was born she would have felt a calling to her chosen destination and traveled there immediately, never to depart again.

Never to depart again.

The command of the Raven Queen echoed in his head once more, and Emory nearly fell into the pool in pure astonishment.

There were no nymphs in the Material plane, were there? They were fae creatures.

Yet now that the thought had occurred to Emory, he could not banish it.

What if Midge belonged to his island? What if she was born to be his island?

He could not look away.

Midge stretched her arms up over her head in a lazy movement, fingers arching, then swooped her hands back down to scoop up a palmful of water, sticking her nose into it and sniffing experimentally. She made a surprised sound when she was able to inhale the water like air, smooth as anything. Dropping the rest of the water back to the pool, she rubbed the tip of her nose and turned a full, gleaming smile upon Emory.

"You cannot leave," he blurted.

Midge's smile dropped and she looked up at the cave ceiling and walls. "What?"

"I'd like you to stay here, in Gloomshadow."

She was already shaking her head before he finished speaking. "No. I don't wish to stay here, when there's so much of the island to explore. And the villagers are so kind, I cannot simply abandon them. Especially Rita. They have come to be important to me."

"They're important to me, too," Emory snapped. "But I don't live with them. You'll be safer here, in Gloomshadow. It's my job to look out for you now."

"No," Midge said, meeting his eyes with her own cobalt-blue reflections. "I'll stay in the village, as I have been."

Emory took a breath to argue, but her facial expression was set to stubborn and suspicious. He gentled his tone and spoke again. "Work with me, Midge. Will you at least sleep here at Gloomshadow, and roam the island by day?"

She hesitated, staring up at him. "So you can protect me?" she clarified, beginning to angle her body and slowly kick back to shore.

"So I can fulfill my oath, yes," Emory said. "If I have Rubius fashion you some method of contacting me, I can teleport myself to you instantly, as long as it is for your safety. You have seen the caliber of ambassador the queen sent first. Who do you think she will send now that you have, to put it colloquially, told her to piss off?"

Midge reached the edge of the pool and lifted her hands, planting her palms down upon the slick, rocky edge and waiting a moment. She continued to inhale that same deep, peaceful rhythm, and Rubius watched as her hands began to change, as if absorbing the dark, craggy stone of the cave floor. Her fingers thickened, darkened and toughened, and when she slid her palms back and forth across the cave floor gently, there was a sound like rocks tumbling together.

She turned her eyes back up to Emory, looking some combination of stricken and overjoyed. "When I close my eyes, down here," she whispered, her voice still echoing within the cave, "I see everything."

"Everything?" Emory was caught in her spell, unable to look away.

"I see the whole island... just as it should be... perfect to the last leaf, and pebble, and drop of water that washes upon its shores. I see it." She lifted her rough palms up, watching in wonderment as the rocky nature faded back to her own smooth, grey skin. Then she looked back to Emory and sighed. "I do not think I could leave if I tried."