Between two unassuming buildings sat an empty strip of land. Not quite as narrow as an alleyway, it would have seemed to be a pointless path between the main street and the edge of a canal were it not for the large pool of water near the end. Peering down over it, Jazathya saw not her own reflection but a beautiful beach looking out over an endless ocean, all upside down when viewed from her own perspective. She could even hear the sound of waves washing up onto the shore,

‘I thought you said we were going to a bar,” Jazathya said.

“Yeah,” Niva confirmed as she walked around the pool to the other side. “A bar for Divers. It’s in the Depths.”

“And there are no bars for Divers up here in the city?” Jazathya complained. “I didn’t sign up to go into dangerous wilderness just to talk to a few drunks.”

Niva rolled her eyes. “Relax, princess. It’s on the top layer of islands. Even non-professionals like me go at least that far. You don’t have to worry about the big scary monsters messing up your hair.”

“How do we do this?” Jazathya asked as she and Kel walked around next to Niva. “We don’t just jump in, I hope.”

As if in response, a man burst out of the pool in a crouched posture. He planted one foot firmly on the cobblestone ground around the pool’s edge, and, with practiced ease, used the forward momentum to hurl the rest of his body up. He near instantly stood straight up with both feet on the ground, displaying the same casual attitude of a man who’d just climbed up a set of stairs.

“Out of the way, tourists!” he shouted at the girls as he turned around and beckoned someone still on the other side up. In response, a giant turtle climbed out of the pool. On its back were what appeared to be a set of chests. Taking a closer look, Jazathya noticed that they were not real chests at all, but rather raised, rectangular outgrowths from the back of the turtle’s shell. Following behind the turtle were two more handlers, who guided the beast of burden to the canal. It plopped into the water and the three men hopped onto its back as it swam off.

Niva whistled to catch the other girls’ attention. “You ladies done gawking at the storage turtle? Let’s get going.” They all turned to the pool. “Once you step through, the ground is going to be at a different angle on your front and your back. You gotta be ready for the change as soon as you start going through. Oh, and remember to hold your breath.”

Niva stood right at the edge of the pool, one foot hovering over it. “Just do exactly what I do.” With that, she lurched her upper body forward, falling straight into the pool. Her left foot was the last thing to disappear into the water, and when Jazathya looked down into the water she could see Niva standing on the beach, happily waving up to them.

“Your turn!” Niva said. Kel and Jazathya stood on the edge, each with one foot over the pool. “C’mon. Don’t be cowards! On my count: 3… 2... 1… Go!” With that, Jazathya took a deep breath and let herself fall forward. She tried to mimic Niva’s movements but quickly found her other foot flying off the ground, leaving her in a free fall into the pool.

Panic seized her as her face met the water. There was no splash as she plummeted through the surface, only the feeling of falling into a thin sheet of water, probably no more than an inch or two thick, before immediately falling out of it and into the air.

Having completely lost all balance, there was no graceful landing for her. Her body tumbled straight into the sand. As she pushed herself up, she saw that Kel was right beside her in the same state, while Niva stood over them, holding her stomach in uproarious laughter.

As she stood up, she found that no part of her body or clothing was wet. The water had apparently stayed behind in the pool as she passed through it. Unfortunately, she was not so blessed when it came to the sand, and she dusted herself off as best she could manage.

“Sorry, sorry,” Niva said, still grinning ear to ear and not sounding sorry in the slightest. “It’s kind of a tradition for people coming in for the first time, you know? You’ll get the hang of it, eventually.”

Jazathya pointedly ignored the girl’s words, instead looking around to take in her surroundings. The beach was just as she had seen it from above, but now she could see that further down the shore was a set of wooden docks. There were no normal ships anchored there, only the long metal snake-shaped Shipsnakes. A band of sailors was hauling crates of cargo into the mouth of one of them, presumably stocking it for a journey deeper into the Depths. Even further she could see a large wooden building, with people sitting on tables outside it on the beach or on the balcony, eating and drinking.

Glancing back towards the pool, she saw that from this side it was a floating circle of water, which looked pure blue, Jazathya realized, because she was looking up out of the ground and at the clear sky of the mundane world. Behind it, stretching along the entire beach as far as she could see was a lush jungle, with a path cleared into it starting a few feet from the pool.

Overtaken by curiosity, Jazathya wandered behind the pool. From the back, she could see nothing but a disc of floating but otherwise regular water reflecting herself and the jungle behind her. She placed a hand on it but found that she could not break the water’s surface.

“I don’t see why the government can’t control these doors between planes at all. There wasn’t even a guard.” Kel’s voice came from the pool’s front, where she stood with Niva. She’d ignored Niva a bit too well while being enraptured by the beautiful scenery, it seemed, and she quickly rejoined the other two’s conversation.

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“It’s the nature of this part of the Depths,” Jazathya explained. “The mortal world is in balance. It’s a mixture of everything that can exist. If a place is hot or cold, wet or dry, or peaceful or violent, it’s because of natural laws and mortal choices. But the Depths are more primal. The fundamental concepts that make up the world start operating beyond their normal bounds, breaking down opposing concepts and forcing reality to work according to magical laws instead of the ones the gods decreed for the mortal world.”

“What’s that got to do with anything?” Kel asked.

“The two aspects of reality that hold sway in Darazzo’s portion of the Depths are water and desire,” Jazathya continued. “Or dreams, greed, hope, addiction. Call it what you like, but the Depths here create things that inspire or fulfill longing: the treasures and secrets that draw Divers here.”

“And naturally people want to get all those magic artifacts, so they desire paths into the Depths…” Kel said.

“Exactly,” Jazathya confirmed. “Ancient regimes tried to regulate and control the pathways between worlds, which caused people to desire ways into it, which caused tons of secret pools to start opening up. At least since the days of the Deluge Tyrant, no one has made more than a token effort at trying to control movement between Darazzo and the Depths.”

A breeze wafted ashore, bringing the refreshing scent of the sea to Jazathya’s nostrils. It was pleasantly warm on this island, but the caress of that pleasant ocean wind made her realize how perfect a dip in that cool, inviting water would be. And if she went deeper, she was completely certain there were riches for the taking. Not just gold and jewels, but magic, fame, pleasure! Secret cities of merfolk where she could live the rest of her life as a pampered empress! All if she would just dive down, as deep as she could go. The image of a jungle plant appeared in her head, and she suddenly knew that eating it would let her breathe water. It probably grew on this very island...

Jazathya blinked and shook her head in order to clear it. The sudden temptation to dive into the waves evaporated. Looking at the confused faces of her companions, she could guess they had just experienced the same thoughts she had.

“Hah! Yeah right,” Niva said with a hint of nervousness in her voice. “Like anybody could get anything they wanted here if they just wished for it hard enough!”

“It’s not that simple,” Jazathya replied, distracting herself from those alien, wind-borne thoughts by retreating into an academic explanation. “We’re still quite close to the real world here. It’s enough to make these tropical islands or a few mildly supernatural plants or animals, but you have to go farther from mundane reality in order to find the stronger magic. Down there,” she pointed to the ocean. “It gets more and more dangerous. Far enough down, the light from the sun doesn’t even reach. It’s all an endless darkness full of obsession and bizarre nightmare monsters ruled by incomprehensible compulsions.”

“And beyond that, Hell itself, where the gods bound the demons at the beginning of the world,” Kel added.

“If you believe the church,” Jazathya said. “No one’s ever been that far and come back to tell the tale.”

“Yeah, yeah, enough geography lessons,” Niva said. “Let’s get a move on. We’ve got a cauldron to find.” With that, she set off towards the docks, and Jazathya and Kel followed her. Being reminded of her need to find the stolen magic cauldron was almost enough to make her forget the strange experience that sea breeze had foisted on her. Almost, but not entirely.

And so she was still slightly on edge when she felt an abrupt pressure on her leg where something had grabbed it. She screamed and frantically flailed her leg, trying to get whatever it was off her.

“Oh wow! A cuddlefish!” Niva exclaimed. In response, Jazathya stopped struggling so strenuously and looked at the thing on her leg. It was a pinkish white lizard, with six stalks sweeping back from the sides of its head, looking like a giant axolotl. It was grabbing onto her leg with its own limbs, but doing nothing hostile as far as she could see.

The cuddlefish looked into her eyes and made a noise that sounded something like “Mip!”

“A what?” Kel said. Jazathya noticed that, during the commotion, the knight had summoned her sword and was pointing it at the creature on her leg.

“A cuddlefish,” Niva repeated. “They say they’re born from wishes for companionship. People use them as pets.”

“Get it off me!” Jazathya yelled. Niva shrugged and grabbed it, causing it to twist around in her grasp until it was hugging her arm.

“Aww, c’mon! I think he likes you!” Niva said, holding it up to Jazathya.

“It attacked me!”

“They don’t ‘attack’ people. They’re made from dreams of friendship,” Niva objected. “They’re literally the friendliest thing that could ever exist.”

It looked towards her, letting go of Niva and reaching out its legs towards Jazathya, making the same “Mip! Mip!” call as before. Now that she’d calmed down from the surprise of the creature’s sudden “attack”, she recognized the species. She’d seen a few of them kept by various nobles and their children during her time in Darazzo. And she had to admit, it was pretty cute.

“Sorry, but I don’t have the money to keep a pet,” Jazathya said, not entirely sure if she was talking to Niva or to the cuddlefish.

“They don’t eat,” Niva said. “Or shit. They live off of the love their owners give them. You just have to play with them every once in a while.”

Reluctantly, Jazathya opened her arms and took the cuddlefish into them. It beamed up at her with an impossibly happy smile on its big expressive face as it hugged her back. It was not slimy nor were its scales rough. Rather, they were so fine and smooth that its skin felt almost like silk. She squeezed it and found that its body deformed slightly, seemingly without causing discomfort as the thing kept letting out a stream of happy cooed mips.

The creature’s joy was infectious, and Jazathya found that she’d started smiling despite herself. With everything that had gone on over the past few months, she realized she’d really needed that hug after all.