Since the beginning of time this world has been divided into the three realms of sky, sea and land. They are each a world of their own, with their people and ways. They are different branches of the same tree, intertwining but never to become the same branch.

Chen has never seen the world above the sea, the place merpeople call land. Sometimes he sees pieces of it in the form of sunken ships and human possessions lost overboard but they show nothing of where they came from.

It had started with a tiny circular gold band, glimmering in the sand when Chen spied it on one of his earliest explorations with Luhan. He’d picked it up and turned it over in his hands, admiring the way the diamond set in it sparkled, and eagerly called over Luhan to look.

A flick of an amber-scaled tail and the other merboy was by his side.

“It’s a ring,” Luhan said. “It comes from the surface people. I’ve seen one before. Grandmother has some that she found.”

“It’s wonderful,” Chen exclaimed, bright-eyed and tail waving side to side in excitement. “Why don’t we have things like this here? I want to see the land. Imagine all the things they have that we haven’t seen yet!”

Shipwrecks became his interest, and sometimes they took precedence over people and responsibilities. On many an occasion he'd dragged a reluctant Luhan out to find more human ornaments to add to the collection in their cave.

To go to the upper world, for Chen, he must wait.

And so he turns to his cousins, pestering them for stories, and wheedles tales from Luhan’s grandmother.

Do they have cities like us? Great palaces and castles of beauty? Do their people sing and dance like we do?

Indeed they do, they had replied. They have castles that resemble ours, beasts that walk on four legs and boats to traverse the seas . Where we have water they have plants, greenery that covers the land until it stretches beyond the hills.

They sing, but their talent falls short of ours; you should be blessed to be from this world, with mastery of a voice like yours, and not from theirs.

“When you are of twenty-five summers, with enough wisdom of your own,” his father tells him, “only then may you ascend to the surface.”

So Chen waits, still waits, spending many moons staring longingly upwards.

And Luhan waits too, for a heart that already belongs to another world.

Sometimes, Chen is jealous of Luhan. As long as it is deemed acceptable by his grandmother Luhan is free to do as he wishes, and this includes going to the surface while Chen remains at the bottom of the sea.

“It’s exactly as your cousins describe it,” Luhan always says consolingly when the prince confides in him. “There’s sand at the shore, and a castle in the distance. Humans, who walk around on two stubs of flesh instead of a tail.”

Chen sighs every time.

“You’re twenty-one summers. Twenty-five is not far away,” Luhan reminds him. “But your home here is grand, and your voice is even more so. Humans don’t understand the beauty in scales like yours. They don’t know what it means to sing our songs. Why would you ever want to be part of their world?”

Sometimes Luhan wonders if the reason why Chen doesn’t return his feelings is because they don't share this love for a realm beyond theirs.

Luhan is not the only one fascinated with the surface world. He’s visiting the palace today, with a little merboy with emerald green scales in tow.

His name is Sehun, and it’s the only thing he’s ever been able to call his own.

Chen and Luhan had found him swimming about idly outside the latter’s home about five summers back, with nowhere to go, no guardians and not a soul to look after him.

Sehun has been abandoned for as long as he can remember. Even his age is unknown to him, and so Luhan calls him ten.

Luhan had taken the boy under his fin without further ado. If there was anyone who knew what loneliness meant, it was him.

Sehun is a sleepy-looking boy who is absolutely adorable during the rare times he smiles. Shyer than the sea flowers that curl up at a touch, he perpetually clings to one of two people – the first choice being Luhan and the second Chen – and hides his face behind their back until only his wayward tufts of brown hair can be seen. His playful side shows when it’s just the three of them. Luhan endlessly dotes on him and calls him his treasure, and the boy loves to lap up the attention. The two of them often go up to the surface together as a result of Sehun’s insistent begging, but even then the little merboy nowhere as obsessed with human things as much as the sea prince.

Chen swims out from the palace to greet them and Sehun does an excited corkscrew in the water before grabbing him in a big hug, all smiles and gangly limbs. Luhan rolls his eyes and Chen chuckles, patting the tiny merboy on the head.

“Where do you want to play today?” he asks, assuming the pair had come by for the usual reasons.

“We went to the surface,” Luhan sighs, because he knows exactly what kind of conversation this is going to turn into.

Chen’s smile falters slightly but Sehun is too busy digging around in a small pouch tied to his waist to notice.

“Ah! I found it!” He pulls out a thin silver chain and holds it out. “For you!”

Upon closer inspection it’s a pendant, with something metal dangling off it that looks like –

“Is this a scorpi– ”

“It’s a lobster!” Sehun chirps. “Because lobsters remind me of Chenchen.”

Luhan muffles his laughter behind the fins on his forearm. Sehun spins around to hit him.

“Oh,” is all Chen says. It’s become a more and more common occurrence lately, Sehun bringing assorted human trinkets to show him. It makes his heart twist to touch things from the world he pines for so dearly, and even though Sehun knows the prince can’t go to the surface world until he’s twenty-five, nobody has the heart to say no to the tiny boy.

“Do you like it?” Sehun asks nervously.

“Huh? Of course I do…” Chen trails off, biting his lip.

Much to his relief Luhan intervenes and tugs Sehun away. “Look, Sehunnie, a squid!” he says, pointing at a big cephalopod jetting along some ways away.

A flash of green scales later and the youngest is gone.

Chen loops the chain twice around his wrist where it sits snugly. He watches Sehun play with the squid, poking it and pulling at its tentacles until it squirts him with a jet of ink.

“I’m going up,” he says slowly. “I don't want to wait anymore.”

Luhan’s eyes widen. “If this is about Sehun bringing you things again I’ll tell him to stop–”

“It’s not about Sehun.” Chen cuts him off. “It’s my choice.”

“What about your father? He will find out easily.”

“Good, because then I hope he changes this stupid rule.”

Luhan hesitates. “No,” he pleads, wringing his hands. “Please, don’t.”

“I’m not going to stay there. I just want to see. Then I’ll come back and I won’t go again until my twenty-fifth summer.” Chen’s eyes brim with fierce determination, daring the other to challenge him.

Luhan knows a meaningless fight when he sees one.

“Fine. Do what you want,” he says, defeated, “but please, be careful. I can’t bear to lose you.”

Chen doesn’t reply. For a moment Luhan wants to believe the prince has changed his mind and backed down, but luck is clearly not in his favour tonight. He exhales and swims off to pluck Sehun away from the poor squid, where he’s all tangled up and stuck amongst its mass of tentacles.

Every time Luhan thinks back to this moment in time, he wishes he had never let Chen go. He wishes he’d tried harder, and taken away the metaphorical straw that had broken the camel’s back.

A/N: i lied. this is hopefully the last of the slow stuff :D