Arethusa's song echoed mournfully around the cave she was confined in, and vibrated through the shell shaped hole and out into the lake, a sad song and a sad cry. Would anyone ever rescue her? Was there any hope? Merpeople could cry too, it was just harder to tell and so she continued singing.

Myrtle glanced over her shoulder once, just once, to make sure the students were still following. They were in the deep, dark center of the lake now, about half an hour (as a ghost swims) from the shore. Maybe forty-five minutes in for a human.

She could see the dark blob of the underwater cave ahead and motioned for the Slytherin with the key to come forward. "Lift the key to the hole!" she ordered as bubbles spewed out of her mouth, pointing at the shell-shaped rock thing.

Merpeople were so weird sometimes. Who used a shell for a lock? A toilet-seat-shaped one would have been better, according to the ghost who lived in a loo.

Her hands slightly shaking out of fear, Anna swam quickly along behind Myrtle. How long had they been swimming anyway? Half an hour? An hour? Somewhere in between? Anna wasn't exactly sure, but she knew they'd left the shore quite some time ago. When Myrtle turned to glance behind her, probably checking on the student's progress, Anna came to a sudden halt. Were they at the cave? Merlin, she surely hoped so. She was getting a tiny bit scared if she was being perfectly honest. When Myrtle motioned for Cam to come forward, Anna swam to the side a bit to allow him room to come through. This was all so exciting and scary!

Torin was exhausted by the time that Myrtle stopped swimming. He hoped that they would be with the princess soon. Then he saw the ghost beckon for Cam. Moving to the side, he waited. He was eager to see what would happen next.

...although fun, swimming has never ever been so tiring before. HOW MANY MINUTES ALREADY? Way more than 30, and he tried his best to follow Myrtle and a few others who were in the lead. But noo worries, he still had the keey!

Or did he?

Reaching into his pocket, he... HE FELT NOOOTHING. No key--WHERE WAS THE KEY? Panic. PANIC. If a fish could have a seizure underwater, that's what he was doing right now.

Oh. Wait. Other pocket. The key was in his other pocket. He calmed himself down and continued following the trail of bubbles, just completely bewildered at all the fishies he saw. And the princess-YES--he shall be her KNIGHT in shining armor, well, even if Anna was the one that snatched it right out of Aornos's neck (MUCHcredittoher). But yeah.

Her hero. Because HEEE had the key. Yup. Catching up to the others, he glanced at AnnaFIRST--then at Myrtle, who motioned him to use the key at the... WHAT KIND OF LOCK WAS THAT??

Well, aaanyways, he lifted the key up into the shell and tuuurned. "OPENSESAMEEEEEE."

The keyhole shimmered and sparkled and the large rock covering the cave moved to it's side by magic revealing the imprisoned Arethusa.

Lynny was astonished that all of this was happening and that they made it there in one piece without any trouble. She held her trident closer to her, she didn't know if the princess was really in there. It was very nerveracking.

Arethusa's mournful song stopped and she swam gracefully to the entrance.

"Thank you children, for freeing me. I feared no one would hear my cries. Where is my brother?"

Reese kept swimming, swimming, swimming. Where they there YET?! She squinted her eyes as she looked upahead and saw the cave. They were here. They were actually here! She kept close to the group as the approached the cave and then Cam went up and unlocked the shell.

When Arethusa asked where her brother was, Reese spoke up. "He's back at Hogwarts," she answered. "Unless, he's already on his way down here." She looked away for a moment when she heard a screech. That HAD to be Aornos. Then, the trident Aislynn was carrying was gone. Oh, no.

Torin was about to reply to the Princess when suddenly he saw Lynny's Trident leave her grasp. "Oh no!" he called out as it suddenly started floating away.

"Hey guys!" She didn't know what was happening but the Trident was forcing itself out of her grip and started to soar through the water. "THAT'S MINE!!!! FOLLOW THAT TRIDENT!!!" She quickly went swimming after it.

"The castle?" Arethusa watched the trident zooming up that way somewhat sadly, "Oh that poor child will suffer to her last if we do not hurry. Where is my key?"

Cam watched as the boulder started moving out of the way. His open sesame wooorked? YAY. Clapping his hands underwater--the first thing he noticed was... a meeeermaid. A MERMAID. She had tentacles going out at the back of her head and wore ancient stuff but whooo cared, she actually looked... pretyy-ish.

"Hiiiii princess." Princess... princess what again? Hmm? Started with an "A". He glanced at Reese who explained that her EVIL brother was ruining the castle.

And then aaalll of a sudden the trident the girl stole just... bubbled up and went away?? UM. UMWUT?! ...

Well, he focused his eyes back on the princess to see if she could stop this whole mess. KEY?! OOH. Cam held the key in one hand and motioned for her to take it from him.

Whoa.

So this was the Arethusa, huh? Anna stared at her for a few moments, completely shocked over the fact that she'd finally be freed. "W---we did it," she said, turning towards her friends to give them the thumbs up sign. She'd momentarily forgotten she now had webbed hands and feet, though, so she just sort of shrugged and smiled at everyone instead.

"You're welcome, Arethusa. How are you feeling? Are you alright?" Anna asked her. She sort of hung her head when Arethusa asked about Aornos. Aornos...the one who'd just been socked in the nose and left angry in the headmaster's office. "He's...he's in the castle...in the headsmaster's office."

Chris swam up as everyone else gathered around the confined Princess, he was so excited. Wait she was free! He looked at Anna and then to reese and the others and then lastly at the mermaid Princess. 'ok what do we do now?' was what he was thinking.

Cy looked from the merwoman, to Cam, to everyone else. “WOAHHH.” He said, wide-eyed, still amazed by the effects of the gillyweed. He’d never expected to see creatures like this, HECK, he hadn’t even known that they lived in the lake.

“Don’t worry miss, I’m make sure you ah’ safe.” He bubbled out, probably quite hard to understand due to the fact that they were underwater.

The first year saluted the merwoman anyways as he treaded the water.

Arethusa took the key gently and restored it to pride of place around her neck. "Thank you young one."

"I am quite fine. Where are your professors? Is Aornos confined? Is everyone safe? We must hurry."

Arethusa gravely saluted the young human back.

Myrtle wanted to be called princess. Myrtle had led them all there. Myrtle had listened to the wailings of the royal brat for weeks. Myrtle didn't have tentacles sprouting from her head.

But did anyone pay attention to Myrtle? Noooooooooo.

*SNIFFFFFFbubblemumblebubbleSNIFFFFFFF*

Reese turned to watch Aislynn swim off. She glanced over at Torin who was SUPPOSE to be watching her. "Um, guys. We better go after her before she gets herself killed," she spoke up. She looked back at Arethusa and the rest of the group.

Hearing Myrtle's sniffling, she turned towards the ghost. "Oh, Myrtle. Don't cry. You helped us so much," she told her. "If it wasn't for you, we wouldn't be here right now." It was true. It was Myrtle who had helped them the most.

With the key right back around Arethusa's neck, it was apparently time to head back to the shore and rush back towards the castle. Anna smiled at Arethusa, happy to hear that she was doing just fine and was once again the heir to the merpeople. "Professor Bunbury is flying juyst above the lake, and there are other professors near Aornos in the headmaster's office," she explained.

At this point, she wasn't exactly sure where all the professors were, but she did remember seeing quite a bit of them back at the gargoyle's entrance and in the headmaster's office. Arethusa was urging them to hurry, though, so she must intend for them to get back to the castle as quickly as possible. "We can take you to Aornos, Arethusa. There are others with him," she said.

Anna turned and started to swim back towards the shore, calling out to Myrtle as she did so. "Thank you, Miss Myrtle. We'd never have been able to do this without you!" she said. 'Twas true...had Myrtle not appeared from that cauldron and given them directions on how to get to the cave, they'd have likely gotten lost a long time ago.

It was the princess! THE princess! Hooray! "Your majesty," she only managed to say with a bow before chaos seemed to just... break out. Everyone was freaking out! Becca looked up just in time to realize the trident was darting up and away from them. The girl who was once holding it was swimming after it. Probably not a good thing.

She turned to the Slytherin Reese as she brought up a very, very excellent point. "Right. Let's go after her." She shot a glance at Myrtle, who didn't seem too cheerful that they had rescued the princess. "You wanna lead the way?"

"I shall meet you there, I will swim through the way my brother got in." Arethusa stroked the key around her neck and it glimmered oddly.

"We must hurry."

Arethusa inclined her head in return and swam out of the cave, much faster than the children could follow, heading for the breach.

Blah blah blah, there went Princess Chicken of the Sea. "Pfffffffffsushi," Myrtle mumbled, blowing more bubbles as she stuck her tongue out at the mermaid.

"Come on." Without a backward glance at the gillyweeders (that was a good name for them, she decided), Myrtle started her ghosty pace up again. They could follow the wake but they did need to hurry before they all drowned.

Grinning at the merwoman as she saluted back, he nodded as she spoke about heading back to the castle. Good idea, and they should get back as soon as possible. Who knew HOW long this gillyweed was going to last, Cy certainly didn't.

Swimming over to Myrtle, the first year attempted to brush his hand through her transparent body. "Go fasta!" He tried to say, but it only came out in various bubble and gurgle noises.

Looking to the rest, he pointed upwards. They'd get his gist.