Chapter Text
A few hours earlier.
Uma dove into the cold, salty ocean just as the barrier started to close behind the limousine. She crashed into choppy, uneven waves, and immediately, an intense feeling of peace washed over her. Uma closed her eyes and enjoyed it for a moment. For the first time in her life, she felt utterly and completely safe. Protected. It was like the ocean was welcoming her home, promising her that nothing would ever be able to hurt her while she stayed there.
She felt something nudge her hand, and her eyes snapped open. Uma’s blood ran cold. A fucking shark was right in front of her. A really big shark. Oddly enough, the shark didn’t attack her. It just… sat there, wagging its tail like a dog and staring at her. Hesitantly, Uma reached out, and put a hand on the shark’s nose. The shark nuzzled into her hand.
Uma stared at it dumbly, but gently kicked her legs and got closer to it.
“Hello!” The shark said cheerfully, pushing away from her hand to swim around her.
Uma squinted. The shark could talk. “What the fuck?”
“My name’s Aoife!” The shark chirped. “What’s your name?”
“Uma,” she replied. Maybe understanding sharks was a gift from her mother’s side. Poseidon was her grandfather, after all. Why wouldn’t she be able to understand the animals of the sea?
“Are you a mermaid, Uma? I’m a shark,” the shark, Aoife, stopped in front of her, wagging her tail.
“I can see that,” Uma said amusedly. “And no, I’m not a mermaid. I'm a cecaelia.”
Aoife giggled. “Don’t cecaelia usually have tentacles?”
She looked down at her legs, and felt a pang of disappointment. Even though she was in the ocean, outside of the barrier, she still had normal human legs. “Yeah.”
“Oh. Well, that’s okay!” Aoife beamed at her. “It’s nice to meet you, Uma!”
“Nice to meet you too. Do you know how to get to Auradon?” Uma asked, and Aoife… made a gesture equivalent to a nod. “Can you show me?”
“Sure! All you have to do is swim straight! Then, you’ll be on Auradon Beach. There’s a big sign! I don’t know much about where to go after that because I can’t leave the water, though,” Aoife wagged her tail a little sadly, and Uma petted her nose.
“Don’t worry about it, you’ve helped me a lot,” she replied, then hesitated. “Thank you.”
Aoife perked up. “No problem, Uma! Have a safe trip!” Then, after a few more playful circles around Uma, she swam away.
Uma decided she liked sharks a lot more than most humans.
The swim to Auradon was pretty short, and since it was so early in the morning, hardly anyone was out. The people who did see her were either on morning runs or teenagers who gave her side-eyes. At some point, she found some sort of map on a big screen, and she quickly located Auradon Prep. It seemed that she was downtown. Auradon Prep was near a big forest, on her left. Far away from the city.
Uma walked until she found the campus. The school was surrounded by a big, gold gate with spikes at the top. She saw students wandering around, and she quickly ducked behind a pillar. She hesitantly poked her head around the corner, and she caught sight of Ben, Mal, and the calvary. Ben looked around, and caught her eye. He paled. Uma waved at him.
. . .
Present time.
Uma looked at all of the different products in Honoré's huge shower—seriously, his shower was the size of Cruella de Vil's closet—in awe as warm water ran over her body. Dirt ran down the drain, which was kinda gross, but whatever. She grabbed the first bottle she saw, and squinted. Curly hair shampoo. Huh. Honoré didn't have curly hair, did other people frequently use his shower? Uma shrugged. She turned the bottle over, and read the instructions on the back. Lather Boucle D'or Curly Hair Clarifying Shampoo generously onto your scalp, then rinse, and repeat with Boucle D'or Curl Defining Shampoo. Then, apply Boucle D'or Hydrating Leave-In Conditioner and let sit for twenty to thirty minutes. Uma followed the instructions, and by the time the conditioner-thing was in her hair, her braids were softer and cleaner than they had ever been. Even a trip to the salon never did this much for her hair.
Giddily, Uma looked around for some soap, and found a bottle labeled Chambéry Savon Corps Hydratant. Next to it was Chambéry Savon Visage Pour Peau Sensible, Sèche ou Huileuse. So, body soap and facial soap. Uma didn't even know there was a difference, but of course some Auradon noble kid would. She put the facial one on first, then the body soap. She rinsed everything off, including the conditioner-thing. She wasn't sure if it had been twenty minutes, but it was just conditioner. She remained under the spray for a few minutes, then regrettably turned it off, and dried her body with the towel Henry or Honoré, or whatever his name was, gave her. She stepped out of the shower, and took a minute to look around. There was a wide glass window high up in the shower, cracked open to let steam out, and a large sink. Everything was either black or white marble and wood with some gilded highlights instead of the blue and yellow she would have expected, and on the sink, there were... a lot of products.
Honoré had said she could use whatever she wanted besides his razor, washcloth, toothbrush, lip products, and something else she didn't care to remember. Or maybe that was it. Yeah, that was it. He did put out a toothbrush for her, though, so maybe she should use that. He also left out something labeled 'pads' and another labeled 'tampons'. Uma brushed her teeth, then grabbed a bottle labeled Chambéry Crème Corps et Visage Hydratanted, and put it all over her body, including her face. Then, she read what it said on the pad-container, and put it down. She didn't need one right now, but who called a serviette a pad? Maybe that was some strange URA thing
She got dressed, schooled her expression, and left the bathroom, sadly. Honoré and Ben were right where they were thirty minutes ago. Honoré looked up, and stood up, pulling out a chair for her next to him. She sat down, and for the next few hours, Honoré attempted to shove so many names, titles, and matters of state into her head that he made Athanasios look like an amateur in bureaucracy.
Then, finally, someone knocked on the door, and Honoré got up to answer it. Uma rested her pounding head in her arms and sighed in relief.
Honoré opened the door, and a lean, tall guy who looked vaguely similar to him, a peppy-looking girl with blonde braids and brown skin, another, paler girl with dark brown hair, and a third girl in a hoodie with black wavy hair and skin darker than the first girl’s entered. They were all holding boxes with colorful dresses thrown over them except the third girl, who was holding a plastic box with a bunch of drawers filled with what seemed to be makeup.
Honoré cleared his throat. “Uma, meet my brother Gabriel, his girlfriend Chloë, Valentina, and Aurelia. Everyone, meet Uma. She’s an ambassador from the Isle.”
Uma vaguely remembered him explaining who Gabriel, Chloë, and Valentina were. Gabriel was, obviously, his younger brother by a year who had gotten into a bunch of scandals recently, Chloë was some famous singer chick who had been hired last minute to sing the national anthem–which, damn that was pretentious and ridiculous–and Valentina was some noble girl who was betrothed to Chad Charment, the son of Prince Charment and Cinderella. He didn’t really talk about Aurelia besides the short remark on her being a singer who was in a group with Chloë—and some other girl—and the girl who was going to do her makeup. The name was familiar, though. Uma wasn’t really sure why.
“I’m sorry, say that again?” Gabriel raised a brow. He looked at his friends in confusion, then back at Honoré, then at Uma, who gave him a little wave. “Uh, is this a thing now?”
Honoré nodded, and Aurelia shrugged. “Whatever, dude. I’m running on energy drinks right now, I do not have the energy to deal with this shit.” She put her box down on Honore’s desk and clasped her hands together. “Uma, I’m gonna be doing all of you three’s makeup today so I’m sorry in advance, this is gonna be a rush job. Here’s how this is gonna work because we have seventeen hours until you guys need to be on the boat for Cotillion—since of course we got all the VIP guests—and it’s gonna take me about three and a half hours per girl for makeup and hair maximum. So, Gabriel’s gonna finish Chloë’s dress first because she gets girlfriend privileges. That will take about thirty minutes to an hour. Then, he’ll finish Valentina’s, which should take up to two hours. While he’s doing their dresses and Valentina prepares her princess-to-be stuff, I’ll try to get as much work done on you. Since Gabriel started your dress maybe two hours ago, including the time it took to get here, once he starts on you, he’s gonna lock in and I can’t work on you so I’m gonna need you to be a statuette. Alright?”
“Sure,” was all Uma said. The fuck does ‘lock in’ mean?
. . .
True to Aurelia’s word, finishing the dresses and everything else took up most of the day. At some point, some other girl—Barbie, the third girl in Chloë and Aurelia’s music group, Uma hadn’t cared to listen much—had arrived with this delicious drink called boba tea, which made the entire process much more pleasant.
Aurelia and Barbie apparently wouldn’t be going to Cotillion because they weren’t noble, Technically, neither was Chloë, but she was Gabriel’s girlfriend and officially, they were “courting” and she was recognized as his girlfriend by the entire d’Ange family so even without the national anthem thing, she kind of had to go—at least, that’s what she told Uma.
The whole process was kind of surreal, for several reasons. Firstly, she was in Auradon. Some guy and some girl were tailoring a dress for her and doing her makeup and basically pampering her. But also… Uma wasn’t really used to being in a room with several other Black girls, especially important ones—she assumed they were important, since Chloë was dating a noble and she, Barbie, and Aurelia were in a music group that Ben apparently thought was a pretty big deal. Also, they all looked rich. And sure, there were Black people on the Isle. Sure, there were a couple of important ones around her age, like Carlos or Sultan, but besides Sultan and Uma, no one else on the Council looked like her, and the most important Black girls on the Isle besides Uma were Freddie Facilier, Sultan’s sister Shetani, and di Capo’s wife. Uma was on decent terms with all of them, especially since she and Freddie shared the same dad, technically, but Shetani was twelve years old and she got quiet when… the incident happened with Scar, and di Capo’s wife Aria really just primped and took care of her baby—which was pretty admirable, since babies were hard to take care of, protect, and keep alive. Aria wasn't the strongest woman either, but Uma had heard enough about her using her—really long—nails against anyone who tried to hurt her daughter. Anyways, Uma didn’t think all four of them had ever been in the same room together at once. Athanasios had brown skin, too, but not because he was Black: his mom was just the Goddess of Spring so he had inherited her sunkissed skin even though he had never seen the sun.
So, yeah. It was weird, but in a good way.
Finally, Gabriel finished the finishing touches on Uma’s dress and helped her into her shoes, and by then, there were two hours left until they had to leave for Cotillion. Uma was exhausted. She had rarely ever needed to stand for about twelve hours with only the occasional food, water and rest break, and that only happened when Ursula made her take long shifts right before Uma had to work on the Lost Revenge. Usually, even then, she had help in the form of Harry and Gil.
And still, there was Cotillion.
Gabriel groaned and collapsed onto Honoré’s bed right next to Ben, Valentina, Aurelia, Barbie, and Chloë, massaging his raw fingers. “Fuck, my hands. Oh my fucking God. Honoré, you better send me my money by tomorrow, asshole,” he whined.
Chloë laughed and tugged on his arm. “Get up, Gabby. You still need to put on your suit.” Gabriel just groaned again.
Valentina shoved Gabriel. “Yeah, Gabby. Go put your suit on.”
“Shut up, Val,” he muttered.
Valentina gasped and put a hand over her heart. “Is that any way to speak to the future Queen of the Royaume Charment? You whore. I’m gonna call Chad and I’ll get you executed.”
Gabriel gave her a side-eye. “Yeah, I’m the whore, but you slept with my brother.”
Honoré coughed, and Aurelia, Chloë, and Barbie all started giggling while Valentina glared at Gabriel heatlessly.
“Executed.” Valentina pressed some buttons on her phone, and some ringing noise came out of it. “And by the way, that was several months ago after stupid fucking Chad decided to go with Audrey to Ben’s Coronation instead of me, his actual betrothed, and embarrassed me in front of all of the kingdoms. And why isn’t he picking up?!” Valentina’s phone stopped ringing and some woman on it said something about leaving a message.
Uma rose a brow from where she was sitting next to Honoré at his desk in her pretty dress. Guess the apple did fall far from the tree. She found it hard to believe that Cinderella and Prince Charming’s perfect princely son would do something like that to a girl, but then again, people weren’t their parents. Still, she wouldn’t have expected that from a prince of Auradon.
Suddenly, Valentina shrieked. “Why the fuck is Chad at the Fairy Cottage?” She sat up straight in the bed, and did something on her phone. “Is he with Audrey? Now? Today?” Her voice cracked.
Ben finally looked up from his computer, where he was revising his speech. “Fairy Cottage is hours away. Why would he be there two hours before he’s supposed to escort you to Cotillion?”
Ben grabbed his own phone, and another ringing noise came out of it. Then, a guy’s voice said hello. “Chad, why aren’t you at Auradon Prep getting ready for Cotillion?” There was a pause, then Ben’s expression became sullen. “But you can’t just dump that on Valentina right before again. Chad, you were supposed to take her to Cotillion in two hours. And you didn’t even warn her?” Another pause. “But why is Audrey calling you more important? You have a duty to—” Some beeping noise came from his phone and Ben pulled it away from his ear in shock. “Did he just hang up on me?”
Valentina sniffed. “Guess I’ll go to Cotillion with his sister instead then.” She was clearly trying to sound optimistic, but it honestly wasn’t working. She just sounded really sad, like Gil when someone called his dad’s “puppies” bloodthirsty mutts.
“You’re saying that your betrothed ditched you at a fancy event for some other girl?” Uma asked in shock, and Valentina nodded.
“Yeah, I think so.”
Uma scoffed. “Girl, dump him.”
Valentina didn’t look motivated like Uma thought she should be. Instead, she just looked defeated. “It’s not that simple. We’ve been promised to each other since we were kids, and our engagement can’t just be broken off. Not unless all of our parents agree. Even if he’s been acting like a jerk since junior year started. And besides, I’ve already gone through all of the training required for a future Queen my age. It would be a waste for us to just break off the engagement.” Half of her words sounded half-hearted, like she was just parroting what someone else had already told her.
“That sounds so dumb,” Uma shook her head.
“That’s what I’ve been saying,” Aurelia rolled her eyes.
“How about I take you to Cotillion?” Ben asked, and Valentina’s eyes widened. Uma whistled lowly.
“What?” She squawked. “Ben, I can’t—aren’t you and Chad friends? And don’t you have Mal?”
“Mal and I broke up, and you’re my friend too, Valentina,” Ben said firmly, and Valentina stared at him for a long moment.
Then, she spoke: “I… okay, you can take me to Cotillion. My dress is blue either way. But if Chad, his parents, and the entire kingdom of Charment get mad at me, it wasn’t my idea.” Ben just nodded, and went back to working on his computer. Uma made a note. Ben had made that offer pretty eargerly. Uma wasn't one to slut shame, but what a hoe.
Uma snorted. “Guess Auradon princes aren’t so perfect, huh?”
Valentina laughed mirthlessly. “You have no idea. But I don’t wanna talk about this right before Cotillion. It’s making me all sad and shit.”
Barbie perked up. “Oh! I have tea.” The fuck did that mean?
Aurelia, Valentina, Chloë, and Gabriel turned towards her so fast Uma thought they’d get whiplash. Even Honoré and Ben looked up from their work.
“Okay, so you know how Lan Lei’s been plotting on Jay since he got here, right?” She said. Uma narrowed her eyes. She didn't know what exactly that meant, but she could take a wild guess. Lan Lei probably though Jay was cute. Who the fuck was Lan Lei, though? “Well, I heard that he asked her to Cotillion and she said yes!” Huh. Maybe that was why he went to talk to Phoenix after the meeting earlier today—or yesterday, rather—and that was definitely why she had stormed out angrily right afterwards.
“Who’s Lan Lei?” Uma inquired, and Barbie looked at her in confusion.
“Mulan’s daughter,” she replied.
“She was the Auradonian girl with swords who was on the Isle,” Ben supplied, and Uma nodded. That made sense. She seemed like Jay’s type. Pretty and strong enough to hold her own. Maybe a little bit nicer though, but that chalked up to being Auradonian.
"Good for Lan Lei," Honoré said, then added. "And Jay."
Barbie cooed. “That’s so cute and romantic."
"It is, right?" Aurelia sighed, kind of sadly too. "I want a love like that."
Uma scrunched up her nose. Eww. Chloë giggled and scooted closer to Gabriel. "What, don't tell me you've never dreamed of meeting your true love?"
"Not really. It's not like I've ever had time for all of that," she shrugged, and Aurelia looked at her strangely. Uma wasn't sure what to make of that look. It wasn't envy or shock or pity, but it wasn't not that either. It was annoying. Maybe Auradon girls were just like that. All of these girls were kind of annoying, with their 'true love' bullshit.
They kept talking for a while until, finally, they had to leave for Cotillion. Gabriel, Honoré, and Chloë left together to join the rest of their family or something, and Aurelia and Barbie went home, since they weren't going to Cotillion. Uma left Auradon Prep with Valentina and Ben in a really nice car. The chauffeur gave them a look when they entered the limousine, but didn't say anything. He was probably paid too well to care.
The car ride was pretty silent compared to the hours spent in Honoré's dorm. It was better for Uma's head. Valentina didn't seem like a super talkative person on her own, and Ben was clearly stressing over Cotillion. So was Valentina, probably.
Uma busied herself by looking at the city as they drove by or at details on her dress. The bodice was a lighter teal color than the ruffly skirt, which kind of looked like a mermaid. There were little gold accents and beads and seashells all over the skirt, which Uma thought was pretty. As for the bodice, the back was laced up and there were lace details meant to mimic seashells, with actual seashells and gold beads over them. The front was pretty similar, with a sweetheart neckline, and gold beads for sleeves that fell off her shoulders. Gabriel had also given her a pair of brown silk gloves with some gold lace details and her heels were blocky, black, and strappy with a gold heel. Uma thought it was pretty impressive he had managed to do all of that in so little time.
Valentina's dress reminded Uma of what Cinderella's dress was said to look like: blue, poofy, except there were a bunch of silvery, lacey accents all over it and a bunch of shiny stones that looked like diamonds. It was also off-the shoulder and much lower-cut than Uma's. Her heels were simple, silver. Sort of like Cinderella's. She looked pretty, but Uma didn't really think it suited her much. She was also wearing a light blue silk sash with a silver crest on it and a big silver tiara.
Ben was just wearing some kind of dark blue suit with a ton of gold crests and stuff and his crown, which looked a little bit big for his head.
Finally, they arrived at a port where some big, white ship was docked. Uma wasn't really sure what type of ship it was, but it definitely wasn't a pirate ship. So far, they were the only ones of the dock. The car came to a stop, and the chauffeur opened the door for them. Ben stepped out first, then helped Uma and Valentina out. They stepped onto the ship, and Ben guided them to some sort of backroom or dressing room. Uma wasn't sure. The door to the room had a blue and gold crest with a beast on it, so Uma assumed this was a designated dressing room.
Valentina sat down on a cushiony seat and went on her phone, and Ben started pacing, muttering to himself. Uma sat down in another one of those cushion-things, and sighed in delight, closing her eyes. It was so comfortable. Uma would have to find a way to get some of these to her crew. She usually didn't relax like this with random people, but a princess and Ben didn't exactly put her on edge. After a few peaceful moments, she heard shy footsteps approach her.
"Hey, Uma?" Ben said, and Uma reluctantly—regrettably—re-opened her eyes. "You remember what to do, right?"
Uma nodded and closed her eyes again. "Yep."
"Okay," he said. He started pacing again, and Uma's eye twitched.
She was about to say something, but Valentina beat her to it. "Ben, my dude, my guy—you're fine. Trust me, you're fine."
"But what if—"
"Ben."
Uma assumed they made eye contact or something because they were quiet for a little bit. Finally, Ben sighed, took some steps, sat down, and shut up.