by Liz Braswell
Flotsam threw himself into the melee, dagger still at the ready.
“Don’t let her touch the water!” Ariel screamed.
But it was too late. Grabbing the stone basin with her tentacles, Ursula dragged all three of them into the water, where they sank to the bottom.
Ariel leapt up and ran over…but all was still.
A single bubble rose to the surface and then popped.
And then a cloud of blood swirled up through the water, dark and ugly.
“No…” she sobbed.
Flounder leapt up out of the water, which flew from his body in viscous, sparkling red and black drops.
“Eric is all right! Help him out—he’s all tangled and trapped under her body!”
Ariel stumbled over to the fountain, her father still clutched in her arms. In the blurry depths she could see Ursula’s massive body…and Flotsam’s dagger somehow buried in her chest. The witch’s face was growing pale, and her mouth hung open slackly. Her servant was stunned, entangled around her in eel form. Underneath the two of them Eric struggled weakly.
“Here!” she commanded, thrusting her father into Vareet’s hands. “Guard him with your life!”
Trying not to choke on water polluted with the sea witch’s foul ichor, Ariel dove in, reverting to her real body immediately. Tentacles and arms and legs were everywhere. She wrestled with the slick cecaelia body, heaving it aside. Grabbing the front of Eric’s shirt, she pulled him away from Ursula, wedging her tail against the dead woman’s midriff.
All the years she had thought about what she would do when she finally defeated Ursula, what she would say or experience…and now the sea witch was just an object, a blunt obstacle that was keeping her from saving Eric.
With a mighty heave Ariel managed to fling Eric out onto the side of the fountain, his chest cracking against the marble. He coughed and water came streaming out of his mouth.
“She did it! She defeated the terrible sea monster!” the apple seller cried.
The crowd screamed and cheered and clapped and went berserk.
Eric was a mess, all broken and bloody and barely upright, legs still dragging under the water. But he was alive. Flounder kept his distance, not wanting to breathe in any more blood.
Everything around them was bruised and broken but the confusion seemed to be slowly clearing up. There was a pile of mostly unconscious soldier bodies on the dais—ones with tiny black octopus insignia on their sleeves. A triumphant ragtag crew stood above them: Argent with her stained and cracked walking stick, which she now held like a club; Grimsby, who had somehow managed to acquire a musket and was holding it quite steadily; two seagulls; several loyal soldiers and their captain; a soprano and two bass clarinetists.
Vareet stood by the fountain, Triton cradled safely in her small arms.
“So this is what winning feels like,” Ariel said. “I think I like it.”
Eric groaned and would have slipped back underwater if she hadn’t grabbed him.
If it had been up to the prince, there would have been happily ever afters right then. The bad guy had been defeated, the love of his life was holding him, she had just said something funny, the crowd was cheering—the perfect place for an opera to end.
Alas, real life was a little more complicated than that.
And real blood, not stage blood, was continuing to leak out his nose.
The captain and the remaining loyal guards—who would all be rewarded richly later—scanned the situation and reacted appropriately, placing themselves between the prince and the confused, curious, adoring crowd. “You, Decard,” he said weakly. “Send two men to go find Carlotta in the castle….In the basement…”
“Yes, Your Highness, immediately.” The captain saluted and spun off.
With that last order given, Eric succumbed to a wave of weakness and began to slip back into the water.
“Nope—no, you don’t,” Ariel said, hoisting him back up and all the way out of the fountain. Grimsby was there instantly, offering his shoulder to lean on. Even in his current state Eric couldn’t help watching the mermaid with her glorious tail thrown out for balance, sparkling in the sunlight. Behind them he could hear oohs and gasps as the townspeople saw her clearly for the first time.
He couldn’t blame them. She was magnificent.
He tried not to put all his weight on the old butler. Things shifted perspective and swam before him—unsurprisingly, there was water in his ears.
“Well done, Prince Eric!” Grimsby said, voice shaking with excitement. “Good show!”
“It was you and Vareet and Max who really got the ball rolling,” he said with a grin. Then he put his arm around the other man and gave him a good squeeze. “You mean so much to me, Grims. Have I ever said that before? I was so worried about you.”
“O-oh, well—there, there,” Grimsby stuttered, smiling but looking around with embarrassment. “You’re a bit out of your head. Shhh.”
Ariel was saying something to the fish in the fountain. Eric felt a strange sense of loss. The fish was truly incredible, unusual by any account. But all he saw was a glaze-eyed animal who apparently was saying something in its silent fishy language, and it made Ariel throw back her head and laugh like a girl. She kissed it on its head and then slipped off the fountain, legs forming as she did.
“I’m getting better at this,” she said, turning to face her human friends and twirling the trident.
“I think this is yours,” Vareet said, handing her the glass ampoule and curtsying. “What is it?”
“This, brave girl, is my father,” Ariel said, kissing her on the forehead. She carefully set the jar down on the ground—then shot a bolt at it.
Smoke—no, water vapor—swirled up and up and up into the sky. On the ground, the polyp grew and lengthened and stretched and hardened into a man.
A man that Eric now remembered: he must have been seven or eight feet tall, broad, and somehow lit from within. He seemed more real than the petty humans around him, the cobbled streets, the fountain; as though they were all a child’s drawings while he was the original, badly copied. His beard was white and flowed down over him, looking the way Eric had always imagined the patriarchs in the Old Testament. His skin was a coppery shade, more precious metal than flesh. His eyes were almost hidden beneath a bushy brow, but sparks shone there.
When Eric saw him last, that fateful wedding day, Triton had the tail of a fish. Now he had two broad, strong legs.
“Father,” Ariel said, and a thousand meanings were in that word: apology, sorrow, joy, love.
“Ariel,” her father breathed, choking on the first word he had said in years. Then without a moment’s hesitation he wrapped his arms around her and began to cry.
All the humans around them felt similarly to Eric, he could tell: amazed but vaguely uncomfortable, wanting to leave the two alone. Even in his emotions, the king of the merfolk was mightier than mortals.
“I am so sorry,” Ariel whispered. She, oddly, was not crying, though she hugged her father back firmly. “For everything.”
“You are forgiven. For everything,” he said, stroking her hair.
“How?” she asked in wonder.
“Someday, you will understand,” Triton said with a smile. “Perhaps when you are a mother.”
Then he looked around and seemed to notice the small crowd of mortals.
“Father, this is Prince Eric,” Ariel said smoothly, taking Triton’s hand and indicating Eric with her other. “He has been a great help in your rescue and defeating Ursula.”
“Eric,” Triton said neutrally, “I thank you for all the service you have rendered to my royal self and the mer of the sea.”
“King Triton,” Eric said, bowing his head. “It is an honor to meet you.”
“All of these people, all of these humans, helped save you,” Ariel said. “This is Grimsby, Eric’s right-hand man. This is Vareet, who, despite her age and size, risked her life to get us valuable information. This is Argent, who k
new about mermaids and can apparently wield a shillelagh with no small skill. Sebastian and Flounder you already know. Jona the seagull and Max the dog were both instrumental in defeating Ursula. Scuttle is the reason we are all here today, and why you are now free!”
“I did what I could,” Sebastian said modestly from her pocket.
“I thank you all,” Triton said with a bow. “Would that I could stay and reward you as you so honorably deserve right now—but I miss my home, and must needs return to the sea at once. Ariel, my trident.”
She handed it over gracefully and formally, but might have been gritting her back teeth.
“You will be recipients of my gratitude shortly,” the king added, addressing the townspeople in front of him. “The sea does not forget.”
He put his arm out and Ariel took it. But not until after she gave Eric a quick kiss on the cheek. It was so familiar, so Honey, I’m going out for a few minutes, back soon, that Triton—and not a few other people—gasped. Grimsby looked as delighted as a gossipy old hen. Vareet looked embarrassed, disgusted, and vaguely amused. Max barked.
“See you in a few tides,” she whispered.
Eric grinned and then kissed her back firmly on her lips, tipping her head back so he wouldn’t accidentally bleed onto it.
The townsfolk cheered.
When they were done, Ariel scooped Flounder out of the fountain, holding him under her arm. She and her father walked through the crowds—which parted, almost everyone bowing to the mer couple. They went straight to the docks and leapt off together, tails slapping the water as they dove down.
“HA!” shouted the old woman with the club. “I got to see two! TWO mermaids!”
This was the second time in a month that she had been conscripted by a foreign entity to carry a message of grave importance. The gull winged her way out over the sea laden with a sense of historic gravity, the special roll of paper tied to her leg and tucked up into her feathers. She was probably the only bird in the world who carried regular communiqués between two of the major—though somewhat self-important—civilized races of the world. It was something to think about.
Crazy joy overtook her, and she allowed herself exactly one loop-de-loop and a single long whoop! before returning to her original heading and task.
She was, after all, her great-grandfather’s great-grandgull.
Sometimes the crazy was hard to keep in.
There were terrible, terrible messes to clean up afterward.
For the first and perhaps only time in history, a seagull was used to deliver a message to the ships sent out to sea—to prevent them from bombing Atlantica. While the prince was fairly certain Ariel and her dad would stop it in time, it didn’t hurt to offer an official order to prevent them before another deadly storm was unleashed.
Carlotta was rescued and royally thanked. She was given a vacation (which she didn’t take), a snug country house (which she did), and a significant raise.
Eric had his men chain Flotsam and Jetsam together and toss them into the ocean. Either they would be found and treated appropriately by the mer, or…not. Not really his problem.
Then he oversaw a careful scripting of the official record of events of the day, to be read, announced, distributed, shared, and generally understood by all the good citizens of Tirulia who had borne witness to the events. There was no mass hypnosis spell to make everyone forget the existence of mermaids this time. Now everyone knew. It was important that they all knew the same thing, and didn’t concoct potentially dangerous fake news about what happened.
Except that he did have to draft a fake formal announcement for the death of Princess Vanessa. Tirulians would understand what really happened; the rest of the continent would only know the faintest details: she died. Possibly drowned.
Troops from everywhere had to be recalled immediately.
Ambassadors and emissaries had to be thoroughly debriefed, and in some cases exiled.
It was endless and exhausting work. Eric stayed up until the wee hours of the night trying to get everything done. Sometimes, given a spare moment, he would glance ironically at the moon and think about how he used to compose music at that time. But that was all right. He had a duty to his kingdom. Being prince wasn’t just fun and games.
There were a few bright moments—like when he summoned Vareet into his office.
The little maid had passed out from exhaustion the afternoon after everything happened, and slept for over a day. Eric couldn’t imagine what was going on in the poor girl’s head, in thrall to a witch-princess for years and then saved by a mermaid girl.
She came in wide-eyed and understandably suspicious when the prince smiled at her and shook her hand. “Nice to meet you, formally.”
She continued to look confused, but her eyes widened in interest.
“Vareet, you have borne more than any of us, in some ways, and come through it all bravely, helping us out in our darkest hour. Of course you shall have whatever you like—fresh, ahem, drawing paper, toy soldiers, a pony—you have but to name it.
“But also: I have hired a tutor from the Academia to come live at the castle. She will teach you how to read and write and do maths. And probably Latin. Sorry about that, but it’s part of the package. Then you can make a choice, when you are caught up: either stay here as my personal secretary, or go to university and attain whatever else you wish to do with your life.”
Vareet remained silent.
The prince suddenly felt awkward, something he had rarely experienced. He had no idea what the little girl was thinking. Should he repeat what he had said, slower? Would that be insulting?
Then suddenly she flung her arms around his neck and buried her head in his chest.
Eric laughed and hugged her back. That was the happily-ever-after moment he had been waiting for, and it wasn’t even his.
Triton’s arrival was epic, although a truly epic official parade was planned for the next day. Flounder, once returned to the sea, shot ahead and told every fish he met. By the time Ariel and her father got close to Atlantica, a massive crowd had already formed: most of the mer, and many, many other people of the sea. Whales and sharks and minnows and sardines and tuna and cod and octopodes…Even all the little corals, anemone, and barnacles came out to wave their fronds.
“FATHER!”
Five slippery, sparkling mergirls shot out of the crowd and wrapped themselves around him like the fat tentacles of a kraken. Attina hugged Ariel.
“You did it,” she whispered, pressing her forehead to her sister’s like they used to when sharing secrets. “You actually did it.”
“I did,” Ariel said with a smile.
“You really are something.” The oldest mer princess smiled and shook her head. When the others regretfully disengaged, she, too, went to greet her father, with a solid—if slightly more formal—embrace.
“Good people of Atlantica,” Triton said, holding his trident aloft, “I have returned!”
His voice boomed out through the water, far more commanding even than Ariel’s newly regained voice. The crowd went wild: cheering, flapping their tails, slapping, bubbling, gurgling, swimming in circles.
The king himself was only too happy to retire quietly that first night, drink goldenwine with his closest friends, swim lustily through the kingdom, and generally stretch his tail, arms, and fins the way he hadn’t in years. When his daughters finally forced him into his coral bed, he only resisted a little.
The celebrations, feasting, and partying the next day were like nothing mortal eyes had ever witnessed. Old rivalries were forgotten; the barracuda even brought gifts of apology. Ariel surprised everyone by singing some of what Sebastian had composed so far for his “Tribute to the Return of the King.”
And on the third day, everyone finally got back to work.
Triton sat at the throne, reviewing all the policies and paperwork Ariel had managed while he was gone. He did not use a desk, instead having people hold tablets, decrees, and documents for him whil
e he read. The king frowned and muttered and said things like “Mmmh. Good point about the right-of-way” and “I would have told the rays to consider an alternate breeding ground” and “Bah, the Rites. I always hated dealing with those. Always made Threll and Sebastian do it.”
At this Ariel raised her eyebrows at Sebastian. The little crab shrugged, chagrined. The seahorse coughed nervously.
“Overall, a very impressive job,” Triton said, raising his eyebrows as he studied his youngest daughter. “Please don’t take this the wrong way, Ariel, but I am pleasantly surprised by how you have matured. Your time ruling has shown wisdom, pragmatism, quick thinking, and unique solutions to difficult problems. You might even have surpassed your old man.”
“Thank you, Father.”
“You know,” he added, speculatively, “I could use a hand with all of this. A right-fin man, or mer. I know you probably want to be off again with your sisters, or singing—”
“Nope. No,” Ariel interrupted immediately.
“Well, then, it’s settled,” the old mer said with a grin. “Father-daughter day! Every day! What a team!”
Ariel cleared her throat. Her thumbs passed over her fingers and back, as if thinking of something to sign.
“Actually, Father, I had another idea….”
“This isn’t about you going to the surface again, is it? Because let me tell you—”
“Hang on,” Ariel said, putting her hand up to stop him—something she never would have done before. She did it calmly, without anger or a sudden burst of temper at his attitude; also something new. “We’ll get to my career options in a moment. Let me first make it absolutely clear, however, that I love Eric and want to be with him. And I can do that for at least one week a month, with your help.”
“WITH MY HELP? IF YOU THINK FOR ONE SECOND I—”
Ariel fixed him with a cool eye. “Remember what happened last time I had to find an alternate solution for walking on land? I’m sure there are other ways out there, and I’m sure I could find them. Do you really want me doing that?”
“Are you threatening me?”
“I am merely stating what will inevitably happen if you resist this. I will see Eric. If you want to turn him into a mer for a week every month, I’m fine with that, too. However, currently he is a prince with actual duties, and I doubt he has the time for such things.”