Far out in the ocean, where the water is as blue as the prettiest cornflower, and as clear as crystal, it is very, very deep. There dwell the Sea Vince and his wrestlers. We must not imagine that there is nothing at the bottom of the sea but bare yellow sand. No, indeed, the most singular flowers and plants grow there, the leaves and stems of which are so pliant, that the slightest agitation of the water causes them to stir as if they had life. Fishes, both large and small, glide between the branches, as birds fly among the trees here upon land. In the deepest spot of all, stands Titan Towers, the castle of the Sea Vince.
The Sea Vince had been a widower for many years, and his aged mother kept house for him. She was a very wise woman, and exceedingly proud of her high birth, on that account she wore twelve oysters on her tail, while others, also of high rank, were only allowed to wear six. She was, however, deserving of very great praise, especially for her care of the little Sea Princesses, her grand-wrestlers. They were six beautiful children, but the youngest was the prettiest of them all, her skin was as clear and delicate as a rose-leaf, and her eyes as blue as the deepest sea, but, like all the others, she had no feet, and her body ended in a fish�s tail.
All day long they wrestled in the great rings of Titan Towers, or among the living flowers that grew out of the walls. The large amber windows were open, and the fishes swam up to the princesses, ate out of their hands, and allowed themselves to be petted. The youngest princess, named Stephanie, had a special flounder friend, whom she named Edge.
Outside, in the castle gardens, each of the young princesses had a little plot of ground in the garden, where she might dig and plant as she pleased. Princess Chyna had her flower-bed into the form of a whale, Princess Lita thought it better to make hers like the figure of a little mermaid, but the garden of Stephanie was round like the sun, and contained flowers as red as the rays at sunset.
Princess Stephanie was a strange child, quiet and thoughtful, and while her sisters would be delighted with the wonderful things which they obtained from the wrecks of vessels, she cared for nothing but her pretty red flowers, like the sun, excepting a beautiful marble statue. It was the representation of a handsome boy, carved out of pure white stone, which had fallen to the bottom of the sea from a wreck. She planted beside the statue a rose-coloured weeping willow.
Another thing about Princess Stephanie was that nothing gave her so much pleasure than to hear about the world above the sea. She made her old grandmother tell her all she knew of the ships and of the towns, the people and the animals. To her it seemed most wonderful and beautiful to hear that the flowers of the land should have fragrance, and not those below the sea, that the trees of the forest should be green, and that the fishes among the trees could sing so sweetly, that it was quite a pleasure to hear them. Her grandmother called the little birds fishes.
�When you have reached your fifteenth year,� said the grand-mother, �you will have permission to rise up out of the sea, to sit on the rocks in the moonlight, while the great ships are sailing by, and then you will see both forests and towns.�
In the following year, Princess Chyna would be fifteen: but as each was a year younger than the other, the youngest would have to wait many more years before her turn came to rise up from the bottom of the ocean, and see the earth. However, each sister promised to tell the others what she saw on her first visit, and what she thought the most beautiful, for their grandmother could not tell them enough, there were so many things on which they wanted information. But none of them longed so much for her turn to come as the youngest, she who had the longest time to wait.
As soon as Princess Chyna was fifteen, she was allowed to rise to the surface of the ocean. When she came back, she had hundreds of things to talk about, but the most beautiful, she said, was to lie in the moonlight, on a sandbank, in the quiet sea, near the coast, and to gaze on a large town nearby yadda yadda yadda. Hey, this is about the youngest Princess after all!
In another year Princess Trish received permission to rise to the surface of the water, and to swim about where she pleased. She rose just as the sun was setting, and this, she said, was the most beautiful sight of all. The whole sky looked like gold, while violet and rose-coloured clouds yadda yadda yadda. Once again, the youngest Princess.
Princess Jacqueline�s turn followed, she was the boldest of them all, and she swam up a broad river that emptied itself into the sea. On the banks she saw green hills covered with beautiful vines, palaces and castles peeped out from amid the proud trees of the forest, she heard the birds singing. In short, she also saw naked kids and a dog. Remember, tale is about the youngest Princess.
Princess Ivory was more timid, she remained in the midst of the sea, but she said it was quite as beautiful there as nearer the land. She could see for so many miles around her, and the sky above looked like a bell of glass. Hmm�sounds a little boring to us, but this ain�t about her. Youngest Princess, right?
Princess Lita�s birthday occurred in the winter, so when her turn came, she saw what the others had not seen the first time they went up. The sea looked quite green, and large icebergs were floating about, each like a pearl. They were of the most singular shapes, and glittered like diamonds. She had seated herself upon one of the largest, and let the wind play with her long hair, and she remarked that all the ships sailed by rapidly, yadda yadda yadda. Still remembering the youngest Princess?
When first the sisters had permission to rise to the surface, they were each delighted with the new and beautiful sights they saw, but now, as grown-up girls, they could go when they pleased, and they had become indifferent about it. They wished themselves back again in the water, and after a month had passed they said it was much more beautiful down below, and pleasanter to be at home. Yet often, in the evening hours, the five wrestlers would twine their arms round each other, and rise to the surface, in a row. They sang sweetly of the delights to be found in the depths of the sea, and begging the sailors not to fear if they sank to the bottom. But the sailors could not understand the song, they took it for the howling of the storm. And these things were never to be beautiful for them, for if the ship sank, the men were drowned, and their dead bodies alone reached the palace of the Sea Vince. Evil mermaids!
When the sisters rose, arm-in-arm, through the water in this way, their youngest sister would stand quite alone, looking after them, ready to cry, only that the mermaids have no tears, and therefore they suffer more. �Oh, were I but fifteen years old,� said Princess Stephanie, �I know that I shall love the world up there, and all the people who live in it.�
At last she reached her fifteenth year. �Well, now, you are grown up,� said the old dowager (aka the grandmother), �so you must let me adorn you like the other Princesses� and she placed a wreath of white lilies in her hair, and every flower leaf was half a pearl. Then the old lady ordered eight great oysters to attach themselves to the tail of the princess to show her high rank.
�But they hurt me so,� said the Princess.
�Pride must suffer pain,� replied the old lady.
About damn time!
Stephanie rose as lightly as a bubble to the surface of the water. The sun had just set as she raised her head above the waves, but the clouds were tinted with crimson and gold, and through the glimmering twilight beamed the evening star in all its beauty. The sea was calm, and the air mild and fresh. A large ship, with three masts, lay on the water, with only one sail set, for not a breeze stiffed, and the sailors sat idle on deck or amongst the rigging. There was music and song on board, and, as darkness came on, a hundred coloured lanterns were lighted. Hmm�interesting�
Stephanie swam close to the cabin windows, and now and then, as the waves lifted her up, she could look in through clear glass window-panes, and see a number of well-dressed people within. Among them was a young Prince, the most beautiful of all, with large blue eyes. He was sixteen years of age, and his birthday was being celebrated with much rejoicing. How handsome the young Prince looked, as he shook the hands of all present and smiled at them, while the music resounded through the clear night air. This Prince�s name was Jericho.
It was very late, yet the little mermaid Princess could not take her eyes from the ship, or from the beautiful Prince. Who could? It�s Prince Jericho!
The coloured lanterns had been extinguished, no more rockets rose in the air, and the cannon had ceased firing, but the sea became restless, and a moaning, grumbling sound could be heard beneath the waves: still the little mermaid remained. After a while, the sails were quickly unfurled, and the noble ship continued her passage, but soon the waves rose higher, heavy clouds darkened the sky, and lightning appeared in the distance. A dreadful storm was approaching. And the ship was sinking. Stephanie could see every one who had been on board. Except Prince Jericho. There he was! Uh oh. She had seen him sink into the deep waves.
But she was glad, for she thought he would now be with her, and then she remembered that human beings could not live in the water, so that when he got down to her father�s palace he would be quite dead. Damnit!
Stephanie knew that he must not die. So she swam about among the beams and planks which strewed the surface of the sea, forgetting that they could crush her to pieces. Then she dived deeply under the dark waters, rising and falling with the waves, till at length she managed to reach Prince Jericho, who was fast losing the power of swimming in that stormy sea. His limbs were failing him, his beautiful eyes were closed, and he would have died had not Stephanie come to his assistance. She held his head above the water, and let the waves drift them where they would.
In the morning the storm had ceased, and the sun rose up red and glowing from the water, and its beams brought back the hue of health to the prince�s cheeks, but his eyes remained closed. Stephanie kissed his forehead, and stroked back his blonde, wet hair, he seemed to her like the marble statue in her little garden, and she kissed him again, and wished that he might live.
Presently they came in sight of land. The sea here formed a little bay, in which the water was quite still, but very deep, so she swam with Prince Jericho to the beach, which was covered with fine, white sand, and there she laid him in the warm sunshine, taking care to raise his head higher than his body. Then bells sounded in the large white building, and a number of young girls came into the garden.
Stephanie swam out farther from the shore and placed herself between some high rocks that rose out of the water, then she covered her head and neck with the foam of the sea so that her little face might not be seen, and watched to see what would become of poor Prince Jericho. She did not wait long before she saw a young girl approach the spot where he lay. (Bitch!) She seemed frightened at first, but only for a moment, then she fetched a number of people, and Stephanie saw that the Prince came to life again, and smiled upon those who stood round him.
But to her he sent no smile � ungrateful much? � for he knew not that she had saved him. This made her very unhappy, and when he was led away into the great building, she dived down sorrowfully into the water, and returned to her father�s castle. She had always been silent and thoughtful, and now she was more so than ever. Her sisters asked her what she had seen during her first visit to the surface of the water, but she would tell them nothing. Many an evening and morning did she rise to the place where she had left Prince Jericho. But she never saw him, and therefore she returned home, always more sorrowful than before.
At length she could bear it no longer, and finally told one of her fellow wrestlers all about it. Then the others heard the secret, and very soon it became known to two mermaids whose intimate friend happened to know where the Prince came from, and where his palace stood.
�Come, little wrestler,� said the other Princesses, then they entwined their arms and rose up in a long row to the surface of the water, close by the spot where they knew the Prince�s palace stood.
Now that she knew where he lived, Stephanie spent many an evening and many a night on the water near the palace. She would swim much nearer the shore than any of the others ventured to do, indeed once she went quite up the narrow channel under the marble balcony, which threw a broad shadow on the water. Here she would sit and watch Prince Jericho, who thought himself quite alone in the bright moonlight.
As the days passed, Stephanie grew more and more fond of human beings � and of Prince Jericho especially � and wished more and more to be able to wander about with those whose world seemed to be so much larger than her own.
�If human beings are not drowned,� Stephanie asked her old grandma one day, �can they live forever? Do they never die as we do here in the sea?�
�Yes,� replied the old lady, �they must also die, and their term of life is even shorter than ours. We sometimes live to three hundred years, but when we cease to exist here we only become the foam on the surface of the water, and we have not even a grave down here of those we love. We have not immortal souls, we shall never live again. Human beings, on the contrary, have a soul which lives forever, lives after the body has been turned to dust.�
�Why have not we an immortal soul?� asked Stephanie mournfully, �I would give gladly all the hundreds of years that I have to live, to be a human being only for one day, and to have the hope of knowing the happiness of that glorious world above the stars.� Secretly, she was thinking of Prince Jericho, whom she had fallen in love with.
�You must not think of that,� said the old woman, �we feel ourselves to be much happier and much better off than human beings.�
�Is there anything I can do to win an immortal soul?� Stephanie wished more than anything to be with her Prince.
�No,� said the old woman, �unless a man were to love you so much that you were more to him than his father or mother, and if all his thoughts and all his love were fixed upon you, and the priest placed his right hand in yours, and he promised to be true to you here and hereafter, then his soul would glide into your body and you would obtain a share in the future happiness of mankind. He would give a soul to you and retain his own as well, but this can never happen. Your fish�s tail, which amongst us is considered so beautiful, is thought on earth to be quite ugly, they do not know any better, and they think it necessary to have two stout props, which they call legs, in order to be handsome.�
One night, during a court ball, Stephanie swam away from the glamour and glitter of the under-the-sea dance. As her little friend, Flounder-Edge, swam around her, she thought to herself, �He is certainly sailing above, he on whom my wishes depend, and in whose hands I should like to place the happiness of my life. I will venture all for him, and to win an immortal soul, while my sisters are dancing in my father�s palace, I will go to the sea witch, Terri, of whom I have always been so much afraid, but she can give me counsel and help.�
And then Stephanie went out from her garden, and took the road to the foaming whirlpools, behind which the sorceress lived. Her house was located in the centre of a strange forest, in which all the trees and flowers were polypi, half animals and half plants. Stephanie was so alarmed at what she saw, that she stood still, and her heart beat with fear, and she was very nearly turning back, but she thought of Prince Jericho, and of the human soul for which she longed for, and her courage returned.
She now came to a space of marshy ground in the wood, where large, fat water-snakes were rolling in the mire, and showing their ugly, drab-colored bodies. In the midst of this spot stood a house, built with the bones of shipwrecked human beings. There sat Terri, allowing a toad to eat from her mouth, just as people sometimes feed a canary with a piece of sugar. She called the ugly water-snakes her little chickens, and allowed them to crawl all over her bosom. Eeeeww!!!!
�I know what you want,� said Terri, �it is very stupid of you, but you shall have your way, and it will bring you to sorrow, my pretty Princess. You want to get rid of your fish�s tail, and to have legs instead of it, so that the Prince may fall in love with you, and that you may have an immortal soul.� And then Terri laughed so loud and disgustingly, that the toad and the snakes fell to the ground, and lay there wriggling about. Even grosser!
�You are but just in time,� said Terri, �for after sunrise tomorrow I should not be able to help you till the end of another year. I will prepare a draught for you, with which you must swim to land tomorrow before sunrise, and sit down on the shore and drink it. Your tail will then disappear, and shrink up into what humans call legs, and you will feel great pain, as if a sword were passing through you. But all who see you will say that you are the prettiest little human being they ever saw. You will still have the same floating gracefulness of movement, and no dancer will ever tread so lightly, but at every step you take it will feel as if you were treading upon sharp knives, and that the blood must flow. If you will bear all this, I will help you.�
�Yes, I will,� said Stephanie in a trembling voice, as she thought of Prince Jericho and the immortal soul. But mostly Prince Jericho.
�But think again,� said the witch, �for when once your shape has become like a human being, you can no more be a mermaid. You will never return through the water to your sisters, or to your father�s palace again. And if you do not win the love of the Prince, so that he is willing to forget his father and mother for your sake, and to love you with his whole soul, and allow the priest to join your hands that you may be man and wife, then you will never have an immortal soul. The first morning after he marries another, your heart will break, and you will become foam on the crest of the waves.�
�I will do it,� said Stephanie, although she became pale as death.
�But I must be paid also,� said Terri, the conniving she-devil. �And it is not a trifle that I ask. You have the sweetest voice of any who dwell here in the depths of the sea, and you believe that you will be able to charm the Prince with it also, but this voice you must give to me. The best thing you possess will I have for the price of my draught. My own blood must be mixed with it, that it may be as sharp as a two-edged sword.�
�But if you take away my voice,� said Stephanie, �what is left for me?�
�Your beautiful form, your graceful walk, and your expressive eyes. Surely with these you can enchain a man�s heart. Well, have you lost your courage? Put out your little tongue that I may cut it off as my payment. Then you shall have the powerful draught.�
�But-�
�Do you want it or not? And hurry up, cos my toad and snakes are getting away.�
Stephanie felt herself grow bolder. �Do you really have to cut off the tongue? You�re a witch. Can�t you just enchant me so that I can�t speak. The cutting off of tongues is just�disgusting. Not to mention extremely painful.�
Terri rolled her eyes. �Fine, whatever!�
(We now return to our regularly scheduled program�)
�It shall be,� said Stephanie.
Then Terri placed her cauldron on the fire, to prepare the magic draught.
�Cleanliness is a good thing,� said Terri, scouring the vessel with snakes, which she had tied together in a large knot. She then pricked herself in the breast, and let the black blood drop into it. The steam that rose formed itself into such horrible shapes that no one could look at them without fear. Every moment the witch threw something else into the vessel, and when it began to boil, the sound was like the weeping of a crocodile. The what of a crocodile?!
When at last the magic draught was ready, it looked like the clearest water. �There it is for you,� said Terri. Then she cut off- oops, been fixed. Terri then cast a spell on Stephanie, so that she became dumb, and would never again speak or sing.
So she passed quickly through the wood and the marsh, and between the rushing whirlpools. She saw that in her father�s palace the torches in the ballroom were extinguished, and all within asleep, but she did not venture to go in to them, for now she was dumb and going to leave them forever, she felt as if her heart would break. She stole into the garden, took a flower from the flower-beds of each of her sisters, kissed her hand a thousand times towards the palace, and then rose up through the dark blue waters.
When she reached the top of the sea, Stephanie drank the magic draught, and it seemed as if a two-edged sword went through her delicate body. She fell into a swoon, and lay like the dead. When the sun arose and shone over the sea, she recovered, and felt a sharp pain�but just before her stood the handsome Prince Jericho.
He fixed his bright blue eyes upon her so earnestly that she cast down her own, and then became aware that her fish�s tail was gone, and that she had as pretty a pair of white legs and tiny feet as any little maiden could have. But she had no clothes � no wonder the Prince was staring � so she wrapped herself in her long, thick hair. Prince Jericho asked her who she was, and where she came from, but she could only look at him mildly and sorrowfully with her deep blue eyes. She could not speak.
Every step she took was as the witch had said it would be, she felt as if treading upon the points of needles or sharp knives, but she bore it willingly, and stepped as lightly by Prince Jericho�s side as a soap-bubble, so that he and all who saw her wondered at her graceful-swaying movements. She was very soon arrayed in costly robes of silk and muslin, and was the most beautiful creature in the palace. But she was dumb, and could neither speak nor sing. He then took her by the hand and led her into the palace.
(This fic is taking awhile�time to shortenise a little.)
Beautiful female slaves sang before Prince Jericho and his royal parents. One sang better than all the others, and Prince Jericho clapped his hands. Stephanie knew how much more sweetly she herself could sing once. She thought, �Oh if he could only know that! I have given away my voice forever, to be with him.�
The slaves next performed some pretty fairy-like dances to the sound of beautiful music. Stephanie raised her lovely white arms, stood on the tips of her toes, and glided over the floor, and danced as no one yet had been able to dance. At each moment her beauty became more revealed, and her expressive eyes appealed more directly to the heart than the songs of the slaves. Every one was enchanted, especially Prince Jericho. She danced again quite readily, to please him, though each time her foot touched the floor it seemed as if she trod on sharp knives.
Prince Jericho said Stephanie should remain with him always, and she received permission to sleep at his door, on a velvet cushion. This was later changed, and she was able to sleep with him in his bed, though nothing happened! He had a page�s dress made for her, that she might accompany him on horseback. They rode together through the sweet-scented woods, where the green boughs touched their shoulders, and the little birds sang etc etc etc. Let�s just say they pretty much did everything together.
As the days passed, Stephanie grew to love Prince Jericho even more fondly, and he loved her as he would love a little child, but it never came into his head to make her his wife. Well, yet. But she knew that unless he married her, she could not receive an immortal soul, and, on the morning after his marriage with another, she would dissolve into the foam of the sea. Honestly, some men!
�Do you not love me the best of them all?� the eyes of the former mermaid Princess seemed to say, when he took her in his arms, and kissed her fair forehead.
�Yes, you are dear to me,� said Prince Jericho, �for you have the best heart, and you are the most devoted to me. You are like a young maiden whom I once saw, but whom I shall never meet again. I was in a ship that was wrecked, and the waves cast me ashore near a holy temple, where several young maidens performed the service. The youngest of them found me on the shore, and saved my life. I saw her but twice, and she is the only one in the world whom I could love, but you are like her, and you have almost driven her image out of my mind. She belongs to the holy temple, and my good fortune has sent you to me instead of her, and we will never part.�
�Ah, he knows not that it was I who saved his life,� thought Stephanie. �I carried him over the sea to the wood where the temple stands. I saw the pretty maiden that he loves better than he loves me. Ungrateful jerk! What more do I have to fricken do to-� But she quickly stopped that thought, because she loved Prince Jericho and knew that a miracle was going to happen. Right? It was such a bitch, because even as a human she could not shed tears.
Very soon it was said that Prince Jericho must marry, and that the beautiful daughter of a neighbouring king would be his wife, for a fine ship was being fitted out. Although Prince Jericho gave out that he merely intended to pay a visit to the king, it was generally supposed that he really went to see his daughter. A great company were to go with him. The little mermaid smiled, and shook her head. She knew the prince�s thoughts better than any of the others.
�I must travel,� he had said to her. �I must see this beautiful princess. My parents desire it, but they will not oblige me to bring her home as my bride. I cannot love her, she is not like the beautiful maiden in the temple. If I were forced to choose a bride, I would rather choose you, my dumb foundling, with those expressive eyes.� And then he kissed her rosy mouth, played with her long waving hair, and laid his head on her heart, while she dreamed of human happiness and an immortal soul.
Stephanie could not help but wish ill will towards the young bride whom was promised to Prince Jericho, while, unknown to her, Prince Jericho really actually wanted his �dumb foundling�.
And so, they set out towards where the little bitch non-ex-mermaid-Princess lived. In the moonlight, when all on board were asleep, excepting the man at the helm, Stephanie sat on the deck, gazing down through the clear water. She thought she could distinguish her father�s castle, and upon it her aged grandmother, with the silver crown on her head, looking through the rushing tide at the keel of the vessel. Then her fellow wrestlers came up on the waves, and gazed at her mournfully, wringing their white hands. She beckoned to them, and smiled, and wanted to tell them how happy and well off she was, but the cabin-boy approached, the merwrestlers disappeared below the sea.
The next morning the ship sailed into the harbour of a beautiful town belonging to the King whom Prince Jericho was going to visit. But the Princess had not yet appeared. People said that she was being brought up and educated in a religious house, where she was learning every royal virtue. At last she came. Then Stephanie, who was very anxious to see whether she was really beautiful, was obliged to acknowledge that she had never seen a more perfect vision of beauty. Her skin was delicately fair, and beneath her long dark eye-lashes her laughing blue eyes shone with truth and purity. Skanky slut.
�It was you,� said Prince Jericho, �who saved my life when I lay dead on the beach.� And he folded his blushing bride in his arms. �Oh, I am too happy,� said he to Stephanie. �My fondest hopes are all fulfilled. You will rejoice at my happiness, for your devotion to me is great and sincere.�
Stephanie blew him a kiss, and felt as if her heart was already broken. His wedding morning would bring death to her, and she would change into the foam of the sea. All the church bells rung, and the heralds rode about the town proclaiming the betrothal.
Finally, the wedding. Stephanie, dressed in silk and gold, held up the bride�s train. But her ears heard nothing of the festive music, and her eyes saw not the holy ceremony. She thought of the night of death which was coming to her, and of all she had lost in the world. On that very same evening, the bride and bridegroom went on board ship. It contained elegant couches for the reception of the bridal pair during the night. The ship, with swelling sails and a favourable wind, glided away smoothly and lightly over the calm sea. When it grew dark a number of coloured lamps were lit, and the sailors danced merrily on the deck. The little mermaid could not help thinking of her first rising out of the sea, when she had seen similar festivities and joys, and she joined in the dance, poised herself in the air as a swallow when he pursues his prey, and all present cheered her with wonder.
She was about to die. Why couldn�t she have a bit of fun? Stephanie had never danced so elegantly before. Her tender feet felt as if cut with sharp knives, but she cared not for it. A sharper pang had pierced through her heart. She knew this was the last evening she should ever see Prince Jericho, for whom she had forsaken her kindred and her home, whom she had given up her beautiful voice, and suffered unheard-of pain daily for him, while he knew nothing of it. This was the last evening that she would breathe the same air with him, or gaze on the starry sky and the deep sea, an eternal night, without a thought or a dream, awaited her � she had no soul and now she could never win one. *Sniff* Poor Stephanie!
All was joy and gaiety on board ship till long after midnight. She laughed and danced with the rest, while the thoughts of death were in her heart. Prince Jericho kissed his beautiful, but skanky, bride, while she played with his blonde hair, till they went arm-in-arm to rest in the splendid tent. Then all became still on board the ship, the helmsman, once again the only one up. Poor bastard.
Oh, and Stephanie could not sleep either. She leaned her white arms on the edge of the vessel, and looked towards the east for the first blush of morning, for that first ray of dawn that would bring her death. She saw her fellow wrestlers rising out of the flood, and they were as pale as herself, but their long beautiful hair waved no more in the wind. It had been obviously cut off.
�We have given our hair to Terri,� they said, �to obtain help for you, that you may not die tonight. She has given us a knife. Take it. Before the sun rises you must plunge it into the heart of the Prince, and when the warm blood falls upon your feet they will grow together again and form into a fish�s tail, and you will be once more a mermaid. Hurry! He or you must die before sunrise. And we mean it! Hurry the hell up! In a few minutes the sun will rise, and you must die.� And then they sighed deeply and mournfully, and sank down beneath the waves again.
Stephanie drew back the crimson curtain of the tent, and beheld the fair bride with her head resting on�a pillow! Where was Prince Jericho?
She took a couple of steps back from the bed, the knife held high as she turned to search for the ungrateful little bastard. How dare he not love her, after everything she had ever done for him!
But it did not take her long to find the man for whom she searched for. He bumped into her just as she was stepping out, and luckily did not stab him. Yet.
�My little Princess!� Prince Jericho cried out with joy. �I was wrong! It is you who my heart belongs to, and who it has always belonged to. I remember. It was you who saved me from the storm that night a year ago, and it was you of whom I always dream of at night! It�s the voice I hear in my dreams, but it�s your face which I always see.�
His words brought joy to Stephanie�s heart, and she dropped the knife, throwing her arms around him. Over his shoulder she could see the first few streaks of dawn approaching, and she turned to face him again. He had yet to say the magic words!
�I love you,� her eyes told him.
Prince Jericho leaned down and kissed her softly. �I love-�
�No!� a voice was heard screaming from behind Stephanie, which she recognised as her own. �It can�t be! You will die in a couple of minutes, and Jericho will be all mine!�
Stephanie turned, and was terrified to see the skanky bride transform into the skanky sea witch Terri. So that was why she had asked for the voice! Oh! The sun! The sun was beginning to rise, and Stephanie could feel herself beginning to turn into foam.
Alas, it was not to be.
But Prince Jericho was determined not to lose his soulmate, after just having found her. He hurriedly picked up the knife which Stephanie had dropped, and stabbed the Terri in the heart with her own dagger. Black blood spewed forth�and the dark mystical magic she had placed upon both Stephanie and Prince Jericho were broken. Stephanie regained her lovely voice, and the truth was returned to Prince Jericho�s mind and heart.
And so, the little ex-mermaid Princess and the human Prince married, and lived happily ever after.
AN: So it wasn�t how the original story ended. Smoochy Dreamer here. Of course it was going to have a Disney-like ending!