PRINCESS BEAST (13 page)

 

Chapter Twelve

She’s Got Legs

 

Rune and the dowager queen are making good progress through the waters of Kattegut, the arm of the North Sea between Sweden and Denmark; turtles are slow only when compared to mermaids.  Rune has not noticed, enraptured by the queen’s tale.

“My grand daughter carried the potion to the waters below the prince’s castle and sat on the lowest marble step. Just before sunrise, she drank the potion, and felt as if a sword had pierced her heart. She fainted and lay still as death until the sun rose. She opened her eyes and saw the prince looking downward at her and her slender little legs. He asked who she was and how she had arrived there, but of course, she could not answer, instead she tried to convey her feelings with her beautiful eyes. The prince took her hand and led her to the castle, each step like walking on broken glass, but she appeared to walk on air.” The queen yawned and declared it was time for her afternoon nap.

“Now?” Rune protested, a bit too vigorously.

The dowager queen possesses the brass of the elderly feeling death’s breath on their shoulders. “If you hurt me, you’ll die and fish will eat the flesh from your bones.” And with that she curls up like a cat atop the shell and falls asleep, leaving Rune with hours to occupy.

For a while, she is content simply to observe the great sea, the hues of blue and green and grey, the swirling sea gulls, the turtle’s giant fins pulling through the water, soundlessly. But her thoughts soon turn to the little mermaid princess and her prince. She had been transformed; the prince had taken her into his castle—then why was she back in the sea a mermaid once more? Rune is tempted to jostle the old queen, but fears, and rightly so, that the queen may use her tail to slap Rune into the sea. And so, she imagines her reunion with Hans, running on her slender legs and tiny feet to embrace him.  Perhaps an injury of some type would add to the drama . . . until a pod of Minke whales swims close by, blowing air like tea kettles and the queen awakens. She lifts her head and uncurls her body, then faces Rune with an accusatory expression.

“Don’t look at me--it was those whales”, she says pointing to where plumes of water are visible. “Will you tell me now, please, your majesty, what happened after the prince took your grand daughter into his castle?”

“Since you asked so nicely, I will tell you that she was dressed in silk and muslin and no other girl in the kingdom matched her beauty. There were scores of slave girls that sang and danced to please the prince, and at those times, my grand daughter sorely missed her incomparable voice. Still, the prince declared that she should never leave him and gave her permission to sleep in front of his door on a velvet pillow.”

“What! Like a pet dog or cat?” Rune sputters.

The old queen purses her lips together, and Rune says she is sorry for the interruption. The queen spits into the water. “No need, my thoughts exactly and it leaves a bitter taste on my tongue. My grand daughter was happy to do so, and to walk with him high into the mountain, ignoring her bleeding feet. At night while the others slept, she walked down the marble steps and cooled her feet in the water. One night, we all went to the surface, me, my son, and his daughters. We sang out our sorrow and stretched out our hands, but she would not come.”

“She loved her prince,” Rune sighs, a fairy tale beauty sympathy sigh.

“Yes, and she was sure he loved her as much, more than anyone else. With her eyes, she asked that question of him and he replied with a kiss on her forehead. He told her that she was dearest to him because of her kind heart and her devotion. He also said she reminded him of a girl he once saw and would likely never see again because she belonged to the temple, the girl that saved him when he was shipwrecked.
She is the only girl in the world I can love, and you look like her; you nearly make her image disappear from my soul. Good fortune has sent you to me and we shall never part
, he said.

Rune grabs hold to the turtle’s shell in case the queen decides to knock her off for speaking out. “She told him it was she who saved him, right?”

The queen gives Rune the fish eye and snaps, “She couldn’t speak, no tongue. She figured since the girl belonged to the holy temple, he would never see her, and she was happy to take care of him, love him and devote her life to him.”

“Creechy! If he knew she had saved him, he would have proposed right then. She couldn’t talk, but she could use her hands, she could point at herself, mouth the words, “It was me—I saved you,” Rune sputters. “She could write a note . . . draw pictures, crap, I would draw a book with every detail.”

“You are frothing at the mouth,” the queen says icily.

Rune wipes her mouth with the back of her hand and takes three deep breaths. “Please tell me the rest; I won’t interrupt again.”

“The king decreed that the prince should marry a neighboring king’s daughter, and he made a ship ready for the journey,” the queen continues. “The prince told my grand daughter not to worry, that in fact, she must come along. He said that his parents could not force him to bring the princess back as his bride to be.
I can’t love her
, he said,
because she is not the girl from the temple. If ever I marry, I shall most likely chose you, my foundling with the eloquent eyes.
Then he kissed her on her lips and stroked her lovely hair.”

Rune runs her palm over the top of her bristly head, imagining the feel of the silken blonde curls she had seen in the mirror.

“The next day, the ship sailed into the port of the neighboring king. Bells rang out, trumpets blew, and banners flew. Every day there was a banquet, balls and parties, but the princess was not there because she was being educated in a holy temple. Then at last she arrived,” the queen says, arching her eyebrows high and looking down her nose at Rune, who was biting her lip so hard that drops of blood rolled down her chin.

“Yes, the girl from the temple. The prince exclaimed,
It is you, the one who saved me when I lay near death on the beach
! And he embraced his blushing bride. The news was spread throughout the kingdom, the altars were adorned and the wedding took place. My grand daughter was dressed in silk and gold, and she held the train of the bride’s dress,” the queen stares out to sea. “She did not hear the music, nor did her eyes see the ceremony for the night would bring her death and her thoughts were on all she had loved and lost.

“The wedding party boarded the ship where a tent of gold and scarlet cloth had been raised. Until midnight, all was gaiety, and my grand daughter danced and laughed with death in her heart. When the bride and groom walked into their tent, the ship grew quiet. My grand daughter stood at the rail looking toward the east for the pink of dawn, the sun that would turn her to foam.”

Now it is tears that roll down Rune’s chin; she is not weeping for the mermaid because she has seen her with her own eyes, but she is weeping for the love that might have been, that should have been, that will surely be hers.

“At that moment, her sisters rose alongside the ship, their head’s shorn to the scalp,” the queen says and twirls a finger through her long white hair. “We have given our hair to the sea witch in exchange for this knife, sharper than shark’s teeth. Before the sun rises, you must plunge it into the heart of the prince,” they said.

Rune can’t help herself; she takes hold of the queen’s hand, and the queen squeezes Rune’s hand. “When his warm blood sprays your feet, your tail will return and you will be a mermaid once again, to live three hundred years in our father’s kingdom. Hurry, he must die before the sun rises and the horizon has turned pink, her sisters pleaded. She took the knife and drew aside the crimson cloth of the tent to see the bride sleeping with her head on the prince’s chest. She bent and kissed his forehead and he whispered the name of his bride. My grand daughter’s hand trembled as it gripped the handle of the knife, then she threw it into the sea where the waves turned red where it fell. Her eyes glazed in death, she threw herself into the sea and felt her body change into foam.”

Rune leaps to her feet, struggling for balance atop the turtle’s shell. She releases a horrible beastly howl, which does not faze either the old queen or the old turtle. “Would you have stabbed your prince, Rune?"

“No,” she shouts, “I would have stabbed that imposter who stole the love that was rightfully mine and thrown her into the sea!”

The old queen laughs, wheezing, and breathless laughter.

“What’s so friggin’ funny?” Rune demands.

The queen is holding her ribs, and the turtle joins in on the laughter, wheezing louder than the queen. “Never mind, child. She is back with us thanks to you. Sit down, please or you’ll be thrown in the sea. We will reach land soon and I am nearly finished.”

Rune sits, her entire face contorted with anger.

“We thought she was lost forever, then last night, my grand daughter told us that after she had turned to foam, she saw the sun and above her floated hundreds of airy, transparent forms. Their voices were so tender that no human ear could hear them, just as their forms were so fragile, no human eye could see them, and her body was exactly the same as their bodies.
We are daughters of the air,
they said,
and have not received souls either, but we can win one by doing good deeds for three hundred years. You are one of us now, little mermaid, and if you earnestly try to do what is good, you too may earn an internal soul
. She was trying to do a good deed by blowing your dory across the Great Belt. And then you magically transformed her back to her true self,” the queen says and kisses Rune’s cheek.

Rune’s face wears an incredulous expression. “If that doesn’t just frost the friggin’ cake,” she mutters. “I can swim to land from here; I am simply beside myself,” she says and jumps into the sea. The queen waves as Rune shouts, “I told you, it wasn’t my magic that changed her—I sure hope she stays a mermaid.”

 

* * *

 

“You look like a bat when you flatten your ears in an attempt to look questioning and vulnerable,” Elora says to Croesus and sips her Grand Marnier. The pair reclines in Le Corbusier chaise lounge chairs before a crackling fire in the palace library. The ginkgo, majolica fireplace tiles gleam in the fire’s glow. The crystal ball sits between them on a stand where they have been watching Rune and the dowager queen.

“Will she remain a mermaid? She should—my spells are ironclad, but the ambient apathetic ooze of Andersen Land could interfere even with my genius.” Elora throws her empty glass into the fire, which flares briefly to the shape of a mermaid.

“Her story was the only one from Andersen Land the Disney crew took on and they took more liberties than a hungry fat man at an all-you-can eat buffet. Their Princess Ariel is sixteen and spunky. Just like in the other Disney princess flicks, the creatures sing and dance while helping Ariel out of sticky situations. She falls for Prince Eric and goes to the sea witch, Ursula. In this film she has black tentacles from the waist down and from the waist up is a bustier thrusting her DD tata’s out in front of her. She wears big white hair, blue eye shadow, arched black eyebrows half way up her forehead, big red lips and long red nails. Hell, she could be Divine’s stand-in for
Pink Flamingos
. The real witch, Winifred, looks like a giant sea cucumber with eyes. You remember her; she came to Samhain once, fifty years ago, stayed in the pool, neutralized the chlorine and we had scum for weeks?”

Croesus sticks out his tongue and blows a raspberry.

“Disney’s Ariel makes a deal with Ursula, no cutting out of tongue, no walking on sharp knives—Ariel gets three days of legs in exchange for her voice. Eric finds her on the beach, takes her to his castle, and figures she is not the one who saved him because she can’t speak, like in the Andersen tale. Meanwhile, Ursula changes herself into a beauty and with Ariel’s voice, enchants the prince into believing she was the one who saved him and he pops the question.”

Croesus drops his jaw in mock surprise.

“The wedding barge is set to sail, leaving Ariel behind to weep in her hands, but her faithful helpful critters come to the rescue by breaking Ursula’s necklace, which holds Ariel’s voice.  Spell broken, Ariel’s voice back in place, she calls out to prince and he rushes to kiss her, but the sun sets on the third day and poof, she’s mermaid again. Double poof, Ursula is the sea witch again. She kidnaps Ariel down to her lair where King Triton shows up to rescue his daughter,” Elora says.

Croesus makes a pfftt noise, a dog style, ‘as if.’

“I know, but wait, there’s more. Ariel can’t break her contract with the witch so her father sacrifices himself for Ariel and the witch turns him into a polyp. Don’t ask me, you don’t want to know. Name one, one king father of a princess in the fairy tale realm that sacrifices himself for his daughter . . . hmm, Snow White—no, left her alone with the evil stepmother; Rapunzel, no she was bargained away at birth for rampion; Sleeping Beauty, ah, no, he didn’t invite the 13th wise woman to the birth banquet resulting in the curse that put the whole bloody kingdom to sleep. Cinderella—nope, mother dies, father marries sadistic harpy, and it doesn’t seem to bother him a bit that Cindy is perpetually covered in soot.”

Croesus begins grooming, in case there is a trace of fireplace ash on his gorgeous red and white coat.

“So back to the Disney flick, Ursula grabs the king’s triton and crown and whips up a major whirlpool, giddy with power. Eric jumps aboard an abandoned ship, and just as Ursula is about to kill Ariel with the triton, Eric rams the ship’s bowsprit through the witch. The king is restored to his body, and he throws a grand wedding to which everyone is invited, humans, merpeople and crafty cute sea critters. Don’t you dare sigh,” Elora says, catching Croesus on the inhale.