Based on the original Hans Christian Anderson fairytale of the Little Mermaid. Somewhat inspired by the summary on Wikipedia — I couldn't find a better version anywhere else. I might submit this as part of a school assignment, so do give me your comments so that I can improve on it!

The witch told her, "You will only get a soul if your prince falls in love with you and marries you. Then a part of his soul will flow into you, and you will be made whole. Otherwise, at dawn on the first day that he marries another woman, you will die, turned into the foam of the sea."

He was married that evening. As he and his new princess slept, she sat down and began to write.

To my prince:

All I ever wanted was a soul. No, let me put it differently. I was drawn to you because you had a soul. My grandmother used to tell me stories of you; you humans, whose souls set you apart from us.

I'm not making sense. I should start again.

There's a truth that I — I should have told you this from the beginning. You may have sensed that there was something different about me. Perhaps that was why you never fully put your trust in me, could never trust yourself to love me. You were right.

Your people tell legends of nymphs, undines, sirens, mermaids… creatures of the sea. You speak of us so because you do not understand, you do not know us, I think. But there are none of those, no such things as your legendary fay. There are only us. I — I realize that this sounds strange to you, but—

It doesn't matter. I don't have much time left, but I want you to know and, if it pleases you, to remember the words which I pen down now.

I don't have a soul. I've never had a soul. I never will have one, now. When my life comes to an end, my body will turn to the foam that crests the waves, and it will be as if I never existed. Don't feel sorry for me. It is my fate. I couldn't accept it before, but now I know. You, you and she have had the good fortune to be born with souls… treasure them. That is all you can do.

If you had loved me, loved me enough to had taken me as your wife — I promised myself I wouldn't think of it, but I will, now, because it doesn't matter anymore. If I had your love, I would have had some… just the smallest portion of your soul to be mine. But now you love another and — I still cannot think of it, even to write of it now. Forgive me.

All I wanted, at first, was to have a soul. This I confess, so that you will understand that this all happened thanks to my own selfish desires. I wanted to see heaven. I loved you from a distance at first, though you may not have known it, that stormy night that you first met her. You never knew, never realized that it was I who saved you, though it doesn't matter now. That was the night I began to love you, and to want not just a soul for me, but also for you.

I thought you might have begun to love me — me! A mute changeling who had no friends or family to speak of! — but now I realize it was absurd. I could laugh now, thinking of my own foolishness. I thought, perhaps, that I might have a chance, just the smallest chance of seeing heaven, but now I know that that was never meant to be.

A knife lies beside me now, and I stand at a crossroads. If I were to use that knife to take your life, I would be able to continue living, to return to my home under the sea, to take up life again as it were before I met you. But of course that is impossible! These few days that I have spent with you have changed me, I cannot say for better or for worse, but I know that I cannot quietly return to life in the sea and life without you. More than that, I know that I could never bear to take your life. And I still would not have a soul…

I still love you. I thought it might not be so, when you rejected me, but it is true. Although I came for a soul, what — is most important to me, now and forever, will still be you. This sounds awkward, it is strange to pen these words, it seems as though it is finally admitting what I would not admit earlier, but it is true: I love you.

At first, I thought that true love was to be with you forever, basking in your smiles and your laughter. But tonight I realized that true love is to give you as much happiness as is in my power to give, unselfishly and lovingly.

That is why, because of this love, I would rather you live a happy, long life without me that for you to be dead by my hand, while I continue to live for another hundred years, weighed down by guilt and sadness.

You won't see me again. Perhaps you will, but you — you won't know me. I always imagined that leaving you forever would be unattainable, painful, worse than anything I'd ever experienced before. All the nightmares told me that. But now, it seems as though it is going to be impossibly easy. I have so many more things that I want to say to you, to whisper in your ear, in a way that I never could have done. But there is never enough time, and I shall have to settle for the most important ones.

Remember me. You may not be able to love me, even as a friend, after this, but do not let me fade from your memory. Even if you choose to remember me as the pretender, the sea witch, the one who would have killed you, remember me. For my people — though I shall never return to them again — the final death is when you have faded from the minds of the world. Take this as my final plea to you — I shall never ask for anything other than that you remember, always remember.

I laugh and I cry, now, remembering all the times we had together. Memories return to me as I write, of my childhood naïveté, of my wonder at your world, of my desire for the things of your world. I'm not that girl anymore. I'm not even sure who I am, now, but perhaps I have become a better, wiser person. You, and love, and — could it be? — tragedy have made me what I am now.

I never told you, but I've always loved your birds. Nothing has ever been more different than the sea and the sky, and if we are creatures of the sea, then the birds are our land counterparts. To soar through the air, free from all troubles, to be able to travel across river and lake and mountain and valley…

The dawn is almost breaking.

Love,

The girl who could not speak.