Deep in the sea, beneath the ever moving waves, far deeper in the darkest corners of the unexplored ocean lay the home of the sea people. The merpeople ruled the seas, the kings wielding great power over all fish, and the queens, the sirens, wielding great power of their own; the great siren's song, that brought destruction to ships and death to sailors. There were other kinds of sea people, of course, but these half-fish, half-human creatures had climbed to the top and ruled over the others. The king of these merpeople ruled from his glittering, golden city deep in the ocean, and had many daughters, all beautiful of face and voice, able to sing the most enchanting of all siren songs. It was the game of the sirens to take ships and lives for sport. Other sea people were kind and gentle and mostly shy enough to steer clear of the mysterious land people.
Ursula was one of these shy sea people. She preferred to stay deep in her sea cave, far away from the surface and the shore, and far from the sirens. Staying away from the sirens was not difficult, as her people – the half-cephalopods – had long been outcast from the glittering kingdom of the sirens. Ursula and her people had powers of their own; none so beautiful as the siren's song, but more wonderful perhaps. These people had the power of magic and spells.
Despite merely being outcasts, these people were also mainly hermits, living alone and staying deep within the shadowy depths of the ocean. Ursula was alone as well, hiding away in her sea cave, with only her spell books and cave dwelling eels for company.
Occasionally, when she was feeling daring, Ursula would venture out of her cave to gather sea flowers and plants from nearby cliffs to decorate her cave. And on one of these days that she ventured from her cave and swam closer to the surface in search of sea plants, she heard a sound she hadn't heard in many years. It sounded clear as crystal, soft as velvet, beautiful as the golden sunset, yet chilling to the bone; a sound both beautiful and terrible, the siren's song.
Ursula followed the sound, swimming further from the dark and closer to the surface. She saw now the bottom of a ship, tossing in the angry waves. And there on one of the tall, jagged rocks, she spotted the shimmering green scales of a fish tail, the tail of the singing siren.
She could tell by the beauty of the enchanting song that this must be one of the king's daughters. Ursula did not dare to venture above the surface, but merely watched from behind another of the jagged rocks. Surely this ship would sink, as others had before it, their scattered bones of wood now resting deep below the waves. The siren's game was to sink the ships and drown the sailors.
As she watched there was a dull thump as the ship crashed into a jagged rock. As the ship began breaking and sinking, the sailors began plunging into the ocean; some falling to the rocks and others drowning in the waves. The siren paid no heed to any and her song continued. One more sailor plunged into the waves, clear of the rocks, and merely sank. Suddenly the song stopped and the siren dove on him faster than a frenzied shark. This siren was the king's oldest daughter, the most beautiful siren of them all. Her hair was like fire and her scales sparkled like emeralds. She took hold of him, the most important sailor in her eyes, the one she had decided to kill by her own hands.
He was dressed more opulently than the others, in rich blue fabric and gold buttons, one of which the siren ripped from his coat to add to her collection as prize for the drowning. As the siren began to slowly drag the unconscious sailor downward to his death and drowning, Ursula was overcome with the dangerous urge to save him, to ruin the siren's game. Thinking quickly, Ursula devised a spell to help him breathe, a small air bubble. The siren dragged him down and down further into the darkness. She continued down until red blood leaked from his ears and swirled in the water. Then he released her grip on his arm and dove away, back to her home in the depths.
The sailor remained there, slowly sinking; it appeared almost as if he were suspended there in the water, his dark hair swirling around him and the red blood from his ears slowly dissipating. There was something beautiful about him floating there, Ursula thought.
But he didn't have long; soon the spell would fade. Ursula had to make a decision then; to help him or to let him slowly sink. She watched him still as he slowly, slowly, drifted down into deeper darkness.
Half of her wanted to simply watch, to watch his beautiful descent into the cool darkness of the sea. But the spell had faded, and in that moment Ursula knew that she couldn't simply watch; no matter how much the surface frightened her, letting him drown would let the siren have her cruel game. And since he could not save himself, she was the only one who could. She darted out from behind her hiding place and wrapped her arms around his waist, pulling him upward toward the surface.
She carried him to the shore, though it was far, always keeping his face above the waves. In the dead of the night she left him on the beach. She wanted to stay to watch, to make sure he was found, but she was far too afraid. She rested briefly before making the return journey.
Once she was back inside her cave, safely hidden in the depths, she still could not shake the image of the sailor floating in the darkness of the water; it was the closest she had ever been to one of the land people. An eel nudged her arm, and she patted it on the head gently, still lost in her thoughts of the man in the water.
