Chapter 2: A Venture
The girl of water went to a worker of miracles, a peddler of hopes, a sea witch. She went, singing a song of love and getting everything you could ever want in the world, while thinking that her voice was far better than that of the golden girl on the beach. Clearly the sea witch agreed, because the cost of the requested spell was to have the water child's tongue cut out. (I still fail to see the usefulness of this to either party.)
The parameters were simple: take the potion andrecieve human legs. But the only way to keep them would be to make the man fall in love with her. On sunrise the morning after his wedding to someone else, she would simply dissolve into foam on the sea. If he loved her, then she would be granted an immortal soul and a chance to live on after death, as humans have. Mermaids only have thethree hundredyears of life they are given, before turning to foam on the sea and losing consciousness forever.
Confidant in her love (the young are always confidant—don't look at me that way) she agreed to have her tongue cut out by a knife. A long, glittering knife. Before the deed was done, the witch warned her—with every step she took it would be as if such knives were stabbing the soles of her feet and shooting pains up into her beautiful human legs. The girl of water only shook her long dark hair and gestured for the witch to go ahead—so confidant was she.
A few days later, she was not so confidant. She had found the man, found he was a rich man, and taken up residence in his palace by the sea. Of course, as she couldn't speak, he didn't know her name, just called her "Pet" and patted her on the head, allowing her to sleep on a floor cushion at the foot of his bed.
He came to love her, in a way, over the months of her excruciating pain that they were together. He would whisper to her his dearest wishes and desires. But she both loved and hated this, for they were all of the golden one who he thought had rescued him. She had no way to tell him that truth, she could only smile and gently touch his cheek. (You think this is silly. But you have never been in love, have you, young one?)
A/N: Well, response is appreciated.
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