The Mermaid's Egg

1 -- The Summoning

"Happy birthday, Kiandra!" said Kiandra's mother as she presented a card to her son.

Kiandra looked at the homemade card as its cover was a simple digitalized picture of his mother and him standing on the 10th floor of his family-owned pharmaceutical company in the heart of New York City.

He looked at the younger version of himself, his brown chocolate eyes matching his mother's earthly tones. Whereas his messy brown hair matched his father's shortly trimmed business cut. He stood an inch taller than his father, standing at a modest 6.1 feet.

'How I have fallen so far...'

Kiandra sighed as the image also revealed that he was once a muscular boy back then. But exposure to his parents leaked research drug seemed to have melted away his muscles making it impossible to ever regrow them back.

His skin had softened into a silky-smooth glisten. And the reddish-brown facial hair that he once cherished had all fallen away from any place that was influenced by the curse of puberty. He looked like an androgynous boy with a matching hypomasculinity mindset. It made him curse all of mankind for its cruelty.

He opened the card and saw an itinerary for a paid expense trip to Ireland to visit the lands of his ancestors. His parents wanted him to embrace the O'Sullivan past.

"Son." Kiandra's father called his attention as he slid over a tiny old box that possessed the O'Sullivan family crest upon its lid.

"What is this?" the young man asked his dad.

"Your ancestor's past, the family's present, and your future. Your grandfather gave this to me on my 20th birthday. As his father gave it to him on his 20th birthday. And now, I pass it down to you, my child...on your 20th birthday."

Kiandra opened the lid and looked inside the box with a confused look upon his face. He had expected golden treasure, historic money, ancient relics, or even a castle deed! Yet, inside was just a solitary milky-blue colored pearl that seemed to be glowing a pulsating crystalline-blue light. It looked like it might be alive!

Kiandra reached in and picked it up and held it in the palm of his hand. He did not know what was so important about a single large pearl. He had expected something 'else' from his multibillion-worth father. And all he got was a glowing rock!

"A pearl!?" Kiandra muttered.

"This gift is far greater than all the money in the world! Greater than the entire sum worth of King's riches." his father smiled "Now that you are twenty years old, you will use this pearl in your union with your soon-to-be wedded wife!"

"Wife!?" he asked, gripping the pearl tightly.

"You are to be married within the week." he told his son "Just as all your ancestors were married upon receiving the Pearl Of Lir. It is an ancient tradition!"

"I do not want it then!" as he shamelessly dropped the pearl on the table "I do not want to get married!"

"But what about children!?" his mother asked him.

"You dare ask me of that!?" Kiandra snapped at his mom, bristling with anger "Especially when we make the top leading abortion drug in the world! Besides," he immediately stood up, glaring down at his parents "Thanks to the both of you, I cannot have children of my own!"

"You do not know that..." his father stammered, slamming his clinched fist upon the table.

"I do! I got tested!" Kiandra yelled, sapping all of the argument from his parent's lips "Because of that drug! I am now sterile! You took away my God-given ability to have a family of my own. And now you want me to get married!?"