Constellation : A Treasury Of Fantasy Stories

*Mirror by the Sea*

On the day of the great thunderstorm of the goddess Seidra, young mermaids had to prove their worth. If they succeeded, they would enter the court of the empress.

Mermen not allowed... a serious rule to consider. They buffoon about, disrupting the careful balance and concentration only the feminine mind possessed and prided.

No, no no. They have their own challenges.

She had to get through, or else. Fight or flight.Triumph or exile. Partners were selected at random, some getting the worst catch. Xandrie, the athlete champion, got Tama, the class clown. Auklette, daughter of the empress's advisor, got Flarien, a mermaid with ravishing looks but no brains. She's lucky she got Izeimi, quiet yet quick with her mind and strategies. Thank Seidra and Titen and all the other gods of the deep.

Since all the pairs are each assigned different villages, she and Izeimi plan all their moves carefully. They would take the Western Current around the Curved Cliffs, then head north to the village perched on the rocks. There, they each would charm a male human youth into giving them a prized possession.

"A tradition worthy of nothing," her mother had sniffed, yet she still passed it with vigor. Now she's determined to do the same, or maybe even better. She will not let her mother down, or more specifically, let herself down. The first pair to come back wins, after all. It is a race that she will enjoy.

The humans that had fallen for the mermaids' charms were left to spin tales taller than the deepest trenches left by their own kind. Humans are thick-headed, rash in their ways. They never believe witnesses, that was why her ancestors chose them to continue the legacy the mermaids carried. If it weren't for the humans, she could have been sent to steal goblins' hearts, or elven ones. Or perhaps dwarfs'. She is glad to know that it will be this way for many more years. A path for future mermaids. As her grandmother said, a mermaid is just a regular being without her wit and will. She's stoked these qualities to their current limits, ready to unleash.

    "Keiko," Izeimi calls, her voice tingling nervously, spindly fingers fiddling with her short whale-colored wraparound dress. The long, wavy pleats billow carelessly in the lazy current and the cloudy ceramic beads sewn to the ends twist in slow pirouettes. Her sharp, fin-like ears stood straight and proud, wispy-looking blue-grey hair floating around her large whiteless eyes. Her black pupils dart from side to side in a sea of turquoise.
Keiko swims towards Izeimi, swirling tail-fins shimmying on the water's soft currents, nothing compared to the monstrous, roaring thread of underwater wind a few dozen miles behind them, snaking into the blue, blue horizon. The Western Current, the tool that will help them succeed.

Some have buckled under the pressure of this future-determining task, abandoning the empress's court to grovel near the mud and
clamfish.
Once vivacious students, now seaweed-wrapped peasants.
She furrows her auburn brows disapprovingly as they pass through a lesser village, on their way to the starting platform.

They whisper like hissing snakes, pointing work-gnarled fingers at the maidens and their dainty expressions.

It's Izeimi, the General's niece.
What I'd give to have those eyes...
Look at their snooty faces! As if-
Now, now. Don't anger them.
It's her.

All the merpeople whip round to see Keiko, resplendent in a simple red-and-white shell headdress, a wraparound shirt, and with dark peach cloth cinched around her waist with fiber-brown rope from a sunken ship.

It's Princess Ming's -
Lady Ming's daughter. She did say herself not to use 'Princess'.
It's quite the same thing -
What's her name? Was it Reiko, or-
It's Keiko, you moronic clownfish.
You're going to get us killed!
Keiko, daughter of the princess-
Keiko, granddaughter of the empress-
And next in line for the throne.