Silent Mermaid: A Retelling of The Little Mermaid (The Classical Kingdoms Collection Book 5) Read online

  Silent Mermaid: A Retelling of the Little Mermaid

  The Classical Kingdoms Collection, Book #5

  Brittany Fichter

  Brittany Fichter Fiction

  Contents

  Copyright

  Dedication

  1. Born of Sun

  2. Child’s Play

  3. Preferences

  4. Stolen Moments

  5. What Strong Girls Do

  6. Dangerous Mourning

  7. Charms are Fleeting

  8. Remain

  9. Worthy of a Prince’s Gaze

  10. In My Bones

  11. Untimely Surprises

  12. What People Do

  13. Who She Is

  14. A Meager Night

  15. One Sun’s Time

  16. More Than Belongings

  17. Angry Princess

  18. Thumb Tucked Out

  19. Figures

  20. An Outing

  21. Shimmers

  22. Accusations

  23. Due

  24. A Risky Venture

  25. While I Have You

  26. Stirrings

  27. Duty’s Call

  28. Whispers

  29. The Kindest of Intrusions

  30. Dismissed

  31. Good Little Prince

  32. No Reason Not To

  33. A Hefty Contribution

  34. No

  35. Fleshly Bonds

  36. Prophesied

  37. What It Means

  38. Praying Man

  39. Haunting Melodies

  40. Refusals

  41. Unsettled

  42. The Sun’s Betrayal

  43. A Feast of Defeat

  44. Formidable Tides

  45. Striking the Deal

  46. All You Can Ask

  47. Impatience

  48. Plans and Peril

  49. Bitter Fates

  50. Worth the Cost

  51. Through the Deeps

  52. Stipulations

  53. Ally of the Sun

  54. Vortex

  55. The Right Thing

  56. A New Song

  57. Let Me Be the One

  58. Epilogue

  Also by Brittany Fichter

  About the Author

  SILENT MERMAID: A RETELLING OF THE LITTLE MERMAID

  Copyright © 2017 Brittany Fichter

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the web address below.

  BrittanyFichterFiction.com

  Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.

  Silent Mermaid / Brittany Fichter. -- 1st ed.

  Cover Art and Design by Armin Numanovic

  Edited by Meredith Tennant

  To my grandparents, who fell in love even though you were from different continents and spoke different languages. Your hard work and life of love is the stuff of stories. And Appa? We love and miss you so much. You left behind a legacy of courage, honor, and love.

  1

  Born of Sun

  “But how did they get all the way to the mansion courtyard?” Giana gripped her husband’s arm more tightly with her right hand as she held her protruding belly with her left.

  “Last night’s storm swell must have pushed them in!” Amadeo said over the Protectors’ songs. “The guards say more than usual escaped from the Deeps. It’s a wonder these two didn’t cause any harm before we found them!”

  As the Protectors continued to wrestle the sharks back out of the city with their songs, Giana wondered at the fact that her husband wasn’t more disconcerted by the whole ordeal. The storm itself had been especially violent. Even from the seafloor Giana had been able to feel its tenacity while it raged above the water’s surface all through the night before. But then, Amadeo had always been particularly fascinated by the creatures that lurked in the Deeps. Giana wondered if all Protectors were so obsessed with danger. Healers surely didn’t harbor such feelings.

  The closest guard had been successfully luring the smaller of the frill sharks away from the royal mansion when a distant Grower’s song floated in on a current. The creature jerked its head toward the sound, and in doing so, made eye contact with Giana. In the split second they held one another’s gaze, she saw all of the contempt and darkness of the Deeps in those serpentine eyes. Its red-gray gills flared out, and its long body stiffened.

  Giana was off as fast as her fins could push her. Through the courtyard’s open roof she fled before continuing to lead the creature above the city. Pink, red, orange, gray, and white coral rooftops sped beneath her as she swam with all her might. It would do no good to try to escape the creature through the city. She would be hindered there by the people and buildings. So up she climbed. She could hear the Protectors’ songs behind her, including her husband’s, but the creature’s pursuit continued.

  Every time she glanced behind her, she could see the creature’s long, thick body ripple as it gained on her. Giana tried pushing out her own song as she pressed on. Not the Healer song that came so easily to her, but the simple Protector song she’d been taught as a child. Still the creature continued as though she hadn’t even made a sound. She could feel the disturbance of the water as it began to snap at her fins with the hundreds of teeth that edged its long jaws.

  Help! Giana cried out to the Maker as she struggled to keep up her pace. Her swollen belly slowed her down, and she could feel her muscles straining dangerously as the child within her began to move. Not now! she pleaded as her body begin to contract. The baby has still another month!

  She could hear the shark’s jaws snap over and over again as they came closer and closer, but Giana was still tempted to slow. They were too high, too close to the surface, and the sun would be rising any moment. She risked another glance behind her. Where were the guards? Just feet from the surface, however, there were no guards close enough, and a glancing touch of the shark’s teeth to her left fin made Giana’s mind up for her. Launching herself out of the water, she landed on a sandbar.

  Let them come! she begged the Maker. For my baby’s sake, let them come! Her body was wracked with pain as the contractions began to come faster and closer together, and her head felt fuzzy as she tried to breathe in the air that was far too light, too different from the comfortable, heavy pressure of the seafloor. Rolling over, Giana gasped, trying to see whether or not the beast had been captured. Through the rippling water, she could see that the guards had finally arrived, at least a dozen, and their Protector songs began to rise as they coaxed the creature down.

  But their work wasn’t swift enough.

  The child was born there on the sandbar, coming much faster than either of Giana’s other children had come. Giana hugged the little girl close and tried in vain to brush off the sand that stuck to her tiny arms, back, and tail. As the light around them moved from gray to pink to gold, Giana�
��s back began to burn with each new touch of the sun. The tears that couldn’t be felt below the surface stung her eyes as she used her body as a shield over the baby, who gasped and choked on the strange air but couldn’t seem to gain enough breath to cry.

  How long they lay like that, Giana couldn’t tell. All she knew was that as the sun’s rays began to grow in strength, her own strength slipped away. The world around her faded in and out. Soon she was unable to even hold herself on her side, and to her horror, before the world went completely black, she rolled on her back just in time to see the child engulfed by the sun.

  Giana wanted to shriek. Jarred from the nightmarish haze by the searing pain on her back, however, she knew better than to interrupt her Healers’ songs. That would only make the pain worse. And yet, as she held herself still, she knew she was forgetting something.

  The storm.

  The shark.

  The sun.

  The baby.

  “Amadeo!” Healers’ songs or not, Giana bolted upright from the sponge bed they’d laid her on. “Amadeo! The baby!”

  He was there in an instant, but that didn’t stop Giana’s weeping.

  “The sun touched her! It touched her, and I didn’t stop it!” Giana was gripped by self-loathing as she clung to her husband. If her child was dead, it was because she hadn’t been strong enough. Her daughter’s blood was on her head. Giana imagined all the horrible ways her child had suffered. And all of it without her.

  “Giana, listen to me!” Her husband grasped her firmly about the arms and pushed her back to look into her eyes. “You’re not listening. She’s alive! The baby survived!”

  Giana stopped writhing and stared at her husband. Still, her daughter’s survival only brought on more dread. “The sun . . . did it—”

  “Come see for yourself.”

  Gently, Amadeo lifted his wife and, holding her, swam to the other side of the mansion to the nursery. Or rather, they started in the direction of the nursery. Instead of taking her to the east wing of the mansion, Amadeo took her to the highest tower of the entire structure. To Giana’s surprise, he took her to their chamber.

  The Nurturers parted at their arrival, leaving an open path to the gemstone-edged infant bed. Giana felt the pain of her burns with every flick of her husband’s fins, but she couldn’t have cared less. Only when she was gazing into the clear blue eyes of her daughter was she able once more to breathe freely. No burns were visible on the baby’s skin. In fact, there was no sign of any deficit other than her unusually small size, which Giana blamed on her early arrival.

  “It was a miracle, Lady Giana.” One of the Nurturers swam forward and gave her a tentative smile. “She suffered no burns from the sun even though she was directly in it. She wasn’t even scratched by the rocks or shells in the sand!”

  “She’s perfect,” Giana breathed, no longer able to resist stroking her baby girl’s soft pink cheek.

  “There is . . . something . . . that sets her apart,” Amadeo said from behind her.

  “I’ll say.” Giana laughed, nearly giddy with relief. “I don’t recall the last time a mermaid had blue eyes or,” she ran her hand over the child’s head, “such pale hair. It’s almost white!”

  “That’s not it,” Amadeo said.

  As if ordered, the Nurturers began to clear the room, and though she was absorbed with her child Giana didn’t miss their exchanged glances. She turned to her husband. “What is it?”

  “She’s three days old now, so we have had ample time to watch her,” Amadeo said slowly, holding his hands out in front of him.

  “And?”

  “It seems . . .” He took another breath, then frowned. “She has no voice.”

  2

  Child’s Play

  Arianna had nearly given up hope and returned to the water by the time they ventured out. When she heard the little girls’ shrieks, however, she stopped fiddling with her necklace and pulled herself back up on the rock. They were late. Usually the prince and his nieces were out playing on the terrace before noon.

  “Uncle Michael!” the eldest girl called. “I want to play on the rocks today!”

  If Arianna could have groaned, she would have. As of late, Claire had decided that her favorite place to play was on the rocks that lined the terrace and overlooked the ocean. Whenever the girls and the prince played there, Arianna had to dip back under the water where it was harder to see and hear them. To her relief, however, Prince Michael told the girl no.

  “Your mum will be very angry with me if I let you play over there again. You’re not big enough. Besides,” he hefted the baby, who was very nearly too big to be called a baby anymore, on his hip. “Lucy might fall in. She can’t walk as well as you.”

  “Why do we have to take her?”

  “Because she’s your sister.”

  “You don’t take Lucas everywhere! And he’s your little brother!” Claire stuck her bottom lip out.

  “Lucas is big enough to take himself places,” Michael said. His expression made Arianna smirk. She’d heard the brothers argue enough times to know how Prince Michael felt about his own little brother tagging along.

  “There will be none of you out on the rocks or playing anywhere on the terrace today,” a familiar, low voice called out from the terrace’s door.

  Arianna pressed herself down against the rocks again. She could just barely see the head housekeeper make her way out to the children to join them. Not that Prince Michael was really a child, but the housekeeper treated him just the same way she ever had. Now Mistress Bithiah crossed her arms and looked down at Claire. “I have got tables to set and a ball to plan for tonight of all nights, and none of you will be of much assistance to me underfoot.”

  “A ball?” Claire clapped her hands and squealed, her brown curls bouncing. “Who is it for?”

  “The Sea Crown and his family are coming up to meet with your grandfather. And I will not have them thinking your grandfather inhospitable on my account.” She shook her head. “Even if they do plan such meetings with less than a day’s notice.”

  “When?” Michael tried in vain to hold a squirming Lucy as he asked.

  “Tonight. As I said. Now, be off with you all. There are date cakes in the kitchen, and don’t you eat too many, Michael. You don’t want another stomachache.”

  Arianna reluctantly let herself slip beneath the waves as the children went back inside the palace and Bithiah began ordering about her horde of servants. Arianna didn’t mind so much today, however, that her observance had been cut short. Not if there was a ball to attend.

  Though Arianna was in no rush for her lessons to begin, she swam steadily back toward her tower. Her aunt would know about the ball. She might even be able to convince Arianna’s parents to let her go. Arianna clutched her bag to her side as she pushed herself even faster. She imagined getting her own little charm to wear around her neck. What would it feel like when she emerged from the water and the charm split her fins to make two sturdy legs? Even better, what would the beautiful skirts feel like that the charm would fashion to cover those legs?

  Most importantly, she would finally meet Prince Michael face-to-face. He wouldn’t know her, of course, but she would know him. She would know those wide, cautious eyes before she even drew near, and the way they crinkled when he smiled.

  Would he ask her to dance?

  The shiver of delight that ran down Arianna’s back was immediately followed, however, by a sensation that was far less enjoyable. She gave her body a shake, but the feeling only persisted. Her fins, arms, stomach, and even her gums tingled as she slowed and searched all around for the feeling’s source. The sensation was slight, but even so, it made her feel sick, as though the water had grown thick and hot. Protectors’ songs floated in then, and Arianna no longer swam at a steady pace but darted up as high as she could go, stopping to float just below the surface. She’d barely turned to look down again when the scene unfolded in the very place she had been swimming.

&nbs
p; The figure of a merman zigzagged below her, so low he was nearly smacking his tail against the seafloor. He swam, if it could be called that, but with each push of his tail, he writhed so hard Arianna was sure his back would snap. The blue-green of his fins was quickly fading into a nameless shade of brown, and the screeching howls he emitted were far from the song they should have been. Instead, they caused the fish to scatter and the plants that could, to withdraw into themselves.

  Arianna’s breaths came hard and fast as she prayed he didn’t see her floating above him. Afraid to swim for fear he would notice her movement, she watched instead as the guards encircled him, five of them, their voices rising up in a reverberating chorus of Protectors’ songs.

  The man continued to writhe, but the power of their songs pushed him down upon the seafloor until he was pressed flat against the sand. Still, his screams and grunts persisted even as the Protectors huddled over him. When they pulled back, he was bound with ropes, and they began tugging him toward the city. Arianna followed. Her mother would disapprove, and probably her aunt too, but it had been a long time since she’d seen a man touched by Sorthileige. Was it really as horrible a sight as she remembered it being?

  She followed along at a safe distance until they came to a stop in the main city circle. She would have liked to get closer, but as usual, her head began to pound and her vision grew blurry when she tried to perch on a lower seat, so she contented herself instead with resting on one of the taller rooftops and nervously fingering her necklace as the merman was moved from the ropes to the stocks. By now, his screeches had become more guttural, like he was choking. And she couldn’t be sure, but she believed she saw his eyes roll back into his head at least twice.

  “Let it be known,” one of the guards, Lorenzo, called out in a loud voice to those who had stopped to watch, “that this is what happens when our sacred laws are broken and one chooses to enter the Deeps!” He gestured at the thrashing merman behind him.