The sisters sat silently for a moment in contemplation, their large eyes widening and smiles growing, cracking the facade of their smooth white porcelain faces and causing them to look like crumbling whitewashed stone. “She will want to become human herself.” “It will kill Triton! Turning his beloved daughter into something he loathes.” “But that isn’t enough! It’s just one of his many punishments.” “First to see her transformed, then witnessing her destruction!” “Only then will he understand true loss.”
Ursula laughed and said, “But not before he surrenders his soul. And that, my dearest darling witches, will be his undoing.” With that all the witches laughed, delighted in their hate and with their scheme. This time, however, they were sure not to allow their voices to travel to the kingdoms beyond, as was customary.
This was a dark, secret sort of magic, and they couldn’t stand for interference of any sort, not even from a well-meaning witch who wanted to lend her magic to their mix. No, this was far too important, because their hate was pure. Their righteousness was unpolluted by doubt.
“We will ruin Ariel; the daughter will pay for the sins of the father. And then—and then we will kill Triton! And when we do, we will dance!” “Yes, dance! We will dance on the grave of your tyrant brother!” The three sisters spun in circles, dancing around Ursula, who had splendidly transformed into her true form. Her tentacles grew and curled around the odd sisters as they stomped their tiny black boots, singing songs of Triton’s death while Ursula’s laugh rattled the teacups and potion bottles in the little house where the witches plotted the ruin of Triton’s youngest daughter.
Ariel.
Morningstar Castle stood high upon the rocky cliffs, overlooking the ocean like a brilliant lighthouse in the fog. The castle was, in fact, built upon the remains of a cyclopean lighthouse, left from days when giants had ruled those lands after their great battle with the Tree Lords.
Within the ancient lighthouse was a magnificent lens, fashioned by a crafty dwarf by the name of Fresnel. The lens resembled a giant crystal jewel and it cast a brilliant light that guided the ships safely away from the rocky cliffs. The castle was intentionally built not to look dissimilar from the original lighthouse; it was fashioned with gloriously cut windows so the lights within would also function as beacons.
But to see Morningstar Castle properly—to truly experience its beauty—one must see it on solstice from a distance while traversing the sea. Sailors and fishermen would journey out of their way, sometimes by tremendous distances, just to see the castle, referred to by most as the Lighthouse of the Gods. The Morningstar clan was a well-respected family, always willing to help those in need, and of course they were great friends to those who sailed the perilous seas, often giving aid to anyone who washed up on their shores shipwrecked or lost their way on long journeys. Indeed, they were one of the few royal families without enemies, and they genuinely got on well with the other kingdoms they encountered. But their closest allies were the kingdoms under the seas, for they depended on the sea gods for their well-being.
King Morningstar had long before made an agreement with the sea witch who dwelled in those waters that he wouldn’t interfere with her kingdom. And she, in turn, wouldn’t meddle with his. Unlike her brother, who detested humans for fishing his seas, Ursula was rather more relaxed on the matter—as long as the Morningstars’ fishermen stayed within the specified boundaries. And those boundaries were within Ursula’s domain, the Unprotected Waters; her brother had no jurisdiction there. The agreement was to everyone’s benefit, and while the Morningstars held to their portion, the sea witch saw no reason to break hers. So she hadn’t broken their agreement when she found the king’s daughter, Princess Tulip, after she had thrown herself off her father’s rocky cliffs. She was, after all, under the sea and in Ursula’s domain, and the princess was all too eager to take Ursula’s deal: her beauty and voice in exchange for her life.
When Tulip looked back on that terrible experience, it was as if it were another lifetime. She was looking back now as she curled up on the window bench of the sunny morning room, drinking her tea, with Ursula’s distant voice ringing in her ears: “Well, well, my dear. Are we so brokenhearted as that? Is the loss of that terrible prince really worth your life?”
“No! I’ve made a terrible mistake.”
“Yes, you have, my sweet, but I can help you. There are just two things I will need in exchange: your beauty and your voice!”
Tulip was happy to fling her beauty away. It was the very thing that had caused her such misery. It seemed no one except for her beloved Nanny ever considered Tulip’s other attributes. The Beast prince loved Tulip only for how her beauty could reflect upon him. She was expected to sit idly, always looking beautiful and saying nothing, while he did what he willed. And she had filled the role remarkably. She cringed thinking about what a fool she had made of herself in those months, horrified she had allowed the Prince to treat her so shabbily. That was what beauty had brought her. Heartbreak. Humiliation. And without it, without her beauty, Tulip could focus on what made her hersel
f. Life meant so much more to her than she had ever realized. And her voice—well, it had gotten her into nothing but trouble. She was happy to be rid of it, happy not to have to make small talk, or frankly to have to talk at all.
After that day by the sea, she had decided to be done with the business of being a princess. No more fancy balls or being carted off to meet men of royalty. Certainly no more engagements to awful cads! Her parents begged her to reconsider the idea of a good marriage, and she almost relented out of guilt. As much as she wanted to help her father’s kingdom by marrying some wealthy prince, she couldn’t fathom another terrible brutish man in her life. No! She wouldn’t allow it!
She had set her mind quite firmly on the matter and decided she liked her life exactly as it was, when an enchanting young woman named Circe came to negotiate with the sea witch for the return of Tulip’s beauty.
“But I don’t want it! I don’t want to be beautiful!” Tulip screamed. Circe was beside herself. She almost regretted having convinced Ursula to return Tulip’s voice just moments before.
“But, my dear, it belongs to you. It’s yours. I’ve got something for the sea witch she will want much more than your beauty, and I daresay you won’t have much choice in the matter. The deal is sealed, as they say. She may not have the item until your beauty is returned, and I guarantee Ursula would destroy the entire pantheon to get at it.”
Much to Tulip’s horror, she was once again beautiful by the next morning. It was like some sort of twisted fairy tale, all confused and backward. You see, once Tulip had her beauty back and this Circe girl had seen to it that Tulip would be in possession of a wealthy dowry, every prince from every kingdom was traveling to Morningstar Castle to ask for Tulip’s hand in marriage. Once, Tulip would have delighted in being fawned over, but she was now eager to dismiss the vile and pathetic men who did the fawning.
Tulip was content to spend her days sitting with her nanny or reading books from her library. She had gotten used to the way life had been in those days before Circe’s visit—the silence of the room as she read about adventurous, brave young women escaping their terrible stepmothers or the Dark Fairy who put a spell on a young girl for her own protection.
She had liked not having to speak, and for the first time, she had truly spent time with herself, not worrying about impressing this prince or that, or wondering if she’d said the wrong thing at dinner or worn the shade of pink that best brought out the color in her cheeks. She’d never felt happier in her life, or more content.
Nanny brought her out of her thoughts when she padded into the room. “What’s this, Nanny?” Tulip asked, looking at the basket Nanny was holding. It was bedecked with a bunch of pretty pink roses that looked fearfully familiar.
“Well, I don’t know, child! But it’s clearly from that loathsome kingdom.” Nanny was speaking, of course, of the ghastly prince to whom Tulip had once been engaged. They had heard he had since changed his ways and fallen in love with a remarkable young woman named Belle. Apparently they were very much in love and were living quite happily together.
Tulip found that hard to believe, based on how the Prince had treated her. But she also recalled meeting Belle at the Prince’s ball and noted to herself that she wasn’t the sort of woman who would stand to be mistreated. If anyone could bring about a change within the Prince, it would be a woman who could stand up for herself in a way Tulip never could.
She hoped they were happy together, the Prince and Belle, and she appreciated the letter the Prince had sent to her shortly after his marriage, begging Tulip for her forgiveness and promising to make things right with her father. She quite frankly couldn’t imagine the Prince writing such a letter and was surprised when her father later shared the news that the Prince had indeed made good on his word. As gallant as his recent actions had been, she couldn’t banish from her mind or heart the foul things he had done to her, and she decided it was best to avoid any further correspondence with the lout.
“You don’t think it’s from him, do you?” Tulip’s lip was quivering at the mere thought of that nasty beast she had almost married.
“I shouldn’t think so, dear! Perhaps it’s from old Mrs. Potts. She was awfully fond of you.”
Princess Tulip laughed at her nanny’s calling anyone “old Mrs.” anything. Her nanny, whom she loved deeply, was impossibly old and resembled a withered apple doll, with her shriveled and heavily lined powdery white skin and her brilliant silver hair. She was short, shrunken with age, and slightly stooped but with a fierce personality and a spark in her eye.
“Open it, my dear! Open it up!” Tulip looked at the package suspiciously and decided to open it as gingerly as she could, fearful there might be something dangerous inside. But she was happily surprised.
“Pflanze! My dear girl, I missed you!” Pflanze was a beautiful black, white, and orange cat the princess had grown to love during her stays with the Prince when they had been engaged. Sometimes the cat had been her only company while the Prince had gone off to the tavern to drink with Gaston, leaving her alone and weary at his every opportunity. She had mourned the loss of Pflanze’s companionship in the many long months since all that wickedness had transpired with the Prince. But as she had mused earlier, that was a lifetime before.