My city was known as the birthplace of mermaids, or so a penpal of mine wrote. "I don't believe you," I said in my next letter. "Mermaids do not exist. Or, do you mean to say that the legend of mermaids came from my city? Please be more specific in your next letter."

 

I received her reply several days earlier than I'd expected. In it, my penpal had snapped, rather waspishly, that she meant what she meant and to stop putting words in her mouth.

 

The nerve! I can't believe she had the guts to speak to the future king of Ilene like that.

 

I began writing back immediately, my words a furious scrawl in black ink. I was most surprised when my father interrupted me by lifting me up by my back collar. "Dorian! This is no way for a prince to behave," he'd said, aghast.

 

I told him to unhand me at once because this was no way for a king to behave. He sighed and said that they should get me a different etiquette tutor. 

 

I like my current tutor. Her name is Renée, and she's thirteen, three years older than me, and looks like a fairy, or maybe a mermaid. Maybe that's what my penpal meant? I like my penpal too, even if she annoys me sometimes. I wish she lived in the capital. We write often, but the days of a prince are long and boring, and there aren't many others I can speak with as equals. Her name is Sumire, but I call her Sumi because she hates it. 

 

As it turns out, I may actually need to include an apology to Sumi in my next letter, because mermaids are, in fact, real. There is no conceivable way they exist, and yet, as sure as the moon turns in the sky, as the sun scorches the sea, as the white sails of ships larger than belief set forth from my city's harbors, probability may eventually defy reality, and mermaids may be found in forgotten seaside caves.

 

"Waugh," the mermaid said, and my illusion of beautiful women singing in amber-colored seashells shattered before my eyes. "Mweh... I didn't realize that I would be found here..."

 

Well. At least she could talk.

 

"Are you a mermaid?" Despite her less-than-elegant first impression, I was still awestruck. She wore a dark blue shawl with tassels, and looked like any other girl from the waist up. Her long, wavy hair was a color between slate gray and sea green, and was pinned back by a ribbon whose ragged ends swayed like seaweed. Her lower half looked more like a sea serpent's tail than that of a fish. It was long, sinewy, and glimmered with deep green scales that I'd first thought were black. I stared openly at it, and when the mermaid caught my gaze, she looked away, flicking her tail backwards so that it was obscured beneath her cloak. Her hands were the pale color of seashells, and moved constantly. She would twirl a gray-green lock of hair around her finger one second, and then move on to fuss with her bangs.

 

"I'm a mermaid princess, so you should address me as ‘Your Highness.'"

 

"You're a princess? I'm a prince!" My mind was racing. Mermaids were real! And not only were they real, there were more of them, and they lived in an underwater society. This was the discovery of a millennium. I would go down in history, not just as a king, but also as an explorer, an intrepid adventurer who had uncovered the secrets of an ancient civilization beneath the sea. "What, what," I tripped over my words in my excitement, "what are you doing here? What's your name?"

 

"Mweh. I'm here because I don't want to be a princess anymore." The mermaid wrinkled her nose, as if she'd smelled something bad. "Ah... and, you don't need to know my name. I said, you can call me ‘Your Highness.'" She leveled an oddly piercing gaze at me. "And you — you're here, because you're hiding from your duties as a prince."

 

"What? How did you know?"

 

"Simple," she said haughtily. Oh, this girl has a terrible personality. Of course, it would turn out that the first mermaid I'd meet would be some kind of mer-misanthrope. "I read your mind."

 

"You can read minds?" This wasn't in any of the stories. The legends spoke of beautiful men and women who lived in the ocean and sang hauntingly alluring songs. In the kindest tales, they guided lost ships to harbor and sailors to shore. In the cruellest ones, they drowned boats and tore into the bodies of men with razor-sharp teeth. I hadn't noticed any fangs when she was speaking, but maybe they were hidden somewhere, like those of a sea urchin.

 

"You're thinking something weird again," she accused.

 

"Stop reading my mind, then! It's against the law to read a prince's mind, you know," I retorted, though no such law existed. Wait, can't she tell I'm lying?

 

Evidently, it didn't matter to her if I was telling the truth or not. "I'm a mermaid, so human laws don't apply to me." She smiled and flicked her tail backwards, which began to thump rhythmically on the sandbar. It reminded me of my father's hunting hound, who did the same at the end of long days, and meant that he was feeling content. "What's your name, anyways?"

 

There was no way I was telling her my name. "You may call me ‘Your Highness.'"

 

"Mweh... I'm not calling you that. You're a bad prince, y'know, shirking your duties." She stuck her tongue out at me.

 

"Wouldn't that make you a bad princess, then?" I fired back. "You just said you didn't want to be a princess anymore. You're running away from your responsibilities."

 

The mermaid looked thunderstruck, even though all I had done was simply point out the obvious. "I'm not a bad princess."

 

Aha. I'd found the weakness in her armor. "You are!"

 

"I am not!" Her hands moved upwards to cover her eyes, and after a few seconds of stunned silence, I realized she was crying. Had I said something wrong? No, that was impossible.

 

I waited several more seconds for her to stop crying, which didn't happen. It wasn't fair when girls cried. Renée told me that I needed to be gentle with girls, but it was easier to be nice to her, because Renée is a lady, and this girl is a sea urchin.

 

I dragged my hand through my hair and down my face. Ugh...

 

"Your Highness," I began awkwardly. I wasn't used to addressing others in this manner, for good reason. "I may have spoken too rashly. I apologize for calling you a ‘bad princess.' I am unversed in the ways of mermaid society, nor do I know of what you may have experienced. If I may, I would recant my earlier words. You are a ‘good princess.' It's the others around you who are incorrect."

 

I was unaccustomed with apologizing, because I was so rarely wrong, and the words sounded awkward in my mouth. I did genuinely want her to stop crying, however, if only because her struggles reminded me oddly of my own. When others said my behavior was unprincely, which was surprisingly often, it always made me feel better when I remembered that they were just wrong.

 

"Waugh..." the mermaid continued weeping for another excruciating minute, before she was finally finished. "You're still a bad prince, and you talk weird," she sniffed, "But, thank you for trying. You're an okay friend, I guess."

 

"Me? Your friend?" Wait, that sounded uncharitable. "I mean, yes! Your friend!"

 

"Yeah... you're the first person my age I've ever spoken with."

 

"That's really sad." The words slipped out of their own volition, and I knew at once that they were the wrong thing to say, because the mermaid immediately shot me a murderous glare.

 

"I take it back! You're awful! I'm never coming to the shore again," she fumed. "I thought other mermaids were bad, but it turns out that humans are even worse!" With a flick of her tail, she jumped into the swirling ocean, soaking me with seawater.

 

I knew just what to write in my next letter. That night, as my father passed me by, he shook his head slightly as he saw its contents. How rude.

 

Dear Sumi. Mermaids are real, and they are awful...

 

Despite my words, I felt elated, and lighter than I had in days. I finally had someone I could speak to like an equal, who didn't live hundreds of miles away. Tomorrow, I'd go to the cave, and hopefully see the mermaid again. Perhaps I'd even bring a peace offering, like some sardines.