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It’s so colorful! That’s Ariel’s initial thought as she takes in life above the sea.The sky is alight with explosives that scatter rainbows of color.She flinches as fire hits the water around her,but it doesn’t lessen the grin that takes over her face.She has never seen any-thing like this before.This is the creativity she keeps trying to get her father to understand.The humans have made the night sky come alive!
The display mostly centers above a mas-sivesailing ship,beautifully decorated with bright lanterns.The reddish Coral Moon hangs in the sky,illuminating everything.
Music and human voices drift over to Ariel.Intrigued,she swims toward them.She makes her way into a small lifeboat hanging from the ship’s side.It doesn’t let her view much more than a few legs and shoes dancing about,but she can hear people singing in cel-ebration.
Ariel smiles.Their merriment is conta-gious.Making sure to stay out of view,she shifts to better observe the sights and conver-sations before her.
One thing is undoubtedly true:even in the middle of the ocean,sailors know how to throw a celebration.Tonight’s raucous fete is to celebrate Prince Eric’s birthday.
Men cheer as they blast fireworks into the sky.The sailors pass around food and drink as someone plays a fiddle.Eric sits in the center of the deck,petting his fluffy sheepdog,Max, and grinning at the men around him as he joins them in bellowing an old shanty.
Eric finds himself getting into it,singing and dancing with his crew.He enjoys the rush that comes with such a carefree moment.For a little while he’s able to forget that he’s any-thing other than a regular sailor,unburdened by“proper”responsibilities.But alas,Grimsby doesn’t allow it to last.
“Thankyou,gentlemen,thankyou.”Grimsby grabs Eric by the arm and guides him away from the others.
“Come on,Grimsby.What’s wrong with me having a little fun?Everyone else is.”Grimsby is a good man,but boy,can he be a killjoysometimes.
“You,sire,”Grimsby says,“are not every-one else.It’s time you separated yourself from the rest of the crew—”
“But I’m one of them,”Eric interjects.
“—and behave in a manner more be-coming to a future king,”Grimsby continues, straightening his gait as if simply talking about royal matters demands proper posture.
Eric bristles.He hates being reminded that he’s a prince,that he’s close to becom-ing a king.“You mean I should be more like my father was,”he says,“cut off from the rest of the world.”It’s not the first time they’ve had this discussion. It’s time to get serious, Eric.You’re not like everyone else. Eric knows that Grimsby means well.He’s just trying to prepare him for the inevitablefuture,but ev-ery time they discuss it,Eric feels more and more like he is being led to a prison sentence.
Grimsby places a hand on Eric’s shoulder.Neither he nor Eric notices as Max wanders away,having spotted someone new peering through an opening in the ship’s railing.
“You know what I mean,Eric,”Grimsby says.He softens his gaze.“When you came to us twenty-one years ago,the king and queen took you in and treated you as one of their own.And now that you’ve come of age—”
“Max?”Eric suddenly realizes his dog is no longer beside him.“Max!What are you do-ing over there?Come here,boy!”His dog is across the ship,pantinghappily as he tries to peer at the sea over the ship’s railing.
The prince bends down to ruffle the fur on his dog’s face.“What are you looking at, silly boy?”
Ariel’s heart races as she presses herself into the lifeboat to avoid being seen by the hu-man who has come for“Max”.Under the sea, they don’t have any creatures quite like Max, all big and fluffy with four legs!He likes her,if his wagging tail and happy panting are any-thing to go by.
In the opening,a hand appears,patting Max on the head and guiding him out of her view.
“Eric,now that you’ve come of age,your responsibilities are at home,”someone says.“Your father would have expected that.”
“Oh,yes,trapped inside that castle in iso-lation and fear.”Eric’s voice is heavy with sar-casm.“I can’t do it.”
Something in Ariel stirs.Based on his conversation with the other man,she realizes the human’s name is Eric and he is a prince.His words are piercing,echoing her own feel-ings more than anyone has ever been able to.She doesn’t know whether to find it comfort-ing or frightening that even in the vast,open human world,someone can feel just as trapped as she does.Maybe it’s inevitable for a child of a king.
Ariel may understand,but the human with Eric doesn’t seem to.“I believe a little fear may be advisable,”he counters.
“Grimsby,”Eric groans.“You’re not lis-tening.I want to be a different kind of leader.That’s the whole reason we’re on this voyage.Don’t you see?We have to stay open to what’s out here.It’s the only way our island can grow.”
Eric leans over the railing,gazing out to the sea.Ariel shrinks down farther,the wood of the lifeboat biting into her back.“I can’t ex-plain it,Grims.It’s in my blood.Even now I feel there’s something out here calling to me.”
Ariel allows herself a moment to gaze at his face.She suddenly realizes that this is the first human she’s seen up close.How marvel-ous! And he’s quite beautiful ,she thinks,her face heating slightly.It’s the hunger in his ex-pression as he views the open sea.It’s the longing in his words.Nothing at all like the barbarians,with sharp teeth and hate in their eyes,that her father described.No,the more Ariel stares,the more she recognizes pure wonder in this human’s eyes.
Ariel is startled by a few cold drops of wa-ter hitting her cheek.She follows Eric’s gaze to the darkening clouds on the horizon.His face goes pale.
“Storm coming in fast!”Eric shouts as his crew swarms into motion.Eric moves away from the railing and begins calling out orders.The sky opens up,and a sudden downpour sweeps across the deck.The ship rocks vio-lently back and forth.
Cold dread twists in Ariel’s gut at the sight of the storm.It builds to a startling in-tensity in mere seconds.Torrents of freezing rain make it hard to see clearly.The ship, which seemed so massive moments ago,is pulled almost effortlessly by the churning waves.There’s a sinking feeling in Ariel’s chest as she realizes that this is how most of the shipwrecks she’s explored happen.
Ariel dares a closer look through the rail-ing,watching as Eric takes charge.“Batten down hatches and crates!”he orders.He di-rects,and people listen.Ariel is fascinated by the way he moves,with purpose and certainty, as if he’s led these men through dozens of storms.She wonders if his confidence truly outweighs his fear,or if it’s his job as a prince to be that good at pretending.
The ship lurches again,violently rocking Ariel’s lifeboat.She dives out to avoid being flipped over.She resurfaces,swimming along-side the vessel as she keeps an eye on the sail-ors.The storm has to end soon,right? Please let them get to safety.
Eric is terrified.He has never been a fan of storms.They have a history of not boding well for him,and when he was a child,a single clap of thunder used to send him straight to his parents’bedroom.This storm seemed to come without warning,following Grimsby’s reprimandso closely Eric half wonders if the universe is trying to berate him,too.But while Grimsby may have a soft spot for him, Eric knows the sea can be unrelenting.
“Clew up and stow the main course—we’re over-canvased!”Eric yells.
“Brail up the foresail!”Mulligan howls against the onslaught of rain.
Crewmen climb the rigging and furl the sail.There is a flash of lightning,and for that moment the world stops.Then at once the wind is back to shrieking as it batters the ship about like it’s nothing.A large wave crashes onto the deck,managing to knock the helms-manover.The ship’s wheel spins and turns the vessel off course.The ship is now headed straight toward a line of large rocks,and no one is manning the wheel.Eric sprints over to try to steer the ship on course,but it’s too late.
Eric is barely able to brace himself as the ship smashes into the rocks.He hits his head against the wheel.There’s a sharp pain before everything goes dark.
All around,chaos is unfolding.Men are thrown violently across the deck.A crate breaks loose and crashes against a railing, bursting open to reveal a statue of the prince.The decorative lanterns fall from the mast, catching the sails on fire.
Eric groans,slowly coming to.A strange ringing in his ears blocks out all other sound.A warm light greets him,and for a moment he’s reminded of sitting wrapped and cozy with his mother in front of a glowing fire-place.As his vision clears,he realizes that the entire deck is on fire.He jumps up,fueled by the panic coursing through him.“Lifeboats! Abandon ship!”
Crew are jumping overboard into the wa-ter as others rush to lower the lifeboats.A cabin boy,no more than twelve,looks over the side of the boat,frozen with fear.
“Into the water,boy!”Mulligan calls.
The boy hesitates,his face pale with panic.
“ Argh, ”Mulligan groans before picking up the boy and throwing him overboard.He jumps in after him.
Grimsby shakily climbs up the rail,his face ghost white as he jumps into the water.
“It’s jammed!”Hawkins calls as he un-successfully tries to lower a lifeboat.
With no time to lose,Eric grabs Hawkins’s machete.“Stand aside!”He cuts through the ropes,sending the lifeboat plummeting into the ocean.The sailors in the water swim to it while the rest continue to abandon ship.Heat from the fire prickles Eric’s skin,and he can barely breathe through all the smoke,but he waits until the last of his men have made it over the side.He won’t dare leave a sailor be-hind.
The ship is now completely ablaze.Eric prepares to jump himself when he hears fran-tic barking.He looks back to see Max is trapped high on the stern castle.
“Max!”
Eric navigates his way through flames.“It’s all right,boy,”he calls as he reaches the trem-bling sheepdog.He tosses Max down into the water below.The dog lands with a resounding splash.
His ship is now unrecognizable.All around Eric,flaming debris falls.He rolls to the side, narrowly avoiding being hit in the head.The ship suddenly lurches,and he is painfully thrown to the opposite side of the deck.
Ariel has felt fear before,but there’s noth-ing as frightening as her own helplessness as mayhem is unleashed around her.She has seen the aftermath of plenty of shipwrecks, but she has never seen what it’s like when they occur.It’s terrifying.
She does her best to help,though.As sail-ors fall into the water and struggleto stay afloat,she pushes drifting lifeboats toward them.She makes sure to stay underwater,out of sight.Luckily,they are too focused on sur-vival to pay close attention,even when she has to give one of the last sailors who jumped a gentle push onto his lifeboat.A nearby splash alerts Ariel to Max,paddling ungracefully.He lets out a low whine when Grimsby calls out to him.
“Max!Come here!You can make it!”
Ariel swims beneath Max,one hand against his belly as she guides him to Grimsby’s lifeboat.Max sticks his face down and at-tempts to lick her cheek before Grimsby grabs a hold of him and pulls him onto the boat.Ariel allows herself a moment of relief.She’s glad Max is safe.
Most of the men seem to have made it to the lifeboats,but last Ariel saw,Eric was still on the ship.She surfaces in time to see him thrown across the deck and knocked over-board.Panic swells in her chest as he falls into the water and disappears from sight.
Ariel’s heart races as she swims among the wreckage around the boat,searching for Eric.She dives out of the way as the statue of the prince breaks through a railing above her and plummetsinto the water.Ariel swims deeper,her eyes desperately searching.Then she sees him.He’s unconscious,drifting down into the deep.She rushes to him and pulls him into her arms before swimming him up toward the surface.
