The Octopus Queen (A Little Mermaid Retelling)

25 - Lost Mermaid

Amanthara is not answering my calls. It's been precisely eight hours since I set a mermaid loose upon the human world—a young, impressionable mermaid—and I've already lost her. I bite my lip as I stalk through the workroom, every available surface littered with potions and half-completed charms.

Bippi sits quietly on a stool, tentacles curled around his body.

"What if she got lost?" I lament to the octopus. "What if she ate something she shouldn't have and is in intestinal distress? What if some petty thief lured her into an alley and raped her?"

"Sina," Bippi says calmly. "There are spells for that."

I cut my wild pacing short to stare at him. Of course. Why didn't I think of that before? I am a mess, that's why. I rake hair from my face and tie it back in a knot at the nape of my neck. My eyes hurt, and my brain feels fuzzy. I've been in the workroom too long.

As always, Bippi is there. "Take a deep breath," he advises. "Seek calm and center yourself. You will see more clearly."

I am eight years old, taken back to our first lessons. I listen to the octopus and slow my breathing, find my center, and gradually, my thoughts untangle.

"Everything is riding on her success," I tell Bippi, calling for a guard. A selkie male appears and I direct him to scour the cellar pool for any scales Amanthara may have left behind. As he leaves, I pull down a wide, flat-bottom scrying bowl from a nearby shelf and find a clear spot on one of the tables. "If this doesn't work, I'm not sure the spires will hold."

After seeing Amanthara off, I gave the selkies the last of my protection spells to slap on the surrounding spires. Now, I am down here, making more.

"There are other methods," Bippi says slowly.

I pause mid-pour; water drips from the ceramic ewer in my hands. "What other methods?"

The octopus sighs, the flaps behind his eyes fluttering. "You can summon the creatures of the deep," he says at last.

I stare at Bippi. Summon kraken and leviathan? I have only been able to make contact with the whales and Bippi believes I can summon the deep-dwellers?

"I thought you were against using sentient creatures for personal gain." As I have been. "What would the Grey God say?"

Bippi sighs again, tentacles rubbing together. "I have grown very fond of you over these last decades, Sina. I cannot see you fall."

My throat tightens, but no tears fall. Bippi has been my friend—in truth, my only friend. "Only as a last resort," I tell him.

Bippi nods.

Swallowing, I finish pouring water into the scrying bowl. The selkie guard returns with bad news: no scales from the mermaid princess.

"I apologize, my queen," he says, bowing.

Well, that just made everything more complicated. "It's all right," I tell him. The selkie nods and returns to his post outside the workroom door. I grab rosemary and sage from a shelf behind me and sprinkle a pinch of each into the bowl. Setting my hands on either side of the bowl, I take a deep breath, drawing the scent of the herbs deep into my lungs.

Clarity for sight; clarity for mind.

I hold an image of Amanthara in my mind's eye and plunge my senses into the scrying bowl. The herbs drift idly across the surface, forming random patterns. Sweat beads on my brow as I concentrate.

The herbs tremble, then spread out to form a circle; a circle within a circle in the bowl. A drop of sweat falls from the tip of my nose as I force the water to bend to my will. A hazy image begins to form in the center and I see what appears to be Amanthara, a brown kerchief tied around her head to hide that pink hair. She's perched on a barrel, talking to someone.