Circe saw into the sea witch’s heart. She was foul. She was ugly. She was monstrous and loathsome. She was everything her brother said of her, and everything the Dark Fairy foresaw. And the sea witch had known she deserved that end. She had known it the moment before she died. She had betrayed the odd sisters, her dear friends for this…for this power and for revenge. A power that was destroying her. A power she couldn’t control. She had no will of her own. The seething hate had taken possession of her. It was its own creature, and she had no will to command it.
She had been dead before Eric took her life.
Circe pealed a frightful scream so loud and so terrible she thought the force of it would rip her throat.
She was herself again, but diminished, not only from her ordeal but from seeing into Ursula’s heart in the sea witch’s final moments.
When she reached the surface, she could see purple and black billowing smoke rising from the ocean like a menacing cloud of ruin, filling the sky and blackening the ships that had been docked near Morningstar Castle. Ursula’s remains had floated to the surface and mingled with the sea foam, turning it a putrid grayish black. Her hate seemed to linger even after her death.
The Lighthouse of the Gods stood shining in exquisite brilliance, however, as if refusing to be diminished by the foul smoke of decay. As Circe stepped out of the waves and onto land, it was comforting to have feet again and to feel the sand beneath them. She felt her sisters were near, and rushed to the castle in a panic, because she knew there was something horribly wrong.
She didn’t bother with the guardsmen at the gate and simply willed them to let her in. Mr. Hudson greeted her at the door with a panic-stricken look. He was pale and his eyes were full of terror.
“Miss. Circe, thank the gods you’re here! There is something terribly wrong with Princess Tulip, and Nanny has been attacked!” Circe tried to clear her head, which was still muddled from her transformation from mermaid to witch.
“Where are they? Take me to them.”
Mr. Hudson directed her to the main room, where several guardsmen were trying to chop their way in with axes, succeeding only in breaking their weapons, which lay in a heap on the floor.
“Stand back, gentlemen.” Circe cast her hand forward, blasting the door inward with a violent splintering crash.
Nanny and Circe’s sisters were lying on the floor, unconscious.
“Where’s Tulip?” she asked, looking around the room.
“In her room, miss. Rose has been trying to wake her for hours.”
Circe couldn’t fathom what had happened.
“I need everyone out of this room.”
Mr. Hudson tried to protest, but Circe silenced him with an uncustomary sternness.
“Hudson, now! Order everyone out of this room so I can tend to Nanny and my sisters.”
As Triton made his way through the murky waters, trying to find his daughter, he was sickened by the horrors that surrounded him. He could feel his sister’s hate embedded in the decay that littered the ocean floor. He thought he would choke on it and assumed that was her intention. He knew he deserved her hatred, and he felt an overwhelming sense of dread for the part he had played in her demise. There was nothing Triton could do to atone for his malversation toward his sister, but he could make things right with his daughter, even if it meant turning her into a human.
And he thought that Ursula had her vengeance after all, because he was about to turn someone he loved deeply into the thing he most hated.
A human.
Circe was sitting near Tulip’s bed, watching her as she slept. She checked to be sure Tulip wasn’t wearing anything unusual that could have cast the sleeping spell, and came to the conclusion that one of the many witches under that roof must have cast the spell, and Circe was unable to break it. She wished she knew what had happened while she was held captive by Ursula. But much of it remained a mystery while Nanny and the sisters were still unconscious. Circe was sitting there holding Tulip’s hand, feeling helpless and alone, when she saw a magnificent rainbow soar through the sky over a beautiful ship. The scene sent a surge of joy through her heart, but she didn’t know why.
“It’s a wedding ship, dear, that’s why.”
Circe looked up and saw Nanny and Pflanze standing in the doorway.
“Nanny! What’s happened?”
Nanny sighed in relief that Circe was safe and their sacrifice hadn’t been in vain.
“What sacrifice? Not Tulip?”
Nanny smiled weakly. “No, dear. Tulip will be fine. I can wake her whenever I wish.”
And then Circe knew. There was something terribly wrong with her sisters. “Yes, my dear. To reverse magic so embedded with hate took great strength. I’m astonished your sisters survived the ordeal.”
Circe now understood why Ursula had felt her own magic was being leveled against her.
“I don’t understand. What magic needed reversing? Why would my sisters…” And then she understood. They had done it to release her from Ursula’s garden.
“Come, my darling, we should see the wedding ship off, and then we shall have some tea and Nanny will tell you everything.”
Nanny could hear Circe’s thoughts, her confusion, and the myriad questions weighing upon her.
“After you’ve heard my story, you will be glad you saw the happy couple off to live their life together. Trust me, my dear. Nanny knows your heart almost as well as you do.”
Two witches, divergent in age and in schools of magic, though with very similar hearts and sensibilities, stood on the windy cliffs as they watched Ariel and Eric’s wedding ship sail off into the future. Ariel was happier than she had ever been. She was venturing into an entirely new world with the man she loved. She would finally dance, and run, and know what it was to live and love as she had always imagined.
“My sisters stopped Ursula from killing this girl?”
Nanny decided the simplest answer was best.
“Yes, my dear, they did. Your sisters saved us all.”
Circe thought Nanny was right: perhaps in the retelling of the tale she would find pleasure in the little mermaid’s story, and she would be happy that Ariel’s wish to become human and marry her prince came true. But for now she could only think of her sisters and of Pflanze sitting beside them, watching silently with fearful eyes, waiting and wishing for her mistresses to wake from their deathlike sleep.
Then a shiver came over Nanny and Circe, a tingling sensation at the backs of their necks that told them someone was coming.
A witch.
A powerful witch. But neither could make out her intentions.
THE END
SERENA VALENTINO has for years been weaving tales that combine mythos and guile in her critically acclaimed and celebrated comics and graphic novels. Poor Unfortunate Soul is the triumphant finale of her trilogy that began with Fairest of All and continued with The Beast Within.
Poor Unfortunate Soul: A Tale of the Sea Witch Page 10
