Princess Moments

Return of the Sea Queen

By Holly Maley

I have reigned as Queen of the Sea for all of two weeks and I already regret accepting the title. My military advisor, Marcelus, and I float above a pinnacle of rock and survey a fierce battlefield. Far below us, mermen fall to tooth and claw of our ancient enemy—sea dragons. Half-lizard, half-fish beasts from the abyss with jaws as big as my head. From this distance, the battle noises are muffled but still dreadful: shrieks of pain and rage from both sides. Otherwise all is silent. Eerily so. Not a single crustacean disturbs the nearby waters, having long fled or hid along with every other able sea creature.

This never should have happened. Emboldened by my failures as a queen, by my reluctance to take up my own crown, the sea dragons emerged from their dark abode for the first time in a thousand years to claim the seas as their own. All because I ran away on the eve of my coronation, having convinced myself that the oceans would be better off without me.

Without a firm hand to govern the waters, unseasonal storms and tsunamis erupted. Rapid changes in currents and temperature, along with the return of sea monsters, upset a delicate balance. Natural habitats were destroyed worldwide along with the creatures that depended on them. And that was just the beginning.

I returned to my post too late. In the last two weeks I managed to calm the storms and return some equilibrium to my domain, but none of that will matter if the sea dragons seize control. Their mindless destruction will plunge the four oceans into a chaos darker than anything mermaid or human has seen before.

Someone has to end this conflict.

But why me?

A young scout swims up the pinnacle to Marcelus and bows at the waist. “Report, soldier,” Marcelus says. He speaks with a confident efficiency earned through centuries of defending the depths, his long white hair and beard swirling about him in a flowing halo. After my father’s untimely death, the general practically raised me, and I trust him with my life, even my kingdom. He still wields Spyridon’s Trident, my birthright, and I sorely wish that he also wore the silver crown that rests on my brow.

“Sir, more dragons are incoming. If we do not move quickly, they will surround us,” the scout says.

I can see the unspoken statement in his eyes. We cannot win.

“What are we going to do?” I ask. I do not miss the scout’s brief look of bewilderment before he hides it. A queen should not be so indecisive, especially not in front of her subjects. Marcelus dismisses the scout before I can damage morale further, then he turns to face me. Even after my recent failings, few others would dare to stare down the Queen of the Sea with such intensity.

“This is not a battle that can be won by nets and spears,” Marcelus says. He grips the trident in both hands and holds it out to me. “Your Majesty, it is time.”

Two millennia ago, Spyridon the Godslayer seized that very trident from the dragon king Neptune and ran it through his heart. Every sea king and queen since has wielded it. My father gave it to Marcelus for safekeeping until I was old enough to take the throne, but I had insisted the general keep it even after that.

I try to wave it away. “I am no warrior queen. You make much better use of it than I ever could.”

Marcelus’s stern gaze rips holes in my soul, exposing my fear. “Not all battles are won by warriors, Your Majesty. This path has been set before you, only you can complete it.”

He continues to hold out the trident. When I can withstand his eyes no longer I take it from him as though it might curse me.

The adamant weapon weighs heavily in my hands despite the sea taking most of the burden. It is a weapon of war, but a beautiful one. The three points represent my dominion over the three realms of the sea: the surface, the deeps, and the abyss. Intricate gold and pearl inlay dances about the haft in impossibly detailed depictions of the heroic deeds of my ancestors. Near its head, Spyridon pierces Neptune with his own trident. Farther down, Yunus seals Kraken in the abyss and Mared tames the sirens. Other kings and queens of old are etched into a grand story spanning thousands of years. The images end halfway down the haft, leaving room for the deeds of my descendants. If such a day comes.

“None of them did it on their own, Your Majesty,” Marcelus says, his tone and gaze softened.

I grip the trident to my chest and wonder how many other royal hands have done the same, how many of my ancestors clenched this relic to themselves on the verge of insurmountable trials, praying for the will to go on. I am not worthy to be listed among them. And yet I can almost feel their presence, a host of witnesses spurring me onward.

I close my eyes and silently ask for strength to follow in their footsteps. I do not need to be a legend, I just need my people to be safe. Protector and Light of my ancestors, guide my heart and strengthen my hand.

I stay in that place as long as I dare, allowing the caress of the ocean and the comforting presence of my ancestors—real or imagined—to still my screaming heart. When I open my eyes, my fear is tempered with resolve. I cannot say how—instinct, perhaps, or a connection to something greater than I—but I know what I must do.

Swift as an eel, I leave Marcelus behind and swim down the rock face toward the fighting. The growls and screams grow to an almost deafening roar as I reach the battlefield. I weave in and out of mermen and dragons locked in ferocious combat, doing my best not to draw attention. My efforts are for naught. As soon as the dragons notice me they home in on my position, determined to destroy our army at its head. I am quicker than they are and manage to dodge their clamping jaws and slashing claws for a time, but there are too many. A gaping maw comes straight for my head, too close for me to adjust course. Two lines of razor teeth are inches from my neck when a spear slices clean through the monster’s skull. A second dragon comes for my fin, only to be felled by another of my soldiers.

My presence has rallied the warriors. They pick off the monsters with renewed vigor, clearing the way in front of me with shouts of “For the queen!” Their zeal carries me onward and for a moment it feels like we could actually win. That feeling does not last. I am almost at the center of the battle, where merman and dragon shred at each other the most viciously, when a new cry rings out: “More are here! We’re surrounded!”

I look up to see a horde of dragons descending upon us. My men panic, their heads whipping back and forth to behold monsters converging from all sides. There will be no escape.

There is only one thing left to do. I raise Spyridon’s Trident above my head with my right hand and shout, “Silence!” The act feels futile, silly even, but I put all my force behind it nonetheless. My voice ripples out in shockwaves, amplified by years of royal training and something else. Something unexplainable. On its own accord the trident shines brilliantly with a light purer than the sun. Its rays pierce the darkness of the deep and the dragons shrink back in blindness and terror while my soldiers look to me with expectant awe.

“I am Queen Estera Serena, daughter of Niklos the Just, Ruler and Protector of the Three Realms,” I begin. I feel like an imposter. Only my training keeps my voice steady, but as I continue I grow in confidence. In my sense of rightness. “Your god is long dead. I wield his weapon. Our Protector and Light destroyed him at the hand of Spyridon the Godslayer, whose blood runs through my veins. Submit!” The word echoes through the water in a volcanic burst. “Or suffer the same fate.”

For a moment, the ever-present groan of the depths is all I can hear as dragon and merman alike gaze on me in stunned silence. Then all at once the stillness shatters. Some of the dragons bolt toward the abyss while others sneer and resume the attack, their rage only doubled by my words. In their blind fury, they lack control, and my mermen cut them down like jellyfish. Mere minutes ago, the dragons had all but defeated us. But now it is the dragons who have no hope. Marcelus joins the fray, bellowing orders to advance with a confidence that assures me that he and my army will hunt down every last one of the rebel monsters.

But some dragons neither fight nor flee. They instead lower their heads and claws in deference and my men do not touch them. Spyridon’s Trident warms in my hand and I look down to see a new image form on its haft: a host of monsters bowing before a resplendent sea queen, submitting to a new ruler. The small gold and pearl queen on the trident feels like a stranger, as distant from me as Spyridon himself, but I know I cannot escape her. I still itch to flee, to hide from the responsibility these new and strange subjects will bring. But this time, I will not. Nor will I go it alone.