THE KINDNESS THAT CAUGHT THE PRINCE

CHAPTER 2: THE PRINCE WHO CAME TO THE SILT Lira didn't know the whole kingdom was talking about her. She was back in her small hole in the grey rock at The Silt, shivering. Not from cold, but from fear. She had touched the Prince. A common girl had touched royal blood. That was forbidden. Punishment was banishment to the Black Trenches where no light ever reaches. She sat on her seaweed bed, holding her empty basket, staring at her hands. Her mother's pearl was gone. She had crushed her only treasure for a stranger. "Mama, did I do wrong?" she whispered to the water, tears mixing with the sea. She curled into a ball, her plain white tail covering her face, and cried. She cried for her mother. She cried because she had finally been seen, but by the one person she was not allowed to be seen by. She didn't know that at that same moment, in the shining Pearl Heart Palace, Prince Caelum could not sleep. His royal room was bigger than Lira's entire rock. His bed was made from living coral that warmed itself. His ceiling was diamonds that glowed like stars. But Prince Caelum sat on the edge of his bed, staring at his tail. His tail was healed. No cut. No blood. But where Lira had pressed the glowing powder, there was still a faint golden light pulsing under his skin. Like a heartbeat. Not his. Hers. He had been in the Deep North for ten years. Ten years of ice and blood. He slept on ice rocks. He ate raw fish. He heard monsters scream. No one was ever kind to him there. If you fell, they left you. If you bled, they said you were weak. His father told him at age seven, "Don't come back until your heart is as hard as ice." So he made his heart hard. He stopped crying. He stopped missing his mother. He stopped wishing someone would say, "Are you okay?" And today, for the first time in ten years, when he fell in the sand and everyone laughed and ran away because they didn't want to get dirty — one girl came. A girl with a plain white tail and shaking hands who said, "Are you okay?" And she gave up her only treasure to heal him. He closed his eyes and saw her again. Her big brown eyes full of fear and kindness. Her plain white tail that came towards him when all the shiny tails ran away. Her small, trembling, warm hands. He touched his fin where she had touched him. It was still warm. "Who are you?" he whispered to his empty room. He stood up. He could not wait until morning. He swam out of his room, his white cloak flowing. The guards jumped. "My Prince! It's midnight! Where are you going?" "To find her," he said. "My Prince, it's forbidden to go to The Silt at night! It's dirty! It's dangerous!" Prince Caelum looked at the guard with warrior eyes from the Deep North. "If you will not go, I will go myself." Captain Thorne, his loyal captain with a scar across his face, stepped forward. "I will go with you, my Prince." So at midnight, while Coralia slept and dreamed of being chosen, the Prince himself with only two guards swam out of the shining Pearl Heart, past the High Reefs where noble girls slept in pearl beds, past the Middle Currents, and down, down to where water became dark and cold. To The Silt. Lira woke up because she heard shouting. It was Lady Varra. Mean Lady Varra who owned her. "GHOST GIRL! WHERE ARE MY 200 PEARLS! YOU STUPID FISH! YOU LOST THEM!" Lira swam out, trembling. Lady Varra was there, huge pink tail swishing angrily. "My Lady, I... I dropped them at the Market Reef when the chariot—" "YOU DROPPED THEM! DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH THAT IS! I WILL BEAT YOU AND SEND YOU TO THE BLACK TRENCHES!" Lady Varra raised her thick arm to hit Lira. Lira closed her eyes and waited for pain. She was used to it. But pain never came. A strong hand caught Lady Varra's wrist in mid-air. "WHO DARES—" Lady Varra turned, furious. Then she froze. Her mouth fell open. Her pink tail stopped shining. Because the hand belonged to a tall merman with long white hair and blue eyes like the abyss. White cloak. Power that made water shake. Prince Caelum. Captain Thorne stood behind him. The whole Silt became silent. Commoners came out of holes, whispering, "Is that... the Prince? The Prince is in The Silt?" Lady Varra fell to her knees, head bowing to sand. "M-My Prince! Forgive me!" Prince Caelum didn't look at her. He let go of her wrist like it was dirty and swam past her. He looked at Lira. Lira stood against her grey rock, basket in hands, plain white tail trembling, eyes wide with terror. She thought he came to arrest her. She fell to her knees too. "My Prince, please! Forgive me! I didn't mean to touch you! Please don't send me to Black Trenches!" Prince Caelum's heart broke. He had seen warriors beg before death in Deep North. But never a girl beg because she was kind. He knelt down in dirty sand of The Silt. He, the Prince of Coralia, knelt so his eyes were at same level as hers. "Look at me," he said softly. "I can't... I can't look at royalty..." "Please," he said. Not a command. A request. A boy asking. Slowly, Lira lifted tear-filled eyes. For second time, they stared at each other. In dark, cold water of The Silt, with grey rocks around, with poor commoners watching. The golden light on his fin pulsed brighter when she looked. "I have been looking for you," he said. "All day. My guards searched every reef. But I knew you would be where light doesn't reach. Because that's where kind people hide." "You... you were looking for me? To punish me?" Prince Caelum shook his head. He took her small, trembling hand in his large, warrior hand. His hand was warm. "No. To thank you. No one has ever touched me like that. Not to take something. Not to be chosen. You touched me to heal me. And you gave up something precious. I saw it. Your pearl. I saw your tears when you crushed it." Lira gasped. "You saw?" "I saw everything. And I felt it." He opened his other hand. Faint golden powder still glowed in his palm. "This is still warm. What was it?" Lira's tears fell harder. "It was my mother's. Her last pearl. She said kindness is a pearl that never loses its shine. She died two winters ago. It was all I had left." Commoners were crying now, listening. Prince Caelum felt something he had not felt in ten years. His eyes became wet. A tear rolled down his strong, scarred face and mixed with sea. In Deep North, warriors never cry. Crying is weakness. But he cried. For this girl who lost mother and still had kindness left. "I am sorry," he whispered. "I am sorry you lost your mother. And sorry I made you lose her last gift." Lira shook her head quickly. "No! Don't be sorry! My mother would have been happy that her pearl saved someone!" Prince Caelum looked at her plain white tail trembling, at her small hole in grey rock behind, at empty seaweed bed, at broken shell table. And he made a decision that would shake Coralia. "Come with me," he said. Lira's eyes widened. "What?" "Come with me to palace. Not as maid. As my guest. I want you to have warm bed. Food. A hundred pearls. You gave me your only treasure. Let me give you mine." Lady Varra gasped. "MY PRINCE! SHE IS JUST COMMONER! HER TAIL IS WHITE! SHE IS NOTHING! YOU CANNOT TAKE HER TO PALACE! WHAT WILL NOBLES SAY! WHAT WILL KING SAY!" Prince Caelum stood slowly, still holding Lira's hand, helping her stand too. He looked at Lady Varra with eyes of warrior who killed leviathans. "She is not nothing," he said, voice cold and loud for all of The Silt to hear. "Today, when I fell, when my crown rolled, when my blood was in water — you know what noble girls did? Girls with shining tails and pearls? They laughed. They covered noses. Said I would stain their tails. They ran away." He looked at commoners now gathered, hundreds. "But this girl," he lifted Lira's hand high. "This girl with plain white tail you call ghost girl — she came. Scared, but she came. Knew it was forbidden, but came. Had only one treasure, her mother's last pearl, and she crushed it for me. A stranger." He looked at Lira, eyes soft again. "So tell me, Lady Varra. Who is nothing? Girls who ran away because they didn't want to get dirty? Or girl who made herself dirty to save me?" No one answered. Lady Varra's face was white. Lira was shaking. "My Prince, I cannot go to palace. I don't belong there. My tail... not shiny..." Prince Caelum smiled. Real smile, second time in life. "Your tail," he said, touching her white tail gently, and where he touched, faint golden light from her mother's pearl spread, making her plain white tail glow softly for first time, "Your tail is only real thing I have seen since I came home." He turned to Captain Thorne. "Bring my chariot. My personal white one." Thorne bowed. "Yes, my Prince." Lira looked at him, terrified and hopeful. "You really want me to come?" Prince Caelum nodded. "If you want to. I will not force you. But I have been alone ten years in cold water, Lira. And for first time since I was seven, I felt warm yesterday when you touched me. Please. Don't make me go back to being cold again." Lira looked at her small grey rock hole, at empty seaweed bed, at dark water where she had been invisible seventeen tides. Then she looked at hand holding hers. Warm. Strong. Safe. She took deep breath, and for first time in two years since mother died, she made choice for herself. She nodded. Small nod. But enough. "Okay," she whispered. "I will come." And when she said that, golden light on both their tails — his healed fin and her plain tail — pulsed together, bright, like two stars that finally found each other in dark ocean. Behind them, commoners of The Silt started to cheer. Soft, like wave. Some crying. Some clapping hands over mouths. And far away, in High Reefs, noble girls who laughed at Prince that morning were about to hear news that would make them scream. The Prince had not chosen any of them. He had chosen ghost girl from The Silt. And he was bringing her to palace in his own white chariot.