Mermaids - Truths and myths

~ Part 3 ~

 

by Elante of Alinor,

Wandering scholar

 

 

 

 

I unsuccessfully tried to gather my wits as even her voice was perfect, charming beyond measure and promising me eternal happiness if I did what she asked me. As a mage who faced for her training the temptations of Dremoras summoned by our Conjuration teacher and who knows in her heart that a mage's will is the only thing keeping her alive, I held for an entire second before gratefully taking her hand.

 

Even this gesture further broke my resistance as her skin was and her handling gave me further glimpses of the apotheosis mortals would damn themselves over multiple times. Yet she called me 'sister' and no malice could be heard in her voice, although I would have thought the same if she asked me to jump in a colony of giant spiders for her amusement. And I know I would have done it if she asked.

 

She could do whatever she desired of me, and all she did after helping me stand back on my so imperfect legs was going to the rock where my clothes were and hand them back to me. I felt my knees shaking again at the honour of being gifted something, anything, by the goddess standing in front of me, and the fact that she was giving me my own clothes did not come a single moment to my mind.

 

With another whisper, her hold on me weakened and rather than needing to kill and die to satisfy her smallest whim, I barely felt as comfortable as I would be next to a lover who understood and accepted me down to my very soul and whose life I shared for centuries. Embarrassed to be naked in front of her, I quickly put my robes back and followed her as she started walking with a regal stance towards Dawnstar.

 

For a moment, I thought to tell her that the mortals there would probably rather like her to wear something, anything, but quickly bit my lip as it was clear that no thread of mortal make could do anything except sully her forms and movements. No guard, no townpeople disagreed, each who was not stunned by this appearance slightly bowed towards her like they would towards their High Queen and looked at me, who walked besides her, with a mixture of respect and envy, as we went to the tavern.

 

Without even a word being said, the most expensive foodstuff, from a reserve I knew was kept in the remote case of a royal or imperial party, was laid down on my table. The mermaid thanked the innkeeper with another of her whispers and I felt he would faint on the spot. When we finally were alone, I saw her looking at my schematics, theses and notes on her, on how I arrogantly attempted to steal her appearance in my hubris. I froze, knowing that her vengeance for this insult would be swift and that I would welcome it.

 

She smiled at me and praised my work.

 

It took me a moment to blabber some thanks as if I was a novice whose work got genuinely praised by the Arch-Mage, and her understanding smile did not help. As my heart stopped pounding, she started going into details of alteration magic that showed her profound understanding of what I did, going over the fundamental weaknesses of my spell and hinting that I could – should – do better over time.

 

That she would watch my progress from the sea and would make sure my experimentations with this new body I crafted would be safe. Before returning to her dwelling in a Glacial Cave on the island of Solstheim. Then, before I could find the words to thank her, she stood up, giving me another close view of her legs, where only a handful of scales remained. I finally got to open my mouth and begged her to tell me what I should do next, how I could solve the riddle that her existence meant.

 

With another of her unforgettable smiles, she held her hands as if to show her whole body once again, asking me to work on it, something another part of my mind desired beyond measure. My desire either showing or being predictable as a mortal's, she winked at me, saying that all things come in due time, then took the glass of crystalline water from the table.

 

She told me to watch carefully, as if I or anyone else in her presence could do otherwise, and splattered the water over her right leg. In a matter of seconds, the water was absorbed by her skin as I heard her softly moan in pleasure, and scales covered all the affected parts of her leg, with her foot shifting slightly to look like a fintip. Before long, she dried her leg with my towel and the skin had replaced her beautiful scales once again. Bidding me goodbye, she left me alone in my room, stunned by the experience.

 

When I finally got myself together, I tried understanding what all of this meant. This mermaid could turn herself at will in something human but more than human. Her every trait was beyond what mortals imagined as perfection, yet beneath her skin the mermaid remained, ready to surface with some water. Understanding this body of hers was what she encouraged me to do, and I knew I could manage it using my observations as a base.

 

Though at the time, I was slightly worried at what more she hinted was awaiting me. I, like any living mortal, had been aroused by every instant I spent close to her, but my analytical mind told me that I should be even more worried that no record existed of such women who could make entire cities worship the ground they walked on, god-queens if even one of them wished so.

 

As I left my room, I quickly realised none of the other people from the inn or the city at large had clear memories of who visited them, beyond some vague hints of a beautiful stranger who left soon after arriving. Her charm was fleeting, unnatural, yet somehow it stayed in my mind with a clarity that I knew would last as long as I lived. As if something of her was already resonating within me.

 

Over the weeks, my life became a new routine, similar but noticeably different from before. I started going once again on expeditions towards shipwrecks, except this time, I took care to walk further away from Dawnstar than before meeting her. Then, I did go to the ocean, although my gills were the smallest of the changes my body had undergone. My tail was just as much a part of me as my legs, with longer and longer parts of each day spent underwater, embracing this new body.

 

Now and then, when carrying back some chests from sunken ships, I was seeing glimpses of another tail, the one from my protector and mentor whose teaching method was as tantalising as it was distant. Seeing her reminded me of the promises she hinted back in the inn, her unspoken answer to an unspoken desire, and that I would have to not disappoint her to learn whether this answer was the one I hoped for, or something greater entirely.

 

Each time, back on the beach, my shape shifted again to the ever more disappointing mortal body I was born with so long ago. Each time, I got more used to the pain that came with the transition and focused on the magic itself and how it reshaped my beautiful tail in such imperfect feet and legs. Each time, I went back to my room and wrote more notes and runes on the mechanisms that I felt reforming my limbs.

 

Taking more notes and drawing more sketches of her shape, I started the heresy of replacing her ideally-proportioned face with the mortal one I was wearing. Ashamed of ruining her beauty like this even in a drawing, I started shifting my face to borrow some of her traits. Each time, I made my face look closer to the obsession that kept invading my dreams and my waking moments until it started invading the moment my beautiful tail shifted to imperfect feet and legs.

 

I did not notice it at first, nor did I notice I went back to shore earlier than usual. I had applied my magicka to kickstart the transformation again, which was such a regular event I instinctively blocked the pain while thinking about this her/me in my drawings.

 

This is when it finally happened.

 

I felt my face burn and rearrange itself, my torso shift and collapsed again, surprised from the unexpected suffering. When I woke up, however, she was there by my side. I felt like with a close relative I had not seen in years and when she embraced me, I felt complete. She whispered some congratulations in my ear, telling me that I made the first step towards becoming akin to her, that even now, mortals would bask in my beauty.

 

But that beauty was still, like my tail, fleeting and due to disappear as I would once again become the mortal I used to be. My face must have betrayed my distress at this reminder and she wiped my tears with her soft hand before reassuring me that I would soon get rid of this mortal body of mine and become a true mermaid. Then she said that before such time would come, I would have the answer to the question I asked and that it was 'yes'.

 

The time we spent together was like her and now me.

 

Perfect.