Lilophea, the Bride of the Sea King

Gifts from the waterman

It was impossible not to attend the reception in honor of the ambassadors from Etar. On her way to the throne room, Lilophea found another unusual thing on the railing of the stairs – a mother-of-pearl box full of large pearls. They shimmered with a pale, dead gleam, and Seneschal kept talking about the drowned women they reminded him of.

“Have you ever seen one in your life?” Lilophea asked bluntly, which made him cover his beak briefly. It’s nice to have a peacock friend, but sometimes he gets tiresome. The large polished pearls in the box were much prettier than the one the caper had given her in the sink. It was as if someone was jealous of that gift and decided to give her something better. But who was it? There was no one at the stairs. It was useless to look around for the giver. And that was what happened every time she found a gift from someone she didn’t know. And lately she was finding them everywhere. In the garden, under the palm trees in the park, on the lawns, in the groves of magnolias, most often by the fountains and springs, but sometimes coral and pearls were brought right into her bedroom. She woke up in the morning and jewelry made of shells and some strange sea stones were lying on the dressing table or right on the pillow. It was a miracle. Lilophea found jewels in the shape of starfish, seahorses, jellyfish, and assorted fish. And one day she noticed that in the gallery someone had paved an entire path of sparkling stones under her feet. They shimmered under her feet in all shades of the rainbow. She had to stoop down to collect them one by one to keep from treading on any one. They shimmered like fireworks.

Even the Seneschal said they were rare and very expensive and should not be thrown back into the sea where they came from. And he had always been against her keeping jewels from an unknown giver.

“I didn’t know there were gems like that in the depths of the sea,” Lilophea said in surprise.

“There’s more than meets the eye,” the peacock muttered, but he didn’t specify what it was. He didn’t like to talk about the underwater world. He wasn’t a water bird, and he couldn’t go to the sea bottom to see all the local wonders with his own eyes. Naturally, he was angry. Lilophea couldn’t breathe underwater either, but she was still curious about all the underwater wonders. If you can’t see everything with your own eyes, you can at least gossip. If mermaids really existed, she would gladly be friends with one to gossip about the underwater kingdom. Of course, if there was such a thing. Even the lore that mermaids could drag her to the bottom didn’t scare her.

Seneschal was much more cautious. Perhaps that was the only reason why he was still not in a cage, but was flying free. A talking peacock would be put in a cage, so in the presence of strangers he pretended to be silent.

Entering the throne room, where the solemn assembly was already taking place, Lilophea was surprised that the peacock became straight as a mute. Not even a squeak. But he obediently sat on her shoulder, pretending to be tame.

Nevertheless some lady wondered why he did not have a golden leash-chain attached to his leg, as tame birds like falcons, parrots and even peacocks in rare cases are supposed to have. And the case of the princess’s personal peacock, of course, was considered rare.

Lilophea hurriedly stepped away from the annoying lady. The seneschal, fortunately, was not heavy at all. Nestled on her shoulder, he resembled a rare piece of jewelry. The stone on his forehead shimmered with iridescent reflections under his colorful tuft, his puffy tail tickled her skin pleasantly, and when it opened it resembled a frieze around a princess’s dress.

“Is he your new admirer?” Her confidant, Morissa, took a lively interest in the peacock. It was the girl’s duty to keep close to the princess at all times, but she often slacked off. And now she was bored at the reception. But she didn’t mind plucking a luxurious feather from the peacock’s tail. The seneschal didn’t even hiss at her. He must have taken a fancy to the pretty brown-haired girl in the canary-yellow dress. Morissa immediately tried to arrange a feather as an adornment for her corsage.

“You have a whole bird, and that is enough for me,” she explained playfully. “By the way, it is a beautiful peacock. What country was it brought from?”

“It speaks!” Lilophea bragged.

“Aren’t you mistaking him for a parrot?” Morissa doubtfully looked at the silent bird.

“It is absolutely not!” Lilophea did not want to look like a liar in the eyes of her friend, so she even touched the peacock by the lush tail. “Come on, Seneschal! Say something!”

But the peacock had a lot of water in its beak.

“I guess he only indulges in conversation with royalty. He doesn’t have the courtesy to talk to a court maid like me anymore.”

Morissa was surprisingly frank when she and the princess were alone. But, like Seneschal, her rudeness wore off as soon as anyone else came along.

Her widowed father left his daughter at court without a dowry. So the beautiful Morissa would probably have to spend her life as a maid of honor, unless her looks and pedigree were more important to someone than her financial situation. Lilophea had heard rumors that Morissa’s father liked to gamble, so the family was constantly short of money.

Morissa was not discouraged. Secretly she ran on dates with the capers. Until it ended in trouble, so Lilophea too was not afraid to watch their ships from the shore, but still did not come close. What’s the worst that could happen? The worst thing would be if people back home found out how she was enjoying her leisure time.

For Morissa, it was all right, even if she was suddenly kidnapped and taken across the ocean. Still, she had almost nothing to lose.

“Look at the way he’s staring at you,” Morissa pointed to one of the lavishly turbaned Eastern ambassadors. He was actually staring at them. “He wanted to kidnap you from here.”

“They are ambassadors from Etar.”

“What crooked swords and feathered turbans they wear,” Morissa said as if she had not heard her. “And the trousers are of expensive silks. And what ornaments! If it is so rich in Etar, I shall pretend to be you and go to the harem instead of you.”

“It is right now! Let’s swap roles.”

“We’ll just have to find a wizard who can change our faces as well,” said Morissa playfully grinning.

Meanwhile, the ambassador was staring at the princess so intently that it seemed as if he was trying to capture her mind.

Lilophea turned away. She suddenly felt heavy and stuffy under his gaze. Meanwhile, the ambassador leaned toward his escort and whispered something.

“She no longer fits! She is theirs now, not ours. She is underwater…”

Did the murmuring of the fountain’s jets really make her hear those words? Or was she only imagining it?

The peacock on her shoulder grumbled.

“I want to buy a monkey and wear it on my shoulder, too,” said Morissa dreamily. “It would be both a pet and a fun addition to my outfit. What do you think?”

“You can have a monkey from the King’s menagerie. You have my permission.”

“No, I want to bargain some cute and scholarly monkey from the sailors myself. And then I’ll teach her all sorts of tricks.”

Lilophea only shrugged her shoulders. Her confidant, Morissa, was sneaky and charming. Often, through flirting, she found out information that even spies would not have known. But even she knew nothing about underwater states.

“Ask your suitors,” the princess insisted. “You have so many of them on the dock.”

“My suitors are nothing but pirates,” Morissa snapped back. “They are more interested in those who can be robbed, and mermaids are not one of them. So they know nothing of the underwater kingdom. But I know a lot about pirates, and how nice it is to kiss them, and get presents from them. I can tell you all about it.”

“What would your father say if he knew how you spend your leisure hours here?”

“It’s a good thing my father isn’t here. Besides, he’s so busy trying to find me a decent stepmother, he doesn’t think about anything else.”

Morissa was right. Lilophea sighed sadly. Not everyone has good fathers. And some mothers left a lot to be desired, too. Many of the maidens complained that their noble mothers had been unnecessarily strict with them as children.

Lilophea thought that her kind and caring father would one day be forced to give her in marriage to someone she had not chosen herself, and she immediately felt gloomy.

Iridescent streams flashed in the water in the fountain, as if someone was trying to comfort her. But the box of pearls in her hands became heavier.

“Who gave it to you?” Morissa asked.

“I don’t know? But I think each one of these pearls has a woman’s name.”

“Is that so?” The girl giggled softly.

“My peacock says that all the pearls are the souls of drowned women.”

“But I hear him say nothing but silence.”

Morissa even began to tease Seneschal and provoke him to say something, but he remained stubbornly silent.

“You see! It looks like he is deaf and dumb.”

“It is not true!” Lilophea herself did not understand why she had to defend him. Seneschal was so often rude to her.

“By the way, have you seen an unusual ship by the shore, looking like a large carved figure of a mermaid?”

Morissa shook her head in the negative. She and Lilophea were getting out of the crowd that had gathered for the reception, because they were both tired of it. Thankfully, Aquilania was a tropical island nation, and they didn’t have much regard for etiquette. Besides, the king never reprimanded his daughter for her manners, nor did he let others.

It was a good thing he didn’t know yet that seafaring gifts had begun to be delivered to the princess’s palace. Boxes appeared by themselves at springs, fountains, and once, instead of a jug for washing, Lilophea found an amphora with pearls and a wonderful mirror in which you can see the underwater world.

Morissa had already traded the monkey from some pretty caper by then. But the mirror, which could see mermaids, schools of fish, and tridents of newts, fascinated her so much that she was ready to give the monkey in exchange for it.

“Curious, how does it work?” She was nervous. “I knew a toy-maker in the province, where I lived with my father. He made such marvelous mechanisms, but even he couldn’t have made such a marvelous thing.”

“What if it was magic?” Lilophea watched the swarms of piranhas that pounced on those drowning in the water, wrinkled at the sight of the mermaids picking up and eating the bodies that fell into the sea after the battle of the ships above. In the mirror there were glimpses of sunken palaces, lagoons of sirens, colorful jellyfish, and some strange underwater flowers that caught and devoured the fish that swam by.

“Do not show it to anyone,” Morissa advised in a whisper. “If it really is magic, it is better to keep it a secret.”

Lilophea wanted to tell her that the jewels she had been given by someone unseen were also magical, but she did not dare. What if Morissa started sneaking them around and something bad would happen to her. She herself remembered what visions began as soon as she tried on one of the gifts.

Lilophea went for walks closer and closer to the sea shore, but she no longer saw a ship in the shape of a mermaid. But once she noticed a strange girl, who was diving into the sea waves and after a couple of minutes swam out. Her hair shimmered in the setting sun with multicolored strands. Strangely, there wasn’t even a dress thrown on the shore. What had she come to the sea in? Her shoulders, occasionally peeking out of the waves, were definitely bare. The swimmer suddenly disappeared for a long time under water, and Lilophea even worried about whether she would drown, but a bright head with purple-green strands suddenly came up very close. The stranger and the princess were separated only by a coastal boulder.

“Hello!” The stranger’s voice sounded like the echo in a shell. Lilophea only now noticed that her pale face had some bumps on it, and the pearl on her forehead looked as if it were growing right out of her skin.

“Who are you? I have not seen you at court. You must have just come in from across the sea.”

“You could say that.”

Probably she was by that peculiar ship that looks like a mermaid.

“I am Nereida,” the setting sun disappeared behind the horizon, and the girl in the water suddenly began to behave more bravely.

“And I am Lilophea.”

“I know.”

She must have heard the name of the local princess before. But how does she know that it is the princess who walks unaccompanied on the seashore?

“I wish they would let me swim in the sea,” Lilophea sighed. “Sometimes I want to dive into the waves too.”

“Try it!” Nereida beckoned her with a pale hand. “Come on, let’s swim together. Let’s dive deep! It’s very exciting.”

Lilophea didn’t mind, but she was ashamed to take off her dress. What if someone walked along the shore and saw her naked. Besides, a corset without a maid couldn’t be undone. Better just to chat with a new acquaintance for now.

“Are you from far away, Nereida? Your homeland must be very far away.”

“It was measured by depth or height.”

What did she mean by that? Lilophea grimaced as she noticed the white skin between her fingers. It looks so much like webs.

“You must be bored at the beach,” Nereida suggested. “Ashore is always boring, unless it’s a siege of a fortress or a battle at sea. I like to see armadas in action.”

“Have you ever seen one? I haven’t.”

“I’ve seen a lot of things.”

Nereida’s eyes flashed strangely as she stumbled over the mother-of-pearl mirror in Lilophea’s hand.

“It is better to see things in real life than inside toys,” she hinted. So the mirror is a toy after all. And Lilophea decided that it really was magic.

“Don’t stay on the beach, come to me!” Nereida tried to clutch at Lilophea’s dress, but she was just a little short of it. In addition, Seneschal was already flying toward the shore, squeaking something anxiously as he flew. Seeing him, Nereida’s face twisted so sour that it became almost ugly.

“See you later, Lilophea,” she ducked under the water quickly. You could only make out a long tail of her multicolored strands and what looked like fish fins. Lilophea looked after her for a long time, and the foamy circles on the water diverged in the form of some signs.

In the company of the peacock

Morissa was glad that she had successfully traded the monkey. The amusing little beast was worth nothing more than a kiss. She had trained him to sit on her narrow shoulder, where he could only fit with difficulty, and always had his tail around her neck to keep him from falling over.

“I’ll call him Traitor, because he only wants to jump on someone else’s shoulder where there’s more room,” she said.

“Better the Cheater,” said Lilophea, noticing the way the monkey had deftly removed the ring and pearl from the gift chest.

“Traitor sounds more romantic, it’s as if I were a fairy who bewitched the cheating lover into a monkey and now takes him with her,” joked the girl.

Cheater meanwhile offended snorted and dropped the ring, as if burned on it. He even blew on his paw.

“Your jewelry chills me,” said Morissa reluctantly. “I tried it on while you were away, and it looked as if I were freezing at the bottom of the ocean, snow and angry swordfish. It was horrible! I took them off right away, and I felt warmer. Aren’t you cold in them?”

“No!” Lilophea wore a pearl bracelet made of many strands, and she felt no cold at all.

“You’d better be more careful. The pirates in the harbor are wondering if it’s easy to kidnap the Princess,” Morissa hinted.

“And they weren’t teasing you.”

“I could betray them to the harbor-guard, but they gave me Traitor for that. And he’s so pretty!”

“Not for nothing, it is for a kiss. Which means you didn’t get him for free.”

“A kiss is not money. It didn’t make me poorer.”

Lilothea did not remind Morissa that she couldn’t get any poorer, because she was penniless. Her father was losing everything. She would have been better off looking for a worthy match at court, rather than tangling with dubious individuals at the wharf. She even got herself a telescope so she could watch the smugglers from the gallery by starlight. Strange how no one had ever caught them in the dangerous vicinity of the royal castle. Dashing fellows! She even began to respect them for their courage and recklessness.

“They’re in a hurry to earn their keep,” Morissa explained. “Not everyone loves a girl for free.”

“How do you know?”

“They only socialize with those who wear a bright yellow and red dress, and that’s what only portly whoremongers dress like. They always have brightly colored faces. If we can get them, we could walk through the town incognito, and no one would suspect us of being noble ladies.

“It’s too risky,” Lilophea began to suspect Morissa. She might be conspiring with the pirates to sell the princess to them. A penniless freedwoman at court is sometimes capable of all manner of intrigue to secure a well-fed future. Morissa’s prospects were grim. As soon as she was old enough no one would hold her as a lady-in-waiting or a maid of honour. And her father had bankrupted the estate. Where could she go? Except marry a pirate or a smuggler and sail the seas with him.

“I’ll go to the ball,” said Morissa, smoothing her canary yellow dress with puffed shoulders and spreading the feathers of her lemon-colored mask. “I will go with the Traitor. He’s my beau tonight, and let everyone else be jealous.”

She already knew that no one would be jealous. Stately and rather handsome, Morissa was not particularly popular with refined courtiers, but she was easy to get along with all sorts of criminals: pirates, bandits, smugglers. They all tried to oblige her. But at the masquerade ball, where she was going, most likely no one would even notice her. Perhaps such an exotic appearance as hers only appealed to rugged men.

“She looks like a mulatto,” said the peacock, as soon as her maid left.

“Who is she?” Lilophea wondered.

“Well, let’s say, even a Creole or a Quaternary.”

“What does that mean?”

“That she has an admixture of black people’s blood in her.”

“Are there people with black skin?”

“People are rare. Mostly wild island tribes that try to enslave. But I have seen with my own eyes black-skinned wizards and peri.”

“Tell tales!” Lilophea was indignant. It was curious that somewhere there were creatures so unlike the usual people around her.

“There are whole islands in the sea with black peri.”

“What are peri?”

“They are Genie girls. They twirl around the fires at night, like pillars of fire, and lure sailors with their charms to the slaughter. And they are supposed to be kind. That depends on whom! One plucked feathers from my tail to make herself a fan. Can you imagine?”

“You could write a whole novel of adventures about your life before you came to my prosperous palace under the guardianship of a royal daughter.”

“By the way, I was the one who came under your tutelage, not the one who got in. You frowned for the first minute, wondering whether I should be invited to live in your chambers or sent straight to the pigeon-house with the other peacocks.”

“It’s not a dovecote, it’s a greenhouse,” said Lilophea, who had some difficulty in guessing that he was referring to the glass structure in the garden.

“If the peacocks are white, it’s a dovecote.”

“No one’s ever seen a blue one here before you.”

“And in countries other than Aquilania, peacocks are mostly blue or blue with green flecks.”

The Seneschal flew around the room worriedly.

“So are we going to the masquerade ball?”

“I don’t feel like it,” Lilophea went through the pearl and coral jewelry in the chest. It felt so good to touch them. It was as if water were gurgling inside them. And the miraculous mirror showed ever new vivid pictures of the amazing underwater world, where the tridents of newts shoot lightning bolts, and mermaids ride in a chariot drawn by sharks or stingrays. Truly magical stuff!

“By the way, I got you a mask to match that beautiful mauve dress with the cape you never wore.”

Seneschal had indeed got a mask of feathers and sequins. It resembled the tufts of a peacock. Lilothea put it to her face. It really looks magnificent, and the princess is unrecognizable in it, except for the tiara. And the purple bouffant outfit is worth wearing for once. The peacock helped her tighten the lacing in the back like a caring chambermaid. The corset was so tight it was hard to breathe. You wouldn’t think a peacock could pull the laces down like that with one beak.

“Come on, let’s go!” He flew ahead, of course, and talked nonsense until they reached the door of the ballroom. Here the Seneschal fell silent as usual. He does not want to be caught and put in a cage for chattering so that in the future he will entertain the king and his ministers exclusively. Perhaps even give them some advice for everyone’s amusement. The scholarly peacock is an unheard of wonder. It can be bragged about in front of ambassadors. He circled over Lilophea’s head like a devoted cavalier.

How long since he sang that she didn’t believe the waterman? He could even now sing for the amusement of all the guests and visitors. They, too, must be warned not to believe the watermen and water waders, or suddenly they crawl right out of the sea.

Instead of water girls, Nereida was carelessly bathing in the fountain near the entrance to the ballroom. Her graceful head stood out against the border of balls and shells. She had lost all shame. At court one must be mindful of propriety. She smiled defiantly at the princess.

“You’re in a hurry to have fun!”

“Yes I am, and what is about you?”

“I prefer to watch from a safe distance.”

“Bathing in the fountains is not permitted.”

“But it’s not forbidden either.”

“That’s because no one’s thought of climbing into them yet.”

“Don’t worry, the guards won’t catch me.”

Lilophea really noticed that there were no guards around for some reason. Usually they were standing guard at the door. Maybe they’re having fun, too.

“Swimming in the sea isn’t enough for you anymore?”

“I like all kinds of portals.”

“What do you mean?”

Nereida was slow to respond, and Lilophea remembered that before entering the ballroom, the mask must be put on her face, otherwise everyone would recognize her as a princess and the fun would not be so interesting. The beauty of a masquerade is that no one will recognize you. A masquerade is like a game of hide-and-seek. Will anyone guess your identity or not? Nereida was in no hurry to go to the masquerade, and Lilophea passed her by.

“It’s not nice to leave a friend,” came a resentful cry from the fountain and the princess was followed by a splash of water.

“So you’re already friends,” the peacock whispered indignantly. “You’ve only talked to her twice, and she’s already asking to be your friend.”

“Don’t you like her?” Lilophea noticed that the peacock kept well away from the fountain while she talked to Nereida. And for some reason Nereida was still squinting at him angrily. Apparently their dislike was mutual. There are some ladies who dislike even very beautiful birds. Personally, she liked it better in the company of a peacock than a cavalier or a friend. The peacock is much easier to handle. He has a funny way of talking. And if he becomes too annoying, he can simply be locked up in a cage. But you can’t get rid of the Sultan that easily if he comes to visit.

It’s a good thing only ambassadors have come from across the sea so far. None of them has approached the princess in person. All negotiations for a possible alliance were conducted only with the king and his ministers. Even all gifts were passed through the king. Lilothea received rolls of fine brocade, spices and silk. She could assume that the Sultan himself, arrived in Aquilania disguised as an ambassador and demanded a masquerade ball to suit the bride-to-be. Also, all the gifts left at the fountains might have been from him. Only this assumption was contradicted by the boxes of jewels from Etar, which turned out to be quite ordinary jewels of opals, sapphires, rubies, emeralds, even amber. But among them were neither unusually large pearls, nor coral, nor rare sea stones. Not to mention the coldness of the water and the visions that did not emanate from them. So it was not the sultan who had given the chests of pearls as a gift after all. But that would be a fairy tale.