He Captured The Little Mermaid’s Heart
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There was a certain mermaid, the youngest of them all, who had not found her prince and wished he would appear so she might go to live in his castle where everything there would be wonderful.
One day, when it seemed that this fairy tale was never going to happen for her, an enormous fish rose from the depths near her house and asked if they could talk together. He told her how beautiful she really was and said he wanted only one thing: to become human.
This mermaid knew nothing about magic but decided this was what she needed to do, so she agreed. She gave up her voice and allowed him to transform her body into his likeness. Then, he kissed her and became a man-fish, and she became a woman mermaid.
Now, whenever he felt like it, he could swim around with her, holding hands as they did before, and then, just once in a while, he would kiss her.
This went on for quite some time until eventually, a fisherman noticed the strange couple swimming together and began teasing them both about it. It wasn’t long after that, though, that the mermaid grew tired of always being alone and left her lover behind because she had finally met someone else whose love surpassed his: a human boy. They lived happily ever after.
I’m sorry, I have no idea where those stories came from. That was all stuff my parents used to tell me when we were kids.
–Jasper
“So you’re not a princess?” Jasper laughed at Jasper’s story, feeling a bit jealous of the boy.
The young man smiled back with his mouth but his eyes showed that he didn’t understand. “Oh,” he said simply, looking up into the branches overhead.
“It means you’re not a fairy godmother or any other mystical creature,” Jasper explained. “You’re probably a real person.”
He chuckled again and looked away. “No, I guess not… But I’m still here aren’t I? And I’ve been trying to get you out of the forest since I first saw you. You should know that.”
“Why do you care?” Jasper asked.
But instead of answering, Jasper suddenly realized he hadn’t heard anything for a while and looked up into the trees around him. All he could see was a little patch of green in front of his face.
When he took the time to look beyond that, however, he realized they were in fact in a clearing, surrounded by trees on every side except ahead which was blocked by the massive trunk of something far larger than Jasper.
At that moment, he recognized it as one of the great tree giants—the ones that held their entire civilizations within. He had seen one such monster fall down upon another when he and his brothers had been young, killing almost everyone inside.
And now they were trapped in this same giant’s shadow?
“Do you hear that?” Jasper asked, leaning forward and staring straight into the shadows between the branches.
Jasper thought he saw something move but then it vanished again. He stood up and stretched his arms, then bent over to touch the ground beneath his feet. His fingers touched dirt, but he could feel it crumbling against his skin and falling to the ground below. There was more of it under his shoes, but it had stopped falling.
Then, as he turned back to the boy’s face, Jasper realized that the youth was gone. Only his footprints remained, leading from the edge of the forest to the right where Jasper was standing.
“Hello, hello?” The voice called out again, coming closer. “Is anyone home?”
Jasper looked around and then spotted what seemed like the bottom of the giant trunk through which they were traveling. A figure stood at the foot of the great tree, looking up at him. Jasper couldn’t believe how big it was; it was almost as tall as the tallest buildings in downtown New York City.
As soon as he noticed it, however, the young man remembered he’d already seen a creature much smaller than this, though perhaps even larger than his parents’. It had taken them nearly ten minutes to climb the beast’s leg and find a way into its torso.
After that, it required all three of them to crawl through what seemed like miles of tunnels until they reached this very large cavern. It was there that they had been forced to hide inside a cave for many days until they were sure the creature had passed on.
As Jasper approached the huge tree and saw the small person standing there, he wondered whether he was dreaming again, or maybe this was some kind of hallucination brought on by hunger.
Either way, his mind began searching for ways to wake himself from whatever bizarre state it had found itself in. He knew he had to stay awake or he would lose his memory altogether, and the last thing he wanted to do was lose his memories of his friends and family.
“Are you lost?” The person called out again, walking toward Jasper from the base of the great trunk.
A smile broke across Jasper’s face, and his heart felt lighter than ever before. “Yes!” he exclaimed, waving excitedly. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”
“We’re not far from the top,” the person said, pointing to the trunk of the enormous tree. “Come on up. I’ll take you somewhere safe.”
***
Jasper didn’t hesitate to follow the person up to the top of the gigantic tree. The young man was a good thirty yards taller than the giant, and it took him several steps just to reach the giant’s waist. Once there, he climbed up onto a flat spot at the base of the great trunk and waited patiently for Jasper to join him.
“Who are you?” Jasper asked once he’d reached the young man’s side.
His new friend smiled and bowed his head slightly. “My name is Jasper,” he introduced himself, extending his hand for a shake. “And yours?”
Jasper accepted the handshake and shook the young man’s hand firmly.
“You seem familiar somehow,” Jasper said after letting go of the boy’s hand.
The young man frowned and scratched his cheek. “Maybe you’ve seen me before?”
Jasper shook his head. “Sorry, I can’t say I have. Though now that you mention it, I think I recognize your voice. You sound exactly like one of my best friends when we used to play together as kids.”
The youth laughed at that. “I suppose I probably shouldn’t be so surprised by someone who remembers me being so young, but you really do look just like him.” Then he paused and looked away from Jasper for a moment, deep in thought. “I’m sorry if I’ve confused you, but—”
He broke off suddenly, as Jasper noticed something in his eyes: confusion, fear. “No need to apologize,” Jasper said quickly. “I understand completely. We must have traveled a long distance since you rescued me last time. Perhaps we should start over—we don’t know each other yet, and we’ve got lots to talk about.”
For several minutes they walked along the top of the giant tree trunk, making conversation. Jasper was glad to discover that he was indeed remembering his childhood friend perfectly. In fact, the young man’s voice reminded Jasper so much of Jasper’s younger self, he wasn’t sure he would ever forget it again.
After talking about the places they both came from, Jasper started asking questions about the place they now found themselves in. What had happened here? Had he fallen asleep or was this another dream?
They made their way down the length of the massive trunk and finally arrived at what Jasper recognized as its mouth. As soon as he saw what lay beyond that opening, he knew why his friend had been so terrified and confused upon first sight. His jaw hung slack. “This isn’t possible. We can’t possibly have come to some sort of land-based creature.”
Jasper turned to his young friend, still shaking his head in disbelief. “It’s unbelievable,” he whispered.
But the young man merely shrugged. “Don’t worry. It’s real enough for me.”
“That creature is going to kill us,” Jasper said, glancing nervously back at it and then looking around for any sign of movement.
“Oh no!” The young man grabbed Jasper by the arm and pulled him to the base of the trunk. “Look up! There’s only room on this level for two people.”
Jasper looked where the youth was pointing and gasped. A rope was hanging high above them from one of the upper limbs of the towering tree, suspended by two sturdy knots. “You mean there’s a way we can climb down?” he asked, incredulous.
“There’s always a way. This whole tree has many arms. They all serve different purposes, but they all allow access to other levels.”
Jasper took in his friend’s words and nodded. He glanced back at the creature for a moment longer and then followed him up onto the next limb. From there, they climbed further up to the third, which also led upward into the great tree’s crown.
“Here,” the young man said, stopping and reaching back down to grab something he’d brought with him. Jasper hadn’t noticed it before because he’d been distracted by the monster and its looming shadow overhead.
When he reached out to take what his friend had offered him, he realized it was a small round disc attached to a string that ran through a hole in the palm of his hand. Jasper pulled it off and held it up, turning it over slowly in his hands while his companion watched. “What is this thing?” he asked.
“A mirror,” the young man replied without hesitation. “We’ll see things clearer if we use it.”
As if in response to his words, Jasper caught his first glimpse of what lay beneath them: a vast forest covered by an endless ocean; waves crashing against a mountainous shoreline. Mountains rose far above the water, and they seemed to be made of sandstone instead of the limestone and granite of the landscape he remembered from home. Above them were huge clouds of wispy white mist.
“How did I get here?” he wondered aloud.
“You fell down a well,” the young man answered simply, handing him the mirror so he could hold it himself and look more closely at what lay below. He pointed to a small island near where the sea met land. “That’s where you hit bottom and died.”
Jasper stared hard at his reflection, seeing a face much older than he felt inside: deep grooves carved into his forehead, black circles around his eyes, sagging cheeks, hair gone completely gray. It was not at all how he imagined his own face would look if he lived to be old.
“Is it possible I was actually dead when you found me?” he asked the young man, trying to imagine what it might have been like for him to find a corpse floating on the surface.
The young man frowned slightly and shook his head. “Not at all,” he replied firmly. “I’m sure the last thing you remember before you died was your mother telling you that she loved you and that her father loved you too. And then suddenly you were in my arms and alive again.” He smiled warmly and patted Jasper on the shoulder. “Trust me.”
Jasper took a long breath and let it out slowly. “You’re right, of course. Of course, I don’t want to believe I really did die. But now that I think about it, I suppose it must’ve been a lot easier for me to accept that I had passed away because it wasn’t something that was new to me at the time, as it is now.”
His friend’s smile broadened and he nodded. “Now we just need to figure out what we do next,” he said, setting the mirror on the floor between them. “Let’s go down.”
“Down?”
The youth gestured to the rope they stood beside, hanging high above them.
Jasper picked up the mirror and turned it in his hands once more, thinking over the image in his mind of the monster they’d seen earlier and wondering if perhaps his friend’s story wasn’t entirely true after all.
“This isn’t a rope,” Jasper finally said, shaking his head. “If it’s attached to anything at all, then what lies beyond this place is going to be pretty damn unpleasant.”
“Then let’s hope the tree has something better to offer us,” his friend suggested.
They climbed carefully to the top of their limb, tied the mirror back onto its string, and stepped off onto another, smaller one nearby.
They both grabbed for the rope, pulling themselves down. Jasper found himself clinging tightly to his friend’s waist, and soon they were dangling in midair, swinging gently to and fro while gazing out across a wide expanse of green. “Where are we?” he wondered aloud.
“Well, this certainly seems like it belongs to someone else,” his companion replied.
“Who’s that?”
“It’s not clear yet. We’ll find out soon enough though.” He pointed to what appeared to be a distant castle or keep of some kind rising among the trees.
“What’s that place?” Jasper asked.
“A fortress,” the other man replied with certainty, adding nothing more.
After making good progress toward their goal, they came to a point where the branches they clung to became thinner, and Jasper looked down for the first time since entering this new realm. He saw a large lake stretching out below him and several low hills surrounding it.
Beyond that was a massive city-like structure, which he thought might be some kind of palace. It was set way apart from most of the houses and buildings in the area, standing tall against the sky even though its upper floors were not visible. “Looks like a real fancy place,” he said with a shake of his head.
The End