Maristella: Star of the Ocean

Identity

The plush cream interior of the private plane greets me one I open my eyes. What's the time again? I direct my tired gaze towards my meager wrist watch, it's 8.00 pm. Great! I have successfully slept through half of the time I was supposed to study. Well done, Trisha! I will reach Osaka within two hours and I haven't yet prepared a single report on the international relations of the two countries. But then again, there's only so much that my sixteen-years-old tired self can take. I spent the next 15 mins daydreaming about the very many ways in which I can prank and disturb my best friend once I land in Japan, with no intention of completing the task at hand. But still, I force myself to work for the next 1.5 hours to prepare a report on the current conditions of Japan and India. It is a part of the royal training program that I am currently a part of, which is supervised by King Himeji Okakura of Japan. In simple terms, I can say that I am going to Japan to be grilled by uncle Himeji. He has been nothing less than a father to me for the last 10 years that I have spent under his guidance, but he can be a bit strict at times.

Ah, I can't believe it's been ten years already since I found out the reason behind my obsession with the waterbodies. Ten years since I found out why I could talk to fishes, yen years since I was fudgeing kidnapped by two pink dolphins!

I still remember the day as if it took place just the day before. It was my 6th birthday and as a gift I had asked my parents to take me to a beach and they had reluctantly brought me to our vacation house in Palolem. I had somehow managed to sneak into the water without the guards noticing me when I saw two pink dolphins swimming towards me. Before I could move towards the shore, they bowed before me and said in perfect sync, "Thanks be to the Great Lady of Kindness, we found you your highness." I was of course flabbergasted and somewhat overjoyed that two dolphins were talking to me, when they suddenly pulled my hands and started to drag me towards the deep ocean. And to my utter surprise I saw, though only for moment, a grand golden gate open in front of my eyes, and in an instant it sucked me in alongside the two dolphins.

When I opened my eyes next, I found myself on a bed in the most beautiful room I had ever seen. I had obviously freaked out and almost hyperventilated when I realized that the room was under water and that my legs had been replaced with a tail, albeit it looked gorgeous with its dazzling mix of Violets, blues, greens and silvers! And surrounding me were people whom I had never seen, yet they seemed somewhat familiar.

 My eyes first laid on a mermaid who looked like a goddess with her chocolate skin, blue eyes, silver hair and silver tail. She had a smile on her full lips and a crown made sparkling of gems I had never seen before on her head. She patted my head and said, "Welcome home princess, you must be tired after your journey , I am Princess Rosella, your aunt." I was unsure of whether to smile or run for the hills, and finally decided to give her a small smile with a missing tooth.  

She spent the next two hours explaining to me the magical secrets of the mermaid world. It took me some time to wrap my little head around the idea that I, apart from being a princess of Bhavyanagar, an Indian kingdom, I am also the princess of the largest underwater mermaid kingdom: Oceana. "yo-you are not lying right? Ma says that those who lie to others, God never wants to be their friend." She smiled an angelic smile and said, "You princess, are the most powerful being on this planet, afterall the Ocean talks to you, listens to you and bends to your wishes, doesn't it?" I was astonished to say the least, "How do you know that, I never told anyone that the waves are my friends, I- can you talk to the waves too? Did they tell you about me?"

This made her smile even harder and she said, "No princess, no mortal other than you has this power, and every Ocanian knows that their crown princess is the daughter of the Ocean goddess and hence has the power to control the seas."

"But am I not a human? And will I never see my parents again" I was already tearing up.

"No my child, don't cry, you will definitely see your parents, you will be able to visit home on human holidays, as we will somehow arrange for your parents to admit you to a Princess Boarding school that is run by mermaids, one you go back up on land. And no you aren't human, though your parents are, that is because your grandfather, my father is a mermaid, but your grandmother was human, so my elder sister was born as a human and I as a mermaid."

"That explains why I never heard about you, but you are an Oceanian 'mermaid' princess too, so why can't you talk to the waves?" I asked the question that was puzzling me.

"Because the Maristella comes to the earth once in every 300 years, and you, my child, are the Maristella." With that she stopped the hour long conversation and looked at the doorway.

Then I saw an old merman whose eyes crinkled with a loving smile, standing by the door, he looked at me adoringly, and somewhat fearfully, almost as if he was afraid that I could vanish away anytime before his eyes. He looked like someone I had seen before... Then it dawned on me that he resembled my grandfather who was supposed to have died before my mother turned ten. And I spoke my first words as a mermaid: "Grandpa, is that you?"