Title: Ariel's revenge

Series: Twisted fairy tales

Author's note: This is also featured on Tumblr and my AO3 account.

...

Ariel grows legs for the Prince, walks and dances every day when it feels as though a thousand needles are piercing her new feet, all to win his love. The court whisper about her, pale eyes and pale skin that almost glows in the moonlight. The villagers and townspeople gossip about her, how she traded her voice to the devil himself to dance as beautifully as she does. She ignores their whispers - she is mute, not deaf - and focuses only on the Prince and his desire to see her dance.

Weeks pass full of whispers (sometimes the people don't even bother to whisper) and pain and needles and no amount of cool water to ease the crippling agony she feels, but she still dances. Then the Prince introduces her to his new bride, with her dark eyes and skin that doesn't shine in the moonlight, and unlike Ariel, she can talk. But the Prince's new bride is not Ariel; she doesn't know the secrets of the ocean nor how to sing so sweetly that even the shyest creatures will come out of hiding just to hear her voice. Ariel is a child of the ocean, of waves that are taller than human castles, of tsunamis that can destroy towns and villages in mere minutes. She is a mermaid and she will remind them all of the power of the sea.

Her sisters greet her when she throws herself into the ocean, not in despair, but in rage. The spell cast on her disappears through pure force of will, her legs changing to a scaly tail and her voice returning as beautiful and clear as ever. Her sisters are enraged that she, the most beautiful of them, was spurned by a lowly mortal. They raise their voices, beautiful as a whale's song and as spine-chilling as a siren's. Their harmony swells the sea itself and when Ariel's voice joins the melody, sea creatures come in droves and packs and teeming schools.

Their song lasts for three days while the Prince and his bride are meant to celebrate their marriage, but instead they and the townspeople hide in their homes, too terrified to leave and face the unearthly beings whose song haunts their dreams. On the third day, her sisters sing and the ocean rushes towards land, angry and unstoppable. Ariel's voice joins once again, urging the sea creatures forward. Piranha, their teeth sharp and eyes hungry, swim along eagerly with the current. Octopi, sharks, stingrays, other numerous unnameable and unknown creatures from the depths of the sea move towards the land where the villagers still hide, the Prince and his new bride cowering in their castle. The ocean rushes in between cracks and crannies, weakening mortar and stone until the creatures can gain entry to the human homes and the castle itself.

Ariel and her sisters watch as the ocean changes to red and the village is no longer full of whispers, but screams.

...

The end.

Thanks for reading; I hope you liked it!