Ariel Mermaid Quotes

I BET YOU DIDN’T KNOW THIS, but lots of guys have a thing for Ariel. You know, from The Little Mermaid? I’ve never been into her myself, but I can understand the attraction: she fills out her shells nicely, she’s a redhead, and she spends most of the movie unable to speak. In light of this, I’m not too disturbed about the semi I’m sporting while watching Beauty and the Beast—part of the homework Erin gave me. I like Belle. She’s hot. Well…for a cartoon, anyway. She reminds me of Kate. She’s resourceful. Smart. And she doesn’t take any shit from the Beast or that douchebag with the freakishly large arms. I stare at the television as Belle bends over to feed a bird. Then I lean forward, hoping for a nice cleavage shot… I’m going to hell, aren’t I?

At first she was overjoyed that he would be with her, but then she recalled that human people could not live under the water, and he could only visit her father's palace as a dead man.

And unless I'm remembering it wrong, mermaids don't sing and sirens don't swim." "Ariel sang in 'The Little Mermaid'," Corey said. Sam came over to join us. "Do I even want to know why you remember her name?

I do love you. I love you enough to accept who you are. Why can’t I received the same feeling in return?” -Ariel

Not every fairy tale story that begins with 'Once upon a time,' has a 'Happily ever after'....

Henry finishes his fifth brandy. “It was all right, but I prefer The Little Mermaid.” Olivia raises a black brow. “I thought ‘cocks’ didn’t like princess cartoons?” “Have you seen Ariel?” Henry asks. “My cock likes her a whole bunch.

I think of Ariel, my local neighborhood mermaid, how she only had twenty-four hours to turn her life around...

Ariel: “Eric!” Eric: “Do not sing me back to shore! Not until you are standing on two feet!

You've become a queen, a woman with a complicated personality. You have hidden depths and a wisdom and intelligence that all went unnoticed before by an idiot prince whose heart couldn't listen to anything his ears couldn't hear." Ariel felt a little giddy. "I control storms and the heart of a prince. I like that." If she were in the sea she would have been swooning, thrashing her tail and spinning in circles until she was dizzy.

Goodwill shouldn't be just for men. It should also apply to women and children, and all animals, even the yucky ones like subway rats. I'd even extend the goodwill not just to living creatures but to the dearly departed, and if we include them, we might as well include the undead, those supposedly mythic beings like vampires, and if they're in, then so are elves, fairies, and gnomes. Heck, since we're already being so generous in our big group hug, why not also embrace those supposedly inanimate objects like dolls and stuffed animals (special shout-out to my Ariel mermaid, who presides over the shabby chic flower power pillow on my bed - love you, girl!). I'm sure Santa would agree. Goodwill to all.

Still, you can’t deny that, like goldfish and gummies, The Little Mermaid is fucking magical. I still feel sparkles in my stomach when I watch it. Despite Ariel wearing an ocean bra for most of that movie, and despite the fact that a man ultimately saves her from an evil plus-sized sea witch, and despite Ariel ditching her entire family for this man just because he’s a handsome prince, I gave in and showed The Little Mermaid to Mari on repeat. Those songs are also the shit. I’m a sucker for a drunk seagull best friend and since this is a safe space free of judgment: Ariel’s dad is kinda hot? I still find my feelings about King Triton confusing. He looks like Santa with abs and a tail.

She was beautiful. Before, she had been pretty and gorgeous, lively and smiley, all red hair and perfect skin and quick movements. Now her eyes were deeper. He could fall into her face forever and happily drown there, pulled into her depths. There were worlds in her mind that were only just forming before.

Kingdom? Or queendom?" "What?" Flounder asked, exasperated. "The mer are ruled by a queen. Shouldn't it be queendom?" "No, that's- well, I guess so. Maybe. Does it matter?" "It does if you're the queen," the bird pointed out. Ariel had to hide her smile; she would have laughed, if she had the voice for it.

I’m owning my wild mane of red, she’d said when Lily tried to get her to brush and straighten it before leaving today. I’m like Ariel in The Little Mermaid.

She sang. Wordless hymns of the sea: immediate, extemporized passages about waves and sunlight and tides and the constant, beautiful pressure of water on everything. The glory of seaweed slowly swaying, the delicious feeling that foretold a storm in the Dry World and turbulence below. The music came out of her without pause, driven by years of observing, seeing, listening, enjoying, experiencing the world and unable to express it. The wonder and sadness of being alive. The joy of being a mermaid; the pain of being the only one like herself- the only mermaid who had been mortal, temporarily, and then lost everything.

Making Waves I would do anything for you. Would you be yourself? In the Hans Christian Anderson classic, The Little Mermaid, Ariel gives up her beautiful voice in exchange for legs. This is a seemingly innocent fable that captures our deal with the modern devil. For aren't we taught that mobility is freedom, whether it be moving from state to state, or from marriage to marriage, or from adventure to adventure? Aren't we convinced that upward mobility, moving from job to job, is the definition of success? Of course, there is nothing inherently wrong with change or variety or newness or with improving our condition. The catch is when we are asked to give up our voice in order to move freely, when we are asked to silence what makes us unique in order to be successful. When not making waves means giving up our chance to dive into the deep, then we are bartering our access to God for a better driveway. As a story about relationship, the lesson of Ariel is crucial. On the surface, her desire for legs seems touching and sweetly motivated by love and the want to belong. Yet here too is another false bargain that plagues everyone who ever tries it. For no matter how badly we want to love or be loved, we cannot alter our basic nature and survive inside, where it counts.

Running her fingers on the scales, she sighs. “I wonder what its like to be a human?” “Why won’t you just go and find out?” the question startled her. She whirled around to come face to face with her evil aunt; Ursula.

This fear of needing a man to make us happy is a product of our bullshit Disney princess culture that also taught us a man can fall in love even if a sea witch stole the woman's voice. She was pretty damn awesome as a mermaid first!

If Eric had just listened to his heart and not someone else's singing, none of this would have happened. He had fallen in love with the voiceless red-haired girl. He was just too stupid and obstinate to recognize it. He loved everything about her. Her smile, the way she moved, the way she took delight in everything around her. She was impulsive, unmannered, willing to get dirty, a little strange, and extremely hands-on. And beautiful. So different from all the princesses and ladies his parents had introduced him to.

The nautilus shell was exquisite, brown and white and perfectly striped. The math that lay like a dazzling creation spell over all who lived in the sea showed clearly in the spiral, each cell as great as the sum of the two previous sections. Everything in the ocean was a thing of beauty and numbers, even in death. Mermaids could live for a long time, but their bodies became foam that dissipated into nothing when they died. The poor little mollusk who lived in this shell had a very short life, but his shell could last for centuries. Ariel sighed and brushed her fingers over it, feeling strangely melancholy despite the triumph she literally held in her hands. Years of being mute could be swept away in a second. Years of frustration, years of silent crying, years of anger. And then what? If she destroyed it, what would it change?

Ariel is an independent, headstrong, and determined young mermaid who sings, daydreams, and is willing to risk everything to explore the shore above. Her unflappable spirit and resilience carry her through her journey of self-discovery, through which she becomes a courageous young woman who discovers her place in the world.

She had the voice of the gods, some had said. The sort of voice that could lure landlubbers to sea and sailors to their deaths, a voice that could launch a thousand ships. She had the voice of the wind and the storm and the crash of the waves and the ancient speech of the whale. She had the voice of the moon as it glided serenely across the sky and the stars as they danced behind. She had the voice of the wind between the stars that mortals never heard, that rushed and blew and ushered in the beginning and end of time.

Attina saw her and came over. Despite their extreme difference in age, she was the one Ariel felt closest to. Even if her big sister didn't fully understand the urge to seek out a human prince, or to explore the Dry World, or to collect odd bits of human relics, she always treated her little sister as gently as she could- despite how gruff she sounded. "What's happening?" she asked, swishing her orange tail back and forth. Her hair wasn't done yet; it was obvious she was devoting her time to helping the younger sisters with theirs. The only slightly frumpy brown bun was locked in place by sea urchin spikes.

You are so strange," Attina whispered with something like awe. "I'm not-" "You are. Don't you get that? You always have been. As a girl you never liked anything the rest of us liked. We looked for shells, you looked for ship garbage. We swooned over mermen, you lusted after statues of creepy two-legged Dry Worlders. You had this beautiful voice that everyone envied- and you gave it away. You don't like being queen, but you do it willingly and honestly as some sort of penance for what happened to our father. You've never tried to abdicate, though it's pretty obvious you hate it. "You don't want to be here. You never wanted to be here.

Her whole childhood, she'd devoured stories of children with dead and missing mothers, often easier to find than stories of children whose mothers were alive and well. The absence of a mother was a promise of adventure; mothers made things too safe, too comforting. Children with mothers didn't need to look outside their homes for affirmation of their supremacy in someone's story. They didn't need to write their own protagonism. Esther remembered Cecily complaining about this when they'd watched The Little Mermaid, Cinderella, and Snow White, offended by the lack of loving birth mothers and the prevalence of monstrous stepmothers. She'd squeezed Esther tight and smeared her cheek with red kisses and said, 'This evil stepmother loves you very much.' But despite Cecily's love, which Esther had never doubted, she had already identified within herself the same motherless quality that drove Ariel to shore, Cinderella to the ball, Snow White into the forest. Her motherlessness was intrinsic to her sense of self, and her sense of self was all she had these many years alone. What would it mean if her mother was alive? Not only alive, but aware of Esther and watching out for her, passing notes through magic mirrors and protecting her from afar, her own fairy godmother. What would it mean if her mother had not died, but left her?

Mermaid queens didn't often have a reason to move quickly. There were no wars to direct, no assassination attempts to evade, no crowds of clamoring admirers to avoid among the merfolk. In fact, slowness and calm were expected of royalty. So Ariel found herself thoroughly enjoying the exercise as she beat her tail against the water- even as it winded her a little. She missed dashing through shipwrecks with Flounder, fleeing sharks, trying to scoot back home before curfew. She loved the feel of her powerful muscles, the way the current cut around her when she twisted her shoulders to go faster. She hadn't been this far up in years and gulped as the pressure of the deep faded. She clicked her ears, readying them for the change of environment. Colors faded and transformed around her from the dark, heady slate of the ocean bottom to the soothing azure of the middle depths and finally lightening to the electric, magical periwinkle that heralded the burst into daylight. She hadn't planned to break through the surface triumphantly. She wouldn't give it that power. Her plan was to take it slow and rise like a whale. Casually, unperturbed, like Ooh, here I am. But somehow her tail kicked in twice as hard the last few feet, and she exploded into the warm sunlit air like she had been drowning. She gulped again and tasted the breeze- dry in her mouth; salt and pine and far-distant fires and a thousand alien scents.

She ran her hand through a shell bowl absently, letting the trinkets slide through her fingers. Mostly they weren't cut or polished the way a human jeweler would treat them: they sparkled here and there out of a chunk of brownish rock. A single crystal might shine like the weapon of a god- but be topped by the lumpy bit where it had been prized out of a geode. Ariel regarded the stones with fascination. Of course they were beautiful. Yet she still found the bits and baubles from the human world, made by humans, far more alluring. Why? Why couldn't she be content with the treasures of the sea the way the ocean had made them? What was wrong with them that they had to be altered, or put on something else, or framed, or forced in a bunch onto a necklace, in perfect, unnatural symmetry?

Hey, Ariel," Flounder called shyly. "Before you go... could you... could you sing that lullaby? The one you used to sing to me after I lost my mother?" Her eyes widened. "Flounder, you haven't asked me that in years... even before I lost my voice." "And I won't ask again! It's just that" - he looked around. Jona politely pretended to watch something out in the sea, over by the far rocks- "we're alone here. No one from Atlantica is going to hear us. I don't know when you're going to have another chance." And Ariel, who lost her voice for years and had mixed feelings about singing for others, sang more sweetly than she ever had before, or ever would again. And no one heard but one fish, one seagull, the sand and the water and the evening breeze coming over the waves, and the rising moon.

Vanessa was clearly enjoying the bath. Her brown hair flowed around her in slippery wet ringlets that very much brought to mind the arms and legs of a squid. Great quantities of bubbles and foam towered over the top of the tub and spilled out onto the floor, slowly dripping down like the slimy egg sac of a moon snail. Vanessa was splashing and talking to herself and playing in the bath almost like a child. Ariel remembered, with heat, when she had been in that bath, and was introduced to the wonders of foam that wasn't just the leavings of dead merfolk. The whole experience had been marvelous and strange. Imagine the humans, kings of the Dry World, keeping bubbles of water around to bathe and play in. There was no equivalent under the sea; no one made "air pools" for fun and cleanliness.

Queen Ariel held the nautilus and considered thoughtfully. But the little mermaid didn't think. She acted. Before she realized fully what she was doing Ariel had smashed the nautilus on a sharply faceted rock. It didn't break like a normal shell. It shattered like a human vessel. Shards flew in all directions equally, unhampered by gravity or luck. Ariel pitched forward. She choked, no longer breathing the air of the Dry World. Her arms flailed up like a puppet's. Her torso whipped back and forth, pummeled by unseen forces. Something flew into her mouth, up her nose, and suffused her entire body with a heat that threatened to burn. It rushed into her lungs and expanded, expelling whatever breath she had left, pushing blood to her extremities, pushing everything out that wasn't it, leaving room for nothing else. Ariel collapsed. It was over. It was like the thing, whatever it was, had been absorbed by her body and had now dissipated into her blood and flesh. She took a breath. Her heart started beating again. She hadn't been aware it had stopped. She coughed. A few grains of sand came out. And then she sang.

Don't even consider it, young lady." Ariel raised an eyebrow at him incredulously. Young lady? In the years that had passed since the duel with the sea witch, she had aged. Not dramatically, but far more than a mostly immortal mermaid should have. There was something about her eyes- they were deeper, wiser, and wearier than when she was a young mer who had never been on dry land. Her cheeks weren't quite as plump anymore; the angles of her face were more pronounced. Sometimes she wondered if she looked like her mother... aside from her own unreliable memories, the only physical evidence of the former queen was a statue in the castle of her and Triton dancing together. But it was all pale milky marble, no colors at all. Dead. Ariel's hair no longer flowed behind her as it once had; handmaidens and decorator crabs kept it braided and coiffed, snug and businesslike under the great golden crown that sat on her temples, like the gods wore. Small gold and aquamarine earrings sparkled regally but didn't tinkle; they were quite understated and professional. Her only real nod to youth was the golden ring in the upper part of her left ear. "Young lady," indeed.

She could sense the approach of land- taste when the waters changed, feel when currents turned cool or warm- but it didn't hurt to keep an eye on the shore now and then, and an ear out for boats. The slap of oars could be heard for leagues. Her father had told tales about armored seafarers in days long past, whose trireme ships had three banks of rowers to ply the waters- you could hear them clear down to Atlantica, he'd say. Any louder and they would disrupt the songs of the half-people- the dolphins and whales who used their voices to navigate the waters. Even before her father had enacted the ban on going to the surface, it was rare that a boat would encounter a mer. If the captain kept to the old ways, he would either carefully steer away or throw her a tribute: fruit of the land, the apples and grapes merfolk treasured more than treasure. In return the mermaid might present him with fruit of the sea- gems, or a comb from her hair. But there was always the chance of an unscrupulous crew, and nets, and the potential prize of a mermaid wife or trophy to present the king. (Considering some of the nets that merfolk had found and freed their underwater brethren from, it was quite understandable that Triton believed humans might eat anything they found in the sea- including merfolk.)

Father, I've ruled, and while I might be good at it, I don't like it. I want to do what I've always wanted to do." She pointed out at the dark ocean. "Explore. Meet new people. Learn new languages. Discover new things and the artists who make them. I want to find out what happened to the Hyperboreans. I want to reengage trade with the Tsangalu. I want to know if there's anyone else out there like Ursula..." Triton- and Sebastian, and Flounder- shuddered. "Maybe they're not all like her," she said quickly. "Father, the world of the mer has been getting smaller and smaller, consumed with ourselves and our own arts, thoughts, and philosophies for far too long. Humans have conquered most of the Dry World- we need to unite the World Under the Sea, for survival if nothing else.

Her thoughts spun. There were objects in the window of a shop that she couldn't quite fathom: possibly candy, possibly gems and crystals. There were so many alien things about this world she still didn't know. There were so many more things in the rest of the world, both above and below the sea, that were yet to be discovered.... "You okay, Ariel? You seem a little, I dunno, worried or spacey or something," Scuttle said. "I just... I was just thinking about past choices and future possibilities." "Huh. Deep stuff. Well, the world's your oyster after today.

Benny barely even looks at the papers before dropping his signature onto the designated line. I'm reminded of the scene in The Little Mermaid when Ariel signs her voice away to Ursula, and I try to skim for any major life-altering clauses. But I feel the pressure of everyone waiting on me and quickly sign my name, kissing my fins goodbye.

No question, prowling the Russian steppe for wolf meat and potato vodka takes a certain amount of admirable grit. Far more frightening to me, though, is the prospect of exploring the comely mermaid fantasy of Ariel’s Grotto inside the walls of a twenty-six-square-mile temple of consumerism dedicated to celebrating synthetic American culture at its overcrowded, fake-dreams, corndog-and-cotton-candy-inhaling worst, pushing a CEO-manufactured, ultraconformist mass “fantasy” presented fait accompli to American children. If it turns out there’s more horror to shrink from in Disney World than in Africa, I for one won’t be all that surprised.

JULY 12 Making Waves I would do anything for you. Would you be yourself? n the Hans Christian Anderson classic, The Little Mermaid, Ariel gives up her beautiful voice in exchange for legs. This is a seemingly innocent fable that captures our deal with the modern devil. For aren't we taught that mobility is freedom, whether it be moving from state to state, or from marriage to marriage, or from adventure to adventure? Aren't we convinced that upward mobility, moving from job to job, is the definition of success? Of course, there is nothing inherently wrong with change or variety or newness or with improving our condition. The catch is when we are asked to give up our voice in order to move freely, when we are asked to silence what makes us unique in order to be successful. When not making waves means giving up our chance to dive into the deep, then we are bartering our access to God for a better driveway. As a story about relationship, the lesson of Ariel is crucial. On the surface, her desire for legs seems touching and sweetly motivated by love and the want to belong. Yet here too is another false bargain that plagues everyone who ever tries it. For no matter how badly we want to love or be loved, we cannot alter our basic nature and survive inside, where it counts. o Sit quietly and consider your own history of love. o As you exhale, consider a time when you gave up some aspect of yourself in order to be loved. o As you inhale, allow yourself to reconnect with this silenced part of your nature. JULY

(Ursula) She was a boss babe running a business, and doing it in style.

I bet you didn’t know this, but lots of guys have a thing for Ariel. You know, from The Little Mermaid? I’ve never been into her myself, but I can understand the attraction: She fills out her shells nicely, she’s a redhead, and she spends most of the movie unable to speak.

Ariel touched his cheek again. He was peacefully asleep, and she knew she ought to leave before he saw her. But a part of her wanted him to remember something about her, even if he never saw her face or learned her name. A song bubbled up to her throat, a melody she sang to herself whenever she yearned to explore more of the world that wasn't hers. Going by the party she'd watched on Eric's ship, it seemed they liked music on land, too. Perhaps it was something a mermaid and a human might have in common.

I can think of no one better than Ariel to find a bridge between our two worlds." Ariel smiled back at him shyly. "It'll be a cultural exchange, too." Sebastian raised his claws in delight. "There's nothing that shows off Atlantica better than our music. Shall we have a concert to introduce this young merman to our kingdom?" "You can play your snarfblatt," said Ariel, still smiling. Then she took Eric's hand, and together they dove--- two worlds meeting, just as the sky meets the sea.

mermaids floated

If we want clues, we need to look at the extracurricular activities they pushed at us. Clearly, with Daniel and me, they were trying to boost our natural talents: fighting for him and running for me. Serena, Hayley, and Nicole were all in the choir and on the swim team. Plus they’re all blonde and pretty.” “Um, thanks,” Hayley said as she came over. “But what…” Her brow furrowed. “You think we’re mermaids?” “Isn’t that sirens?” Corey said. “Those chicks we studied in Greek mythology. Lured guys to their deaths by singing.” Hayley glared at him. “I thought you liked my singing.” “Yeah, because apparently it’s magical. That’s how you seduce guys.” “Seduce them? Or kill them?” “Same thing, kind of, if you think about it. Like that other guy in mythology. The one who got his hair cut and lost all his power. Mr. Parks said it symbolized men losing their power by falling for women.” “No,” I said. “Mr. Parks said it symbolizes men’s irrational fear of losing their power to women. And unless I’m remembering it wrong, mermaids don’t sing and sirens don’t swim.” “Ariel sang in The Little Mermaid,” Corey said. Sam came over to join us. “Do I even want to know why you remember her name?

When I was in my early thirties I wrote a profile of Maureen Dowd. She was the sole female columnist at The New York Times then, and had been the second female White House correspondent in the paper’s history. She had started her career as an editorial assistant in 1974, the year I was born, and now she was fifty-three, had won the Pulitzer Prize, looked amazing, and lived alone. I remember sitting in the insanely decorated living room of her brownstone in Georgetown—the walls were blood red, the bookshelves were crowded with feathered fans, old Nancy Sinatra record jackets, a collection of bubbling motion lamps, another of mermaids, a dozen vintage martini shakers, all kinds of toy tigers—and being intoxicated by her peculiarity, independence, and success. I asked if she’d ever wanted children. She told me, “Everybody doesn’t get everything.” It sounded depressing to me at the time, a statement of defeat. Now admitting it seems like the obvious and essential work of growing up. Everybody doesn’t get everything: as natural and unavoidable as mortality.

I guess falling in love with mermaids is pretty dangerous," he finally said. "Did you?" Ariel asked in a small voice. "Fall for me? At all?" Eric gave her a measured look, treating the question seriously as she had his. "I did fall for you, just not in the way I expected it would happen. And maybe not in the way you hoped. It wasn't a lightning bolt. As I got to know you, I realized you were the most... energetic, fun, enthusiastic... alive girl I had ever met." He smiled at the memory- and Ariel felt her breath catch. "You know, for a boy who's all about sailing and running around with his dog and exploring, you were just about as perfect a companion as he could ever want. And beautiful, to boot. I would have been very lucky." He said this wistfully. Ariel wasn't sure when she was going to start breathing again.

Ariel signed. "I will take these matters into consideration," Flounder translated, "and will either return here myself in three days or send a messenger in my place." "Understood," the seagull said with a bow. "Understood, My Queen," Flounder corrected politely. "My Queen? How does that work with the Law of the Worlds- that of the Dry World and the World Under the Sea?" Ariel found herself almost rolling her eyes and making that wide, sighing smile she used to with Flounder. But the little gull looked at her, at her, while she signed. Not at her hands, or Flounder as he had spoken. There was a friendly heart under Jona's direct and inappropriate questions. Ariel just shook her head and dove back under the water, tossing a sign over her shoulder as she went. "The Queen says you may call her Ariel," Flounder said. Also, under his breath: "You have no idea what an honor that is.

She picked up a roundish thing from the ground and shook the sand off. It was the top of an old ceramic jar, once painted bright blue and gold. The humans had so many jars. And amphorae. And vases. And vessels. And kegs. And tankards. So many... things... to put other... things in. Merfolk rarely had a necessity to store anything beyond the occasional rare and fancy comestible, like the sweet golden-wine they used to trade for when she was a child. Merfolk ate when they were hungry, almost never had the need to drink anything, and rarely had a reason to store food for the future. She dropped the lid and sighed, drifting over to the rock she used to perch on while admiring her collection. Things, so many things. Things she never found out the proper use for in her short time on land. Because she had been too busy mooning over Eric. In some ways, that was the part of the seagull's story that bothered her the most. She could not believe the reaction her traitor heart had when the bird mentioned his name. Eric. Eric remembered something? He wrote an opera about it? About her? It wasn't just the flattery of it, though. If Eric remembered enough to compose music about it... would he remember her, too? A little? She remembered him far too often. Despite the fact that her life had been ruined because of her pursuit of Eric, when she closed her eyes to go to sleep, her last thoughts were often still of him. Or when a perfectly handsome, reasonably amusing (and mostly immortal- not an irrelevant point) merman tried to win her affections, and all she could think about was how his hair might look when it was dry. Would it bounce, like Eric's?

Her voice had been such an important part of her life before. The merfolk celebrated her for it. Her father excused her occasionally questionable behavior because of it. Eric loved the girl who rescued him, because of her singing... But... ... she'd never really enjoyed singing for anyone else. In fact, she hated audiences. She sang because she liked to sing. She just... felt... something, and had to sing it. If she were happy, or sad, or angry... she would go off by herself and sing to the coral, sing to the seaweed, sing to an audience of sea snails or tube worms (who listened, but never commented). Most of her mergirlhood had been spent swimming around, exploring, singing to herself. Making up little stories in her head and then putting them into song.

No one has ever been able to stop you from doing anything you wanted anyway- even when it costs you dearly." For a moment, Ariel felt her old self surface, the urge to grin and plant a kiss on the little crab's back. He was right. She did have a habit of swimming in where angels feared to tread. No one could dissuade her once her mind was fixed. And it had cost her dearly. What could it cost her this time?

Alana swirled around Ariel, her deep magenta tail almost touching her sister's. Her black hair was styled in intricate ringlets that were caught in a bright red piece of coral, its tiny branches and spines separating the curls into tentacles. The effect was amazing- and not a little terrifying.

Attina- Ariel didn't spell out the sign; she moved her hand to suggest the robes of a goddess, the sign for Athena, for whom her sister was named. There was an implication of regalness and wisdom; Ariel was appealing to her oldest sister for her best values.

And unless I’m remembering it wrong, mermaids don’t sing and sirens don’t swim.” “Ariel sang in The Little Mermaid,” Corey said. Sam came over to join us. “Do I even want to know why you remember her name?” “Mermaids and sirens weren’t on the list,” Daniel said. “Maya’s point is that Hayley, Nicole, and Serena shared common characteristics, which probably means they’re the same type, and it has something to do with singing and swimming.” “And being pretty,” Hayley said. “That’s not a superpower,” Sam muttered. Hayley turned to her. “No? How many times have you gotten into movies for free because you’re a tough warrior chick?

Kingdom? Or queendom?" "What?" Flounder asked, exasperated. "The mer are ruled by a queen. Shouldn't it be queendom?

The world doesn’t need another mermaid tale, but I’m going to tell you mine anyway. Just be warned - this is more Ursula than Ariel.

She probably fell asleep and was washed away by the tortoise waves!” -Arista

Father, what are you to do now?” Triton’s sneer grew scarier. “She broke the law.” turning away from the terrified faces of his daughters. “She must die.

How charming. The king and his little princess knocking on my covens door.” Ursula sighed dramatically. “What do you insolent merfolks want with me now? I swear I haven’t eaten any of your children.” -Ursula

Plus if there were really mermaids, I hoped they didn’t look like Ariel.