The Sea Witch of Atlantica

The Sea Witch of Atlantica

“Retelling of The Little Mermaid”

Ursula is a mermaid princess and the twin sister of King Triton. She has long beautiful blond hair and a shiny tail. Ever since she was young, she dreamt of working with powers, she had no knowledge of one of them being dark magic. She saw it as a way of understanding the impossible.

Ursula and her best friend, Attina used to sneak around the palace all of the time to explore the oceans and find new things to understand. This meant that Attina spent a lot of time around Ursula’s brother, Triton, too. This carried on until Attina got married to Triton.

Attina had a blessed life with Triton along with Seven daughters. One the day of the youngest, Ariel’s third birthday. Ursula came to visit Attina and asked how things were.

Attina complained a little, “I miss the adventure.”

Ursula completely understood her and told her about her secret lover who lived 50 Kilometres away from the palace. Attina asked Triton for permission to leave the castle once lying that they were going sunbathing near the beach and that she would return immediately after with his sister.

King Triton agreed and told Ursula to look after her well. Ursula agreed and as they were on the way to Ursula’s secret, they suddenly heard honking. Both of them went up and there they saw a beautiful ship.

But the beauty didn’t last long, a net was thrown and Ursula didn’t see it. Attina pushed her out of the way and the net fell on her, capturing her. Ursula couldn’t do anything to stop it, so she rushed to Triton for help. As Triton came back with her, he noticed that Attina was in the back of the boat and several human beings were surrounding her.

He used his sea powers to help her escape, but in vain. Just then Ursula decided to use her new more powerful “black magic” powers. The entire sky turned dark and then with a loud thunder she crashed the ship, making all of the sailors drown and Attina fell in the water. As Triton rushed to her, it was too late, she was gone already with a blade driven through her heart.

This made Triton angry and he said that it was all Ursula’s fault. If she hadn’t taken Attina out for a so-called adventure, she would be safe and sound in the palace, right now.

His anger knew no stop, “What was so important that she had to leave the palace, huh?”

Ursula didn’t want to tell him about her secret lover who was a human knowing that a human had just killed Attina. After this, she knew for herself that she also would never trust a human again.

Lost in thoughts, she didn’t even listen to Triton’s ranting, until he spoke the following words, “I, King Triton, ruler of the merpeople of Atlantica, hereby banish you, princess Ursula from Atlantica. You are stripped off your titles for using black magic and you are never allowed in Atlantica or near its people ever again. And your tail will turn into that of an octopus.”

Ursula wanted to beg not to do this, but she had just lost her best friend too and it was all her fault according to her and Triton. So she accepted this banishment and returned to the depths away from Atlantica, somewhere dark and creepy away from love and beauty. She felt like she deserved it.

15 Years Later…

King Triton and Attina’s youngest daughter, Ariel, just turned 18 years old, which meant she was allowed one wish. Ariel was obsessed with the human world even if she actually knew nothing about it. So she asked her father to see the sunset one time.

This brought back a lot of bad memories, but King Triton decided to look at the bright side of things and agreed.

As the sun started to set, suddenly fireworks erupted from a nearby ship. Ariel swam closer to get a better look. There she saw Eric, a prince from a nearby human kingdom. She sees humans dancing and singing lots of stuff. Just then Eric leans over the railing and spots Ariel. He waves over to her, as he is completely drunk.

Ariel waves back at him, she doesn’t completely understand humans.

She starts to sing with her hypnotising voice. Soon Eric’s hypnotised and Ariel gestures for him to join her so she can take a better look at him, as drunk as Eric is, he jumps in the water.

Ariel does not yet realise the danger and starts talking to him underwater. All Eric does is smile and then water starts entering his lungs and he slowly starts drowning. Humans can’t breathe under water and Ariel does not know that. She thinks it's weird that he just sinks. In a split of a second, another figure arrives and drags Eric with him.

Ariel follows the figure, it looks like a woman, but also like an octopus. Her short, yet wavy blond hair follows beautifully behind her. As they arrive at the beach, she throws Eric on the beach and leaves.

Ariel stays with him until he wakes up and as soon as Ariel notices that he’s conscious, she leaves.

Eric yells behind her, “Wait, I want to know the name of my saviour!”

Ariel, already back in the water, listens to him and then leaves back to the palace. The following days, Ariel’s stays in her room a lot and constantly arranges the human objects that she possesses. She even made a carving of Eric.

King Triton is bothered by his daughter's behaviour and asks Sebastian, the crab, what the matter is with her; Sebastian reveals that Ariel hypnotised a human which almost led to his death. He advises King Triton to act fast.

This explanation made King Triton angry and as he barged into Ariel’s room, he saw the carving of Eric and realised that it was too late. His daughter was in love with that mortal too. He tells her that she’s never allowed to return to the surface again and he breaks all of her human objects with his trident and water powers.

Ariel’s heart is broken. And her dreams are shattered, she cries for days and begs her father not to do this to her.

King Triton replies with, “Ariel, the humans are another species! Not toys! You have to understand that and leave them alone.”

“But father, Eric is everything.”

“You met that mortal once! Your obsession is becoming really dangerous, Ariel. Be careful.”

Angry and sad by that reply, Ariel swims far away from the castle, not realising she crossed the border of Atlantica, she sees two eels talking with each other about some powerful sea witch who possesses the power to cure every doubt there exists. The way they talk about her, Ariel knows that she needs her help to get what she wants.

As she approaches the eels, she learns that the Sea witch is actually her father’s sister who was banished 15 years ago for practising dark magic. She says she doesn’t care and gets to Ursula’s lair.

There she asks Ursula to give her legs.

Ursula cursed under her brother’s spell, has not aged a day and is still 23 by heart and body. She denies, “This is not a wise idea, Ariel. I won’t do it.”

Ariel replies, “Please auntie, I know my father wronged you. But I know Eric is the one for me. Please, help me. I feel so trapped in the palace with my father.”

Ursula lost her true love and faith in love a long time ago, but seeing Ariel like this just made her think about her younger self. And Ursula didn’t know about Ariel’s dangerous obsession with humans so she agreed.“Fine, I’ll do it.”

“Thank you so much, you won’t regret it Auntie!” Ariel squealed.

“Dark magic wants something in return though.”

“Anything,” Ariel said hopefully.

“Alright, You will turn into a human for three days and in that time you must receive a “true love’s kiss” to stay human. If you fail, you will turn into bubbles and disappear.”

“I’m willing to risk that.” Ariel said.

“That’s not all, the dark magic wants your singing voice in return.”

Ariel hesitates for a second, but then agrees. Then Ursula uses her magic and gives Ariel legs.

***

Back in the human world, some fisherman rescues Ariel from the beach and she’s taken to Eric’s castle. As Eric hears about this, he immediately rushes to see her, as he is in search of the woman who saved his life. As he notices her long wavy red hair, he realises it just might be her.

But when he finds out that she can’t speak, he walks away, saying, “She had the most beautiful singing voice ever.”

Ariel is angry because of this. She thinks of a plan to make Eric realise it was her. While walking through the palace, she sees Eric busy in a chart room. She walks in and pretends that she’s lost and starts looking at miniatures and souvenirs of items that Eric gathered in his travels. Eric thinks that Ariel’s interested in them and starts telling her stories about his voyages.

Ariel pretends to listen to him, while in fact she studies how he’s walking and talking. She looks at his features and realises, he actually looks a lot like a mer person, just with legs.

The following day, Eric goes sightseeing with Ariel. As they are in a boat, Eric keeps talking to her and he realises that the more he stares into her eyes, the more he gets hypnotised and zones out. He thinks this is weird, but brushes it off.

On the other hand, Ursula looks through her magical orb to check if Ariel was alright and sees Eric’s insecurities. She sends her eels to take a closer look.

As the eels arrive there, they notice Eric’s absence again and just then they see Ariel open her mouth and there are a thousand teeth in there like piranhas, as she approaches Eric. The eels kick the boat as hard as they can and Eric awakes out of his slumber and Ariel’s smiles again without revealing her teeth.

He takes them back to the castle and drops Ariel back at her room. He heads to his own room and goes to sleep.

Back at Ursula’s lair, she realises the truth; When Ariel said that she felt trapped in the palace with her father, she wanted to take things in her own hands. She was going to kill Eric and become the Queen of the humans to show her father just how powerful she was. But that was not everything, Ariel didn’t only wanted to kill Eric, she wanted to eat humans.

As much as Ursula despised humans, she knew that they were just another living and breathing species and as long as they didn’t bother her, she was going to leave them alone.

Angry that Ariel was going to commit such a sin and to help the humans, Ursula used black magic herself and turned into a human. She turned into a beautiful young lady with long black hair. As she walks on the beach, she uses Ariel’s voice to hypnotise Eric and calls him to the beach.

As he arrives, he snaps out of the “hypnotisement" He wonders, “What am I doing here?”

As Ursula sees him, she realises that Eric looks a lot like her old secret lover, John. This brought back old feelings and good memories. As Eric saw her and didn’t realise who she was, she knew that it wasn’t John.

She said, “I summoned you here, Prince Eric.”

“I’m sorry, do I know you?”

“I wanted to warn you that Ariel is not who she seems to be.”

“Ariel, who?”

Ursula sighed, “The girl with the red hair living in your castle, she’s dangerous.”

Eric frowned, “Sorry, what did you say your name was again?”

“Vanessa.” Ursula lied and she went back to the ocean.

“Wait!” Eric stopped her, “I have questions. How? Why? Who? When?”

“I’m afraid, I can’t stay Prince Eric.” As her feet reached the ocean, she turned back into her normal form; her blond short hair and half octopus ofcourse.

“Ursula?” A voice behind her then said.

Ursula was in shock and turned around, “How do you-”

“It’s really you!” Eric shouted and ran to her hugging her. “It’s me, John!”

Ursula didn’t understand.

“I have been searching for you for 15 years, my love. I made a bargain with one of the people in my kingdom who practises dark magic. To give me 15 years my 23 year form, in case I ever saw you again or else, I would die. I had to change names not to confuse people with my age. This year was my last year, I can’t tell you how happy I am to see you.”

Tears streamed out of Ursula’s eyes as she realised someone would actually do such a thing for her. Eric proposed to her and she accepted. She knew she had no place in Atlantica anymore, so she used her magic and gave herself legs and went to live with her love.

On the third day, as Ariel searched for Eric, she heard from a few maids that he’s getting engaged. This made Ariel angry, she rushed to the engagement party and confronted Ursula. She breaks the shell containing her voice and her voice comes back to her. She explains to Eric how she saved him and as Eric tells her that he already knows the whole story and what her goals are, he also states that Ursula is his true love.

As Ariel sees the sun setting, she gets even more angry and rushes forward. She pushed Ursula aside who yelled, “John, watch out!”

But it was too late, Ariel had kissed John and hypnotised him again. And that all before the sun setted which meant she was allowed to keep her legs.

“No!” Ursula yelled and crawled over.

Just then King Triton arrived at the scene and confronted Ursula. Ariel pretended that Ursula wanted to attack her and kill her. “Please daddy, you have to believe me.”

Eric stepped in and said, “She’s right, your highness. That evil Sea Witch tried to eat us.”

“John, please. This is not you.” Ursula pleaded, but it was over.

King Triton raised his trident, “I’ve given you a chance and this is what you choose to do with it?” He shouted, “It’s all over now, Ursula.”

Ursula wanted to object and ask him to listen, but King Triton replied with, “Enough! I will not hear another word from you.”

He shot a powerful blast from his trident and with that Ursula disappeared. Forever.