First drawn on iPad, then at the halfway of the colouring process I moved to work on the computer. I’m a sucker for mermaid!aus, so of course I needed one for McLennon. I only used watercolour brushes + a crayon brush, and topped it with a watercolour texture in the background. Read more for the 2300 word story that I wrote to accompany this!
Paulos, the youngest son of King Triton, is forbidden from going on land. Ever since the kingdom of Atlantis lost its queen, Mary, to a mysterious disease, King Triton has strictly refused from letting anyone ashore. There is nothing else that Paulos wants, though, his curiosity too strong.
After a vicious fight with his father, once again about this same subject, Paulos runs into a merwitch. She suggests that he goes on land, without telling anyone.
“What your father does not know, will not hurt him, my boy.”
Paulos follows the tug in his heart and rises from the sea, scrambles on a shore in the middle of a night. Mermagic, something that other merpeople possess more strongly than others, allows his tail to transform into legs. He stumbles his way over to the nearest city, fascinated and curious about the new world.
Three days later he returns to the sea; and there he is met by the seawitch, who tells him that the kingdom thinks Paulos ran away, and that King Triton has died from grief -something not entirely unusual for merpeople.
“You cannot return to the sea,” she tells him. “Do not even set a foot in the water.”
Paulos, shocked and mortified, turns and does not look back.
Paulos meets someone after having spent a week on the streets, mourning, his life crumbled down. The boy throws him a sandwich with a smile on his face, and takes Paulos to his place. Paulos cannot speak English, but little by little, he learns. He learns about the boy, John, as well. He wants to learn more.
“What is your name, then?” John asks, curiosity embedded into his expression. Paulos thinks, not able to pronounce his real name with the letters of humans.
He searches for the right word.
“Pa-Paol-” he grimaces, and John laughs.
“Paul?” he asks, and Paulos stops trying, and smiles, nods. It’s good enough, and John looks so happy when he says it, finally able to call him by his name.
Paulos becomes Paul.
They have a large circle of friends -John, mainly, and he pulls Paul in. Two years have passed, and Paul feels at home with John. He is afraid, as well.
The soul of merpeople is set to break in two before they are born. The two pieces of one soul are meant to be together again, and thus, a merman only loves once, and only wants for one. That is how Lord Poseidon, Paul’s grandfather, decided when the first merman, King Triton, was born. A merman, or a mermaid, can wait for their other half for centuries. Some are born at the same time, more often one has to wait. King Triton waited for Queen Mary for thousands of years.
Paul knows that John is his other half.
He is afraid, because it is not right for his Chosen one to be human. But he loves John, and wants John.
But John is human, and humans do not have Chosen ones.
Paul’s friends decide to play a prank on him. Paul does not swim, because his legs become a tail once he is under water. He always stays ashore, listening to music and reading a book, when the others swim.
His friends grab him, and despite him screaming, terror entering his voice, they carry him into water.
“He’s afraid of water, you idiots!” John is shouting, further away from everyone else. Paul is thrown into the water, and he sinks.
“C’mon, it’s barely three feet deep there,” someone says.
“How isn’t he up already?” another wonders.
Paul comes up, gasping, splashing, and his silvery tail is visible to everyone when he tries to get away from the water in panic. Shocked sounds are heard everywhere, but Paul does not care. Because-
The water rises and King Triton is hovering above them, water holding him up. The air crackles around him, the trident in his hand glowing blue light.
“You have betrayed your people,” King Triton says, and Paul is shaking, trying to get back to the shore. Everyone else is running away, except John, who dashes forward, towards Paul. He shouts Paul’s name, and water slides tightly around Paul, lifts him up, choking him.
“You have betrayed me,” King Triton thunders, and Paul tries to get away from the water’s magic grip in vain. He cannot understand what has happened- how did everything come to pass. His father is still alive.
John’s feet touch the water, and he starts to wade through it to where Paul is hanging in the air. He calls Paul’s name, panic etched into his voice, shock and fear in his expression.
Paul shouts at him, to stay away, to run. Paul cannot lose him, not like he can himself. John is important; not like Paul who has managed to destroy everything he held dear in this world. King Triton thinks he abandoned merpeople- but instead of dying from grief, he has lost his sensible mind. Paul prays to Lord Poseidon that his father could find himself again.
King Triton looks at John with storm and lightning in his eyes, points the trident at him, and John comes to a full stop.
“You will feel the pain that I have from you abandoning merpeople. It is all the fault of humans, in the end.”
Water pours out of John’s mouth, and he chokes, coughs, more water coming out. He cannot breathe, and he brings hands to his chest. He is drowning, standing knee-high in the sea, and Paul loses himself.
He screams, and writhes, and his body jerks when a sob comes through. He sobs out John’s name, and tears run down his cheeks when he looks at John fighting, water filling the man’s lungs from inside.
Paul drops to the sea, and without thinking, he dashes towards John, grabs him, and pulls them to the shore. John waves on his feet, falls down and then vomits, water pouring out.
Paul sobs, and holds him, his tail turning into legs again, and looks up at his father.
The King looks at him with a strange expression, the swirl of water that holds him up becomes less powerful, lowering him slightly.
“He is your Chosen one,” he says, and Paul nods, cries, holds John tighter when the other’s body jerks with his coughs. There is no water anymore inside of him -it disappeared, just like Paul’s restraints as well.
King Triton’s expression is, for one second, defeated. Then it hardens and he looks at Paul, the storm back in his clear blue eyes.
“If you, or he, ever touch the sea, you will be locked under Atlantis for the rest of all time, and he will drown.”
And he leaves, and Paul sobs against John, and John puts a hand on his back and coughs one last time, sounding exhausted.
“You have a lot to explain,” he says, and Paul cries even harder.
Merpeople do not cry. Sadness, for them, becomes physical pain, but they do not cry.
Paul does not know what he is, anymore.
He wipes out the memory of almost everyone at the shore. He is skilled enough in mermagic, and possesses an indescribable amount of power. He is a direct descendant of Lord Poseidon, a god, and one day the trident might have been his.
Not anymore.
They leave the shore, he, John, and a couple of friends that deserve to know. Otherwise all this could happen again. Paul tells them everything -except for John being his Chosen one.
They take it fairly well. After three hours John is able to crack a joke or few about Paul being technically a fish. Paul is in a silent shock, and he doubts it will leave in a moment.
A year passes, and John suggests they move to London. He has got a job offer from a record shop. Paul goes wherever John does, and so they leave Liverpool. John’s aunt Mimi hates them for doing that, and vows to never talk to John again for abandoning her. Paul wonders how different their families can be, and at the same time so similar.
Paul gets a job from the London Zoo. His ability to work with sea animals is astounding, and he is happy there. The fish call him Prince Paulos, because every sea creature can see who he is. He has said that he is not a prince anymore, but the fish feel more comfortable in their captivity when he allows them to call him like that.
John cooks chocolate cake every Sunday, and gets better and better with it. Paul loves those cakes, and loves human food, since merpeople mostly eat seaweeds and other plants. Those have always tasted bland, especially now that Paul has got to know the joy called spicy food.
Life is good, since they do not dwell in the past, and do not think of the future. Sometimes John looks at Paul with such a fond gaze that Paul wonders whether John could love him back. It is illegal in the human world, though, two men together. So Paul does nothing, and enjoys life as well as he can.
John gets a letter from America. It is from his father, who left him and his mother when he was not even born yet. Alfred writes that he is dying, and wants to see John once before he goes.
Paul makes the decision for John, and reserves two tickets on a ship.
“But what if your father-” John tries when Paul is packing, doing John’s work for him as well.
“Don’t be daft,” Paul says cheerfully, although he feels slightly weak in the stomach. “Technically we’re not in the water.”
John just looks worried, his fingers curling into fists.
Paul loves being on the sea. He stands on the deck with the wind hitting his scandalously long hair. It is a regular haircut for a merman, but amongst humans it was met with wide eyes and scowls. John quickly took it from him, though, and it became a running joke between them. The fish hair, John would say at the barber, and then laugh at his confused expression.
The first half of the journey goes well. Paul gets more and more nervous as they approach Atlantis. He knows that his father cannot find him as long as he does not touch the water, and then as well he has a chance of cheating a bit. He knows mermagic, which will be used to capture him, and he knows how to defend himself. He used to be His Royal Highness, Prince Paulos of Atlantis and the Seven Seas; he knows how to stand for himself, and for others as well.
One evening Paul is in the cabin he and John share, reading a book. The ship tilts, completely out of nowhere, and Paul almost falls off the bed. He manages to keep himself in, and looks up, alarmed.
Then the bells start ringing, and he knows that things are going bad.
He remembers John mentioning of going for a smoke. He lets out a small, terrified sound, and rushes to his feet, scrambling to get out of the suddenly strongly waving room. He runs up on the deck as fast as he can, avoiding other people, and pushes out through a doorway.
The storm is bigger than what he’s ever seen before. The waves are huge, raising up so high that they could even reach the deck. The ship is making its way through them steadily, but people are trying to get inside as quickly as they can, yelling at each other.
Paul spots John, coming towards the stairs with his hand on the rail, and then a wave comes.
Paul watches how John’s eyes widen before water falls upon him. Paul shouts, dashes forward, people are screaming. The wave withdraws lazily, and Paul’s heart falls down into the pit of his stomach.
The deck is empty; John is not there.
Paul turns to look at the sea and does not hesitate for a second.
He runs forward, ignores somebody shouting ‘stop him!’ and jumps over the rail.
He meets the water with a deep inhale, feels his legs pull together and his clothes disappear with the mermagic taking over, and he opens his eyes.
John is going down. He is unconscious, and the water is pulling him towards the darkness that is not dark to Paul. The current is strange, and certainly not one that should be here at this time of the year, but Paul ignores it in the favour of concentrating on John. He needs to get his love on the surface before it is too late; if John dies, Paul has nothing left, and he will go as well.
He swims after John, heart thudding against his chest. They are way too deep -Paul knows he cannot get up in time. His fingers close around John’s wrist and he pulls, looking up. The surface is too far away.
“Come on,” he calls out to John, just for the comfort. He takes John into his arms and starts swimming up, against the current, John lifeless in his hands.
Paul knows he cannot make it. John has been under water too long already.
He looks at John’s face, at his beautiful features, and his stomach turns into knots.
He cannot lose John.
The words come from deep within, a spell that he did not even know existed pours out. He holds John against him, and something golden lights up. Paul feels the familiar pull of mermagic in his heart and he shouts the last words breathlessly, and there is a silver flash of light that blinds Paul momentarily, and then he looks up.
John is floating above him, still unconscious, his body curling backwards. Paul looks at him, and- looks again.
John’s tail is the most beautiful he’s ever seen.
