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Oh no, I forgot to post yesterday. Darn. Guess it sort of blew past me.

Anyhoo, I wrote the first chapter to this new mermaid story I started. It's a short chapter, so you won't have any trouble reading it:

1. Monster
Far off in the Tropic of Capricorn lay an underwater kingdom of mermaids and mermen no man had even dreamed of discovering yet..

Deep in the ocean outside the palace doors you could hear the faint screams of Queen Vasilisa as she gave birth to her third and final child.

The common merchants at the market gossiped and exchanged their theories on the soon-to-be heir of their kingdom. Everyone was in hopes of the queen to give birth to a son since the first two children had been daughters. Although, if it was true that there would be no son - which they doubted - the youngest of the children was already assigned to rule the merpeople.

"Oh how I hope the queen and king's son will grow up and come to love my daughter and marry her!" gushed a rather large mermaid. She sighed as she daydreamed.

"Please," said another, "Everyone knows he will grow up and wed to my beautiful gem of a daughter Christyna!"

"Ridiculous," the men murmured to each other a couple feet away.

"I bet you ten pearls she'll have a miscarriage."

"What horrible luck if it was the last child, and a son, that the queen lost."

"Shh! Shut up!" A mermaid swam up to the window of the palace and hid from sight as they listened. Her smile widened as the wail of a baby was heard.

"Your highness," the merman doctor said to the fatigued woman in the bed, "it's a healthy baby girl."

"A healthy girl?" Queen Vasilisa sighed, exhausted. She outstretched her arms. "Can I see?"

"Your highness, I don't think that is wise..." the doctor said with caution.

"I want to see her," the queen insisted. The doctor sighed and handed the bundle over. The child was very squirmy inside. She pushed around to free herself from the cocoon of sheets.

The queen screamed.

"Sh-She...It has legs!" she wailed. "Human legs!"

"Please!" the doctor pleaded, rushing to the woman's side. "Please, your highness, here me out. Our ancestors were completely human head to toe. The first mermaid was in fact a human with a severe mutation of the legs. Evolution had taken its course then and well..." He looked down at the green-eyed child and raised a hand to her head which gold hair had already sprouted from. "This child is simply unaffected by the mutated gene."

The queen stiffened. "You are a hypocrite to your own kind! You say we are the mutants when there is a monster right before your eyes."

"Queen Vasilisa, does this child truthfully look like a monster?" The doctor raised the tiny baby up into his own arms and tilted her for the queen to see. The baby looked at her mother with a round, flushed face and wide, innocent eyes.

Queen Vasilisa's eyes narrowed. "You take her. Tell my people I have had yet another miscarriage."

"I cannot," replied the doctor. "You have to raise this child as your own and give her the equal amount of love your other children receive. She will be the heir to the throne after all."

"No. She will not. I would never allow it. She is too different."

The baby started to cry in the doctors arms. He held her closely. "Shh, there there," he whispered. He turned to the queen. "What will you name her?"

The queen hesitated. Slowly she held out her arms for the child. The doctor handed her over. Queen Vasilisa looked down into those impossibly round emerald eyes. "I shall name her Grace."

The mermaid eavesdropping outside the window gasped and swam away, back to the market to tell the tale of the creature inside the castle walls.