file:///F|/rah/Piers%20Anthony/Anthony,%20Piers%20-%20Xanth%2015%20-%20The%20Color%20of%20Her%20Panties.txt
She brought out her mirror and stretched the glass out to full length so
she could see all of herself. It merely reflected what she already
knew: she was a splendiferous creature, with fuller breasts than any
mere mermaid and a flashier tail than any fish could boast. About her
neck she wore a necklace supporting two precious glowing firewater
opals, surely sufficient to attract the best quality husband.
So why wasn't she married? It wasn't as if she were choosy. All she
wanted was the nicest, handsomest, most manly and intelligent unmarried
prince in Xanth, who would be pleased to let her do anything she wanted.
Such as swimming in the salt sea for hours and eating raw fish, and who
would love to brush out her hair for her. Once she had captured Prince
Dolph, but he had been a trifle young at the time, nine years old. She
had traded him off for her opals, and later he had grown up and married
a girl of his own species whose endowments weren't nearly as impressive
as Mela's own. Human men just didn't have much sense.
The problem was that there weren't many males who met her modest
standards, and most of those were already married. She had scoured the
seas and found nothing worth her while. So what was she to do?
She sighed, and the effort sent ripples down through her fabulous flesh.
There was no help for it: she would have to go ask the Good Magician.
That meant doing him a year's service, which would surely be a colossal
bore, but if he landed her a suitable husband it just might be worth it.
No time like the present. Mela gathered together the few useful spells
she had collected during her explorations of the bypaths of the sea and
tucked them into her invisible purse. Then she swam out of her cave and
up toward the surface of the sea. She didn't worry about the fire
spreading during her absence, because fire could not burn under water
without the magic presence of the merfolk. Only if another merwoman or
merman came would it flare up, granted no one would intrude on her
private premises.
Mela's undersea cave was near the Isle of Illusion, by sheerest
coincidence, so she came up in sight of the isle which had once appeared
to be the most illustrious of regions. Her hair yellowed as it broke
the surface. She remembered again how she had captured Prince Dolph
here, despite the objection of his skeletal companioris Marrow Bones and
Grace'l Ossein. They had in the end turned out to be decent folk
despite their gauntness; indeed, they had helped her get her opals. She
wondered how they were doing; they had made a nice if somewh,-it
emaciated couple.
The Isle of Illusion no longer had much illusion, because the Sorceress
of illusion, Queen Emeritus Iris, had long since departed it. But a
faint tinge of great fancies still surrounded it, suggesting the
greatness of past imaginings. Perhaps some day another great
illusionist would inhabit it, and once again no one would know its
rather pedestrian reality.
She swam directly to the shore where the Gap Chasm debouched into the
eastern sea. She came as close to the small beach as she could without
getting out of the water.
Then, when the sand threatened to abrade her satiny skin, she sat up,
her tail folded before her. She concentrated, and her beautiful flukes
became misshapen lumps, while the main portion of her tail turned a
sickly pink. A lengthwise crease appeared, which deepened, until the
entire tail split into two ungainly limbs.
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