When Water Sang Fire is a folk story published in the collection The Language of Thorns by Leigh Bardugo. It is a story from the nation of Fjerda.
Summary[]
The story follows the sildroher Ulla, a talented singer. For the sildrohers, music is a form of magic that can be used to summon storms, create fantastic objects, and even convert themselves to humans. Ulla has spent her childhood as an outcast, having heard rumors of her being part human. This changes when Signy, another talented singer, becomes her music partner. The two girls summon powerful storms together and become close friends. Years later, at a celebration of the king's youngest son, Roffe, the girls gain the prince's attention by creating a magnificent garden for the royal family through a song Ulla composed. Roffe is impressed and the three form a friendship, in which Ulla discovers the prince's dangerous ambition. Signy falls in love with the prince despite Ulla's reminders of the difference between their social statuses.
Every summer, the sildroher princes take a three-month long trip to the mainland where they mingle among the human nobility. The year the sildroher king declares his abdication of the throne, Roffe invites Ulla and Signy to join him and his brothers on their trip to the human world. When they return, the brothers will present gifts to their father, and the prince with the most impressive gift will become the next king. While Signy hopes that Roffe may be developing feelings for her, Ulla knows that Roffe intends for the two girls to create a gift impressive enough to make him king.
Ulla's parents disapprove of their daughter going to the land, but Ulla joins Signy and Roffe regardless. The process of turning into a human involves cutting their tail in half while singing a spell that transforms their bodies. The knives used in the transformation must then remain untouched by the mortal, or else the sildroher would be unable to transfigure back to their original forms. Afterward, the sildroher travel to their lodgings with the royal family. The company spends the next three months mingling amongst the humans, attending dances, having affairs, and enjoying the vices of the mortal world.
While on land, Ulla meets the apprentice to the king's seer, who shows her a magical mirror in which a person's reflection can talk back to the viewer. As the trip progresses, Roffe becomes more eager for the two girls to create a gift for the king. Despite believing it impossible, Ulla argues that the only gift Roffe can use to win the title is fire that can burn underwater. When asked how to create the fire, the apprentice grimly replies that a human life must be taken. The apprentice also reveals to Ulla that they are siblings, their mother being a Grisha who was impregnated by Ulla's father, a sildroher. The apprentice invites Ulla to leave with him to return to their mother, saying that the sildroher will never show Ulla the love and devotion she craves. Both sets of information devastate Ulla.
Now knowing the rumors surrounding her birth are true, Ulla asks Signy if she would still love her even if she were part witch, to which Signy assures she would always love her. Ulla is determined not to create the fire, but Roffe bargains that if Ulla creates the fire, he will marry Signy and make her his queen. As the weeks go by, Roffe pretends to fall in love with Signy. Unable to break her best friend's heart, Ulla agrees to the ritual. On the last night of their trip, Roffe drugs a ten-year-old he claims to be a murderer and the two girls begin singing their spell. The boy awakens right as Roffe cuts out his lungs, then igniting them to create the eternal flame. In the process, Ulla catches fire and is left in critical condition.
When the ritual is complete, Roffe reveals that the sacrificed boy wasn't a murderer at all, but an innocent child. He also reveals that he used Ulla's knife to cut out the boy's lungs, meaning that Ulla would be unable to transform back into a sildroher. Ulla realizes that Signy was the only person who had access to it. Signy admits to giving Roffe the knife, as he had told her he would only use it as leverage in case Ulla wanted to back out of the ritual. Mortally wounded, Ulla begs Signy to summon the other sildroher to heal her, but Signy leaves with Roffe, abandoning Ulla.
Angry at Signy's betrayal, Ulla wills herself to find the apprentice's mirror. She holds a second mirror up to her reflection, creating an unending chain of reflections, and has all of them sing a healing spell to restore her. Ulla then summons a storm that brings the ocean up to the palace, destroying the town, much of northern Fjerda, and the sildroher's kingdom as it returns her to the sea. After the storms passed, Roffe and Signy became king and queen, relocated their kingdom, and had seven daughters, but the sildrohers stopped visiting the shore and using their singing magic, ultimately forgetting their history. Ulla lives in the caves and pools of the northern islands, awaiting Signy's daughters and other ambitious people who come to strike bargains.
Characters[]
- Ulla: a sildroher with a talent for singing and composing musical spells.
- Signy: a sildroher with fiery red hair who shares Ulla's talent for singing.
- Roffe: a sildroher prince with golden hair.
- The seer's apprentice: a mysterious young man who resembles Ulla. He is later revealed to be her half-brother, as their mother was a Grisha who was impregnated by a sildroher.
- Ulla's father: a sildroher who seeked out on land in search of a wife. He was there when Ulla and the seer's apprentice were having a conversation.
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- When Water Sang Fire is a retelling of The Little Mermaid told in the form of an origin story.
- In the author's note of The Language of Thorns, Bardugo writes that while the Hans Christian Andersen story was the point of departure for her retelling, "it's worth mentioning that Ulla is the Swedish diminutive of Ursula" implying that the sea witch from the Disney adaptation served as inspiration as well.