Q - Queen's Necklace

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Q - Queen's Necklace

When I started writing The Ankulen, I had no idea that there was going to be mermaids ... or that those mermaids would be so important.

I had just helped a little boy, and we were wandering around wondering when Jen would stumble upon her lost memories ... when she stumbled upon the Ocean. And since I now had an Ocean, that meant I needed some Mermaids.

Princess Mynna obliged me and dutifully appeared on a rock a few feet from shore. Which was great ... until I realized that I needed a Good Reason to have her on a rock a few feet from shore. (All of Jen's imaginary friends are in hiding, you see).

So I did some quick thinking and decided that the Mermaid Queen had lost a very important item: the Queen's Necklace. (Originally, Queen Tailya was going to be Mynna's sister, but in the second draft, Mynna became the youngest of Tailya's seven daughters. Fun) Problem was, I needed a reason for the Necklace to be important ... and decided that, since Jen didn't like bending rules, and therefore didn't take Tisha and Chris underwater very often, she spent little of her time in the Ocean. Therefore, the Queen's Necklace had some of the abilities of the Ankulen, and therefore Queen Tailya could keep things running smoothly under da sea in Jen's absence.

I expected to do a quick pop over to the Sea Castle (pictured above), then a swim over to Choral Mountain (where the Necklace was lost) so that Jen could locate the lost item, and then a swim back to the surface to continue the journey.

Well, I didn't account for the Polystoikhedron showing up.

Long story short, five out of the twenty-five chapters have portions underwater, and Queen Tailya ended up being one of the steadying factors in Jen's journey.