Her voice trailed off as though she was remembering some long-forgotten memory.
“Why don’t you start at the beginning?” I encouraged kindly. She was making no sense as it was.
She nodded her head slightly and mopped up the tears with an embroidered handkerchief she’d pulled from a pocket. The tissue I’d passed her lay unused but crumpled on the bed.
“I really didn’t want to tell you this. You, of all people...”
“Please tell me,” I urged. If she didn’t begin to talk soon, I was afraid she’d begin crying again.
“A long time ago, around about the time I was your age, I didn’t live here in Trifork. I lived somewhere very different indeed.”
This was new information. I’d always been under the impression that my mother had been born here. I had no grandparents on her side, and she’d always led me to believe that she was an orphan down on her luck when she met my father at eighteen, and they’d fallen in love. It was a story of forbidden love as she was a commoner. I’d always found it so romantic. Echoes of my own romance with Ari popped into my head. Ever since I’d first met him, I’d had this thought that we’d end up like my own mother and father. Of course, now, I wasn’t sure. I barely knew the guy and now, I realized all these thoughts I’d been having were simply silly teenage dreams. I tried to smother the crushing disappointment and focus on what my mother was trying to tell me.
“Where do you come from then?” I asked her, deliberately keeping my voice low so as not to upset her further. It felt like I was trying to encourage a scared bunny rabbit. This was so not the mother I knew.
She could barely look me in the eye as she spoke. I knew that whatever she was about to say was difficult for her. She took a deep breath and began to speak again.
“I was a woman of the ocean when I met your father.”
I furrowed my brow in confusion. A woman of the ocean? What exactly did that mean? And then it dawned on me.
“Are you trying to tell me that you are a mermaid?”
As she looked up, I saw something in her eyes I’d never seen before but was completely familiar with. I’d seen the flecks of purple in Ari’s eyes.
“Yes,” she replied simply. “Yes, I am.”
A secret uncovered
I gaped at my mother open-mouthed. “Does Daddy know?”
“No,” she answered, shaking her head, “and I don’t want him to know. He thinks I’m from Trifork just like you did. I told him the same story I’ve always told you, told everyone.”
The whole thing was ridiculous, but I could see in her eyes it was true. It still didn’t explain why she’d wanted me to marry Hayden or why she was so scared of the ocean. As a mermaid, or former mermaid, she should love the water.
“So, what happened?” I cajoled. “You said this started when you were about my age.”
She nodded. “I was happily living out at sea, keeping away from the land dwellers. We keep to ourselves. Most people think we are imaginary, so few land dwellers have seen us. We knew how to keep away. Our greatest law was to never speak to those with legs. It was an easy law to keep as I never saw anyone with legs until one day I was swimming away from the town when I saw a man in the water. He was so strange to me. I didn’t know it at the time, but he was a recreational deep-sea diver. I guessed he was looking for coral or oysters. I didn’t know which. He was wearing a black wetsuit and goggles. On his back, he wore oxygen canisters. As I’d never seen a human before, I thought the wetsuit was his skin, and the goggles were his eyes. At first, I was terrified, but after a while, I became fascinated. The way he swam with flippers. He was, quite frankly, the strangest creature I’d ever laid my eyes on.”
I tried to picture a deep-sea diver. For a woman who had never seen clothes before, I could quite well imagine how strange he would look to her.
“Every day I’d go to the same spot, and every day there was someone else diving. I guess a tour company took tourists out. One day, I decided to follow the boat to see where it went. It was foolish, and I knew at the time, I’d be in so much trouble from my parents, but the compulsion to find out about the land dwellers was too much.”
“I guess disobeying one’s parents runs in the family,” I butted in. She gave me a wan smile and carried on.
“The boat came back here to the public jetty. I swam along the seafront until I saw a completely different type of land dweller. In reality, he was just wearing normal clothes, but I didn’t know that then. He was out in the garden, just walking around mumbling to himself. I fell in love with him instantly. He was so handsome and looked so worried about something. I hid behind some rocks, desperately wanting to go up and speak to him, but I couldn’t. I had a tail. There was no way I’d be able to get across all the rocks without legs, and if I did, I was afraid I’d scare him. So, I did something so terrible, something so stupid that to this day, I regret it with all my heart. I went to the sea witch.”
“The sea witch?” An image of a green hag flying around underwater on a broom sprang to mind. A witch was another creature I’d thought was imaginary before this last couple of weeks. Nothing surprised me anymore. I was willing to bet if a leprechaun riding a pink unicorn strolled into the bedroom, I’d not batter an eyelid.
“She was...is the sea’s most ferocious woman. She is the equivalent of the mayor up here and has some serious clout. Most of the merpeople are terrified of her. I was terrified of her, but I wanted to meet your father so badly that I mustered up the courage and sought her out.
“She told me she would give me legs on two conditions. One, that I would never be able to return to the ocean. My tail would be permanently gone, and two, that she would steal my voice.”
I tried to wrap my head around what she was telling me.
“But you have a voice,” I pointed out.
She hung her head again. “I thought that I would need my voice to talk to your father. How else would I get to know him if I couldn’t talk to him?”
I thought back to all the times I’d spoken with Ari. The only time I remembered him using his audible voice was the first time we met when he saved me. I hadn’t thought about it before now, but I wondered if he’d made a similar exchange with the sea witch. I’d seen him with legs after all. Unlike my mother, he kept his tail too. He was able to be one way in water and another on land.
“So, what did you offer?” I asked. The look on her face was enough to tell me that it was something terrible. Her eyes, already brimming with tears, began to overflow.
“I offered my firstborn child. At the time, I was so young that thoughts of children were so far away in the distance. I wasn’t even sure I’d have children. It seemed like a good exchange, and for a time, it was. That was until I found out I was pregnant with you. I worried so much throughout that pregnancy. I spent the whole nine months waiting for the sea witch to jump out and claim what was hers. When you were born, the fear only got worse. I begged your father to move inland, but he refused, saying that this was his ancestral home and the royal palace. I couldn’t tell him why I wanted to move. I was scared he’d hate me if he found out what I was.”
She wiped her eyes with the handkerchief and carried on, her voice barely more than a whisper.
“Instead, I developed a fear of the ocean. I’d not been back in such a long time; it was an easy fear to make up. The irony was that the place I’d come from, the place I’d grown up in was now my greatest fear. I kept you, and when your brother came along, him too, away from the sea. I’ve spent the last eighteen years being terrified she would come and take you away from me.”
“Why didn’t she?”
“She’s tied to the ocean like the rest of us are. It takes a great deal of magic to give people legs, and she only gives if she can take more back. The few merfolk that have come onto land have stayed here. She is too important down below to leave, although I know she craves it. She has been biding her time until you step foot in there. I hoped that would never happen, but then you jumped
onto that boat.”
I thought back to the sound of my mother’s screams as I fell into the water on the day the Erica Rose sank. Knowing what I knew now, I felt sick at what I’d done. If only my mother had told me the truth long ago.
“She appeared almost straight away,” my mother continued. “I don’t know how, but I believe she could sense you. I saw the black shape in the water coming right for you. Everyone else thought it was a particularly bad storm, but storms don’t look like that. It was the witch that brought the Erica Rose down.”
She sniffed. “It’s funny. Everyone else was worried that you’d drown. I was almost hoping you would. Anything would be better than being taken by the witch. She takes of you what she can and leaves you with nothing. No bargain or exchange with her works out well for the person doing it, no matter how good she makes it seem. In exchange for my legs and my life up here, I have spent the last eighteen years in fear.”
I could see the tears welling in her eyes again. This was so difficult, and my heart was breaking for her. To have kept all this a secret for so many years. The shadow she lived under must have been terrible.
“When I heard that you’d been found alive and had been brought back here after the Erica Rose sank, I was so happy. That was until you told me who had saved you. I didn’t know who it was, but the way you described him, I knew straight away it was a merman. I could see it in your eyes that he’d made an impression on you. That’s why I tried to tell you that you’d imagined it. I hoped that you’d pass it off as a hallucination, but you didn’t let it go.
“The night of the ball I saw you kissing him. I knew it was him straight away. The mermen all have long hair, but I’ve yet to see it in a male land dweller.
“It was then that I convinced your father to announce your engagement to Hayden. I told him it was the right thing to do. He was skeptical, but I was insistent. He works away from home so often, making royal visits and such, that it was easy to tell him this thing between you and Hayden was real. I just had to convince you of the same thing. It didn’t work, though, did it? You were already besotted with someone else. I could see it in your eyes.”
I sighed. “I’ve never had any interest in Hayden that way.” I wanted to ask how the wedding had gone, but that story was for another time. I had to know what happened next.
“I know. I’ve always known. I was trying to protect you. I hoped that marrying Hayden would put an end to all this with the merman, but I can see that it won’t. The thing is, you can’t be with him. I don’t know how she didn’t catch you that time you visited him in the ocean, but you saw her today. If I’d not had all the guards out on the ocean as soon as I saw that Astrid wasn’t you, she would have gotten you. I have no idea what she intends to do with you, but I know it won’t be nice. I’ve seen her cut off girls’ hair and keep them as slaves. I’ve known her to kill for just one drop of blood for her potions. I can’t let that happen to you.”
She dissolved into tears again.
My mind whirled at all this new information. It explained so much. My overwhelming love of the sea despite never having been in it. It was because I was half mermaid. My long hair, too red to be natural, was nothing like anyone else’s I’d ever seen, and even though I didn’t have the flecks of purple that Ari had or that my mother had shown tonight, I did have bright green eyes.
It also explained my mother’s morbid fear of the water, of why she had kept both Anthony and me away from it. She wasn’t scared we’d drown, she was scared the sea witch would take us. If the witch couldn’t get me, it made sense she’d go for Anthony.
I hugged my mother tightly. I’d never felt close to her. I felt like the barrier between us had finally come down. Now, I knew what she was and what I was. For the first time, she felt like the mother I’d always wanted. I knew we had a long way to go, but if anything good had come out of this mess, a better relationship with my mother was all I could hope for.
My thoughts turned to Ari. I’d thought he had just decided not to turn up. I’d thought he’d gotten cold feet, but if what my mother said was true, another, much worse thought came to me.
“Ari, the merman had legs the night of the ball. Do you think he was able to do that because of the sea witch?”
She gave a long sigh. “Undoubtedly. There is no way he would be able to walk without her help. I’m surprised she let him have his tail back afterward, but I guess he’s willing to offer her more than I was.”
“More than your firstborn child? What more could he offer than that?”
“I don’t know, but the fact that he didn’t come for you tonight tells me that she didn’t get what she wanted. I’m so sorry, Erica, but she must have taken him instead.”
The sea witch
My heart sank as I took in the implications of her words. A few minutes ago, I’d thought that the worst thing in the world to happen to me was to be stood up by Ari. But I’d take that over him being kidnapped by a sea witch who liked to kill people any time she felt like it.
“We have to go rescue him,” I said, standing up from the bed.
My mother adopted a look of horror.
“We can’t! You can’t! I told you how powerful she is. Everyone under the water is afraid of her. My own parents refused to have anything to do with her.”
“I thought your parents were dead?”
My mother bowed her head. “They are alive. I haven’t seen them in twenty years. Once I was out of the ocean, I couldn’t ever go back. They don’t know where I am. If I’d told them, they would never have let me come.”
I shook my head. This secrecy had been going on long enough. My poor mother had spun herself such a web of lies, that now, she was the one coming unraveled.
“I can’t leave him out there. He saved my life. If it weren’t for him, we wouldn’t be here having this conversation.”
“I know,” she replied. “But we can’t beat her. Our only way to stay safe is to stay away from her, to stay on land. The second we go into the sea, she will be upon us and I doubt she’d let you get away again.”
I thought of a way around it. “What if we don’t go in the sea? Hayden’s father is an admiral of the Navy. He has a whole fleet of ships. We send them all out to sea and find him that way.”
“I think your father might notice all the naval ships leaving.”
“So, we tell him why. It’s been long enough. Don’t you think he deserves to know the truth?” I cried, feeling exasperated.
My mother’s jaw tightened. “No, I don’t. You don’t understand. The merpeople and the land dwellers don’t mix. Why do you think we hide from them? History has told us that once a merperson is found, the land dwellers capture them and give them to scientists to examine. If that happened to me...or to you or Anthony, what do you think they’ll do? It would be worse than being at the mercy of the sea witch. They’d cut us up to study our anatomy or keep us captive for our entire lives. Do you want that?”
“No, but I’m only talking about telling father and your best friends. I’m not suggesting we broadcast it on the evening news. Father won’t give us away, neither will the Harrington-Smythes.”
“Do you want to bet your life on it?” she looked at me in such a way that I knew she was being serious.
“No, but...”
She cut me off. “Everyone will see the naval ships going out. They’ll wonder what is going on. We already have almost all the journalists in the kingdom camping on our doorsteps because of this wedding fiasco. Do you really want to give them something else to write about?”
Oh, the wedding. I’d forgotten about that. I thought of Hayden and Astrid downstairs. As the pair of them came to mind, a plan began to form. Whatever had happened down there today, I figured they owed me. I might have made a giant mess of the day, but because of that, Hayden wasn’t tied to me for the rest of his life. Surely, that must count for something…?
“Hayden has a boat,” I said out loud, suddenly feeling excited. “He is also an excellent
sailor, thanks to his father, and I know Astrid is a great swimmer.”
“Hayden has a boat barely bigger than a dingy that seats four people and being a great swimmer counts for nothing when the sea witch gets to you. You saw what she does. If she can sink a ship as grand as the Erica Rose, what chance does Hayden’s dingy stand? None at all!”
“Maybe not, but it’s all we have. I refuse to stand by and let Ari get hurt just because you don’t want the truth to come out. I’m going back out into the ocean tonight.”
She opened her mouth as if to say something and then closed it again, obviously deciding against it. I didn’t want to blackmail her into letting us go by threatening to tell my father her secret. Thankfully, she just nodded her head.
“If you must go, I know I will not be able to stop you. I’ve done everything in my power to keep you from the ocean, and you’ve found a way around me every time. I hate that you are doing this, but beyond keeping you locked in your room for eternity, I see no way around it. I knew this day would come eventually, and I’m tired of fighting it.”
She did look tired, exhausted even. I waited for her to say more, but instead, she pulled out a long necklace from around her neck. “Please take this.”
A huge red ruby glistened in the light. It hung from a gold chain. I’d seen her wear it every day of her life. She leaned toward me and placed it over my head.
“Why are you giving me this?” I asked, picking up the ruby and examining it.
“It has a protection spell on it. It has faded a lot over the years, but I’d rather you have the little protection it does possess.”
I could see the tears in her eyes already beginning to form. This was her greatest fear. The day she hoped would never come. I knew that going out to sea would hurt her, but I couldn’t leave Ari, not after everything he’d done for me. My heart went out to my mother then. She was letting me go despite doing everything in her power to keep me safe all these years. I was eighteen now, an adult, and I guess she knew deep down that she couldn’t stop me. I leaned forward and hugged her tightly. A part of me never wanted to let her go. She must have felt the same way because we stayed like that for nearly five minutes.
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