The Mermaid's Sister(20)

“I can and I will,” Scarff says with authority. “Now, O’Neill my boy, hurry and fetch your things from the caravan. Tonight my darling wife will occupy your place in the bed. You may sleep in the kitchen or the barn, your choice.”

Like a new bride, Auntie blushes. So do I.

“For heaven’s sake,” O’Neill grumbles. But he is smiling widely, looking just as happy as the old married couple. Or almost.

After the couple departs, O’Neill helps me replenish the warm water in Maren’s tub. Next, I wash Maren’s face and hands. It is silly, I know. She lives in clean water from the mountain springs and does nothing to become dirty. But we have always washed our faces together at bedtime. If we cannot share our bed anymore, cannot whisper secrets from our pillows or hold hands after nightmares, at least I can preserve a small piece of our former routine.

She is fast asleep before I finish dabbing the water from her alabaster cheeks; it would be pointless to move the tub back into the bedroom now. Osbert promises, with a nod of his head, to alert me if she needs anything during the night.

“That’s done, then,” O’Neill says as he places the last refilled kettle onto the stove. “I’ll soon be off to the barn to share the hay with Zedekiah.” He turns toward me, his expression strange and wistful. For a moment I think he might sweep me into his arms and kiss me, but no. His gaze is on the sleeping mermaid. His tender, loving gaze.

I drop my towel onto the table and hasten toward the bedroom. “Good night,” I say without looking back.

“You don’t want to stay up and talk? Like we always do? Come on, Clara. It is not even midnight.”

“I am tired,” I say. I close the door behind me and dive onto the bed, burying my anguish in the depths of my feather pillow.

I hate myself. I hate O’Neill.

I hate everything in the world. But mostly myself.





I dream.



My wings are long and white, with tips of black as if the feathers had brushed along a sea of ink. On ocean winds, I soar and circle. I angle my elegant red bill downwards and dive toward the water. A coppery head breaks through the top of a wave, and then the pale-skinned torso of a young woman: Maren. She reaches above her head with both arms and flips over into the churning ocean, her iridescent fish tail catching the sunlight before she disappears beneath the surf. My bill opens, but I cannot speak. No matter how I try, I can only make an ugly clattering sound. I dive after Maren, and the water swallows me up like a huge, toothless beast consuming its prey.



I awaken, my heart heavy. Is this prophecy, this strange dream? Will I truly be a stork, as Maren is a mermaid? Could it be confirmation of what I have long expected but attempted to ignore?

The truth is (in spite of all my attempts to ignore it), Maren has shown mermaid-like peculiarities since infancy: a love of water and a taste for salt, the uncanny ability to swim as deftly as a dolphin before she could even speak. But I am nothing like a stork. I haven’t the slightest affinity for eating frogs and minnows, and have never desired to fly. My legs are not long, and I am far from graceful.

There, I tell myself. I have examined the evidence and found good reason to declare that I will not become a stork.

Then again, as Auntie has said, what I choose to believe does not change what is true.

I sigh with exasperation and roll onto what used to be Maren’s side of the bed.

Through the window, the moon shines serenely. Its position in the sky tells me that dawn is many hours away. And so I count the stars, one by one, until somehow, I drift off to sleep again.





CHAPTER ELEVEN





A red sunrise stains the bedroom’s lace curtains pink. I dress quickly, anxious to check on Maren. She is my first thought each day, even before I open my eyes. I do not think that I will ever grow accustomed to her sleeping in another room. Or another realm, for that matter.

So I go to her. And there, curled up beside the bathtub in a plaid blanket, is O’Neill. His hair sticks up like a field of windblown hay and he is snoring almost as loudly as Osbert, but to me he is beautiful.

I pinch my arm hard, punishing myself for my continued foolishness, for feeling so unsisterly toward my almost-brother. For being stupid enough to think he could ever choose me over Maren. My brown hair and eyes and regular features are perfectly unremarkable. She was always the pretty and charming one, and now in her mermaid state, she is glorious beyond words. What man could resist? Indeed, aren’t mermaids supposed to be irresistible, capable of luring sailors to their deaths?

On my way to the stove, I bump into a chair. Its legs squeal as they scrape against the floor.

“Good morning,” O’Neill says, his voice thick with sleep. “You are up with the chickens.”

“Too cold in the barn?” Bitterness coats my words.

“Zedekiah was hogging the blankets. Are you angry with me? Was it terribly improper for me to sleep in the house?”

“Of course it was,” I blurt. “And lying beside my sister! Just because she is a mermaid does not mean she should be treated like a harlot.” I keep my face toward the window.

“I’m truly sorry,” he says. “I did not think of that.”

I let my emotions simmer for a moment. And then I take a deep breath. “I’m sorry, too,” I say gently. “I should not have spoken to you like that.”