The Surface Breaks(23)

No one stirs as I move through the shanties but I stop anyway when I come to the whirlpools that separate our world from that of the Sea Witch; a wall of pounding, swirling water twisting from sea-bed to the surface. I look back, my breath uneven. Half expecting to see an army of men led by Zale, charging towards me. I have never been this far from the palace before, not once in my near sixteen years. And to move past the whirlpools, to swim through the chewing currents and allow myself to be spat out on the other side, is strictly forbidden by Sea-King Law. His people are not permitted to travel beyond the Outerlands, especially not to the Shadowlands. If I do this, I remind myself, there is no going back.


“If I do what you’re suggesting, there is no going back,” I had said to Cosima tonight.

A knock on the door. Grandmother had just left and I assumed it was her again. I knew it was not Zale; he never knocks.

“Come in,” I had called. It was Cosima.

“Crying, sister?” she asked.

“What are you doing here, Cosima?”

She sat next to me, adjusting her tail in line with mine, and I knew she was comparing them, my dark green against her royal blue, searching for a flaw in my scales that would mean she had won, for once.

“I heard you,” she said in a strange sing-song manner. “I heard you talking to Grandmother.” My chest tightened, squeezing all the air out of my lungs. What had she heard? And, if she had heard the worst of it, what would she do?

“So, that was you earlier,” I said, as nonchalantly as I could manage. “I knew it wasn’t just a fish, no matter what Grandmother thought.”

Cosima picked up a mirror from the squat wooden cabinet beside my bed. A relic from a storm seven years ago. Vicious winds, a starving sea, Salkas screaming for flesh-revenge with wild, unfettered abandon. Calling the names of men who were long dead, men who broke their hearts or their bodies, and sometimes both. Corpse after corpse after corpse. It was raining humans for months afterwards.

Cosima gazed at her reflection in the mirror, tousling her golden hair. “Don’t try and deny it,” she said. “I heard everything you said to Grandmother. You love him. You love a human man.” I thought of Oliver, spewing sea-water out of his mouth, as if it was something poisonous. How beautiful his face was, even when pallid and cold. And then I thought of him calling her name, Viola? Viola?

I didn’t say anything. It was too dangerous a thing to admit, especially to Cosima. I just focused on catching my breath, one in (You’ll be fine, Gaia), breathe out (Stay calm, Gaia). “What’s wrong with you, Muirgen?” she said when I remained silent. “It’s not fair to Zale. You are to be bonded in two months and this is how you repay him for that honour? He should be with someone who loves him, who understands him. Someone more suited to the rigours of ruling the kingdom. Someone who…” she trailed off. “Anyway,” she said. “Someone else.”

“I never wanted any of this to happen.” I went to take her hand, but she snatched it back. “Cosima, please. You know this isn’t my fault.”

“What’s not your fault? That you stole Zale from me?”

“I didn’t steal him. You and I were such good friends – we loved each other, didn’t we?” There was a lump caught in my throat. “I miss you.”

“Zale was mine,” she said. “Everything was perfect before. Perhaps if you hadn’t been born then our mother wouldn’t have lost her mind and deserted us.” I drew back as if she had slapped me, but she didn’t stop there. “And you don’t even appreciate Zale. You’re so ungrateful that you fall in love with the first human man you set your eyes on. I couldn’t believe it when I heard you admit it to Grandmother tonight. The humans took our mother, Muirgen.”

“You’re always saying that she abandoned us, now you’re saying it’s the humans’ fault. Make up your mind, Cosima.”

“Don’t get smart. Those creatures murdered her for sport. Have you forgotten that?”

I had taken a deep breath. “We don’t know that for sure, do we?”

“What?” She was astonished at this. She obviously hadn’t heard everything I said to Grandmother tonight. “What are you talking about?”

“Well, we don’t know what happened to her after she was captured. We only know what Father has told us.”

“And that is enough. His word is law, you foolish girl. Have you completely lost your senses?”

“I just want the truth. That’s all I’ve ever wanted.”

“And you’re prepared to do anything to get ‘this truth’?” she snarled, her face fierce.

“Well.” I don’t know. I don’t know. “I think so.”

“It’s going to take more than ‘I think so’ to do what needs to be done, Muirgen. Don’t be pathetic.”

She didn’t think I was brave enough, I realized, and I felt something smouldering inside me. “Don’t talk to me as if I’m a child, Cosima. Yes, I am prepared to do anything to find out what happened to her.”

“Okay,” she said, and her features fell clean, as if she had never known anger in her life. “Okay, Muirgen.” A brief smile. “I understand.”

“You do?” I grabbed her hand again, the relief at finally being heard almost overwhelming. This time she didn’t let go.