***
Taba’s feet ached from running over sharp rocks, from pounding into the sand. She’d almost dropped her bags of salvage in her eagerness to get back to the caverns. Her ruined right arm, weak enough under normal circumstances, screamed under the strain of the bags as they slid down from her shoulder. She barely cared.
Corr scowled at her as she pounded up the steps and farther into the cave. The elders were sitting around their pots of tea, munching on kelp and fish rolls.
“Honoured grandmother,” Taba panted, “the seafolk are back!”
There was an awkward silence. The men working under lamplight in the depths, the women and ur-women cleaning and organizing crates near the front—all were silent as her words echoed through the cave.
“I saw a girl—maybe an ur-girl, if they have ur-girls—on the rocks,” panted Taba. “She saw me, cried out, and dove into the water again. I saw her tail flash as she swam away.”
There was a long pause. Corr and the other elders glanced at each other disapprovingly, then at her, looking for signs of a sweaty forehead, glazed eyes, the sway of someone about to faint. Children often got heatstroke at this time of year, especially with the long days and relative dryness. But she held firm, looking at them straight-on, her posture as steady and straight as a lighthouse on the shore. The lone male on the council, Ran, cleared his throat timidly. “She might be telling the truth,” he offered. “It might not just be heatstroke.”
“You’re just hoping a merwoman will come and sweep you away, make you a fish-husband,” jeered Sol, an ur-woman. “Dream on.”
Even if he was a man, crippled by his lack of ties to the moon and sea, Taba felt awfully grateful for his support. Unfortunately, Mila, Nie, and Sol burst into raucous laughter. Ran looked embarrassed, but fell silent. Corr grimaced and sipped her tea.
Mila flicked grey-streaked black hair over her shoulder and glanced at Taba reprovingly. She taught the children, and Taba had been sitting through her classes not long ago. Mila folded her hands together the way she did when she suspected a child was fibbing. “We haven’t seen them since the Ice Time a hundred years ago. And with the trade ships passing through here, they’ve either gone to deeper waters or found better trading partners long ago. If they were real at all.”
“Let her speak,” said Nie tolerantly. Taba noticed distractedly that Nie hadn’t shaved, and had the stubble of a beard showing over the edges of her woven neck wrap.
Taba stared at her feet. “I don’t have sunstroke,” she muttered. “I know what I saw. She had silver scales, and she was sitting in the dune. Her skin was brown, like ours, but lighter. And she was naked. She yelped and jumped into the water as soon as I saw her. Her fins splashed.” A shiver passed through her again as she remembered the girl’s eyes, the brief moment of connection.
There was a long pause. “It does match the legends,” asked Mila again. “Though a daydream and a nap in the sun could, admittedly, produce the same effect.”
“We should weigh the possibility, at least,” said Nie. “It’s not impossible. And this necklace”—Nie tapped the bone beads around her neck with a withered finger— “is said to have been a gift from their queen. I’ve even heard that the Ailo Bay people to the North have some merfolk blood. And everyone knows about their webbed hands.”
Ran cleared his throat for a moment. “Three generations—or four—have passed since we saw them last, but my grandmother was the last one to see one of them. Her oldest brother, she said, was the last liason, until he disappeared under the waves with his husband, never to return. I, for one, believed her tales.”
“You’re taking this…child seriously?” demanded Sol. “All we have are tales, legends. That’s hardly proof.”
“This child has fifteen years. She’s almost a woman, but for the ceremony. It’s time we treated her as a little more than another weed rat, scampering after legfish on the shore.” Corr’s eyes fixed on Taba again, and Taba looked back hopefully. It was a backhanded compliment at best—but she’d take it.
Sol cleared her throat. “But she’s broken! Ever since the fire—”
Taba’s eyes prickled with tears. It always came back to this—a mistake she’d made as a small child. She would always be the broken one.
“The fire marked her skin and gives her enough pain in her arm to remind her for the rest of her life just how dangerous playing with oil can be. It left her mind undamaged,” said Corr calmly. “And the pain made her wiser. However, talking to you makes me wish there was such an oil for hearts—burning yours might teach you the sense of thoughtless words, Sol.”
Sol lowered her head in shame. “I’m sorry, grandmother. I’m sorry, Taba. That was unkind.”
Taba nodded but said nothing.
Mila raised a hand for silence. “We should give her a few pak’ rolls and some dried lemfruit. And sea grape wine. It’s said the merfolk love those things.”
“Do we have enough of them to give away on a frivolous errand?” grumbled Sol quietly.
“We can spare them,” murmured Nie, interrupting. “I was taking stock just yesterday.”
“And if all goes well, Taba and the merwoman will share their first meal,” said Mila. She glanced at Taba again. “But if there are other rituals required of us, they’ve been lost to time. Still, perhaps goodwill can overcome our ignorance. Failing that, Taba is just fat enough to make a good meal.”
Taba blanched, but the elders were chuckling.
“Are you all finished?” said Corr. She waited as Sol, Nie, Mila, and Ran settled down, then looked back at Taba. Taba’s ears burned with embarrassment.
“Tomorrow,” said Corr, “you will go to the same spot before any of the other children go out for the day, and you will bring the offerings and gifts. If the seawoman stays to speak to you, you will have done us a great service. It has been many years since we saw them last, and they were once close friends and good trading partners. Long ago, yes, but older, stranger things have returned since then.”
“I’ll do anything,” said Taba, trying to keep her voice from trembling.
Corr looked at her seriously. “I cannot send a child out to do anything. It will have to be done quickly and without the celebration we would normally offer you…but first, you must go as a woman, not a child. You were overdue anyway—you’ve had your blood for three summers now.”
Taba nodded. It would be a rushed ceremony—too rushed for her to feel the satisfaction of adulthood. As expected, her adulthood would be as broken and rushed as she was. “Why must I be a woman, grandmother?”
“Because the seafolk, it is said, would take one of our clan with them to seal an alliance.” Corr looked grim, and none of the other elders were smiling.
Taba’s knees shook. And then, too, there were the absurd tales of horrid sea monsters, who stalked the merpeople—and of hapless mainlanders and islanders who were eaten by the terrors below. But those were the stories of the sailor women who bragged to each other about the size of their catch. The softer stories were little comfort. To live with the seafolk, then, in their strange castles—to be transfigured, perhaps, so she could breathe below water. It was the stuff of tall tales, of nonsense, of legend—of history. “As a wife?” she managed.
Corr laughed at her nervousness. “Sometimes. But first, as an honoured guest and as a friend. But it’s only the person they choose to speak to at first that would be permitted to accompany them…home. If the seawoman speaks to you again…you must be prepared to see us only at the turns of each season. You will represent us and the surface in general, a respected ambassador, just like Wui in Makola or Yel in Vergreva.”
“What if she doesn’t speak to me?” Taba squeaked. She rubbed her damaged arm, touching the scars nervously.
Corr stared at her for a few moments. “You are not broken, granddaughter,” she said softly. “If you are rejected, it will be the merwoman’s shyness, not your fault.”
Taba nodded, her throat dry
. The elders looked at her, waiting.
“Will you do this, Taba?” asked Corr gently. “Will you be our emissary to the depths?”
Taba thought for a long time. Even if she agreed and failed, she’d have to undergo the womanhood ceremony. No more running on the sand with the children, probably—she’d be minding them instead. No matter what happened—and what happened, if she was successful, involved seldom tasting lemfruit again, never having kinamon, never seeing Corr or her mother Hai or her father Frek—her life as she knew it was about to end. To change forever.
Taba looked out to the end of the cave, where the light was just visible. She could see the blue and white water lapping against the surf. The tide would come in soon, and she had to be ready. Was it worth giving everything up?
On the other hand, if they sent someone else out, and the notoriously shy merfolk refused to come back, whose fault would it be? The opportunity of a lifetime, of several lifetimes, gone. Just because of her own cowardice. No chance of scavenging fine Glimmerglass from the wrecks herself, or other riches, instead of waiting for them to wash up on the shoreline. No chance of seeing what wonders and terrors lay in the sea, hidden in the depths. No chance of renewing an ancient alliance and friendship. All because the little broken girl, whose name was the same as the reed-fishes’, was too frightened of going to the depths. Of leaving Comara Cove behind. Of what she’d seen in the depths of the mer-woman’s eyes.
“I’ll do it,” said Taba softly.
There was silence. Slowly, the elders smiled. Corr stood and shuffled over, setting a hand on Taba’s shoulder.
“The sun will set soon and the tide is coming in. Are you ready to swim against the tide, Taba? To be a woman?”
“I will do anything I must,” said Taba. “Lead me.”