Children of the Sea 01 - Sea Witch

Shut it. At the bottom of the tide pool, a crab rummaged through a pile of periwinkle shells, tapping, weighing, discarding.
     
    “Perhaps we should sit down,” she suggested.
     
    His eyebrows rose, but he folded his long body and sat, stretching out his injured leg, his wet boots scraping on the white limestone forts of a barnacle colony. The sun teased golden glints from his damp hair, touching his face with color. His throat looked strong and faintly sunburnt, tempting her to test its temperature with her lips.
     
    She sat a few feet away—she had to be able to think— and spread her skirt to dry.
     
    Caleb waited, his silence pulling at her.
     
    She picked at a loose white thread, searching for an end. For a beginning. Written texts were rare among her people. Their history was passed and preserved for each generation, each incarnation, in the eternal song of the whales. How would it sound to Caleb?
     
    She took a deep breath. “Before—well, before anything was, the Spirit of the Creator moved upon the face of the waters.”
     
    Caleb’s mouth twitched. “Maggie . . . when I said the beginning, I didn’t mean all the way back to Genesis.”
     
    “What is Genesis?”
     
    His expression closed again. “Never mind. Go on.”
     
    182
    Margred bit her lip in vexation. In centuries past, when the mer revealed themselves to the sons and daughters of men, they were regarded with awe and worship, lust and fear. Margred did not expect Caleb’s worship exactly; but neither was she prepared for his studying her like a scientist observing some new species of marine life.
     
    It was easier, she found, not to look at him at all. “Out of the void, He formed the elements. And as each element took shape, its people also came into being—the children of earth and sea, of air and fire.”
     
    “People,” Caleb repeated. “Are you talking Adam and Eve here?”
     
    She shook her head. “Humankind came later. Much later, long after life crawled from the sea and walked on the land. But then the Creator breathed His immortal spirit into mortal clay. Many elementals resented this new creation— particularly the children of fire. The children of air defended the Creator’s decision, appointing themselves heralds and protectors of humankind. While the children of earth and sea, forced to cohabit with you, chose to avoid you as much as possible.” Margred shrugged. “Sometimes it is not possible. And then legends—or children—are born. Your own mother—”
     
    “No,” Caleb said.
     
    “Your mother came to your father out of the sea.” Now Margred dared to look at him. “As I came to you.”
     
    His eyes were splinters of green ice. “You’re telling me my mother, Alice Hunter—”
     
    “Atargatis.”
     
    “And you are . . . mermaids?” His voice cracked in disbelief.
     
    Margred nodded. “Well, not mermaids, exactly. Selkies.”
     
    “What’s the difference?”
     
    “The mer may take different forms. Fish or mammal or—”
     
    “Prove it.”
     
    “Excuse me?”
     
    183
    “Turn into a—what is it you turn into?”
     
    She stiffened at his tone. “A seal.”
     
    “Right. Turn into a seal.”
     
    She struggled for patience. He wanted facts, he’d said. Proof. It was his nature, the nature of his job.
     
    It was not her nature to justify or explain. But for his sake . . .
     
    “I can’t,” she admitted reluctantly. “The last time I swam to the island, the night I was attacked, my pelt was stolen from me. I cannot Change form without my sealskin.”
     
    He raised his brows. “Convenient.”
     
    “Not for me,” she snapped. “Nor, I imagine, for your mother.”
     
    “Leave my mother out of this.”
     
    “I would not even if I could.” Moved beyond her people’s customary boundaries by her need to convince him, Margred reached out to him, laying her fingers on his arm. His sleeve was stiff and sticky with salt, his muscles hard as iron. “The sea is your heritage, Caleb.”
     
    “Maybe,” he said, his tone dry. “But I don’t turn into a seal and bark when the moon is full.”
     
    Stung, she snatched back her hand. Stupid man. “The moon has nothing to do with it. Most human-selkie offspring are mortal. Human genes and the human soul are what you would call dominant traits.”
     
    “But you said that guy—”
     
    “Your brother, Dylan.”
     
    “He’s not my brother. My brother is gone. Besides, he’s too young.”
     
    “Selkies do not