The Mermaid's Mirror (19 page)

"Someone grabbed me and started to drag me away. Someone else—I think it was her mother—ordered Lucy to be restrained."

Lena swallowed.
Her own mother?

"She pleaded to go with me, but they wouldn't let her. The only reason I'm alive today is that Lucy's brother—your uncle—followed the mermen who took me away. When they stripped the cloak off me and left me half-conscious in the water, he carried me to shore. He risked his own life to save mine."

"But—" said Lena. "Lucy got away later. How?"

"They tried to feed her lotus blossoms, to take away her memory, but she wouldn't eat them. She stopped eating entirely. Rather than watch her die, her parents allowed her to leave, finally."

Lena sat still and silent, trying to absorb this tale of love so tragic, it rivaled anything by Shakespeare. After a time, she said, "I still don't understand why you didn't go back to Magic's after she left us. I know the surf is rough, but you were a great surfer, right? Once she saw you again, she would've remembered."

He massaged his head, as if that old injury had flared to life. "That day ... that day under the water ... there were so many voices. But someone ... someone with power—I could feel the words in my head like thunder—someone swore that if I ever set foot in the sea again, they would destroy me."

"Who was it?"

He sighed. "I think ... it was your grandmother."

Lena shivered. "But how could she do that?"

"I don't know. I just know Lucy told me I was safe in the water as long as I was with her." Her dad stared sightlessly toward the sea, remembering. "Once I lost her, I was willing to risk my life to find her. But I couldn't."

He opened the sliding-glass door and paused, turning back to say, "I've never forgotten those words." He closed his eyes, chanting:

"
Man, beware: I banish you from the sea.
The cold salt clasp is forbidden to you.
Death will be quick should you fail to heed me,
And those you love will die gasping in blue.
"

With a bitter sound, he added, "Their version of 'sleep with the fishes,' I guess." He stepped inside the house. "Do you understand now? You, and everyone else I love, are safe in the water ... as long as I stay out of it."

Lena watched him close the sliding-glass door and walk away, but she stood alone in the garden for a long time, unable to make her trembling legs work.

Cole asked Lena to sing to him that night at bedtime.

"Uh—" said Lena. She felt as empty as an abandoned shell; she didn't have the energy for singing. But Cole was the only person in the house she could bear to be around right now. "Sure." She snuggled up next to him on his bed. "
I can see clearly now the rain is gone,
" she sang softly.

Cole sighed and closed his eyes. When the song was over, he murmured sleepily, "Sing the blueberry one."

Smiling, Lena complied. When she had finished, Cole didn't move. She kissed his hair and whispered, "Sweet dreams, Cole Dog."

"I'm not a dog," he mumbled.

Lena's parents were hovering outside the bedroom when she emerged.

"Thanks, honey," said her mom.

"For what?"

"For singing to Cole."

"I don't do it to please you," snapped Lena. "I do it because I love him." She headed for her room, ignoring the shocked look on Allie's face.

"Lena," said her father.

"What," muttered Lena. She knew why she was angry with her dad—he had lied to her all her life. She wasn't sure why her anger was spilling over onto Allie. Maybe because Allie had known the truth all along, too. Anyway, she was sick of her parents right now. All she wanted to do was go back to her room and see if her mother was visible in the mirror.

"Where are you going?"

"My room. Where do you think? God! Just leave me alone!"

"Lena," he said again. "It will break your heart to keep looking into that mirror." He paused, trying to master the anguish that came into his face. "Believe me."

She went into her room and closed the door gently. Then she slid down the door and sank onto the carpet, weeping.

After a while, she made her way to her bedside table and grabbed some tissues, wiping her eyes and blowing her nose. Enough crying. Her mother was alive. Mermaid or not, she was
alive,
and Lena could see her.

She reached under her pillow for the mirror. She held it up and looked at her reflection for a long moment. As before, the image began to shimmer and dissolve. She waited impatiently to see her mother's face. First the scene was murky and dark, full of flitting shapes, then it lightened.

Lena studied the glass hungrily. She did not see her mother. The "memory circle," as her father had called it, had disbanded, although she thought she recognized some of the same mermaids and mermen from the circle, drifting in the currents. What was a memory circle? There were still so many questions!

Lena turned the mirror this way and that, eager to see her mother.

She watched the distant, blurry shapes of the mer-folk as they went about their activities. Some of them were playing what looked like musical instruments: carved ivory flutes and some kind of small harp, which Lena thought were called lyres. The base of the lyre was a large shallow shell, with fibrous strings stretched across it. Other mer-folk were gathered around a huge stone table. They seemed to be eating. Mer-folk children flitted here and there, some laughing and playing, others sitting with their heads together, as if telling stories. The tails of the mer-folk shimmered blue, green, gold, and silver. Their hair was every imaginable color, and their skin tone ranged from translucent parchment to polished ebony. They were arrayed in strands of pearls and shells and jewels. Lena felt as though she could gaze at them for hours.

But where was her mother?

She turned the mirror in her hands again. Was that her, drifting away from the group? Lena looked harder, and as before, the perspective of the mirror began to zoom in on the figure she watched. It
was
her mother.

Melusina swam into an underwater cave and lay on a bed of seaweed, uncoiling her tail to its full length. At first she lay silent, then Lena heard a low, sad song drifting out of the depths of the sea to the magic mirror, filling her ears again with that language she did not speak, yet could understand. Again, she heard words like "daughter," "heart," and "sleep."

As the scene in the mirror began to fade, Lena lay down with the mirror in her hands, and her mother's song lulled her to sleep.

***

Lena awoke in the middle of the night, the memory of her mother's song fading from her dreams.

Someone had come in to turn out her light and cover her with the sun-moon quilt. She sat up, looking for the mirror.

It wasn't on the bed.

Fear flooded Lena's senses. What if her dad had taken it away? What if he wouldn't give it back? Even though she didn't remember putting the mirror under her pillow before she fell asleep, she checked to make sure. Her fingers touched the coral comb, but no mirror.

She fumbled for the light on her bedside table, trying to calm down.
Maybe it just fell on the floor,
she thought.

The harsh glare lit up her room, and after her eyes adjusted, she saw the mirror on her desk. With a rush of relief so strong it made her dizzy, Lena hurried to pick it up. A note in her father's handwriting lay on her desk next to the mirror.

My sweet girl,

it read.

T
HIS
IS YOUR FAMILY, HERE IN THIS HOUSE, AND WE LOVE YOU. BUT I KNOW YOU MUST WANT VERY MUCH TO SEE YOUR MOTHER. IF YOU WILL BE PATIENT, AND TRUST ME, I WILL HELP YOU. THIS MIRROR IS NOT THE ANSWER. LOVE, DAD

Lena balled up the note.
Sure you'll help me,
she thought.
Sure I trust you.

She lifted the mirror to her face and waited impatiently for her reflection to dissolve. After a moment, darkness filled the mirror. Lena squinted; in it she saw not the fluidly drifting images of the undersea world but more of a deep gray mist. This was not the mermaid's home. The scene in the mirror was air, not liquid.

Lena listened intently, trying to figure out what she was seeing. Gradually, she heard the crash of waves on rocks and the muted sound of the foghorn. With a gasp, she realized that the sound of the foghorn coming from the mirror was echoing the call of the foghorn outside her window.

The gray mist lifted, and Lena could see a darkened figure on Shipwreck Rocks. It was Melusina, her face like a flash of moonlight in the blackness, her long hair dripping over her shoulders, her elegant tail curved around the rock upon which she sat ... the perfect embodiment of the mythical mermaid.

"Mama," whispered Lena.

Melusina sat very still, as if waiting. The cold did not seem to touch her.

As Lena watched, she saw Melusina open her lips and lift her head. Then Lena heard, within the mirror and within her own mind, the sound of singing. It was clear and sweet. First there were no words ... just the sound of a pure, inhuman voice full of longing and love. Then Lena heard that same strange language in her mind:

"
Come to me, child of land,
To the water and the sand;
Come away from wall and door
To the rocks upon the shore.
"

Lena's breath caught in her throat.
She's calling me.

For a single, swooning moment, Lena felt the summons of a mermaid. There could be no refusal, no denial.

Then it was her mother again, calling for her child.

Lena stared into the mirror, transfixed. When her song was finished, Melusina tilted her head, as if trying to recall something. Then she sang,

"
By the light
of the blueberry moon
we sang this song
in Lena's room...
"

Lena didn't know there were tears sliding down her cheeks until the scene in the mirror whirled away, leaving only her own face, wet and white. She grabbed her clothes and pulled them on. Then she put on her hoodie and zipped it up.

But the comb and the mirror wouldn't fit in her pockets. She tore off the hoodie and grabbed her jacket, sliding the comb and mirror into the deep pockets.

She opened her bedroom door.

The house was silent. She hurried downstairs, trying to be quiet, but adrenaline made her careless of the squeaks and creaks.

In the kitchen, she hesitated, wondering if she should leave a note on the message board.

No, she would be back before anyone woke up. Besides, what would she say?

Lena moved toward the sliding-glass door.

"Where are you going?" Allie's voice came from the corner.

Lena jumped and put her hand to her chest. "Oh, my God! You scared me to death!"

Allie didn't answer. There was a rustle from the shadows, and she stood up, holding a blanket around her. "What are you doing, Lena?"

"Taking a walk."

"No, you're not. You are not taking a walk at two in the morning."

"Yes, I am."

"Lena, I am very well aware that you have suffered a huge shock, and that your life is not the same as it was this morning. But whatever you may think you're doing, you are not leaving this house in the middle of the night. You're still my daughter."

"
Your
daughter?" Lena could not keep her voice down. "You lied to me, too! My mother is
not
dead—s he's alive! She's waiting for me at Shipwreck Rocks right now."

Allie stared at her. "Waiting for you?"

"Yes. I saw her in the mirror. I'm going to her, and you can't stop me!"

"Sweetie, wait. Don't ... it's not safe!"

"Leave me alone!" Lena wrenched open the sliding door and dashed out.

"Lena! At least wait for your father!"

Lena didn't answer, just rushed through the garden and out to the sidewalk. She could hear Allie screaming her dad's name. Lena broke into a run.

She flew down the street, past darkened homes, their occupants tucked up warmly in their beds. Tomorrow they would wake up, eat breakfast, do the dishes, watch TV ... go on with their cozy, normal lives. Lena felt a fleeting moment of hot jealousy—her life would never be normal again—then she was racing across the gravel parking lot and down the path through the long grasses.

When she reached the sand, she felt a surge of relief. This was her beach. She knew its landscape even with her eyes closed. Her father might chase her all the way to Magic's, but he was slower than she was.

Without stopping to take off her shoes, Lena ran to the edge of the ocean, where it would be easier to run on the packed sand.

But the tide was coming in, and the sand was wet and springy. It sucked at her shoes, slowing her down. She glanced back once but didn't see her father.

She kept running, and before long, Shipwreck Rocks loomed in the distance.

There was no one there.

A small sob came from Lena's throat.
She's there,
answered her mind calmly.
She's on the other side of the rocks, on the Magic side.

Lena stopped to catch her breath, bending over to put her hands on her knees. When she had rested for a minute, she turned to look back down the beach. Far behind her, running across the packed sand, was a figure that could only be her father.

Too slow,
she thought in triumph.

She straightened up and raced toward the rocks, where she knew her mother was waiting.

The moonlight lay on the water like a shining path to the edge of the world.

My mother's family is down there,
thought Lena.
Maybe they're down there right now, looking up at the moonlight on the water, just like I am. Am I sleepwalking? I must be awake ... I feel wind on my face and I hear waves crashing and I taste the salt spray.

She was closer to the rocks now, and she began to sob. Unable to wait any longer, she screamed, "Melusina! Melusina! Mama!"