Scales and Pearls

It’s the perfect night for a story.

Even the rowdy winter ocean seems to hush itself. To crowd the shore in silent, rilling wavelets that tumble toward the high water mark as if stealing close to listen.

Darkness, deep as cuttlefish ink, hangs in the air. Everywhere but the cottage on the shoreline; glowing like the heart of a candle flame. Like the eyes of the children who beg a favourite story from their grandfather one more time.

-----

Sky and sea turn on each other like grey wolves over a bone. The men of the trading ship Oyster see it coming and know there’s no safe harbour. The ship’s small lifeboat cannot carry them all. And so, if they’re to die today, they will do it together.

The Sailor would be among them had a splinter of the fore bow not smashed him across the face, flinging him overboard. As it is, he loses his teeth and not his life. For he lands in the lifeboat; torn loose from its rigging against the hull.

There he lies as the storm rages itself to peace.

And there she finds him.

-----

All the Sailor knows of not being alone is a cool shadow across his face. He can’t open his eyes. When he tries to speak the pain is a hurricane in his head, tearing him from himself.

“Rest,” says a voice, as the black tide of sleep rises, “you are safe.” Such a voice, he has time to think, lovelier than music.

Something chill and damp lifts from his eyes.

“Can you open them now?”

He can. He does.

The scales she plucks from her tail are the colour of midsummer seas. When she grinds them between her palms, the powder they make could be diamond dust.

She bites a piece from the ribbon of seaweed that soothed his eyes, and chews it to pulp. In the bowl of her palm, she mixes the pulp with the powder of her scales and applies the medicine to his jaw. Her fingers are gentle, the medicine cold and tasting of the sea.

The Sailor’s pain sinks like low tide, taking him with it.

-----

He wakes to singing, and the sea maid guiding his boat through the water.

He cannot move, only watch the wandering clouds and wish everything could be still. The sky, the waves. The spinning in his head. He almost laughs. At himself, at the restless wanderer he was. He thinks of deep ocean, the great calm of vast whales and slow-dancing manta rays. Longing pierces him like a harpoon through the chest.

A wave slaps the boat and his head lurches, upending his thoughts. Black memories rise from his depths; the splintering and smashing of ship and shipmates. Fear thick in the air, stronger even than the scent of lightning.

He reaches for the gunwale of the boat, desperate for the feel of something solid. Beneath his fingers, smooth paint breaches the rough touch of bare wood. Letters; a name. The ship to which this lifeboat once belonged. Oyster. He traces it. He remembers he’s alive.

When he sleeps again, he dreams of glimmering scales and the flick of a tail beneath crystal waves.

-----

The Sailor sits up without thinking but strong hands are ready as his head reels. He blinks. At the seal skins beneath him, at the lifeboat beached on its side as a shelter. At the human form of the maid beside him. He searches her face, only breathing easy when he finds her eyes. Sea glass held to the sun.

Time passes as the sea maid cares for him. She feeds him seal milk and shellfish broth from a clamshell cup. She returns to the sea, and her mermaid’s shape, to forage for things they need. But always she comes back.

Before leaving the ocean to take her human form she plucks new scales from her tail, and each night repeats the ritual of applying medicine to his face. When the Sailor sees the growing slash of raw, translucent skin he tries to stay her hand. The sea maid only shakes her head.

She begins collecting pearls, though the Sailor doesn’t know why.

And, always, she sings.

Long before he’s healed, the Sailor loses his heart to the sea maid. Though perhaps he doesn’t notice its absence immediately. It hasn’t gone far after all.

-----

When the Sailor can move his jaw without pain, the sea maid hands him a gift. A driftwood box. Inside, a set of false teeth. Each tooth crafted from flawless white pearl.

She gives him back his voice. But all he can think to do with it is ask the question that’s raged a storm in him.

“How can I thank you?”

He cannot know the press of his hands around hers and the glow in his eye speaks more to her than his healed mouth.

“The sea has always given me what I need,” she says. “When I was hungry, she fed me. When I needed rest, she sheltered me. When I was lonely, a strange shadow passed over me. I looked to the surface, and there you were; a gift from the sea.”

She raises his hands, their fingers entwined, and drops a kiss to his weathered sailor’s knuckles.

“You are whole again. That is the thanks I need.”

From that day, the knot of their joined hands has never been untied.

-----

“Now, little fishes, to bed. Your grandmother will be back soon, and you know there’s no goodnight kisses unless you’re tucked in.” Grandfather smiles, teeth gleaming in the fireside glow.

The two oldest take their grandfather’s hands and help him to his feet. The youngest wraps her arms around his waist.

“Thank you for telling it, Gampa.”

“You’re welcome, little one,” he says. “Remember, touch the mantle for good dreams.”

Her oldest brother hoists her so she can kiss her fingers and press them to the mantelpiece over the fire. Beneath her fingertips, weathered by time and touch, the word Oyster can still be read. One by one, the grandchildren wish Grandfather goodnight, kiss their fingers to the mantle, and disappear into the darkened house.

Alone, he turns to the window.

In the moonlight, a figure casts a shadow behind her on the sea. As she walks up the beach, Grandfather opens the door. She steps inside. Looks at him. Eyes like sea glass held to the sun.

“Welcome home, my heart.”

“I can always hear when you’re telling our story.” She raises a hand, tracing the scars that feather her husband’s jaw. Follows the touch with a gentle kiss. His hand falls to a long scar on her thigh, faded with years to the shine of old pearls.

To her alone he tells the end of the story.

-----

The man is no longer a Sailor. For while he lives always by the sea, he never ventures onto it again. He takes other names instead. Husband. Father. Grandfather. And loves each one more than the last.