“You should be afraid,” the Sea King says, but he licks his lips nervously. “Your sister has gone mad. The time with the humans has rotted her brain.” He picks up his trident. “We will retire to the kingdom, and leave her here.”
I can see Nia mouth, ten minutes, Gaia.
Why don’t we have a conversation about the humans, Father? Since you brought it up, after all. I lean forward against the railing, resting my chin on my closed fist, the very picture of nonchalance. I’m sure my sisters would love to hear all about them. One in particular. Alexander Carlisle.
“Girls.” He grabs Sophia and Cosima by the back of the neck, snarling at the others to follow him.
Not so fast. I narrow my eyes, feeling a ring of fire raze my pupils. My father jerks his hands away, steam rising from the palms in smoke rings. He douses them in the water, screeching with pain, and I cackle wildly. I sound like a witch, I realize.
“Who are you?” he says, staring at his singed hands.
I am Gaia, daughter of Muireann of the Green Sea. My voice is strong, and so loud. The louder I speak, the more unnerved Father becomes. Was that what he feared, all this time? That his daughters would raise their voices and refuse to be silenced? And I’m asking you to tell us what happened to our mother.
“Your mother was infatuated with the human world,” he recites the story that we all know so well. “She swam too close to the surface and she was caught. The humans took her and while I wanted to save her, I didn’t want to endanger—”
No. I am howling, voice cracking and splintering, the sky dimming even though the sun is climbing. I am making the darkness rain. I have the power. No. Tell us the truth.
“Muirgen,” he says. “Gaia, please.”
She was beautiful, wasn’t she? Muireann of the Green Sea. Beautiful but restless. Hungering for something more, something that she could not even name.
“She was unruly,” he says. “You have to understand that. She wouldn’t follow the rules. She was different to the rest of us.”
And what is wrong with being unruly? I look directly at Nia as I say this. Her eyes shine with unshed tears, and I know she understands what I am trying to tell her. What’s wrong with being different?
“I did it for her own good,” my father says. “For your own good. You needed a better example from your mother, you needed a role model who was pure. I did this for you. I did this for all of you.”
Shut up. I breathe out and a wind flares, blasting his beloved trident out of his hand. He tries to grasp at it, but I focus again, imagining a rope wrapping around his wrists. See how he likes being tied down. He cannot move. I will not allow him.
You killed our mother. The words split the sky apart, moulding into black clouds. No one says anything; my sisters are silent. Their faces are grey as if, on some level, they too knew this was the truth all along.
“Mama,” Talia says again and again, like a small child. “Mama.”
Ceto told me the truth. My eyes boring into his, and I am not afraid. You killed our mother.
“I didn’t—” the Sea King starts, but he can barely be heard over Talia’s weeping. “I wanted to protect you.” He looks at each of my sisters in turn, seeking support, before turning to Cosima. “My darling girl, you don’t believe this, do you?” She is uncertain, her eyes darting between me and our father. She doesn’t know what to believe.
You killed our mother, I say again.
And this time, my sisters swim away from the Sea King, leaving him alone. That was his greatest fear, of course. For who would the king be if he had no one to dominate? How could he stand tall if he did not have his daughters to look down on?
“No.” He tries to go towards them. I will him to stay still, whispering incantations in my mind. I don’t know how I know these spells; it is as if the words are carved within my soul. They had been there all along, waiting for me to find them.
The Sea King sinks, as if in quicksand. “Help me,” he splutters, spitting out water, and yet none of my sisters move. I imagine his gills closing, taped shut. He will know what it feels like to have your last breath robbed from him, just as my mother did. “No,” he says, gasping. “Muirgen. Muirgen, please don’t do this.”
Don’t call me that. My. Name. Is. GAIA.
A forked tongue of lighting, a serpent licking the sky. You will call me by my name, old man. You will do as I tell you to do, for once. The light plunges dark, the sun painted over. I will bend this world as I please, in ways you could only dream of.
“Zale will come,” the Sea King shouts, wrestling to keep his head above water. “No matter what you do to me, Zale will bring an army and fight this war. He will destroy you all.”
I know Zale will come. My mouth waters at the thought of it, of what I will do to him. What I will do to them all. And I will take care of him, Father; isn’t that what you always told me to do? Don’t you worry about Zale.
“You cannot do this.” He is crying now – my father, who told us that tears were a sign of weakness and should be avoided at all costs. “You are just girls.”
We might be girls, I say, lifting my hand so that he can see the Sea Witch’s blade. His head is bobbing up and down, his mouth forming the word “no” when he drops under the water, like a steel anchor has been tied around his tail. I swish the blade sideways and twist it, imagining a thick needle hovering above the Sea King’s face, cutting into his flesh and sewing his lips shut with black thread. Perhaps it is time for my father to experience what it is like to be silenced.
But us “girls” don’t have to do what you tell us any more.
My father falls down, down, down. His body will sink to the kingdom, like all the human men before him, eyes still open as if searching for something. He will search for eternity.
Sisters, I say. They are huddled together, pale with shock. I want you to remember always how powerful you are. Never allow anyone to take that away from you, or try and make you feel small. The kingdom needs you to be brave now. I look at Nia again, and I think of what Ceto told me. The kingdom needs you to be your true selves. And my sister smiles at me. Living true is the most important thing any woman can do.
“Why are you talking like this?” Sophia asks. “There is still time for you to use the blade as the Sea Witch instructed. Why do you sound as if you are saying goodbye?”
Because I am.
I slice the blade through the air, lifting the blanket of night and calling the day in. The sun continues to rise. It is always there, the sun, even when we cannot see it.
“Gaia!” I hear my sisters screaming as I raise the knife, asking the sky to bless it, to sanctify it for this unholy task. “Gaia, no! Please don’t do this.”
(Who are you? Ceto’s voice in my head. And more importantly, who will you be?)
I have a real choice, for the first time in my life. I can be whatever I want to be.
I will be a warrior, I decide, driving the knife through the air and aiming true at my heart, the searing pain muffling my sisters’ cries. (I love you, sisters. I love you all.) I will grow my nails to claws and shave my teeth to blades. I will flay the skin from the bones of men like my father. I will tear them apart and I will eat them raw. Oh, I will set them on fire and devour their ashes whole.
I will be Rusalka. I will have my vengeance.
Mother. Mother, can you hear me?
Acknowledgements:
I would like to thank Lauren Fortune for approaching me with the idea for The Surface Breaks, thus fulfilling a long-held dream of mine to reinterpret this story in a feminist capacity. Your enthusiasm, encouragement, and support made the entire process of writing and editing this novel such a joy. I’ve loved working with you.
I would also like to thank Genevieve Herr, David Levithan, Lorraine Keating, Róisín O’Shea, Eishar Brar, Andrew Biscomb and everyone at Scholastic for working so hard on this book.
Thank you to my wonderful parents, as ever, and my sister, Michelle.
Thank you
to my agent, Rachel Conway, and to Teresa Coyne for sending me incredibly helpful essays on merfolk mythology and fairytales.
Thanks to my friends and extended family, whose patience with me while I wrote this novel was extraordinary. Special thanks to Grace O’Sullivan, whose lovely name I stole for my mermaid.
Bibliography
The Witch Must Die by Sheldon Cashdan
From the Beast to the Blonde by Marina Warner
Don’t Bet on the Prince, edited by Jack Zipes
The Classic Fairy Tales, edited by Maria Tatar
Mermaids – the Myths, Legends, and Lore by Skye Alexander
Among the Mermaids by Varla Ventura
Mermaids 101 by Doreen Virtue
Scholastic Children’s Books
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First published in the UK by Scholastic Ltd, 2018
This electronic edition published by Scholastic Ltd, 2018
Text copyright © Louise O’Neill, 2018
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eISBN978 1407 18627 6
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Louise O'Neill, The Surface Breaks
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