Adrift: A Little Mermaid Retelling

6: Daniel

My father died that first autumn in Master Allore's service. Of all the godsforsaken things that could have killed him in the colonies, it was a bite from one of the tiny, flying pests that plague the place.

Had I seen it, I could have stunned the insect with a wave, pushed it with a breath, crushed it into a smear with a pinch—but I didn't, and he died. The bite was on his neck, swollen and red with his worrying and itching at it. He cut it with his razor while shaving one day, and it festered. That little wound gave birth to the infection that killed him.

So Rog Serran, the man who'd been crushed by an ox-cart and weakened by yellow-cheek fever, who'd been crippled by his misfortune, was killed by a fly half the length of an eyelash. And I was left behind.

I owe my placement to Sybill, the old housekeeper. She was ancient enough to have been Master Allore's wet nurse, I thought; she had come with him from Oranslan. Although I did not think she had any of her own, she had a soft spot for children. She convinced the master that I'd do better in the house than fatherless in the fields. Besides, there was work she was finally growing too frail to do herself.

So, hardly had Father's bones been laid in the earth and the prayers been said than I was at work in the manor. By night I slept on a cot in the kitchen, for Sorla went down to her husband's cabin at dusk. The work varied less by the season at the house than it did in the field. There was hauling wood, carrying water, washing dishes, scrubbing floors, shining shoes ... It all kept me busy. They called me the "cook's boy," although that wasn't true. I was Sybill's pet. But I helped Sorla, stoking the fire and chopping the vegetables, so she tolerated me.

One of my first tasks in the house was to heat water for Mistress Allore's bath. I took the stairs carefully so as not to spill any of the hot water—at least, not on anything but me.

When I finally made it, Mistress Allore opened her door to me in all her splendor. I had just seen my eleventh summer, two or three years away yet from that age when a young man truly sees a woman. Even still, I was struck dumb again by the sight of her. Her hair, all spun gold and flowing down over her shoulders, made me blush. In the murky light of the dark hall I could not see the color of her eyes, but I remember trying, although I knew from staring at her in the Week's Meet that they were the same color as Agnes's—seawater green.

The light of the candles filtered through her diaphanous gown and silhouetted her long legs. I felt like a supplicant—weak and in need. It was like seeing an angel.

Mistress Allore did not speak. She just made a tired gesture. I hastened to carry the water to her tub. Downstairs, Sorla was already heating more. In total, I repeated the torturous ritual thrice, each time taken nearly anew by the sight of her.

She did not wait for me to close the door behind me that last time before untying the neck of her gown, and I turned my face away with heat in my cheeks, closing the door upon the sight of one smooth ivory shoulder.

The next time I saw the lady was in the kitchens.

Agnes had crept up to talk to me as I scrubbed the floors. I had only been living in the house for a few days, and I was still knee-deep in grief over my dead father. Alone in the world in a house full of strangers, I was not in a talkative mood.

She hovered a few paces away from me, watching me as if I were an interesting creature she had never seen.

"Is it hard?" she asked.

I was not so young or backward that I didn't feel bitter at that. Agnes wouldn't know. I didn't know her well then, but I knew she spent her days with tutors, reciting poetry and playing music. I had heard her harp now and then while I was at my work. It was a glorious thing, listening to her. But that she should have leisure to make beauty and I hardly have time to take care of the dirt on the floor seemed unfair.