Strands of Mermaid Hair
By 
Maria Rachel Hooley

Strands of Mermaid Hair
©2010 Maria Rachel Hooley
Smashwords Edition

Strands of Mermaid Hair
The sea was my first world, or so Orsino told me.  Yet, even as the smell of salt filled my lungs, and the cry of gulls flocking overhead broke into the soft crash of waves tumbling ashore, I couldn’t remember my first moment there.  Still I belonged.
When I was one or two, Orsino found me lying in the soft residue, peacefully sleeping.  He was a wealthy man and though he advertised my arrival upon his beach, offering a generous reward, no one came forward.  Rumors spread about me, calling me a witch's babe or a mermaid child who'd become an outcast because she'd grown legs under her fin.  To my face, the people said nothing.  

Thus orphaned, Orsino cared for me as his own child, the daughter his wife had left him without in her early death.  I am told he loved her greatly and that he still mourned her passing. But Orsino did have a son‑‑Orlando.  My earliest memories of him are rather vague and sketchy, probably due in a great part to his vast duties throughout his father’s kingdom which kept him abroad most of the year.  He usually returned in the summer.  Just as I knew Orsino was not my true father, I knew that Orlando was not my brother.  My heart knew that.  I always felt his love, and as I reached out to collect it from the air, as though it would get lost, I felt it change when locked away in my heart.
And I knew I should not love Orlando as a boy who would become a man.  I should love him as my brother.  But I could not help it.
In the shadows of summer, I watched him change from a small, slight boy with a shrill voice to a handsome, perfect gentleman with amber eyes and coal black hair.  Time transformed me, as well, into a tall, lanky woman with eyes the color of seafoam and coral-colored hair.
I spent most of my time dancing with the waves, feeling the strokes of water caressing my feet.  I liked the feel of sand pressed between my toes.  It was always there that Orlando first found me when he returned from his travels.
"You can't catch me, Alannah," Orlando said from behind. 

I turned to face him and saw the dark tunic that the wind pressed against his chest.  His eyes flashed defiantly at me, and his mouth curved into a grin.    The sword hung in the scabbard at his waist.  I studied the stray curl of hair that fell into his eyes and tried to remember what he had looked like a year ago when he had last visited, but I could not remember. 
Orlando was the chameleon in my heart, always changing, save for those feelings I harbored tightly within.  "I can, too," I managed.
The weakened timbre of my voice was lost as he darted away, only looking back to find I chased him.    As long as I ran, I felt as though I were flying, even though he maintained his lead with large, even strides.  He risked another backward glance and slowed his pace, allowing me to catch him.  At once I lunged for him, toppling us both to the sand.  Orlando rolled over and I quickly sat on top of him.  "There," I claimed, proudly.  "I did catch you."
Orlando laughed and lifted his head.  "Only because I allowed you to."
I pushed his forehead back until it pressed against the sand again.  "Think what you will!"  I looked down at the sheathed sword and touched the scabbard, tracing the designs in the leather.
"You like that?" he asked, his fingers following the path of mine.
"It’s okay," I replied, trying to sound indifferent.  "It's kind of pretty."

Orlando scooted me off him and scoffed, "Pretty?  This holds a weapon, Alannah."  He stood up.
I picked myself up from the beach and tried to pat the sand from my dress.  "So I noticed."  I watched him draw the blade from the scabbard, and the sunlight dancing off almost blinded me.  
He turned the handle toward me.  "Take it."
I laughed and stepped back.  "What would I do with it?"  I did want to hold it, partly to see what it felt like and partly to prove to him that I knew what a weapon was.
He stepped toward me and put it in my hand.  "You stare at it as though you wish to learn.  And father surely won't approve of it, so you'd better take advantage of this opportunity."
I looked at my white, gauze dress and shrugged away the responsibility of being a lady.  As my fingers wrapped around the hilt of the blade, Orlando released his grip and stepped to the side of me.  The point of the sword immediately thudded to the ground and I started to follow it.  The only thing which stopped me were Orlando's hands quickly wrapping around my waist.
I closed my eyes, trying to ignore the feel of his hands, but the sensation stayed.  "You didn't say it was so heavy," I complained.

"You didn't ask," he replied, adjusting my grip.  "Here, put your fingers there."  Once I lifted the blade, he stepped back.  "Move your feet a little farther apart."  He watched as I shifted my stance, and all the while he wore a bemused grin.
"You're enjoying this, aren't you?" I asked, pointing the sword vaguely in his direction.
"Of course.  And don't point a weapon at me unless you know how to use it."  His eyes darkened slightly, the brown rolling over the green flecks.  He clenched his jaw and the smile had vanished.  My breath caught and I realized that he was actually staring at my face as though seeing it for the first time.  His gaze settled on my mouth.  Embarrassed, I looked away toward the stallion tethered to a tree.
"Let's go for a ride," I suggested, nodding toward the animal.
"As you wish," Orlando replied.  As he reached to take the blade, his forefinger skimmed the top of my hand gently. 
Once unencumbered by the blade, I darted to the horse and untied the reins.  Orlando quickly sheathed his sword and followed me.  
As I leaned close to the animal, I felt his hands touch my waist again, brushing with quiet intensity.  Each finger gently rested against my gown, and I felt them all and could not make myself move away.   Ten points of heat that reminded me all too well of being a woman. "I'll lift you upon him," he said, drawing close to my back.  His every breath caressed my shoulder. I stood completely still, savoring the feel of this closeness before he hoisted me upon the saddle and then mounted behind.  He leaned so close that I could feel his chest at my back, and I knew that something was passing between us which went far beyond brother and sister. 
We were to have many of those days.  Those moments of barely touching yet feeling each other with our hands, our eyes.  No matter how either of us felt, we never allowed it to fully surface.  It was always disguised as the synchronized movements brothers and sisters make even long after they have left childhood behind.  But I knew better that I could never be his sister.  In vanity, I might say he loved me, but we were both afraid Orsino would never approve, not with my circumstances as they were.
Summers flew.  I grew and changed.  But never a day passed without the feelings of love growing.  He belonged in my heart.  He lived in my thoughts.  He roamed far away.

At least until his twenty‑fifth year.  I had turned twenty and I was rumored to be one of the most beautiful women in the kingdom, Orsino's treasured child.  There were many who sought me, yet I wanted the only one I was destined never to have.
And so it was that everything changed.  I was in the garden, watching Orlando from a distance.  He paced the stone path nervously, obviously waiting for someone.  I rose from the stone table and walked toward him.  Before I arrived, another woman came.  She was adorned in layers of blue silk that lovingly wrapped her petite frame.  Gold curls spilled from the top of her head and coyly wisped around her face.  She smiled at him and offered her hand.  Orlando bowed to her and kissed the top of her hand.
I held my breath.  My eyes saw my brother and the woman Orsino had chosen for him.  Although they walked together, his steps fell in a separate rhythm than hers, and I smiled, despite the growing pain.  I had never been out of rhythm with Orlando.  On the contrary, I had been too close.  He offered his arm and she wrapped hers about it.

Despite the obviously stiff movements on Orlando’s part, I saw something which left me cold and all the strokes of my hand against my arms could not warm my flesh.  I watched them stroll from the garden toward the beach, and then I watched no more.  Instead I sought refuge in my chambers, telling everyone I felt quite ill.
The next morning I rose early and managed to sneak a visit to see my father who sat at a large table, listening to Orlando and another captain disclose information about neighboring keeps that Orlando oversaw during his journeys.  “Baron Talleran sent many gifts to you,” Orlando said, not having seen me standing against the doorway.  “Not the least of which is his daughter, Alyssa’s future.”
Orsino nodded and smiled at me.  “That’s simple, Orlando.  You’ll marry the girl.  She’s everything you could wish for in a wife.”  He pointed at me.  “Feeling better, Alannah?”
A crimson shadow stole across Orlando’s face as he turned and spotted me.  He closed his eyes and shook his head.  His fingers gripped the edge of the table.  “Father—“
“I’ll make the announcement of your engagement next week.  Then the good Baron will see we have honored his wishes and he will continue to support the kingdom as he has always done.”  Orsino reached for me.  “That is why I have stayed king so long, Orlando.  I have tried hard to please those around me.  Just as you will.”
My feet froze and for just a moment, I found no words.  At least until I saw the memory of that blue silk dress from yesterday.  “Was she in the garden before?” I finally asked, my voice sounding strange even to my own ears.

Orsino nodded.  “Yes.”  He still reached for me, expecting me to walk toward them.  “Come sit with us for just a moment.”  I made my way to the table despite the fog swirling in my mind.  “Father?” I asked while sitting down.
“Yes?” he answered.  His fingers absently twisted his beard.  “Why should Orlando marry her if he does not love her?”
Orsino reached out and touched my hand.  Orlando closed his eyes and clenched his jaw.  I could read the frustrated lines, but I couldn’t tell if they were aimed at my questions or our father.  “Well, Alannah, sometimes love doesn’t last forever.  And a kingdom must.  Besides, he will grow to love her.”
“But—“
Orlando’s eyes shot open and he stood.  “As you wish, father.”  He reached out and touched Orsino’s arm before leaving.
My shoulders caved in from the sudden emptiness in the room.  Then I heard Orsino begin to speak again.  “Do not worry about Orlando.  He will marry and he will find love.  Just as you shall.”
I sat up straight and tall.  “I do not wish to marry!”
Orsino, too, stood.  “Yes, but you shall.  It is time.  Actually well past time.  Many men have asked to have you.  One soon shall.”
I stood and almost tripped over my chair.  “Alannah?” Orsino said.  “Are you feeling all right?”

I shook my head.  “No, father.  I still feel ill.”  I briskly walked from the room and exited the castle onto the beach.  Orlando walked barefoot in the sand just as I expected to find him.
I watched him toss shells back into the water and finally I said, “You cannot marry her.”
Orlando whirled about.  His hands looked restless without the shells that he’d been picking from the sand.  His white shirt was undone and the wind exposed his darkly tanned chest.  “I can,” he said slowly.  “I must.”
I walked to him and grabbed both of his wrists.  “No,” I said loudly, shaking my head.  “You don’t love her!”
Despite my words, he stared at a spot in the sand beyond my head.  “I will learn.”
I dropped his wrists and touched his face with both my hands.  “No.  There are places in your heart where only I have been.  She doesn’t belong there.  I do!”
“Don’t.”  Orlando grabbed my hands.  His eyes met mine and his breath came out in ragged gasps.  Despite his breathing, his body remained completely still and his back formed a wall.  “We do not exist, Alannah.   We cannot.”  

Days later, Orsino announced his son's betrothal, and he advertised of his beautiful daughter's need of a suitor at a party which I managed to escape by again feigning illness.  That night, as I lay in bed and felt the moon envelope me in its gossamer halo, I heard my chamber door crack open as someone stepped inside and then closed it.
I shut my eyes, faking sleep in case Orsino had come to check on me.  Instead, when the sheets rustled beside me, I spied  Orlando sitting on the bed.  His warm hand touched my cheek, running up to my forehead to check for a fever.  "Perhaps it is better that you missed the party, Alannah," he whispered.  "I, too, felt ill.  She will never be you, but I can love her if I must."  He said the words very quietly, as if he were attempting to convince himself that he really could love her.  "You have come into my life as a sister.  How would father accept more?"  He bent softly and kissed my forehead.  As he rose, I felt a small dash of tears kiss my face as they fell from his eyes.  "Sweet dreams, my love.  It is all we have."
Once he had departed and closed the door, I rose and climbed  down from the balcony onto the beach.  I stared at the water, watching the lazy waves darting toward me.    Each step brought me closer.  Soon it touched my knees.  Then my waist.  As the water reached my shoulders, I heard a distant cry from the shore. Orlando was waving his arms and running toward the water. 
“Alannah!” he screamed, his voice as loud as a clap of thunder.  “I’m coming, Alannah!”  He darted into the water, dashing toward me.

I half turned toward him, and, in moving, I felt the land slip away, plunging me into deep water.  My wet gown dragged me below.  The last thought I had was of Orlando's face, as I had seen it in the moonlight.

My body felt heavy when I woke and every breath blossomed with deeper pain.  It started in the center of my chest and radiated outward, stretching, reaching, encompassing.  I opened my eyes to a blurred world.  I reached to touch my eyes and brush the smudges away.  Then I realized I was submersed in the ocean.  
What had happened?
Then I remembered Orlando running toward me, his eyes squinted as he screamed my name.  His bare feet threw sand into the air with each frantic step.  His arms flung outward with his fingers groping the darkness like strands of my hair.  His white tunic blown taut against his chest and his black pants were rolled mid-calf level.  He kept screaming my name.
I clawed the water and jerked upward, wondering if I was dead.
No, a voice filled my mind.   You are not dead.  But you can’t reach him.  Hands touched my shoulders stopping me.

I can! I thought, breaking away.  I started to kick, but something felt strange.  My legs wouldn’t separate.  The blurriness eased and I looked down and found I had no legs. Only a long fin.
My whole body trembled as I stopped trying to swim to the surface. I still felt the hands resting on my shoulders, so I turned and looked, finding another mermaid.  Two others sat on rocks behind her.  They wore nothing from the waist up and the only difference between us was that instead of hair, sea leaves flowed from their heads.  Shocked, I patted my own scalp and felt the soft copper mane which I'd always had.  I was the only mermaid with human hair.
You do not belong there, a voice said.  She reached out and touched my face, gently as though tracing a pattern of grief on my skin.  You’ve never really belonged there.
My mouth dropped open and I inhaled sharply.  Each gulp of water hurt less than the last.  What do you mean?  I was human.  How could I not have belonged there?
She swayed the end of her fin absently. The Mermaid Queen found Orsino’s wife’s body after she had drown.  The Queen took the body to the shore so that it could be buried with mortals, but she also saw the King as he grieved.  Again the mermaid’s fin swayed.  Orsino wept, saying that if only he had a daughter, he could accept his wife’s death.  A daughter that would remind him of her.  The Mermaid Queen took pity on King Orsino and gave him the one thing he could not have--a daughter.  You.

“You are a child of the water,” Orsino had once said to me. Had he known? I wondered.  Then I thought of the prince and shook my head while pointing upward.  I have to go back.  Orlando is waiting for me.
The mermaid, touched my fin.  It is true that you have been changed by magic, Alannah.  You have been human once.  It cannot be done again.  Not by all the magic in the world.  The air would kill you.
I was not a mermaid.  I was not a human.  I was nothing, not even Orlando’s.  I clawed the water, trying to swim to the surface.  I had to see him, if only for a moment.  I had not asked for this second life underwater.  I had asked only for Orlando, and that had been denied.
Despite my struggles, they restrained me until I stopped struggling.  
He has seen you die once.  Would you allow him to suffer that again.  It will change nothing, a voice said, filling my head. 
One of them released her hold on my wrists and held out her hand, offering a small object.  When I opened my palm, she placed a small gold ring in my hand.  I stared at it through the watery haze, and then I knew why the ocean tasted of salt as the tears flowed from my eyes.

It was the ring Orlando would have given his betrothed.  He had given it to me.