The Merman's Children

by Poul Anderson

  “Are they piousT’ Margrete asked.

  “The bishop picked them, didn’t her’

  The girl sat mute for a spell, in the blustery day. “I had some forewarning of this,” she said finally, staring at the flagstones.

  “Mother Ellin was hard set ~gainst it-“

  “Are you happy hereT’ Ingeborg inquired.

  “What has become of. . . Tauno and Eyjan?’

  Margrete did not see the pain that crossed the others. “We

  know not,” said Niels. “Since more than a year.”

  Ingeborg laid an arm around the girl. “Are you happy here?’ she repeated. “If you truly are, why, stay. You can deed your legacy to the convent, or do whatever else you want with it. We came just to give you your freedom, darling.”

  Margrete drew a sharp breath. Her fingers clung to her knees.

  “The sisters. . . are . .. . kind. I. . . am learning things-“

  Ingeborg nodded. “But you share Tauno’s blood.”

  “I ought to stay. Mother Ellin says I ought!”

  “Those who rank her say you needn’t,” Niels reminded.

  “Oh, I would like children-“ The slight form bent over in

  weeping.

  Ingeborg sought to embrace her. Margrete pulled away, rose, retreated to a pillar and hugged that while the sobs racked her. Man and woman waited.

  Presently, still hiccoughing but with calm welling up from within, the maiden turned around to them and said:

  “Yes, I must pray for guidance, but I do think I’ll go. Best it not be with you, though. Could you get me a different escort for, oh, next week?”

  “We can abide that long in Viborg,” Niels offered.

  Margrete stood stiffly before them and forced the words forth:

  “No, please not. I should see you two no more than needful, ever. For I am a living sign of God’s grace, and you-I’ve heard about your ways—oh, do mend them, do marry! Shun those halflings, too, for your salvation’s sake, unless you can get them to take baptism. But I don’t suppose you can, and-yes, they were very good to me, I’ll pray for them if the priest says I may-but impurity and soulless things out of heathendom are not for Chris-tian people to consort with, are they?”

  BOOK 4

  VILJA

  I

  PANIGPAK said it was necessary to wail until snow had fallen and igloos could be built. That time soon came. For three days and the three nights in which they were but a glimmer, the angakok fasted. Thereafter he went alone into the mountains while men made a house of a size that would hold everybody. They lined it with tent hides, but over a ledge opposite the doorway they laid a bearskin.

  hen folk were gathered there after dark, Panigpak’s name was called thrice before he entered. “Why are you here?” he said. “This person cannot help you. I am only an old fool and liar. Well, if you will have it so, I will try to bamboozle you with my silly little tricks.”

  He went to the ledge and stripped himself naked. The others already were unclad to the waist, or altogether, for the heat in the igloo was stifling. Lamps made sweat sheen, eyes glisten; the sound of breath was like surf. He sat down, and a man called Ulugatok bound his arms and legs with thongs that cut into the flesh. Panigpak gasped for pain but otherwise uttered naught.

  The helper laid a drum and a dried sealskin nearby, before he joined the crowdedness on the floor. “Put out the lamps,” he said. “Stay where you are, whatever happens. To go to him now is dpath.”

  Blackness rolled in, save for one tiny flame which did not make the angakok visible.. He began to sing, a high-pitched rhythmic chant, louder and louder. The drum beat, the dry skin rattled, sounds which came from elsewhere in the murk, some-times here, sometimes there, sometimes overhead, sometimes below ground. Slowly the people started singing with him. It came to possess them, they lost themselves in it, swayed back and forth, writhed across each other, spoke in tongues, howled and screamed. The madness gripped Tauno and Eyjan as well, until even with Faerie sight they did not know when or how Panigpak departed.

  He was gone. The song quavered onward, endless as winter night. The Inuit were beside themselves, out of themselves.

  Now, said their belief, the angakok swam downward through the rock to the underworld, and out below the waters. He passed the country of the dead; he passed an abyss where whirled eternally a disc of ice and boiled a cauldron full of seals; he got by a guardian dog, greater than a bear, which bayed and snapped at him; he crossed a bottomless chasm on a bridge that was a knife blade; and thus at last he came before huge, one-eyed, hostile Sedna, whom some call the Mother of the Sea.

  It was as if time had gone on to Doomsday F.ve when finally Ulugatok called, “Quiet! Quiet! The shadow ripens.” He dared not give aught its true name here-a man must be a shadow, his approach must be its ripening-lest the spirits hear and strike. He quenched the single flame, for it would kill Panigpak did anyone see the angakok before he had put his skin back on, that he left behind when he went below.

  Utter lightlessness brought a sense of spinning, falling, rushing helpless on a stormwind whose noise echoed off unseen heaven. Then the drum began anew, and the crackling sealskin. Ulugatok droned forth a long magical chant in words that nobody else knew. Perhaps its chief purpose was to bring calm. He did not stop until the only sound was the crying of frightened children.

  Panigpak’s voice came weary: “Two of us must die this winter. But we will find abundance of meat, the fish will swarm, spring and summer will be mild, the Neighbors will go away. I have also word for our guests, but must speak to them later, alone. It is done.”

  A man groped through the dark, sought a nearby hut for fire, returned and kindled the lamps. Panigpak sat on the ledge, bound by the thongs. Ulugatok went to release him. He fell back and lay swooned for a while. When he opened his eyes, he saw Tauno and Eyjan among those beside him. He tried feebly to smile. “It was nothing,” he muttered. “Just lies and tomfoolery. I am an old swindler, and no wisdom is in me.”

  The Inuit did not talk about such things once they had hap-pened. It was with diffidence that Panigpak himself sought out the siblings, after he had had rest and nourishment. The three went off to the strand.

  That was in weather clear and cold. After a glance at the world, the sun was slipping back down, afar in the south. Its rays made steely and blue the forms of two icebergs which plowed by through gray waters. Sheet ice was forming along the coast, though as yet too thin to venture forth upon. Fulmars went skimming above; their cries came faintly to those who stood on the snow-covered shingle.

  “Nothing in the sea is hidden from her beneath it,” Panigpak said, more gravely than was his wont. “Well did she know of your people, Tauno and Eyjan. Somebody had to compel her to disgorge a word, as he must compel her-if he can-to release the seals in a season when they are few for our hunting. She is not friendly, Sedna.”

  Tauno clasped the angakok’s shoulder. Silence lengthened.

  Eyjan lost patience, tossed her ruddy locks, and demanded,

  “Well, where are they?”

  Wrinkles tightened in Panigpak’s face. He stared outward and said low, “It is hard to understand. Something has happened that vexes even her. You must help this lackwit speak, for you will grasp much that he cannot. Thus, while dry land is beyond Sedna’s ken, she does have names for many parts along the coasts. She got them from drowned sailors, I think. I remember the sound of them-one does not forget anything out of that place-but they mean nothing to my ignorant self, though doubtless they will to you.”

  Given what he related, his interrogators could piece together much of the tale. The Liri folk had taken a ship, belike seized by them, from Norway. They were bound for Markland or Vinland-the Norse hereabouts no longer knew just which of the regions west of them lay where-when a tempest smote. That must have been the same whose edge battered Herning. The other vessel suffered its full might and. duration. She was driven clear back to Europe. From their father’s teaching,
Tauno and Eyjan were suf-ficiently well versed in that geography to recognize that he had then steered into the Mediterranean. The spot where he ended his voyage was in no part of their information, but Panigpak did give them names—the island of Zlarin, the mainland of Dalmatia-which they could inquire about later. It seemed the merfolk had there been attacked, and had fled afoot.

  What followed was perturbing, baffling. They must be in the same vicinity, those who lived, for they still appeared offshore: one or a few at a time, for short spans. Otherwise Sedna marked them no longer. And something had changed them, they were different from erstwhile, in a way she could not speak of but which filled her, the very Mother of the Sea, with foreboding.

  · Tauno scowled. “III is this,” he said.

  “Maybe not,” Eyjan replied. “Maybe they’ve found a charm that lets them enjoy a new home inland.”

  “We must seek them out and learn. We’ll need human help for that.”

  “Aye. Well, we were going to Denmark anyhow, on Yria’s account.”

  Panigpak studied the twain with eyes that had seen a lifetime’s worth of grief. “Perhaps,” he said quietly, “someone can give you a little help of another sort.”

  On a calm night, stars filled the jet bowl above until it was well-nigh hidden, save for the silver band across it. Their light, cast back off snow, let Bengta Haakonsdatter, who was now Atitak, walk easily along a slope above the dale. Breath wafted white as she spoke, though it did not frost the wolfskin fur of her parka hood. Footfalls crunched; else her voice alone broke the silence.

  “Must you leave this soon? We would be happy to keep you among us—and not really because of the fish and seal you take in such plenty. Because of yourselves.”

  Beside her, Tauno sighed: “We’ve kindred of our own yonder, who may be in sore plight, and whom we miss. In spite of the kayaks promised us—they should indeed let us travel faster than by swimming-the journey will take weeks upon weeks. We must hunt along the way, remember, and sleep, and often buck foul winds. We’re well rested, after the tupilak business. Truth to tell, we’ve lingered more time by far than was needful. Soon the Inuit will be rambling about. If we went along, we could hardly start home before spring.”

  The woman gazed at his starlit nakedness, took his hand in her glove, and dared ask, “Why have you stayed at all, then? Eyjan is restless, I know. It’s been you who counseled waiting.”

  He stopped; she did; he faced her, reached into the hood to stroke her cheek, and answered, “B~cause of you, Bengta.” He had been living as part of Minik’s household, and Minik was glad to lend her to him. They were only apart when it seemed, mutely, that she should join her husband for a sleep, and Tauno the first wife Kuyapikasit, lest feelings be hurt. (Eyjan bore herself not like a female, but like a hunter who shifted from family to family as the whim took her. She had enjoyed every man in the camp.)

  Bengta stood quiescent. He could barely hear her: “Yes, it’s been wonderful. If you must go, will you return afterward?”

  He shook his head. “I fear not.”

  Hers drooped. “Your merman heart-“ She looked up again.

  “But what about me has kept you? That I seem more like a woman

  of your race than any Inuk does? Well, Europe is full of white

  women.” I

  “Few so fair, Bengta.”

  “I think I know the reason,” she began, “though maybe you

  don’t yourself-“ and broke off.

  “What?”

  She bit her lip. “Nothing. I misspoke me.” She started down-

  hill. “Come, let’s go back, let’s seek the ledge.”

  The snow cried out under their scarring feet. “What did you mean?” he said roughly.

  “Nothing, nothing!”

  He took her elbow. Through fur and leather she felt that grip,

  and winced. “Tell me.” She saw his mouth stretched wide, till teeth gleamed under the stars.

  “I thought,” she blurted, “I thought I’m the nearest thing you have to Eyjan. . . and it will be a long journey with none save her- Forgive me, Tauno, beloved. Of course I was wrong.”

  His countenance grew blank, his tone flat. “Why, there’s naught to forgive. What affront in your fancy, to a being that has no soul?”

  Abruptly he halted again, drew her around before him smiled, and kissed her with immense tenderness.

  · On the furs of their ledge, in the darkness of the hut, she whispered, “Let the seed in my womb be yours. It could be; I’ve counted. Minik is a dear man and I want his children too, but may his gods give me that much remembrance of my Tauno.”

  Day had become a fugitive, scarcely into sight before darkness hounded it away. Night was no blindfold to Faerie eyes, but the siblings departed under the sun because then the Inuit could more easily bid them farewell.

  The whole band was there, as far out on the ice as appeared safe. Land was white at their backs, save where a cliff or crag upheaved itself. Ahead reached the sea, grizzly, choppy, and noisy. Clouds blew low on a wind that stung.

  Panigpak trod forth from the gathering, to where brother and sister waited. In his hand was a bone disc, slightly inward-curving, hung on a loop of sealskin that went through a hole near the edge. It spanned perhaps an inch-and-a-half.

  “Vastly have you aided us,” he told them. “Tauno destroyed the tupilak that this person’s folly brought forth. Thus he won the awe of our enemies, and we have peace. Eyjan,”-he shook his gray head, chuckled, blinked hard-“Eyjan, when I am too old to be of any use, and go forth to sit on the ice alone, your memory is what will warm me.”

  “Oh, you’ve returned whatever we did in heaped-up measure,” Tauno said, while his sister brushed lips across the angakok’s brow. She had told her brother that he was not strong to be with, but he was sweet.

  “One does not count between friends,” Panigpak reminded. Had he never dealt with the Norse, he would not have know what to say. “Somebody would fain make a parting gift.”

  He handed over the disc, which Tauno laid in his palm and

  considered. Graven in the hollow and blackened to stand forth against its yellowish white were signs: a bird with dark head and crooked beak winging before a crescent moon. Eeriness thrilled through him as he felt an enchantment cool inside.

  “You will be seeking strange lands,” Panigpak said. “Their dwellers may speak tongues unknown to you. Whoever wears this amulet will understand whatever is heard, and can reply in the same tongue.”

  Eyjan touched fingertips to it. “With such things, care is ever needful,” she murmured. “Your spells are not like ours. What should we know about it?”

  “It is a deep magic,” the angakok told them as softly. “To make it taxed somebody’s poor powers to the uttermost. I must begin by opening my father’s cairn to,take a piece of his skull-oh, he is not angry; he feels dim pleasure among the shades because he could help. . . .

  “The amulet links spirit to spirit. Beware of gazing long upon the sigil-yes, best wear it under clothing, or with the blank side outward-for a soul can be drawn in if it feels any wish to leave the world, and that is death.” He paused. “Should this happen, the trapped ghost can come out again, into whoever wears the amulet, if that person desires. But who might want to become half a stranger?”

  Tauno hastily closed his hand on the thing.

  Eyjan’s fingers plucked his open. She hung it around her neck

  in the way Panigpak had advised. “Thank you,” she said, a bit unsteadily.

  “It is nothing,” he answered. “It is only what an old fool can offer.”

  When a few more words had passed, and the last embraces, the merman’s children took up their kayaks and walked outward. The ice broke under them, making a floe from which they lowered the boats. They got in, laced their coats fast, untied the paddles. With a wave and shout, they swung southward. The Inuit and Bengta watched until they were gone out of seeing.

  II

  ONCE while homeb
ound, Tauno encountered a pod of Greenland whale on their way around the brow of the world, and heard their route song. Few merfolk had ever done that, for the lords of the great waters rarely came nigh land-and who would seek them out, what would he say to them in their majesty?

  Tauno was hunting. Eyjan was elsewhere, towing his sealed Ikayak behind hers. They did this by turns, lest the craft, untended, drift unfindably far off course. When they eased cramped limbs with a frolic in the waves, they took care to stay close by; when they slept afloat, they tethered hulls and themselves together. It was troublesome, and certainly they could have hunted better as a team, but on the whole they were traveling faster and easier than Iif they had swum.

  He had gone under, in hopes of a large fish. Lesser ones were hardly worth the killing to be the fuel bodies needed for warmth and work. Thus sound reached him far more readily than through air, and toned in thews, blood, bone as well as in ears. Through chill, sliding gray-green came a throb. Faint at flTSt, it made him veer in its direction. He continued after he knew what stroked and clove so resistlessly, for the passage would alarm many creatures and he could well seize prey among them. Then the whales began to sing.

  Almost helpless, Tauno went on, mile after mile farther than he had intended, until at last he saw them—their backs that rose like skerries, their bellies and enormous, feeding mouths down below, each fin more big than a man, flukes raising swells and currents as they drove, steadily onward, forms which outbulked most ships. The slow thunder of that hundredfold movement rolled as a part of the music, which boomed and trilled, dived and soared through ranges no human could have heard. The song took him from within, made a vessel of him for itself, for its might and mystery.

  He knew little of the language, and Eyjan had the sigil. None of his father’s breed were much wiser, because it was not a speech remotely akin to any humankind or Faerie. The sounds were not words but structures or events, each as full of meanings-none altogether utterable-as a library of books, or as a life looked back upon when death draws near. Tauno bore in his mind a double heritage, and he was a poet. Afterward he recreated a fragment of what he had heard. But he knew, with longing, that what he then had was the merest shard, chance-splintered off a whole to whose shape and purpose it gave never a clue.