by Janis Mackay
Aquella stared at her hands. She twisted her fingers together. Of course, there were things she could report. Like how her brother Ronan had won the selkie race to Stroma, and how just last week her grandmother Miranda had saved a stranded tourist, and how there were more storms than usual. And how selkies in the bay were already preparing for the summer solstice celebrations.
“I’m waiting…” Mr Sargent drummed his fingers on his desk. Tarkin coughed to get her attention. He’d already scribbled something about revolution in the Middle East on to a scrap of paper. It was now being passed under desks towards Aquella. “…and still waiting.”
Aquella opened her mouth. She tried very hard to think of something. The sudden change in the weather perhaps? “Um…”
The door handle turned. News was suddenly forgotten. Everyone turned sharply to see a very wet Magnus Fin standing dripping in the doorway.
“Hi,” he said, “um… sorry I’m late.” Fin stepped into the class. A gasp like a gust of wind ran round the room. Everyone stared, open mouthed, at Magnus Fin’s hand. He felt fifty eyes on him. The staring eyes burned him as much as the pain. He looked down. Part of his hand had turned a strange dark purple colour. It looked hideous.
“What the blazes?” shouted Mr Sargent, striding down the aisle of desks. Reaching Fin, he bent forward and stared at his hand. “Is this some kind of a joke?”
Fin’s eyes fell to his aching hand, which Mr Sargent was gaping at. Fin sucked in his breath. He couldn’t believe what he saw. Where he had cut himself the human skin had peeled off, revealing dark seal skin underneath. Fin pulled his hand away and hid it behind his back. Tears stung his eyes.
“I – must have – touched – um, something ’lergic.” His voice wobbled. What was happening to him? What was happening to his hand? He shouldn’t have come to school. He wanted to turn and run, but Mr Sargent had a hold of his wet sleeve.
“Allergic you mean. Well, that’s what you get for messing around down at the beach.” Mr Sargent frowned. He examined the hand closer. He stared at Magnus Fin. He gaped again at the hand – the hand where an inch of dark seal skin had broken through! Gasping, Mr Sargent let the strange hand drop. He took a step back, flashing a fearful look at Magnus Fin.
“Ambulance!” he shouted. “Sophie! Quick! Run to the office. Ask Mrs Calder to phone for an ambulance. This instant!”
Sophie stopped sniffing and ran, circling Magnus Fin as though she might catch a horrible disease.
“No!” Fin blurted out after her. “No – stop.” He plunged his hand into his trouser pocket. At the same time Mr Sargent grabbed hold of Fin’s arm. “Please don’t do that.”
Tarkin and Aquella shot to their feet and called out, “No! Come back!” But Sophie was gone, slamming the door behind her.
Fin wrenched away from Mr Sargent’s grip and stumbled for the door. With his good hand he yanked at the door handle.
“What do you mean – no?” Mr Sargent roared. “It’s infected. I’ve never seen anything like it. You have to go to hospital.”
But Fin shook his head. Salt water flicked into the teacher’s face. Aquella was beside her cousin in an instant. Fin tugged the door open and ran. Aquella followed.
Spluttering, Mr Sargent wiped the water from his eyes. “Come back here,” he bellowed. “You must go to hospital. Do you hear me?”
“But they can’t. You don’t understand. They can’t go to a hospital,” said Tarkin, then he too ran out of the classroom and sped after Fin and Aquella.
“They?” Mr Sargent shouted after him. “What do you mean – they?” He shook his head, stared for a moment at the retreating figures of Tarkin and Aquella, then ordered the rest of the class back to their seats. He groaned and glanced out of the window. Already he could see the flashing blue light of the ambulance in the distance.
Five minutes later Mr Sargent muttered his excuses to the paramedic. He was sorry – terribly sorry – after all it seemed to have been a false alarm. “The injured boy,” he explained, “has gone!”
Chapter 4
No one likes to be made a fool of, least of all Mr Sargent. He was a great supporter of the emergency services and often went on about how anyone calling them out on false alarms should be made to pay. Now he sat at his desk in a mood. He had lost three children and it was only half past nine! He set the remaining children a very difficult long-division sum while he sucked on a barley sugar and tried to make sense of what had just happened.
What, he wondered, did Tarkin mean exactly by they couldn’t go to a hospital. Just who were they? Unusual children were all very well. It didn’t matter where they came from, what they looked like, what their parents did and didn’t do. As far as Mr Sargent was concerned they were all children who would benefit greatly from school.
He chewed the end of his pen, and considered. There was unusual, and there was very unusual. And let’s face it, he mused, there was something very unusual about Magnus Fin. Mr Sargent twiddled the ends of his moustache. Thinking of the dark skin he’d glimpsed, he frowned. Unless his mind was playing tricks he had seen thick hairs sprouting from that leathery skin, hadn’t he? How odd! How very – he unwrapped another sweet – very odd!
And what did Magnus Fin fear in going to hospital? The teacher sucked noisily on the sweet, forgetting his class. Maybe they had strong religious beliefs? Or maybe it was something else? What about his eyes? Yes, his eyes were – not quite human. He unwrapped another barley sugar. Maybe that boy had something he was ashamed of? Something hospitals might discover. Mr Sargent was excited now. He’d make a few enquiries. Ask around. A teacher, after all, has a right to know just who he is teaching.
“Can’t do it, Mr Sargent.”
The teacher looked up and seemed surprised to see a class of children sitting in front of him. “Can’t do what?”
“The sum,” said Leo, who was usually good at long division.
“Aha! The sum,” sang Mr Sargent, rising to his feet and switching from detective to teacher in an instant. “Do it for homework then. It’s a tricky one, that one. Anyway,” he smiled down on them all, “back to the news.” He scanned the class then fixed his eyes upon little Ellie Manson in the second row. “Ellie, tell us, what’s in the news?”
Ellie didn’t hesitate. She had read three whole newspapers. She had sat through the Six O’clock News. She knew it all.
Except Mr Sargent wasn’t listening. He’d had his suspicions about Magnus Fin and his underwater extraordinary abilities. And then there was that cousin of his; a lovely girl certainly, but always with that strange faraway gaze in her eyes. And weren’t they rather round, and large, those eyes of hers? Then there was her singing voice. It would bring a tear to a grown man’s eye. And there was that strange, rolling way she had of walking. And to think of both of them, living way down in that little cottage by the sea with no neighbours, well, that wasn’t normal either. And what about that peculiar illness Magnus Fin’s parents had suffered from? In fact, the more Mr Sargent thought about Magnus Fin and Aquella, the more he was convinced that they weren’t normal at all. And that American lad who was always with them – Tarkin – with long hair and a shark’s tooth round his neck, well, he wasn’t much better!
“And the pound is worth seventy cents against the dollar.”
Mr Sargent blinked.
“And fifty-five boxes of haddock were landed at Scrabster. Crab stocks are up on last year.”
He blinked again
“And Caledonian Thistle beat Celtic 3–0.”
Mr Sargent stared at Ellie. “What are you going on about?”
Ellie stopped. Her face flushed crimson. “The news. I – I was just going on to the farming.”
Mr Sargent thumped his desk. “Not the whole newspaper.” He sighed. “Just the most interesting bit. What’s that?” He glared at her expectantly. “Well?”
Ellie bit her finger, frowned, then smiled and announced, “Cherie Swan is to get a million pounds to go and eat eels on a desert isl
and.”
Mr Sargent groaned. The children in the back row giggled. The teacher lifted his eyebrows. “Really?”
“Yes, really,” piped up Patsy Mackay. “It’s absolutely true.”
A few other pupils chimed in with how absolutely true it was. Everyone except him, it seemed, knew all about Cherie Swan. Mr Sargent fiddled with his tie. This day was not going well. He stared at the class, wondering what on earth to do next.
Robbie Cairns came to the rescue. “Please, Mr Sargent, can we make get-well cards for Magnus Fin?”
“Excellent idea, Robbie,” said Mr Sargent, “and I will deliver them personally after school.”
So that’s what every pupil in the class did…
GET BETTER MAGNUS FIN
MAGNUS FIN RULES OK
HOPE YOUR POOR HAND IS FEELING BETTER
…while their teacher sat back down in his chair, wrote an apology letter to the emergency services and polished off a whole bag of barley sugars.
Chapter 5
Magnus Fin ran like the wind. In all their races Tarkin was usually the winner but this morning Magnus Fin ran as though he had turbo-charge in his feet. Down the brae he sprinted then slid down the hillside, snapping bracken stalks and ripping his school trousers on thorns. In no time he was on the beach path. Behind him he could hear Tarkin yelling for him to stop. But whatever was happening to him was too awful. He wouldn’t stop till he was in the sea. His grandmother, Miranda, the queen of the selkies, would help him.
He shot horrified glances at his hand, his throbbing, swollen hand. Dark seal skin had broken through between his thumb and index finger. Terrified he sped on, leaping over boulders, litter, dead fish and puddles till he reached the flat black rocks. All the time his hand burned with pain. The thing in the sand had done this to him. What was it? Fin felt a shiver at the back of his neck. He shot a glance down to the beach. The thing in the sand was still down there somewhere.
Magnus Fin reached the skerries by the cave, his heart hammering. He leapt over the rocks. Fin had seen the flash of horror in his teacher’s eye. Before he had pulled his hand away Mr Sargent had seen the seal skin. Fin knew he had. With a horrible sinking feeling Fin imagined their selkie secret plastered all over Mr Sargent’s newspapers. They’d make front-page news. It would be terrible. Then the selkies in the bay would go away, they’d have to. What about him and Aquella and his dad? They’d be put into a circus! They’d be paraded around like show cattle. They’d be laughed at.
By now he had reached the tideline and hoisted himself up to the high black rock, which jutted the furthest out to sea. From here Fin could jump and go through the door to the selkie world, leaving the nosy human world far behind. He kicked off his school shoes, yanked off his socks then curled his webbed toes around the edge of the rock. He looked at his hand and shuddered. The water looked soothing and inviting. The sea would be his hospital. Fin bent his knees and swung his arms back. “Here goes!” he cried.
Magnus Fin jumped into the sea. No sooner had his hand hit the cool water than he felt relief spread through his whole body. Down and down he went. He knew the route well. There it was, the shell handle, shaped like a sickle moon, against an underwater rock. Fin reached through the water, grasped the handle with his good hand and pulled. He knew that rush of water, that sound of thundering music in his ears. The door opened. The flash of emerald-green light meant he was through. He had made it into the world of the seal people – his people – the selkies.
There, at the other side of the door, looking calm and beautiful in the serene, clear water, was his grandmother Miranda, the queen of the selkies. This hope at least had been answered. The great silver seal swam towards him and with her flipper she gently stroked his head. Then, as if knowing his trouble, she touched his hurt hand, and, in the thought-speak of the selkies said, Ceud mile fàilte – welcome, Magnus Fin.
Tarkin, panting hard, stood on the beach and watched Magnus Fin disappear into the sea. There was nothing to do now but wait for Aquella to catch up. There was no point in trying to get Magnus Fin back. He had gone into the selkie world and Tarkin couldn’t follow him – even if he could swim. Not even Aquella could follow him there. She was a selkie – but a selkie without a seal skin – who was soon to be a fully-fledged land girl, as long as she survived another month with not a drop of salt water on her skin.
“He’s gone,” Tarkin said, when Aquella finally caught up with him.
“It’s the best place for him,” she said between snatches of breath. “Poor Magnus Fin – did you see his hand?”
Tarkin nodded, though the truth was he’d only caught a glimpse. It had seemed bigger than usual, and it looked bruised. “Weird,” was all he said.
“No, Tarkin, it’s not weird. You say weird when you don’t understand something. He must have scraped his skin against rust. We selkies have sensitive skin. Look at me – one drop of salt water and my skin will shrivel up. I suppose you call that weird too?”
Tarkin shrugged. He felt shaken. There was something wrong with his best friend. The last thing he needed was an argument with Aquella. “No, you know I don’t mean it like that.”
“Well, don’t say it then!”
The two of them stood in awkward silence, the beach at their feet a mess of rubbish and dead creatures. They gazed out to sea, to the place where Fin had vanished. He would be back soon, that much Tarkin knew. Selkie time moved differently from human time. Fin had told him that what might feel like an hour under water would only be a few minutes in land time.
Tarkin turned to Aquella then, gesturing to the strewn beach said, “Fin must have been treasure hunting I guess.”
Aquella nodded.
“And hurt his hand somehow.”
Aquella nodded again, but pursed her lips tight, the way she did when she was annoyed.
“Look, you’re not weird, OK?”
Aquella flashed her round green eyes at him. “I know.”
Tarkin shot a glance over his shoulder, back along the beach path. Taking a step closer to Aquella he lowered his voice and said, “But you’ve got to be careful. I think Sargent’s on to your secret.”
Aquella swung her head round, as though expecting Mr Sargent to come thundering along the beach path towards them. “What secret?”
“You know – your selkie secret.” By this time Tarkin’s voice was barely audible. “Didn’t you see the way he looked at Fin? And you? He’s always giving you the suspicious look. It’s like he knows you’re both – different – but he doesn’t know how.”
“You mean he knows we’re weird?”
“No. Well, yes. I don’t think you’re weird. But, like, he might. And you almost said ‘selkie’ treasures. Not a good idea, Aquella. Sargent wouldn’t understand. He’d have you on the front page of his newspapers.”
Aquella looked miserable. She tugged to free the pleat she wore for school and let her long hair tumble round her face. Through the curtain of her black hair she gazed out to the listless sea. “Fin should be back soon,” she murmured. “He’ll know what to do. Come on. Let’s hide in the cave and wait for him.”
Tarkin touched her gently on the elbow. “Cheer up. I think you guys are great – you know that. You are the best. But, seriously, I think you need to lie low for a bit – you know, act as normal as possible.” Then he winked at Aquella. “And I’m sorry for saying weird.”
Aquella managed a smile. “Well, you’re not exactly the most normal boy in the world. You’ve got long hair. That’s not normal – for a boy.”
Tarkin laughed and flicked his ponytail. “Tell you what, you go back to the cave and wait for Fin there. I’ll wait here in case he gets into some kind of trouble. Plus I’ve got a good view along the beach, in case Sargent sends out a search party.”
Aquella shrugged. “OK, and tell me, Mr Ordinary, is it alright for me to sing while I sit in the cave? Or is that too weird?”
“Sure you can sing, but maybe you should sing kind of quiet?”
Aquella was singing an old Gaelic song about a fisherman who brought up a girl in his net. From the cave her lulling words drifted down. Tarkin felt he could stay there for ever, gazing into the water with the sun on his back and the song floating around him. Deep down, normal was the last thing he wanted to be, but he’d been called enough names in his life to know how badly that hurt, and he didn’t want his selkie friends to suffer. It was hard enough for them – making out they were like everyone else, when half of them belonged under the sea.
Tarkin stared into the still water. A pale face gazed up at him. At first he thought it was his own reflection, distorted by the water. But it wasn’t. He gasped. He didn’t have green eyes. He didn’t have twisted sea grass and cowrie shells in his black hair. He didn’t have black hair! The face in the water was the face of a girl. Tarkin felt goosebumps crawl all over him. He didn’t want to shout out in case he frightened her. His heart hammering in his ribs, he moved, loosening a pebble that rolled into the water. The glint of a fish tail flicked out of the water. When the water cleared, the face of the girl – and the silvery-blue fish tail – were gone.
It was his mermaid; he was sure it was. She had come all this way to find him. Tarkin ran from one side of the rocks to the other, scanning the water. Maybe she had gone round the other side? But only his face stared up at him. He ran to the cave and, throwing normality to the wind, shook Aquella on the shoulder. She stopped singing and stared up at him.
