Crown of Coral and Pearl

by Mara Rutherford

  “The only way they’d let you stay would be if you stopped being beautiful all of a sudden, and we both know that’s never going to happen.” If anything, Zadie had become even more beautiful these past few days.

  Sorrow is good for the soul, Father had said after the incident, when I had recovered from the pain and sickness but had still not grown used to the feel of the torn flesh on my otherwise flawless skin. Those who have never known pain or adversity are as shallow as the waves lapping on the shore.

  And what is wrong with being shallow? I’d asked him.

  What lies beneath the surface of shallow waters? Nothing. It’s only when you go deeper that the ocean comes alive. The deeper you go, the more mysteries and surprises await.

  I had frowned and nestled closer to him, unconvinced. I’d never seen shallow waters, but I did know one thing about them: you could walk through them to the shore. And there could be no greater mystery or surprise than land. At least not to me.

  Zadie folded the cloak and returned it to the trunk. “I just can’t help feeling that the gods switched our fates somehow. That I was the one destined to stay...”

  “And I was destined to go,” I finished. I released my breath through my nose. “Well, we are identical twins. Even Father used to confuse us when we were babies. Maybe I’m really Zadie, and you’re really Nor,” I said with a laugh.

  Before the incident, people often confused us, calling me Zadie so frequently that even now, I still responded to her name as readily as my own. There were times when I felt so close to my sister that I truly believed I was one half of a person, and she was the other. I couldn’t live without her any more than a person could live with half a heart.

  Zadie smiled, but when we lay down to sleep that night, she again presented her back to me, the way she had before. One of the greatest comforts in my life had been knowing that even if I couldn’t make sense of my mother’s actions, or predict what the future might hold, I at least knew Zadie’s mind, maybe better than my own. She was predictable, reliable, honest, and good. She was responsible and even-tempered. She never surprised you by doing the unexpected. She was as straight as the horizon and as dependable as the sunrise. We had known this day was coming for as long as I could remember, and I’d always assumed Zadie had been preparing for it, just like I had.

  I woke some time in the middle of the night to find Zadie missing. My concern only lasted a moment, until it occurred to me that she was probably off kissing Sami again. I told myself I wasn’t jealous, but what if I was terrible at kissing? How did Zadie even know what she was doing?

  For the past seventeen years, she had been as close to me as my own flesh. Now I was starting to wonder if I’d ever really known her at all.

  She was beside me again when I woke in the morning. I looked down at her heart-shaped face, slack with sleep, and wondered if Sami would still have loved her if she’d been the one with the scar. I’d seen the way my mother’s love for me changed after the incident. Even my father, whose love I’d never questioned, didn’t treat me the same. He couldn’t look at me without a touch of sadness or regret, as if he was seeing two versions of me: the one I’d been before the incident, and the one I was now.

  I didn’t mention Zadie’s absence when she woke up, and neither did she. Father had left early with some of the other men to fish, and Mother was still asleep.

  “What should we do?” Zadie asked as we readied ourselves for the day.

  “I suppose we should look for oysters.”

  “We’ll be leaving Mother without a boat. She would have to borrow a neighbor’s. Or swim.”

  I grinned. “Even better.”

  We stayed out all morning, and for those fleeting hours, things felt the way they had been before the ceremony. We raced each other to the few oysters we saw, and I let Zadie beat me one time, like I often did. We even found an octopus hiding in the rocks and pried it free. At least there would be something other than stew for dinner.

  When we returned to the house, Mother was home, as we’d known she would be. She was lying on her bed, fanning herself, but she sat upright when we came up through the trapdoor.

  “Where have you two been?” she moaned. “I’ve been stuck here all morning with no boat.”

  “We just wanted to spend some time together,” Zadie said. “We only have two days left.”

  She frowned. “I know that. I thought perhaps the three of us could spend some time together for a change.” She pulled us down onto the mattress next to her, tucking each one of us under an arm. “I can’t believe in just a few short weeks, it will just be your father and me alone in this house.”

  I squirmed out from under her arm. “What do you mean?”

  “The wedding. Elidi and I think we should do it on the night of the solstice. It’s an auspicious time for beginning a new life together, and a family.”

  Zadie and I shared a horrified glance. A family? I wasn’t even eighteen yet. I wasn’t ready to marry, and I certainly wasn’t ready to be a mother. “I don’t understand the rush,” I said. “Zadie will have just left. Can’t we wait a bit?”

  “We are lucky that Sami has agreed to marry you at all, Nor. I do not think it’s wise to wait. Besides, with your sister gone, we will have one less person in the family working. Once you marry Sami, we will be provided for, you most of all. Don’t you want your family to be secure?”

  So this was about money, not me. I couldn’t deny that we were struggling, but so was every other family in Varenia. At least we weren’t eight or ten mouths to feed, like some. Our parents may not have been fortunate enough to have sons, who would have provided better over the years than Zadie and I could, but Mother had certainly managed to make the most of her daughters.

  “Yes, Mother,” I said. “I want my family to be secure.”

  “Good. We will make the official announcement of your engagement at Zadie’s party in two nights. Then everyone in Varenia will know just how blessed our family is.”

  * * *

  I woke that night to the sound of Zadie crying.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked, sitting upright and reaching for my sister. My fingers found only empty space where her body should be. “Where are you?”

  “I’m here,” she said. As my eyes adjusted to the dark, I saw her crouched at the foot of the bed. Tears glistened on her cheeks.

  “What’s the matter? Did something happen? Are you hurt?”

  “No. I need—I need your help.”

  “Of course,” I told her, but she remained where she was, twisting her hair over one shoulder. “Surely it can wait until morning.”

  Zadie rose without speaking and left our bedroom. Confused and still half-asleep, I followed her to the balcony.

  “What is it?” I whispered. “What’s wrong?”

  “You’ll hate me if I tell you. But that won’t stop me. I can’t go to Ilara. And I need your help.”

  She jumped off the balcony before I could stop her, and I dived in after her, terrified she was going to drown herself. Instead, she swam away from the house. I wanted to scream for her to stop, but I was afraid I’d wake half the village in the process, so I followed her.

  When we’d been swimming for what felt like ages, we reached our boat, anchored far from our house. “What are you doing?” I said between gasps for air. I hadn’t known Zadie could swim that fast. I started to reach for the boat to haul myself in when Zadie thrust her hand out.

  “Don’t get too close, Nor.”

  “What? Why?” I followed her gaze to a rope going over the side of the boat. “What is that?”

  She bit her lip. “I caught it, last night.”

  So she hadn’t been with Sami after all. “Caught what?”

  “A maiden’s hair jelly.”

  I gasped and swam a few feet farther from the boat. “Zadie, no! Do you have any idea how dang
erous that is? Did it sting you?”

  “I used a large net. I haven’t touched it. I haven’t even looked at it since I caught it. I kept it out here all day, weighted down with an anchor. It’s dead, for all I know.”

  I ducked down under the water, sure she was mistaken. Zadie couldn’t catch a maiden’s hair. She wouldn’t even know how. But sure enough, the jelly was there, glowing faintly in the net.

  I came back up and pushed my hair away from my face. “And just what exactly are you planning to do with it?”

  “I’m going to scar myself with it. On my legs. Like Dido.”

  Dido was a girl we’d known since childhood. She’d been scarred horribly when she was only eight, when a dead maiden’s hair had floated into the village. Varenians healed remarkably well, but her legs still bore the scars. She was one of the only girls our age who hadn’t participated in the ceremony, the girl our mother held up as an example anytime we did something she considered risky or dangerous.

  You wouldn’t want to end up like poor Dido, would you?

  “Why?” I breathed.

  “If the only way to stay in Varenia is to stop being beautiful, then that’s what I’ll do.”

  I closed my eyes, remembering what I’d said to her the previous day, and inwardly cursed my own foolishness. “Is this all because of that stupid comment I made? This might get you out of leaving Varenia, but Sami would never be permitted to marry you. And you could die!” A sting from a maiden’s hair jellyfish was rarely fatal, mostly because they were avoidable, and anytime someone was stung, they got away from it as quickly as possible. Dido had been small and a poor swimmer, and the jelly she’d encountered had been enormous, making it difficult to get away.

  This jelly was smaller than the one we’d seen the other day, and juveniles were known to be less venomous than adults. But to expose yourself to a sting deliberately? Who knew what the consequences could be?

  “If you can think of another way for me to stay in Varenia, I will happily listen to it. But if you can’t, I don’t want to hear anything other than whether or not you’ll help me,” Zadie said.

  This isn’t you! I wanted to scream. She sounded cold and unfeeling, like Mother. “I would do anything for you, Zadie. You know that. But I won’t help you harm yourself.” I started to swim away, but her hand gripped my arm fiercely.

  She pulled me to her, until our foreheads were so close they nearly touched. After a moment, her face crumpled and she began to weep. “Please, Nor. I’m scared.”

  I stared at her for a few seconds, trying to imagine wanting something so badly I was willing to injure myself permanently for it. Zadie hadn’t known pain like I had; she couldn’t possibly understand what she was asking.

  But she had seen me suffer. She knew what I’d been through. And just watching it had to have been excruciating for her, as I knew watching her suffer would be for me. If she was asking me to do this, she had to be desperate beyond measure.

  My eyes burned with tears as I began to understand that Zadie was already in pain. Leaving Sami might not cause her physical injury, but I felt like I was being stabbed in the heart every time I imagined Zadie leaving Varenia. She would be feeling that about both me and Sami. I looked down at her hand gripping mine, at the unblemished skin of her arm. She had made it all these years without so much as a splinter, and she wanted me to help her undo all that in one instant?

  “I can’t!” I cried, the tears springing free of my eyes. “I won’t do that to you, Zadie. I’m sorry.”

  I was already several lengths from her when she shouted after me.

  “Then I’ll do it myself!”

  I turned to see her pull a knife from the boat and dive under the water.

  “Zadie, no!” I plowed through the water toward her, reaching her just in time. I pulled on her shoulder, whirling her toward me, and for a moment we hung there in stillness, her face a mirror of the anguish I felt.

  “Please, Nor,” she cried the moment we surfaced. “If you won’t do it for me, at least stay with me. I can’t do it alone.”

  I hated myself for nodding. But I knew I would hate myself more if I left and she seriously injured herself trying to do this by herself. “How were you planning to do it?” I asked shakily.

  Some of the worry drained from her face, but I felt like I had absorbed all of it. “I’ll cut off one of the tentacles and lay it on my legs. It will need to stay on my skin for a little while to ensure permanent scarring.”

  I stared at her in horror. “How do you know this?”

  She started for the other side of the boat, away from the jellyfish. “Mother told me once. She said if a jellyfish ever stung me, the most important thing to do would be to remove the tentacles right away, and to use something flat and rigid to brush out the stingers. Otherwise I’d have permanent scars. It’s a small maiden’s hair. I don’t think it has enough venom to kill me.”

  “You don’t think?” I yelped.

  “I’m sure it doesn’t.”

  That was hardly reassuring. “And what will we tell Mother and Father? What will we tell the rest of the village?”

  “That we went for a night swim and didn’t see it. No one would believe I did this to myself.”

  She was right. I could scarcely believe it, and I was here with her. “What if Sami won’t have you?”

  “He loves me, Nor. I know that won’t change.”

  I knew very well how love could be changed by a scar, but I didn’t have the heart to tell her that. “His father is the governor. He might not allow it.”

  Zadie shook her head. “If Sami wants me, his parents will listen. And if not, we’ll run away together.”

  I blinked in shock. I had wanted to run away with Zadie, but I never believed it was something she would actually do. “Did you discuss this with him?”

  “No, but I just know it. We kissed, Nor. And it was like a promise. That he loves me as much as I love him. That he would do anything for me. I can’t tell you what that feels like, to know someone would do anything for you.”

  I inhaled sharply, her words a barbed hook in my heart. Hadn’t she always known that I would do anything for her? “And yet you ask this of me? Why not ask Sami, if he loves you so much?”

  She pulled me to her. “Because you are the twin of my soul. You know me better than anyone ever has or ever will. Because I trust you more than I trust Sami. And because you are the strongest person I have ever known. Only you can help me.”

  “It’s not fair of you to ask me,” I said, my voice breaking on a sob.

  “You will protect me,” she said through her own tears. “You always have, and you won’t stop now.”

  I had to bite my lip to keep from crying out. A part of me was furious with my sister for even asking, for putting me in this position. I wanted to tell her no, to go back to my bed and sleep through the next two days, until all of this was over.

  But she was right. There was nothing she could ask of me that I wouldn’t do for her. And if this was truly what she wanted, then I couldn’t let her face it alone.

  “I will help you get the tentacle,” I said finally. “But I am only doing this because I’m afraid you’ll hurt yourself trying, not because I agree with it.”

  “I understand.” She reached into the boat and handed me Father’s sharpest spear and a small net used to catch little fish. “Be careful.”

  I took the spear and net and ducked under the water. The jelly was mostly contained within the larger net Zadie had caught it in, but several tentacles had wriggled through the holes. As my tears mingled with the saltwater around me, I fought to still my shaking hands, and it took several attempts before I was able to lop off four or five of the thin tentacles. I reached out with the little net and caught them, still unsure if I was doing the right thing, then rose carefully to the surface, keeping the net at arm’s length. />
  Zadie was holding a small piece of driftwood. “I thought it would be best to do this out here, so no one would hear me scream, but just in case, I’ll bite into the wood. We should get into the boat now, in case I faint.”

  She had planned all of this, I realized. Maybe since the day we saw the dead jelly. “And then what?”

  “And then we’ll see.”

  I dropped the net and tentacles into the boat and hauled myself in after, landing in a heap next to Zadie.

  We were both wearing only our tunics, and the seawater on Zadie’s long legs glistened in the moonlight. She was still whole and perfect. It wasn’t too late to go home and pretend all of this had never happened.

  “Please stop this, Zadie,” I begged. “What if we talked to Governor Kristos together? Perhaps he would agree to let me go in your place.”

  She shook her head. “Even if he allowed it, Mother never would. She is determined that this should be my fate.”

  And she doesn’t believe I’m beautiful enough, I thought. She would never risk the elders choosing Alys to go in Zadie’s place.

  She sat down at one end of the boat and placed the driftwood between her teeth. “I’m ready,” she said around the wood.

  I picked up the small net, where the tentacles barely glowed at all. What time was it? How many hours did we have before our parents woke up and discovered what we’d done? What would Mother say when she found out? I knew everything was about to change forever, but I handed Zadie the net anyway. I thought of Dido’s wounds, which I’d only seen once, when we went to visit her shortly after the accident. The flesh where the tentacles had touched her was raised and pink, as though a mass of worms was crawling over her leg.

  I imagined Zadie with scars like that and began to cry, closing my eyes tight as she lowered the net toward her legs, bracing myself for her screams.

  “I can’t.”

  My eyes flew open, relief coursing through me. “Thank the gods.”

  She removed the wood from her mouth. “You have to do it, Nor.”

  “What?” I shook my head violently. “No. I said I would stay with you, but I can’t be the one to do it.”