Mermaid_ A Twist on the Classic Tale - Carolyn Turgeon [20]
“Tonight?” Margrethe repeated, unable to stop herself.
The word sank into her like a stone, and an anxiety rose from it, sweeping through her entire being. The thought was irrational. She should be relieved, calmed. He was her enemy. And yet all she could think was: what if she never saw him again? If he was planning to leave tonight, he could be gone even before she and the abbess returned. The thought filled her with an inexplicable grief.
But if he stayed any longer, these men—her friends, men whose only task was to protect her—could learn the truth and destroy him.
“Your safety is all we care about,” Lens said. “We are sworn to the death to protect you.”
“I know,” she said.
That was what worried her.
THEY BEGAN THEIR walk back to the convent in late afternoon. Margrethe tried to hide her anxiousness, but the abbess turned to her. “Let him go, child,” she said, softly. “No matter who he is, you must not dishonor your father.”
“You do not need to tell me such things,” Margrethe said, her voice more haughty than she’d intended. The abbess seemed to want to say more but stopped herself.
Margrethe kept her own words back, too. A mermaid. She wanted to tell the abbess that it was a mermaid who had brought the man to her. She wanted to turn and shake her, cry out, I need to see him again! Tell her that the mermaid had brought him to her, for a reason, and that she needed to understand what it was before he disappeared.
Instead they walked in silence, Margrethe struggling to remain calm beside the abbess when her body was nearly shaking with the desire to run.
The sky hung silver over the mountain, the convent just barely visible above them. The trail up to the locked gates seemed endless. Every sound was the sound of horses’ hooves clomping on wet ground, the sound of him leaving.
Finally, they passed through the great gates and into the warmth of the convent.
The novice mistress was waiting for the abbess with urgent news, it seemed, and Margrethe took the opportunity to slip away. She raced down the hall to the infirmary, to find him. She came to the door and stood outside it, pressed her forehead against it. Her heart was pounding. After a few moments, she knocked. Once, twice, then pushed the door open.
He wasn’t there.
It was Edele who came up to her as she was rushing back to the office of the abbess. “He is requesting you,” she said, taking Margrethe’s hand in hers. “He wants to see you. He is waiting for you in the garden.”
“Is he leaving?”
“Yes,” Edele said. “There is a horse ready for him.” Edele paused then, as if she wanted to say something more. “You know he is—”
“I know,” Margrethe said, stopping her. Impulsively, she leaned forward and kissed Edele on her freckled cheek, smiling at her friend’s surprise.
Our enemy.
“Margrethe …”
She took a deep breath, ignoring Edele, not even noticing that Edele had used her real name, and then pushed open the stone door and entered the garden. The cold air slammed against her. It was snowing. When had it started snowing? Big, fat white pieces of snow, drifting down.
He was standing by the stone wall, looking over the water. His back was to her, and she stopped a minute, watching him. Massive in the snow-filled garden, wrapped in furs. She realized this was the only time she’d seen him standing.
She was terrified, she realized. She was not behaving at all like the daughter of the Northern king. Standing in the garden with her heart racing, like a schoolgirl, as she prepared to meet her fate. She stopped and straightened her back, lifted her chin, before going to him.
He turned as she approached, the sun catching his eyes, which seemed almost golden now, in the bright light. The shimmer on his skin was nearly blinding in the sunlight. Why had no one mentioned it? Didn’t they see? His skin, like jewels.
“Hello, Sister,” he said.
“I was afraid you had left,” she said, immediately embarrassed by the panic in her voice. She paused, composing herself.
“No,” he said, looking at her. “Not before thanking you. For saving me.”
He walked toward her,