The Mermaid’s Sister

by Carrie Anne Noble

2016 Realm Award
for
Best Speculative Fiction

Introduction

WHAT REVIEWERS ARE SAYING

“There are elements of fantasy, romance, and adventure throughout [The Mermaid’s Sister]. The book is a page-turner; the story pulls the reader in and the dynamic characters and plot twists keep interest levels high. The author’s writing style is very descriptive, helping the reader truly visualize the sights, sounds, tastes, and adventures of the characters. A must read.” — Publishers Weekly

“Like all good fairy tales, this one touches on deeper themes of sibling rivalry, jealousy, insecurity, and questions of identity. Osbert the rambunctious wyvern is a particularly well-done character. VERDICT Noble’s treatment of the mermaid theme is fresh and original, and even her minor characters are beautifully depicted.”– Library Journal

BACK COVER OF THE MERMAID’S SISTER

There is no cure for being who you really are…

In a cottage high atop Llanfair Mountain, sixteen-year-old Clara lives with her sister, Maren, and guardian Auntie. By day, they gather herbs for Auntie’s healing potions; by night, Auntie spins tales of faraway lands and wicked fairies. Clara’s favorite story tells of three orphaned infants—Clara, who was brought to Auntie by a stork; Maren, who arrived in a seashell; and their best friend, O’Neill, who was found beneath an apple tree.

One day, Clara discovers iridescent scales just beneath her sister’s skin: Maren is becoming a mermaid and must be taken to the sea or she will die. So Clara, O’Neill, and the mermaid-girl set out for the shore. But the trio encounters trouble around every bend. Ensnared by an evil troupe of traveling performers, Clara and O’Neill must find a way to save themselves and the ever-weakening Maren.

And always in the back of her mind, Clara wonders, “If my sister is a mermaid, then what am I?”

Excerpt Of The Mermaid’s Sister

CHAPTER ONE

Llanfair Mountain, Pennsylvania
1870

Wishing gets you nothing.

These words are old wounds carved into the trunk of an ancient tree. Above the vandal’s warning, the tree stretches evergreen limbs across the glassy-surfaced Wishing Pool. Below, its dark roots twist and trail into the water.

Do trees make wishes? I do not think so.

But I am wishing.

I wish that my sister would come out of the water. I can see her resting on the perfect, round pebbles at the bottom of the pool, the ones tossed in by visitors over hundreds of years, the ones said to be required by the pool sprite as payment. One perfect pebble for each wish. Such pebbles are rare in the world—as rare as magic itself.

Bubbles rise from Maren’s mouth, each one slowly drifting to the surface before popping. Her eyes are closed, her body is as still as a corpse. Little gray fishes nibble at the fabric of her floating petticoat. As she dreams, her webbed toes twitch and a smile spreads across her face.

She never looks so happy on the land.

“Come out,” I say, knowing she will not—even if she does hear me. She never obeys me.

Behind me, twigs crack and leaves rustle. I turn to see our wyvern lifting one foot and then the other, fussing at the moss and sticks between his birdlike toes. His blue scales, pale as a summer sky on his belly and dark as midnight on his back, catch the dim light like curved slices of stained glass. He nods his dragonny head and snorts. Auntie has sent him to bring us home for supper, no doubt.

“Good luck, Osbert darling,” I say. “She’s only been in for an hour.”

Osbert spreads his wings wide and dives nose first into the pool with barely a splash. When he reappears, he brings Maren with him, his sharp teeth clutching the back of her camisole, like an enormous mother dog carrying a naughty puppy by the nape of its neck. When he releases her, she crumples onto the muddy shore. Osbert tickles her neck with his barbed tail and snorts encouragement over her motionless body.

Finally, she awakens with a gasp, sits up, and swats at the watchful wyvern. “Go home, you beast!”

Osbert’s ears flatten and he skulks away, whining.

“He thinks he saved your life,” I say. “You could be kinder to him.”

She does not speak again until we are halfway home, at the place where the forest and meadow meet. She plucks a cornflower from its stalk and says quietly, “Someday I will stay in the water. Someday I won’t come out.”

My heart sinks, down, down. I can think of no reply.

She tosses the flower away and says, “Will you visit me, Clara, when I live in the sea with my mermaid sisters? Will you come in a boat and bring me cherries from Auntie’s tree? Will you come and sing our songs? Will you bring O’Neill?”

“What about Osbert?”

“You may leave the silly wyvern at home. But you must promise to come.” She reaches for my hand. Her webbed fingers are still dripping with Wishing Pool water.

They are more webbed than they were last summer.

I stare at them, my sister’s strange fingers. Until our sixteenth birthday, she had hands like mine. Same size, same shape, same chipped nails stained with tree sap or mud, ink or dyes. Twin hands, although we are not of the same blood. But now, her hands are changing.

She is changing.

I am losing her. I wish I would not.

But wishing gets you nothing.

* * *

With a long match, Auntie lights the three fat, yellow candles in the center of the oaken kitchen table. The scent of beeswax mingles with the scents of vegetable stew and fresh bread. She waves the match in the air like a magic wand and its flame transforms into a puff of white smoke. The smoke curls and stretches into a halo around Auntie’s gray hair.

“Come and sit here, Maren,” Auntie says.

Arms crossed, Maren plods to the chair. She tosses her head and her honey-colored curls bounce about her slim shoulders. She casts a scowl my way to let me know that she knows I told on her.

Auntie takes Maren’s pale hands in her plump, wrinkled ones, turns them this way and that, then holds them close to the candles. And she sighs.

“Now I know why you’ve taken to wearing gloves of late,” Auntie says.

Maren’s cheeks redden and she stares at the tablecloth.

“I should have expected the change to come quickly once you turned sixteen. I hope you will forgive an old woman for not being a better mother. For not better preparing you for what’s to come. Now, is there anything else you should show me, Maren?” Auntie asks, releasing her hands. She lifts Maren’s chin so that she must meet her gaze. “The truth, my dear.”

– – – – –
The Mermaid’s Sister is available in paperback, as an ebook, or on Audible.

Riddle me this: what is the only acceptable form of Christian white magic?

Answer: God’s spell!

With this truth in mind, and I hope also with the true and saving Gospel of Jesus Christ in mind, let’s finish this series that fleshes out Six Christian Spells Worse than Fantasy Magic. We have one common Christian white magic spell left: unbiblical “spiritual warfare” spells.

4. How can you say that prayer and demon-challenging are ‘Christian white magic’? Jesus and the apostles did this all the time.

Several readers challenged my view that certain modes of anti-demon-warrior behavior or prayer count as Christian white magic. Before, I quoted from spiritual warfare author and teacher Neil Anderson. He claims demons can own physical territory or objects, and writes:

When I rent a room in a hotel, it is under my stewardship. I have no idea what occurred in that room before I rent it, so I renounce any previous use of the room that would not please my heavenly Father. … Next, I commit the room and all that is in it to the Lord and command Satan and all his evil workers to leave the room in the name and by the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ. Finally, I ask for the Lord’s protection while I sleep.¹

Anderson and some other authors/teachers act as a sort of evangelical Justice League Dark. In other words, standard Christian heroes handle regular matters such as preaching, local church organization, and counseling related to human sin. But the Evangelical League Dark goes where standard heroes fear to tread, into the paranormal realm of evil spiritual forces.

In this view, this is where the real battle lies—a battle far removed from ordinary spiritual actions, such as Bible teaching, prayer, local church fellowship, or discipling your children.

But this is a notion I do not see in Scriptures. Jesus indeed confronted demons. Sometimes the apostles do the same. But in their teachings and writings, the apostles do not emphasize their dealings with demons. Instead they value the non-paranormal aspects of Christianity: teaching, prayer, fellowship, pursuit of holiness, responsible practice of spiritual gifts, evangelism, being good citizens, living quiet lives and working with their hands.

This is why I found fault with the “praying against the devil” scene in the movie War Room. While the story is of course fiction, the scene’s intent is clearly to show that Christians really should “rebuke Satan” aloud in real life. Many Christian moviegoers will assume this practice is biblical. But Scripture never encourages this response to the devil. Even if we assume the devil is anywhere near, or involved with our struggles or situation, the Bible never gives an exorcism guide in the way some Christians seem to want. Instead, James says, as a side comment to his exhortations to “regular” Christian actions, “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.”²

“I think having an understanding and equipping for spiritual warfare is important, but I also know when a lot of Christians are blaming ‘demons,’ they’re really just succumbing to superstition. This book was a laundry list of out-of-context verses that I doubt will teach discernment in the matter.” Photo and comment by CW Briar

Moreover, Scripture never encourages us to treat physical spaces or objects as if they could be “haunted” by demons. When Jesus cast out demons, he knew the person was under demonic influence. Even when the apostle Paul cast out a demon, he waited days before taking action against a stalker servant girl who wasn’t just unstable.³

Finally this view of demonic influence can affect peace between people. In some situations, a Christian may have a personal conflict with someone else. But instead of trying to work through reconciliation, the Christian might assume that other person is being influenced by demons. (If the person is actually being affected by trauma or else just ordinary human sin, the emphasis on demons can really sidetrack actual biblical reconciliation efforts.)⁴

That is not someone’s wrongful abuse of an otherwise healthful “Evangelical League Dark” approach to Christian spiritual growth. It is a mindset that fits exactly with this anti-biblical emphasis. It values supposedly biblical methods to defeat demons with spiritual prayers or other practices. And it devalues our need to confront personal sin in the light of Christ’s death and resurrection—the very spiritual warfare practices the apostles valued.

I can’t help but wonder if such an Evangelical League Dark emphasis can sidetrack some Christian fiction. Might this lead us to focus on angels, demons, and “spiritual” realities, rather than exploring the depths of humans where spiritual battles are actually fought?

Few to no readers of Six Christian Spells Worse than Fantasy Magic questioned my points about romance prosperity gospel “spells” and “if only” spells. So I’ll end here. Yet I do offer to interact with any further questions about any of the pieces in this Christian White Magic series. Thanks to all our SpecFaith readers for their grace-based challenges and discussion!

Not long ago, I took a vocabulary quiz. In the process of it, I learned two new words, avulse and fugacious. It struck me as unfortunate that I would have to look long and hard for an opportunity to use avulse, and I would probably never get a chance to use fugacious at all. They’re just too obscure.

We stand heir to a vast accumulated vocabulary, with words that range from everyday to rarefied to absolutely arcane. This has spawned one of those perpetual debates among writers and editors and agents, and in which readers have their own well-deserved opinions. The never-resolved question is: What words should writers use? What words are too old, too different, too long?

At the heart of the debate is a tension between two competing, legitimate principles. The first principle is that the ultimate aim of writing is to be understood. Far more than self-expression (because then why not just keep it to yourself?), writing is communication. You are not communicating if people cannot understand you.

The second principle is that writing cannot be reduced to the lowest common denominator. Some words are more apt than others, and sometimes the long word or the old word is the one that sings. Although writers should not, on the risk of being obnoxious, consider it their duty to expand their readers’ vocabularies, neither have they failed if they send their readers to the Dictionary.

The tension between these two principles is worked out book by book, sentence by sentence, word by word. There is no universal rule to lay down. I think it worth stating, however, that the thing really to be avoided is not the unknown word but the odd-duck word. These are the words that sound awkward or weird or (perhaps worst of all) funny. These are the words that jolt readers out of a text, and that is something all writers strive devoutly never to do.

Words often drop out of use because language evolves and culture changes, and they don’t fit anymore. Consider the word “oxblood,” a shade of red that is not actually what you would imagine ox blood to be. Ox blood was once used as a pigment in creating dyes and paints. This would explain why oxblood is a dark color, and not the bright red we normally associate with blood: It was originally associated with ox blood that had dried or been mixed with other ingredients or soaked into materials such as wood or leather.

In our own day, when these associations have been lost, oxblood has lost much of its power. Even people who can define the word do not possess the images that first inspired it. Writers develop literary crushes on words, but it is good to consider whether those words, transplanted from the soil where they first grew, will truly thrive.

With most obscure words, the trouble is not dead cultural associations but simply the sound. Some are so unusual, so odd, that your eyes trip over the syllables. Others don’t sound like what they mean. This is the trouble with fugacious. It means fleeting, but to modern ears it only sounds silly, and I would sound silly, too, if I tried to used it (“Fame is fugacious”). Possibly, though, I could play it for humor: “My lunch hour was fugacious.”

By contrast, I have more hope for avulse (“to pull off or tear away forcibly“) because similar, well-known words like repulse and convulse also have vaguely violent meanings. Encountering an unknown word does not, in itself, jar readers out of a book. But the unknown word must flow, must give an impression in tune with its actual meaning. This is why you will not go wrong with words like invidious and deleterious: They sound as bad as they are.

There is a time, Solomon wrote, for everything, and probably for every word. No word should be summarily rejected, or uncritically accepted. In a living language, words fade away and sometimes ought to, but it takes a long time for a word to fade beyond all use.