Free Stormswept by Helen Dunmore

things which will make her smile again. “I don’t trust you. You’re so completely crazy that you’ll be giving egg custard to a seal if I’m not there to stop you. I’ll just go to the bathroom and then throw on some clothes.”
    I wait until she’s gone, and then quickly grab a change of clothes and stuff it into my backpack, underneath the plastic bag of food. I tiptoe down to the kitchen. I want to make us some toast but the smell would wake Digory and he’d stumble downstairs half-asleep and wanting breakfast. The kettle makes too much noise, so no mugs of tea. I make us a peanut butter sandwich each, and then Jenna’s ready.
    We let ourselves out of the cottage into the morning. It’s been raining all night and the gate and the branches of the rowan are hung with drops. It is very still, as it sometimes is after a big storm. The sky is a pale, mild blue. It looks as if it’s never caused any trouble in its life.
    Jenna closes the gate noiselessly, and we walk a little way before breaking into a jog, in case anybody’s up and about. I think you could commit any crime you wanted, as long as when you set off to do it, you made it look as if you were going for a run. Jenna feels a long way away from me, even though she’s at my side. She has walled off her thoughts, instead of letting me share them as she usually does.
    I don’t mean that we can read each other’s minds. That would be creepy. But Jenna’s mind is open to me in a way that no one else’s is. That’s not because our minds are especially alike. They’re not. We’re very different in every way except the way we look. We like different foods and different music. Jenna is studious, responsible, mature. But she’s got a wild streak in her too, deep and hidden. I’m probably the only person who knows it’s there. Or maybe Bran does.
    She hates what is happening. She doesn’t want to go and see how Malin is. She knows I know this, which is why she’s closed herself off from me. We run side by side, not talking.

    We lean over the dark, still waters of the pool. I can’t see him and there’s no sign of movement. My dream floods back, making my heart jump.
    “There he is,” says Jenna, pointing.
    I glance at her. That is so typical of Jenna. She almost convinced herself Malin wasn’t real. She so wanted to believe it, but she’s too honest ever to lie to herself, and pretend she hadn’t seen him when she had.
    He’s lying, almost invisible, at the bottom of the pool. His body curves to fit against the rock shelf. He’s hiding, as much as he can. I lean further forward, and maybe he senses my shadow, because he stirs. Very slowly, using his arms rather than his tail, he twists in the water and looks up.
    Our eyes meet, but Malin is in his world, and I am in mine. He isn’t a wounded half-human that we have to help. He is Mer. I knew it yesterday, in my head, but today I understand it. He’s at home, down there at the bottom of the pool. Lying under three metres of water is no effort for him, but a comfort after the harshness of air and sand. He doesn’t have to hold his breath and fight the burning in his lungs until he’s forced back to the surface again. He is injured and probably afraid, and yet he belongs here in a way that I never will, even though I’ve been swimming in this pool since I was first able to swim. His eyes hold mine, and then move to Jenna. His hair flows upwards, drifting over his face like weed, then parting again. Even through the water I can see the glitter of his eyes. No human eyes shine like that.
    Very slowly, sculling with his hands but not moving his tail, he rises to the surface. His face breaks the skin of the water. I see his nostrils open, like the nostrils of a seal when it surfaces after a dive. For a second his face is mask-like, almost rigid, as air flows into him. I’m sure he’s in pain. He seems so much more of a stranger than he did yesterday.
    “Morveren.” He tosses his hair back, and