28 January, 2008

Trying to keep up the Lab momentum,

I started a new story this morning. It's called 'Sea-Hearts' and it's about selkies.
Along we went, in a bunch-ish, because of the witch. She sat halfway along the distance we needed to go, and exactly halfway between tideline and water, as if she meant to catch the lot of us. She had a grand pile of weed that she was knitting up beside her, and another of blanket she had already made, and the knobs of her iron needles jittered and danced as she made more, and the rest of her was immovable as rocks, except her swivelling head, which watched us, watched the sea, swung to us again.

‘Oh,’ breathed James. ‘Maybe we can come back later.’

‘Come now, look at this catch,’ I said. ‘We will just gather all up and run home and it will be done. Think how pleased your mam will be! Look at this!’ I lifted one; it was a doubler, one sea-heart clammed upon another like hedgehogs in the spring.
All the mams are selkies. It's a very sad story—surprise, surprise.

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