The Ocean's Daughter (Sequel to Sirene)

When I wrote the first draft of chapter 27 last night, I realized it was just too long, so I divided it into two separate chapters. This way I could give enough time and development for the scenes and the characters. Today I edited the shortened chapter 27, and right now I'm working on editing the newly formed chapter 28. Because it is just about ready and only needs some slight tweaking, chapter 28 will be put up tomorrow :)

Unfamiliar words are marked with a star and the meaning can be found at the end of the chapter.

Chapter is dedicated to KhomeshSakeesing, thank you for your votes, comments and support. I am so thankful for it :)

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If I told you I've been cleaning my soul

And if I promise you, I'd regain control

Would you open the door, and let me in

Take me for who I am and not for who I've been--Chris Daughtry (from the song "Sorry")

Chapter 27

Wesley couldn't help dragging his feet as he walked down the path to his former home. He vaguely remembered everything here, but still found it hard to believe that once upon a time this very house had been his home. Now it was just a childish memory, and not a very clear one at that. Still, there was something in the house and the scenery around it that reminded him of auld lang syne*. At last he came up to the low door of the cottage and taking a deep breath, he reached out and gave a firm knock. The fact that he didn't know who would answer the door only added to his already nervous state. Of course he hoped it would be Oceana, but he braced himself with that fact that it might be his father.

After two, long, agonizing minutes, at last the front door opened and a man appeared at the doorway. Wesley looked him up and down. He was about the same height as Wesley, but heftier. His face was weather beaten, speaking of life that was constantly exposed to the elements. It was obvious he had faced many storms in his life. His hair had more gray than black in it, his dark eyes were sad, the cheeks careworn, the shoulders slightly hunched and the hands rugged, but all this passed Wesley by. The only thing he noticed was the absence of the smell of whiskey. The  one disctinct memory he had was that cheap whiskey stench that had always been present when his father had been around, not it was strangely missing. For that matter, the smell was absent from the entire house.

Callum in the meantime had stood silently, waiting for this stranger dressed uniform to state his business, and when Wesley didn't say anything for the first couple seconds, Callum raised his eyebrows and asked, “Can I help ye, lad?”

Wesley took another deep breath. “I certainly hope so,” he said.

“If ye are lost, the village is down that way,” Callum pointed in the direction of the village. “All ye hae* to do is take the main road, it will lead ye right to it.”

“No, I'm not looking for the village, I'm looking for Callum McNeil, and I take it you are him.” Wesley still found it a little hard to comprehend that this man, whom he didn't recognize at all, was his father.

“Aye, I'm Callum McNeil, and who might ye be?”

Wesley didn't answer right away, he still hadn't quite formulated just how he was going to present the news.

“Are ye that good fer nothing blaggard from the navy who went and broke my mermaid's heart?” Callum asked, clenching both fists tightly

Wesley saw muscles on Callum's arm tense and bulge. It was obvious that the Scotsman had a terrible amount of strength in those arms and Wesley figured there was no time to beat around the bush. If he wanted to come out of this meeting alive, he had better just bluntly get to the point.

“Father, it is me,” he hastily spoke.

A perplexed look appeared on Callum's face, and while keeping his fists tightly clenched, he gazed at Wesley quizzically.

“Wesley, you son.” Wesley explained, “the one who disappeared twenty three and a half years ago on that fateful day in March. Surely you remember.”

The fist were slowly released and the puzzlement in Callum's eyes was replaced with disbelief. “Wesley?” he asked in a hoarse whisper. He stared at the young man in front of him, trying to recognize in this tall, handsome officer the four year old son he had given up all hope of ever seeing again. “Can such a thing be?”

Wesley hoped he wouldn't give the man a heart attack, Callum's face had become so deathly pale.

“I know it has been a long time, Father, but at last I have returned home.”

Callum continued to remain rooted to his feet, staring at Wesley, not believing what his head and his heart told him to be true. All this time he had been grieving and searching for the tiny little child with a boyish face and scrapped knees, but of course by now Wesley would be a man. Where had he come from? Where had he been all these years? And most of all, why had he suddenly showed up out of the blue? Callum shook his head and tried to say something, but his voice was taken from him and the words refused to come out. At last he reached out and took the stranger who was his own son into his arms. “Forgive me, lad, forgive me for everything,” he whispered in a cracked voice.

Wesley had not expected to find himself in such an embrace, and the fact that Callum was shedding tears on his shoulder only added to the Lieutenant’s discomfort. It had never occurred to him that his father would even know how to cry. Having spent most of his youth in the military, Wesley generally looked down on the idea of a man crying. It was something only women were supposed to do. But instead of getting annoyed with his father, Wesley found Callum's tears to be comforting. They weren't the tears of a coward or a whimp, they were the tears of a broken man; the tears of someone who had been given a second chance. It was those tears that helped to wash away the bitterness and anger Wesley had found so hard to let go. And the four words he thought he would never thought he would say suddenly poured out of his mouth. “I forgive you, Father.”

For a while to two men stood there in the doorway, until at last Callum pulled himself together. “I suppose I ought to let you inside the hoose,” he said, wiping the tears from his eyes. “I'm sorry, my lad, I ne'er* expected ye to just appear out ay nowhere. I swear, I'm having trouble believing it now. But come in, lad, come in.”

Wesley ducked as he walked through the low door. Everything in the house was completely different to how he remembered it. The house was spotlessly clean, there was furniture where there had never been any and though it was all very simply, the atmosphere was cozy and inviting.

“Aye, things are different, lad,” Callum nodded his head in reply to the look on Wesley's face. “I only wish they had been this way before.”

“You don't drink anymore, do you?” Wesley asked, taking the seat Callum offered him.

“No, my lad, not anymore. Not to say I stopped drinking it when yer poor mother and sister, God rest their souls, were laid to rest. For a long time the only way I knew how to drown all the sorrow was in the very stuff that created it. But when I returned to this house, I told myself I would not allow the mistakes of the past to repeat themselves, and I made a vow to ne'er take strong drink again, and I have kept true to it to this day.”

Wesley allowed himself to smile. Oceana had been right after all, his father was truly a different man.

“But where hae ye been all these years?”

“It is a long story, Father, a long, long story. I have been in good hands, I was given a good education and now I am a officer in the navy.”

“Aye, I can see that, the uniform looks right smart on ye. Whoever raised ye gave ye a better life then a wretch like me could. I ne'er deserved yer mother, or you and Fiona for that matter.” Callum shook his head and gave a despondent sigh. “It is all the better that ye disappeared, my lad, at least ye was safe from me failing ye even more. I dinnae blame ye for leaving, I'd hae left too if I was ye."

"I stayed away from you because was I angry and bitter," Wesley softly said.

“And rightly so, lad, I still cannae understand why ye came back at all. What was it that brought ye here? Something had to happen to make you travel all the way to yer old home.”

Wesley chuckled. “Two years back I met a girl claiming to be half mermaid...”

“So it was ye that broke Oceana's heart,” Callum interrupted him.

Wesley got a sheepish look on his face, “yes, I'm afraid it was.”

“An what was it ye did to make the lass so miserable?”

“We fought over you.”

'O're me?”

“Yes. You see, she never told me much about herself and I didn't even guess she was living with you. However, of course at one point the truth came out. I was mad at you and didn't want her to have anything to do with you, but you know Oceana. She will never leave the ones she loves, and she loves you, Father. I made her choose and she chose you.”

Callum pondered all that Wesley told him. He could never had imagined just how complicated everything truly was. “What made ye change yer mind?” He asked at a last.

“Well, there were many factors involved. Admiral William Chesterton, the man adopted me after you disappeared, urged me to make things right, but I was stubborn. Then one day I met Dr. Wilkens in the street, you remember him, do you not?”

“Aye, I certainly do. A good man, a very good man, the best of men in my opinion. Oceana and myself own him so much.”

“I spoke with him and on his suggestion I spoke with God and I decided to come here and put right all the wrongs. I'm sorry I've hurt her, I promise you I didn't mean too. It was all just very sudden.”

Callum gave a small chuckle. “I was right ready to kill ye lad, I dinnae take lightly the fact that my mermaid had her delicate heart shattered, but seeing as it is my fault that ye fought in the first place, I guess I'll let ye live. If it hadn't been for me, everythin' would have all been a lot happier. Seems the only thing I bring is destruction.”

“Father, if it hadn't been for you, I would have never met Oceana in the first place. I know it was you who first spotted the boat, and it was you along with the French smuggler who brought her up, and made her all that she is now. There were many mistakes along the way, but God was able to work it all out and bring good from the sorrow. Please, shall we allow the dead to bury the dead and concern ourselves with the living. You have changed, I can see that plain as day. At first I didn't want to believe it, I didn't want to accept it, but I think I can now. I'm willing to try and restore our broken relations, but I need you to be willing as well. I know you have obtained mother's and God's forgiveness and now, at along last you have mine, but there is one person left. Father, you have to forgive yourself.”

Callum gazed into the fire, “I dinnae* ken* if I can do that, lad, but I will try.”

Father and son were silent for a few minutes, both pondering all that had taken place. At last Wesley decided it was time to turn to the second purpose of his journey to Scotland.

“Father, where is Oceana?” He hoped he wasn't being to blunt, but he was rather depserate to find out.

“Are ye in love with her, lad?” Callum asked, gazing at Wesley a little suspiciously.

“I'm afraid so. I don't know if it is a good thing or a bad thing, but it is the honest truth. I know I failed the first test of honor, but if she is willing, I will do all in my power to make amends.”

“Chandler had this sayin' he just loved to quote,” Callum mused, “it is a Latin quote I believe, Chandler was a great lover of them ancient Roman and Greek scholars, it went something like, the wounds of love can only be healed by the one who made them. I'm guessing that is the truth in this here situation. Still, no offense my lad, but I do have my reservations. How do I ken ye won't go breakin' her heart again?”

Wesley wasn't quite sure how to answer. He understood why his father was being hesitant, it was annoying to be sure, especially when he was dying to see Oceana and the only way to find out where she could be found was if his father would tell him. But after returning Oceana to his father in tears, with a shattered heart, it was only natural Callum would be hesitant in trusting her to Wesley's care again.

“Just how serious are you about Oceana?” Callum asked.

“Well, before we fought, I was contemplating marriage,” Wesley confessed.

“Hmmmm,” Callum nodded his head. “I've heard a lot about ye, my lad. Oceana wrote of you all the time in her letters. It is strange indeed, seeing as she was writing me of my own son. I ken ye to be a brave and honest man. Even read how you were rewarded two medals for gallantry at sea,” Callum could not quite hide the pride in his voice when he said the last words. To think his son had actually saved the life of his captain in the middle of a terrible storm. “I ken ye to be a true gentleman, and so I am willing to give ye a second chance. I should ken that everyone deserves to hae one. Ye can court Oceana till the end of the summer, and if ye show ye are worthy to hae her then I'll gie* my consent to ye marrying the lass. What do ye say to that?”

“I think that if very fair, Father. My ship has been sent in for repairs and I am stuck here on land till the end of September as it is.” Wesley was very pleased with the direction things were going in. “Would you be against me seeing her now?”

“No, I think the sooner ye get to her, the better. I can no longer bear to watch that poor girl trying to hide her misery. Poor lass is a pinning fer ye, so ye had better go and try to heal that wound, since ye was the one who made it.”

“Where is she now?”

“Well, seeing as it is nearing twilight, there are two places she could be. Either by the shore, or on the cliff overlooking the shore. She must sing to the sun after all, to make it set, or so McDuff claims,” Callum chuckled, “I dinnae know who had a greater imagination, McDuff or Chandle. It is a pity Chandler is not around to compete with him.”

“What is it with the whole mermaid story?” Despite his eagerness to see Oceana, Wesley wanted to just somehow get the whole story cleared out. "Just how much truth is there in it,Father?"

“I cannae say that, my lad. All I do ken about the lass is that twenty years ago, I spotted a boat adrift in the Irish sea. Chandler and myself pulled the boat in and there was a little bairn* in there. She was wrapped up in a blanket and in that blanket we also found a necklace with a lock of hair, a piece of wood and a seashell. Who put the baby in the boat, why she was floating adrift, where the boat had come from, this I cannae say. Chandler had his theory, McDuff has his, ye are free to make one up yerself if ye want too. All I do know was that the lass changed my life and in the end, it was her that brought ye back to me. Who she is, who she could hae been, I dinnae ken and I dinnae care. She gave me reason to live, that is miracle enough.”

Wesley reached out and grasped his father's hand, “Thank you, Father, for raising her. Who would have thought you ended up raising her for me.”

“Well, ye still have to prove that part,” Callum chuckled. “But I think ye will not fail. If I were ye, I would start with searchin' at the cliff and if she isnae* there, go down to the shore. When ye hae made peace with her, bring her back fer dinner, and though I assume ye have had better dinners in yer life, ye are more than welcome to share it with us.”

Wesley smiled, shook his father's hand and went off in search of the mermaid, the ocean's daughter and the woman he loved.

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auld lang syne: days long past,   bairn: baby,   cannae: can not,   dinnae: do not   hae: have,   isnae: is not,   ken: know,   gie: give   ne'er: never.