The Flying Mermaid

Once upon a time there was a mermaid, who lived in the Mediterranean Sea, near Spain. She spent many happy days exploring the wonders of the deep, until she began to get bored of them. She tried sitting on the rocks with her friends and singing to lure sailors, but they said she had a dreadful voice, so sadly she had to leave. She swam to the shore and popped her head out of the water and looked at the land, but it seemed to be hard and bleak and unfriendly. She envied the seabirds, though, as they could fly freely in the sky and swim in the ocean.

One day she was swimming around listlessly near the seabed when she heard cries for help. She swished her tail and powered over to the rocks where the cries were coming from, and saw a sea-hag trying to back into a narrow crevice and being attacked by a large shark. The hag was trying to use her spells to fight off the shark, but everyone knows that sharks are immune to magic. The mermaid swam up and sank her sharp little teeth into the shark’s tail and it bellowed in pain and outrage. It swung round to face the mermaid, and she bopped it on the nose with a lump of coral. The cowardly creature turned tail and fled.

“Thanks” said the hag, disentangling herself from the crevice, “I really am most awfully grateful”.

“No worries” said the mermaid, “We mythical sea creatures must stick together”.

“I suppose I’d better give you some kind of magic reward. What compensation would you prefer – a pair of legs is quite usual?”

“No thanks – walking about on dry land looks uncomfortable and dangerous”

“What then? Please think of something quickly”

“Wings would be nice, and then I could fly in the sky as well as swim in the sea. Can you do that for me?”

“I think there’s a suitable spell for that in here somewhere” said the hag, rummaging in her enchanted bag, which was small on the outside and the size of a large warehouse inside. She finally produced a small bottle and handed it over. “Here you are – this should do the job.”

The mermaid swallowed the contents of the bottle (drinking underwater is quite tricky until you get the hang of it), and pretty soon began to feel rather odd. A weird tickling sensation in her shoulder blades led to some sharp pains and then large lumps appeared on her back.

“I’ll leave you to it, then” said the hag as she swam off, “Fly safely!”

In a remarkably short space of time two enormous wings had sprouted from the mermaid’s back, and after a bit of a struggle she worked out how to fold them up so they stopped interfering with her swimming. With a flick of her tail she rose up to the surface, and peered round to see if the coast was clear. She spread the wings and gave them a cautious flap, and suddenly found she was in the air.

Then the fun began. Birds have parents to show them how to use their wings, but flying mermaids have to work it out for themselves. For while she was completely befuddled, going upside down and backwards, looping the loop and making several unplanned re-entries into the water. After a lot of trial and more error she began to get the hang of it, and was able to fly in the direction she wanted and even hover at will. Several seabirds gave her very funny looks, but she ignored them.

Finally, exhausted, she dived back into the water and returned to her underwater grotto for a good night’s sleep. The next day she practised again, and the next, until after a week she was pretty proficient with her new appendages.

She decided it was time to actually go somewhere, so she headed for the coast. Flying over it, she decided this was much more fun than having to walk about on the hard ground with those stupid leg things – she felt quite sorry for the humans she saw. Obviously they saw her as well, but since flying mermaids do not exist their brains cancelled the signals from the eyes as soon as they received them, so nobody paid her any attention.

She flew over a big city on the coast, and then in the distance she saw them – mountains. She had heard of them, and assumed that they must be the big sticking-up things with white stuff on top. She flew towards them and over their summits and cruised about on the other side.

Far below, on the mountainside, she saw a little figure scrambling up the slope. She flew lower to investigate. He was clearly in a bad way, on the verge of exhaustion, but still frantically trying to claw his way up the mountain. Further down she could see more men, who were obviously chasing this man and not far from catching him. Suddenly feeling sorry for him, she swooped down and grabbed him in her strong arms and flew up into the air again.

Wings beating strongly, she carried him over the mountain tops to the far side, and found a small green valley where she laid him down carefully by a little stream. He had passed out, and she settled down beside him to wait for him to recover. When he woke up his brain must still have been confused, because it allowed him to see the flying mermaid stretched out on the grass beside him.

“What’s going on?” she asked, “Why were you running away from those men?”

Slowly he explained about the war that was happening on the other side of the mountains, and that his country had been invaded by soldiers from another country. Many people, especially those who were Jews like himself, were being rounded up and taken away, never to return. The only hope was to escape across the mountains, but it was difficult and dangerous and there were always enemy soldiers waiting to capture them.

“Well, you should be safe now” said the mermaid, “Just follow this stream down the mountain and you’ll find villages and people who can help you”. And she raised her huge wings and flew up into the sky, leaving the escaper wondering if it was all a weird dream.

In the days that followed, the mermaid spent a lot of time flying over the mountains. She often saw groups of people climbing over the peaks to find safety in the south, but sometimes she saw lone climbers struggling up or collapsed with exhaustion. Then she would swoop down and carry them over the mountains to the other side, and leave them somewhere sheltered and safe to recover.

At times she would see groups of soldiers chasing the escapers, and then she would pick up rocks and throw them, or start avalanches with her beating wings to scare them away. After a while the enemy soldiers stopped coming up the mountains to chase the escapers, scared of they knew not quite what.

After a while the escapers stopped coming, and the mermaid gave up her mission of rescue. She never stopped flying far and wide, exploring the wonderful world that her wings gave her access to.

Most of the escapers never saw the mermaid, or else forgot about her. But in some minds a vague image remained, of a beautiful giant woman with a long tail and vast wings. On one of the places down the valley where the escapers rested after their ordeal, they created statues of her each side of the entrance, to commemorate the Flying Mermaid of Freedom.

(The painting is 'The Flying Mermaid', based on carving on a hotel in Sort, Catalonia, where escapers from Nazi-occupied France were housed)