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meganbmooreWhen fifteen-year-old Peri’s father was lost at sea, her mother entered a sort of dream world, spending her time daydreaming about a kingdom beneath the sea, a kingdom Peri adamantly believes doesn’t exist. Soon after, an old woman of Peri’s village, who Peri went to for comfort disappeared, and Peri, heartbroken and unable to bear living with her mother anymore, moves into her house. Working as a chambermaid at the local in, she practices making hexes and throws them into the sea, hoping to curse the sea witch she blames for her hardships.
Soon after this, two things happen. The first is that the king and his unhappy son, Kir, come to her island. Kir seeks the sea, even to the point of trying to drown himself, and is miserable on land, and unable to love anything there. When he learns that Peri is throwing hexes into the sea, he asks her to add a message from him. At about the same time, a sea dragon with a golden chain appears near the island. A passing magician, Lyo, offers to get the chain for the fishermen, but accidentally turns it into periwinkles instead. One night, Peri sees the dragon come to land and turn into a young man who looks very like Kir for a short period of time, before turning into the sea dragon again.
I like McKillip, I like stories about changelings, and I like sea myth, so my liking this was almost a given. Often, stories about changelings are written to be cases of cruel mischief. Here, it’s an act of hurt and love. In addition, my (very negative) opinions on love triangles are pretty well known, but this one (almost more of a square) is one of the exceptions, because it’s about different kinds of love. Peri’s love for Kir is more a desire to heal and aid, a girl’s infatuation with a tragic figure, than “true love” as we tend to think of it. The sea dragon, often the most obvious choice for a love interest, has a love for Peri that’s pure and childlike but, after a first glance, not romantic. Lyo’s love for Peri is much more subtle, that of an adult, and one she has to grow up to appreciate.
Soon after this, two things happen. The first is that the king and his unhappy son, Kir, come to her island. Kir seeks the sea, even to the point of trying to drown himself, and is miserable on land, and unable to love anything there. When he learns that Peri is throwing hexes into the sea, he asks her to add a message from him. At about the same time, a sea dragon with a golden chain appears near the island. A passing magician, Lyo, offers to get the chain for the fishermen, but accidentally turns it into periwinkles instead. One night, Peri sees the dragon come to land and turn into a young man who looks very like Kir for a short period of time, before turning into the sea dragon again.
I like McKillip, I like stories about changelings, and I like sea myth, so my liking this was almost a given. Often, stories about changelings are written to be cases of cruel mischief. Here, it’s an act of hurt and love. In addition, my (very negative) opinions on love triangles are pretty well known, but this one (almost more of a square) is one of the exceptions, because it’s about different kinds of love. Peri’s love for Kir is more a desire to heal and aid, a girl’s infatuation with a tragic figure, than “true love” as we tend to think of it. The sea dragon, often the most obvious choice for a love interest, has a love for Peri that’s pure and childlike but, after a first glance, not romantic. Lyo’s love for Peri is much more subtle, that of an adult, and one she has to grow up to appreciate.