55 pages • 1 hour read
Natasha BowenSkin of the Sea
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2021A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 25-27Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 25 Summary
While Kola fights, Simi runs up a set of stairs, finding the twins in a cage at the top. While she searches for the cage’s key, Kola enters, covered in blood. He has the key clutched in his hand, and Simi releases the twins, who run to Kola. He asks Kehinde where her ring is, and she backs away, taking her twin with her. Kola shifts to reveal Esu, and the real Kola, bleeding from a wound in his side, arrives at the top of the stairs. Esu delivers a crippling blow to Kola, who falls unconscious.
Simi holds Esu at bay, demanding to know why he’s doing this to Kola’s family. Esu is tired of being Olodumare’s mouthpiece and wishes to be more. He is angry that the orisas’ powers are limited and believes that “our lands will never survive without an orisa like me” (279). Simi asks what he’s done so far to show the world needs him, comparing his tricks to the help the other orisas have given. Esu confesses he never delivered Yemoja’s messages of atonement for creating the Mami Wata to Olodumare and that Olodumare never ordered him to scar Yemoja—Esu acted on his own out of jealousy.
Esu demands Kehinde reveal the location of her ring. She refuses, and Esu hurls Kola at the wall, breaking several bones but leaving him alive. Esu threatens to torture Kola, and Simi attacks the orisa, who clutches her close and tells her he could make her human to be with Kola. Simi refuses, vowing, “If there’s a way for me to be human, I will find it on my own” (283).
Esu starts to choke her, but she rips away, telling the orisa that she knows where Kehinde’s ring is. Kehinde dropped the ring into the sea, and Simi can feel it. She will tell Esu where it is if he answers her riddle, and when he does, laughing at his victory, she drags him over the edge of the palace to fall into the sea.
Chapter 26 Summary
As she falls, Simi remembers her last moments aboard the òyìnbó ship. She attacked them for what they did to her people, prayed to Yemoja, and then jumped into the sea. Yemoja offered her the choice to be Mami Wata, and Simi accepted. As her tail formed for the first time and Yemoja slipped the sapphire necklace over Simi’s head, she thought, “I am Simidele, ‘follow me home’” (289). In the present, Simi and Esu crash into the water, Simi turning to her Mami Wata form and regaining her strength. Esu wraps his hands around her throat, and she drags Esu down, calling on the creatures of the deep to attack the orisa.
Simi summons Olokun, who wraps Esu with the chain he wears, vowing to “bind him at the bottom of the sea until Olodumare sees fit” (292). Olokun gives Simi Kehinde’s ring, and Simi returns to Esu’s palace, climbing the steps to kneel at Kola’s side before he dies.
Chapter 27 Summary
Simi touches the silver-gold essence of Kola’s soul that rises from his body and sees images of his life, ending with one where he sees her as “more than just a girl” (296). Realizing the rings are back together, she returns Kehinde’s, and the twins knelt to either side of Kola’s body. With their orisa essence and Simi’s prayers, the three return Kola’s soul to his body, bringing him back to life.
Later, Simi wears the rings and summons Olodumare to apologize for breaking the rules. A golden light of love envelops her. She sees memories of her life and how those taken found their ways either to their earthly homes or to Olodumare. Last, she sees herself rescuing Kola and feels Olodumare’s gratitude “for all that I have done” (300).
Simi tells Kola what happened in the sea and about her deal with Olokun. In return for his help binding Esu, she promised to live with him in the realm of the dead. Kola reaches for her, but Simi jumps from the palace. As she falls, she begins to cry because she and Kola are not the same, and “[they] can never be” (303).
Chapters 25-27 Analysis
These final chapters reveal the details of the deal Simi made with Olokun and set up for the sequel based on that deal. Olokun offered to imprison Esu to keep him from bringing more harm to the world with his tricks and out of revenge for Esu not telling Olodumare of Olokun’s prayers. Olokun will keep Esu bound in the sea until Olodumare sees fit, which is irony. As Olodumare’s messenger, Esu should be the one to bring his prayers to Olodumare, but he cannot do so while he is trapped in the sea. Olodumare may not learn of Esu’s plight because Esu is not free to do his job and tell him. Leading up to his imprisonment, Esu had not been delivering prayers and messages to Olodumare that he didn’t think were worth delivering, and now a new messenger may not bring Esu’s prayers because they may deem them unimportant.
While Esu is the trickster orisa, he is also arrogant, which is his downfall. Simi knows Esu will solve her riddle, but she needs a distraction to drag Esu into the sea. Simi tricks Esu at his own game, showing her commitment to saving those she loves and her quick thinking. The ease with which Esu falls for her trick shows the easily manipulated ego of orisas. Esu wants to be worshipped, believing that showing his superior knowledge will force Simi to bow to him. He doesn’t think she is capable of tricking him, showing how Esu underestimates humans. Simi’s Mami Wata status means nothing to Esu until she bests him and brings him into the sea, where she is stronger than him.
Simi’s refusal to give in when Esu offers her humanity shows that there are more important things than having our wishes granted. Simi has grown to love Kola and care about the others, but she understands that Esu’s downfall is more important than what she wants. It may be that her connection to the sea makes her more aware of the effect orisas can have, which lets her fight Esu’s promises in a way a regular human might not be able to. Her resolve to find a way to become human on her own may foreshadow her becoming human later in the series.
The final memory Simi regains in Skin of the Sea is her escape from the òyìnbó ship. Rather than being thrown overboard like many of those she’s rescued, Simi fought her way to freedom, punishing the òyìnbó for what they did to her and her people. Simi willingly offered herself to the sea, which may be why Yemoja offered her an existence as a Mami Wata. Simi proved her ability to save herself, which means she has the ability to save others. Simi’s decision to jump from the ship offers the idea that death on our own terms may be preferable to a life controlled by others.
Kola’s death and resurrection are another element of the heroic journey. In making her deal with Olokun, Simi sacrifices her freedom to save those she loves. Kola’s death is an unacceptable consequence, and after all she’s seen, she believes that the twins have the power to save him. While the twins offer the orisa energy needed to return a soul to its body, Simi’s love and prayers are also needed. As a Mami Wata, Simi has collected souls to send on to Olodumare. Here, she does the opposite. Saving Kola in Chapter 3 foreshadowed her saving him again here. Now, she knows about Olodumare’s decree, which shows that if she had known about it then, she likely would have made the same decision. Saving people is part of Simi’s nature, another possible reason that Yemoja chose her to be Mami Wata.
When Simi summons Olodumare, she is prepared to beg for forgiveness and plead her case. Instead, she is met by unending love, which suggests that humans do not view gods as they truly may be. Yemoja described Olodumare as just but unyielding. Olodumare’s anger was mostly a creation of Esu for his own purposes, and it may be that Esu has spread falsehoods about Olodumare until humans and orisas alike believe the creator to be a cruel being. Rather, Olodumare thanks Simi for all she has done, including saving Kola from death twice. This suggests that Olodumare values preserving life above orisas staying out of human affairs. It is possible that the orisas will use this knowledge in the rest of the series to help more of those who are taken from their homes.
