Emily Windsnap and the Castle in the Mist (20 page)

We’d done it! We’d really, truly, done it.

We held hands with the rings together, each gripping the raft with the other hand. Light fizzed out from them like an exploding box of fireworks: white lights rocketing into the sky, bright blue balls of energy whizzing around and around, orange bubbles exploding all around us. I laughed with relief, tears rolling down my cheeks.

With every spark, I felt the life return to my broken body. My tail burst into action with the
light, filling up, flicking the water. My tail had come back! I was still a semi-mer! We’d beaten the curse!

“Look!” Aaron arched his body; something flipped onto the water behind him. A tail! Sleek and black, it shone and glowed as it batted the surface of the sea. “My tail,” he said, staring at it in wonder. “I’ve got a tail!”

“We did it!” I cried, clenching his hand tight as we held the two rings together.

And then Neptune rose in his chariot, his figure blocking out the moon itself.

He opened his mouth to speak, to roar, to do all the things Neptune does. I squeezed my eyes shut in anticipation. What would he say? What would he do now? Surely he wasn’t going to leave it like this. How could we have thought for the tiniest second that we could get away with it?

But no sound came. Eventually I opened my eyes again, to see Neptune in the same position, his hand in the air, his body taut and tense, the sea around him motionless. He was staring in our direction, but not at us.

I turned to see what he was looking at. At first I thought it was just the mist, hovering around the castle as it always did, bunching up into a ball. But there was something inside the mist. A person. A woman. She had the most beautiful face I’d ever seen. Eyes as green as the brightest emeralds,
framed by thick black lashes. Hair jet-black, stretching down her back. She reached out a hand to Neptune, holding his eyes with hers.

“Aurora?” he said eventually. “Is that really you?”

Aurora? Aaron’s ancestor? The woman who broke Neptune’s heart?

As she smiled back at him, her eyes brightened even more. Her smile seemed to illuminate the whole ocean. “It’s really me.”

“How? How are you here?” Neptune’s voice grew hard. “Is it magic? A trick of the light? What is it? How do you come before me like this?”

“Every year at the spring equinox, I wait for you. I try to find you. I have never seen you until this time. . . .” She swept a hand in front of us, smiling down at me and Aaron as she did so. It felt like the sun coming out. “This time, the rings have come back together, and they have brought me to you, and you to me.”

“But you left me,” Neptune replied, his voice even harder. “You broke my heart. You cannot mend it. You can never undo the suffering you caused me!”

Aurora held a slender finger to her mouth. “Don’t say this. Never say such a thing. I would never leave you.”

“Liar! You did. You left me!”

“I was a mortal. I wished with all my heart not to be. I even tried. For you. And I drowned trying to swim to you. . . .” Her voice was fading.

“But you still left me alone,” Neptune called. “Still without you.”

The mist swirled around her face, wrapping around her like a scarf. “You must forgive me,” she whispered.

“Aurora!” Neptune called. Waving his trident at the sky, he cried, “Don’t go! I ORDER you to stay! Do NOT leave me!”

The mist had all but swept her away. Her image. Her spirit. Whatever it was, it had almost faded completely.

“It’s after midnight. The moon has passed its peak. We are moving into day, toward the light, the spring, new life. I cannot stay. Forgive me,” she said, her voice as gentle as a breeze. “Forgive me. I beg you, forgive me.” Again and again she repeated the same words, until there was no more voice, no vision, only the wind, and the moon, and the night.

In the silence, we watched the mist that continued to swirl around the castle, wrapping it in fog. Neptune stared the hardest. His eyes didn’t flicker.

Aaron let go of my hand. “Look,” he whispered. Under the moon’s power, the pull of the rings had loosened. Aaron slipped his from his finger. After putting it carefully on the raft, he held his hands up. In the moonlight, I suddenly realized what he was looking at. The webbing. It was gone.

Gently placing my ring next to his, I examined my own hands. They’d gone back to normal too! I
laughed with pleasure, grinning at Aaron, at Shona, at —

“Gotcha!” A hand snapped up out of nowhere, snatching the rings from the raft.

“No!” I lunged forward to grab them back, but it was too late. I dived down into the water. Fueled with new energy, my mermaid self intact, I swam as hard as I could to catch whoever it was who had stolen the rings. But he was too fast for me. He bolted away, swimming like a lightning streak toward Neptune’s chariot.

When I came back up to the surface, I saw who it was, smiling his smarmy, creepy, nasty smile, holding out the rings for Neptune to take. Who else?

Mr. Beeston.

“Neptune won’t fall for any of that sentimental garbage!” he snarled. “Oh no, he knows what is important in life. What really matters, what —”

“Beeston!” Neptune growled.

Mr. Beeston bowed low, holding the rings out in front of him as he flicked his tail to tread water. “Your Majesty,” he said, his voice deep and intense, “I humbly return to you what is rightfully yours. I swore my allegiance to you, and I have not failed you. Finally, the rings are back with you. Once again, they may be parted and buried, safely out of trouble. And, you have my word, I will never, ever, let anything like this happen again.” Mr. Beeston
went on bowing so low his head was practically under water. No one else moved. No one spoke.

Then Neptune held out a hand. “Give me the rings,” he said.

Mr. Beeston instantly swam forward to hand the rings over to Neptune. “Your Majesty, I am humbled by your —”

“Silence!” Neptune barked, his face contorted — with rage, with pain? I couldn’t tell.

I stared at him. After everything we’d done, everything that had happened, how could it go wrong so quickly? Now that Neptune had the rings back, he could curse us all over again — and this time there wouldn’t be a single thing we could do about it.

I sank lower in the water, my tail hardly moving. Shona swam over to join me. She took hold of my hand. “I’ll always be your best friend,” she whispered. “Whatever happens.”

But maybe she wouldn’t have that choice. None of us had any choices anymore. All the choices were in Neptune’s hands. Literally.

Neptune flicked his trident in the air. Instantly, three dolphins swam to the side of the chariot. He bent down to say something to them and they disappeared, returning moments later pulling something along. Another chariot, a sleigh of some kind. There were two people in it. A woman and . . . a merman, his tail slung over the side. No!
It couldn’t be! But it was. Mom and Dad. Of course! Neptune said he’d bring them tonight!

I swam as hard as I could to reach the boat. “Mom! Dad!” I cried with every tiny bit of me. But the joy I felt disappeared as soon as I saw their faces.

Of course.

They had come to say good-bye.

Here — under the full moon, on the spring equinox, a point in the year when day meets night — earth and sea would finally be separated, and for good this time.

Mom reached out from the carriage to throw her arms around me. “Oh, Emily.” She sobbed, grasping my hair, pulling me to her so tightly I couldn’t breathe. I didn’t care. All that mattered was that I was in my mother’s arms again. “I looked for you everywhere. Everyone on the island has been searching. We found every last jewel that Neptune had been after, but we couldn’t find the most precious one of all. You.”

Dad had slipped into the water while she was talking. A second later, his arms were around me too. Hovering in the water next to me, he reached out to wrap me in his arms. “My little ’un,” he said, his voice raw and broken.

“Windsnap!” Neptune bellowed. All three of us looked up at him. He was pointing at Dad. “Come here,” he said firmly.

Dad let go of me.

“No!” I lurched toward him, gripping him around the neck with my arms. This was it. Neptune could undo everything, put an even stronger curse on me if he wanted. My dad was going to be taken away; I’d say good-bye to him for the last time. “No! Please!” I begged.

Dad unpeeled my fingers from around his neck. “It’ll be OK,” he said, the quivering in his voice giving him away. He didn’t believe that any more than I did. Then he looked at Mom. “I always loved you,” he said. “And I always will, right?”

Mom swallowed hard and nodded.

Dad glanced at Neptune, who glared back at him. “I have to go,” he said. Kissing Mom’s hand, ruffling my hair, he turned and swam away.

I darted through the water to follow him. Gripping his arm, I swam alongside him. Dad tried to shake me off. “Please, little ’un, don’t make this harder than it already is,” he said.

“Don’t go,” I begged. I swam to Neptune’s chariot with him. “Please!” I begged Neptune, choking on sobs. “Please don’t make me have to lose my dad again. Please. Please don’t make them have to part. I’ll do anything. I’ll be good. I’ll never get into trouble again.
Please.
” I let go of Dad and wept openly. I had nothing left to say, nothing to ask, nothing to offer, nothing to look forward to.

“Stop your crying, child,” said Neptune. “Listen to me.” He turned to Dad, looking him harshly in the eyes. “Windsnap,” he said, “do you love your wife?”

“More than anything,” Dad said. He looked around for inspiration — and found it in the sky. “More than the moon itself.”

Nodding briskly, Neptune asked, “And she feels the same way?”

Dad glanced across at Mom. “I hope so.”

Mom held her hands to her chest. Wiping her cheeks with the back of her hand, she nodded vigorously. In that moment, I knew what I’d known all along, really. Of course they loved each other! Everyone argues, even Shona and I. Mom and Dad were never going to split up. I’d gotten it all out of proportion. My overactive imagination, and my silly worries — that’s all it had ever been. I hugged myself, grinning with pleasure and relief.

Neptune was silent for a long time. He put his trident down on the seat in his chariot and held the rings in both hands. Juggling them in his palms, he looked back and forth between Mom and Dad. His powerful face looked different. The lines of anger streaking down each cheek seemed to have
gone. His eyes looked rounder, softer. For the first time ever, I noticed how green they were.

In the darkness, rain began to fall, tiny, sharp droplets plopping onto the sea all around us. Neptune opened his mouth to speak again.

“No one has to say good-bye tonight,” he said quietly. He turned to Mr. Beeston. “Beeston,” he said, “you were wrong.”

Mr. Beeston swam forward. Bowing so low his hair fell right into the water, he babbled, “Your Majesty, if I have failed you in any way, I —”

Neptune raised a hand to silence him. “You acted out of loyalty. But you are mistaken when you say I know what is important in life, what really matters. I don’t at all. Or if I do, I have only just found out.” He looked up at the mist, still swirling around the castle. The rain fell harder, bouncing off the sea all around us. “I have only just remembered.”

Then he held the rings out in front of him. “Come here, Windsnap,” he said. Picking up his trident, he nodded to the dolphins, who instantly swam forward, bringing the chariot and Mom to Neptune.

What was he doing? “I will no longer hide from the truth. I will no longer attempt to bury my feelings,” he said.

Neptune called Aaron to him. “You are the man of the family now,” he said to Aaron. “I cannot undo what has been done. But I can make amends.
You are free to travel, to live where you please, mix with whomever you like. I will not hide you from the world any longer. You are my fin and blood, and I am proud of you.”

Aaron smiled hesitantly at Neptune. His eyes, his deep green eyes. Neptune’s eyes.

“Your Majesty, sir,” he said, “What about my mother?”

“She will be waiting for you at the castle.”

“Is she . . . ?”

Neptune nodded. “She will be fine,” he said. “Like you, she has a long life ahead of her. I want you both to enjoy it.”