Emily Windsnap and the Castle in the Mist (4 page)

Shona and I decided to go out on our own. We picked North Bay. That’s where I lived with Mom and Dad on
Fortuna.
There is something about our bay that seems to sparkle more than all the others. I was pretty sure anything glittery would wash up there eventually. Also, it has more boats than the other bays. Shona reckoned that made it a good place to find things, as there were so many nooks and crannies around the underside of the boats where lost jewels could easily get stuck. Some of the oldest boats were lived in; most were abandoned and unused.

Millie lived in North Bay too, on our old boat,
The King of the Sea.
Millie is Mom’s best friend,
who came with us to Allpoints Island. She used to have a kiosk called Palms on the Pier in Brightport, where we lived before we came here. Recently she’d started doing tarot readings and hypnotism for some of the mer-families because they were so impressed with the way she helped deal with the kraken by hypnotizing it. She’s a funny one, Millie. Most of the time, she’s obviously the world’s biggest phony, but just occasionally she gets something right and you have to take back everything you’ve said about her.

I thought it might be a good idea to search near her, as she always had crystal balls and fancy jewelry herself. Perhaps she’d dropped something over the side that we could use.

Shona swam ahead. She was determined to win the gold starfish for best-decorated mermaid. I went along with her, too distracted to concentrate properly. Neptune. In our classroom. Today!

“Imagine, Neptune coming to our class!” Shona said, reading my thoughts, as she so often did.

“Yeah, imagine that,” I said, without any of her enthusiasm. I thought back to the times I’d met him so far and how I’d managed to get on his wrong side both times. Not that he was especially known for having much of a right side.

We had an hour before we had to get back to class with our findings. Gliding silently into the bay, I scoured the seabed for anything that could be
used as a mermaid accessory. It wasn’t the kind of thing I normally bothered with, but I wanted to try to look the part, at least, for Miss Finwave, and for Neptune. And Shona was so excited by the whole idea, I didn’t want to dampen her enthusiasm.

Mostly the seabed was just pure white sand, soft and powdery. Every now and then we swam over a rock. We’d dive down and scrabble around it, coming back up with lengths of golden seaweed to wrap around our tails, or shells that had holes worn right through the middle. Great for necklaces, if we could just find a thin chain somewhere.

“Come on, let’s try this one.” Shona swam ahead toward an old fishing boat that lay wrecked on the seabed.

We swam over the top of it. The front end had been smashed against a huge rocky layer of coral and lay exposed and ruined. Algae and seaweed had grown around it over the years. Groups of fish swam in and out of the wreckage that had become part of their habitat. Two black-and-white harlequins pecked at the rotting wood, covered as it must be by now with the tiniest forms of sea life, perhaps a small breakfast for this pair. A lone parrot fish swam into the hull of the boat. We followed it in.

“Nothing much here,” I said as we looked under the frayed benches and all around the edges of the boat.

“Hey, look at this.” Shona swam into the wheelhouse of the boat. Spongy coral had somehow made its way in, filling the little room as though it were a greenhouse. Shona was pulling at some delicate purple sea fans. “I could wear them in my hair,” she said, holding one up against her head. It looked like a feathery hat.

“Nice,” I said, tugging at a blue-and-pink vase sponge. “Hey, maybe we could use this in class. Miss Finwave could put flowers in it.”

“Swishy idea!” Shona grinned.

Pink jellyfish lined the bottom of the boat. “Shame they’re poisonous,” Shona said as we swam back out into the bay with our findings. “They would have made nice cushions.”

I laughed. “Where to next?”

“How about your boat?”

“Fortuna?”

Shona nodded happily. “It’s so old I bet all sorts of things have gotten lodged underneath it over the years.”

“OK. And then
King,
” I insisted. “I want to see if we can find any of Millie’s discarded lucky pebbles!”

“Come on,” Shona said. “Let’s go.”

We swam all around the edges of
Fortuna.
Portholes lined the lower level. Some had glass in them. The biggest one near the front, the one Dad and I used for getting in and out of the boat, didn’t. The whole lower floor was half submerged. That was how Mom and Dad managed to live there together.

Green ferns reached up all around the front end of the boat. It was like an underwater garden, except that we never had to water it!

“Let’s take some of these,” Shona said, grabbing at the ferns. She held them against her tail. “We can wear them as skirts.”

Under the ferns I spotted some silver seaweed, thin and wispy. It was just the thing to help turn our shells into necklaces. I carefully ripped out some strands.

Swimming around the boat, we scavenged under the rocks, trailed along the hull with our fingers, batted fat red fish out of our way, and created sandstorms as we burrowed for treasure, picking up anything colorful that we could carry.

“Come on,” Shona said. “We’ve got enough of the B and D stuff. I really want to find some of the jewels. Think how pleased Neptune would be!”

“Hm,” I said. It was hard to imagine Neptune being pleased about
anything,
let alone something I’d done.

“Let’s try
King,
” Shona said. Then she stretched out her long tail and swam off. I started to follow her — but something was drawing me away. It was as if I was being pulled in another direction by something attached to me, tugging at me. What was it?

“Shona, let’s try over there,” I said without even knowing why. I pointed toward a bunch of rocks nestled among a tiny forest of bushes and reeds. Spiky black anemones sat along the rocks’ edges, lining them like guards. The bushes were gray and dull.

“There won’t be anything down there.”

“Please,” I said, my chest aching with the need to look in the rocks. “Let’s just try it.”

Shona sighed. “Come on, then.”

She scavenged away under the rocks with me, dodging the anemones and burrowing into the sand without knowing why we were looking here any more than I did. A small sandstorm built up around us as we scratched and scrabbled at the seabed, digging out broken shells and pebbles. But nothing more than that.

“How about this?” Shona asked, holding up a razor shell. “It would do for a comb, perhaps, if we just cut away a few ridges.” She turned the shell over in her hands, held it to her hair.

I nodded. “Yeah,” I said absentmindedly. But I
knew there was something else there. I could feel it shining into me, almost calling me. It reminded me of a game we used to play where someone hides an object and the others have to look for it. Move nearer, you get warmer. Move away and you’re cold again.
Warmer, warmer.
I could feel it close to me. What was it?

“Come on, let’s try one more boat,” Shona said. “We need to be back in class soon.” She started to swim away.

“Wait,” I called.

Shona turned. “What is it?”

Could I really say what I felt? That I had a burning in my chest that told me I had to stay here, had to find whatever it was that was down here? Look what had happened the last time I made Shona help me follow my instincts. We’d ended up disturbing the kraken and threatening the safety of the whole island. No, I couldn’t do it.

But I couldn’t leave it alone either.

“You go on,” I said. “I’ll just look around a bit more here.”

“But there’s nothing to see. It’s just a bunch of rocks, Em.”

“I know. I just — I just want one more look around.”

Shona flicked her hair back. “OK, if you’re sure. I’ll meet you by
King.
Don’t be long.”

“Great. See you there,” I said, trying to return her smile. I hurried back to my task as soon as she’d turned away. What was down here? Why was it drawing me in? One way or another, I was determined to find out.

I worked like a dog burrowing down a hole on the trail of a rabbit. I scratched my tail on the coral, my hair was matted and tangled, and my nails were filled with sand and broken from tearing at the rocks. But I couldn’t stop. I had to find it. Whatever was down here, I needed to find it. I could almost feel it calling me, as though it
wanted
me to find it.

“What are you doing?”

I jerked my head up. Shona!

“I —”

“I’ve been waiting for ages. I thought you were going to meet me at
King.
”

“I was,” I said. “I just — I wanted to —”

“Your nails!” Shona screeched. I instantly curled my hands into fists, but it was too late. Shona swam over to me and uncurled them. “Miss Finwave’s going to hit the waves!”

“Yeah, I know,” I mumbled. I didn’t want to talk about my nails! I wanted to get back to my search.

“Come on,” Shona said, “we’re going to be late.” She had some fine, wispy pink seaweed draped around her neck. She must have found it by
King.

“All right,” I said. I didn’t make any effort to move.

Shona pursed her lips and pulled her hair to the side. “Emily, what’s going on? You’re acting all weird.”

“No, I’m fine,” I said with a lame smile. “Really. Sorry. Come on — let’s go.”

I dragged myself away from the hole, pretending I was going back to class with Shona. There was no way I was leaving this, though.

“Hang on a sec,” I said as we passed
Fortuna.
“I’ll just go in and clean my nails.”

“What?” Shona flicked her tail impatiently.

“Because of Miss Finwave.” I faltered. “I won’t be long. I’ll just go in. I’ll be right behind you.”

“I’ll wait.” Shona sighed.

“No. You go ahead. I’ll catch up. I don’t want you to be late.”

She shrugged. “OK,” she said, and swam away.

As soon as she was out of sight, I went straight back to the rocks. Whatever was down there was pulling me so hard I could almost feel it, as though I were a fish caught on a piece of bait. As I burrowed deeper and searched all over, I almost had to hold my hand over my heart to stop it from hurting.

And then I saw it.

I turned over one final stone and there it was, glinting at me, throwing light in a multicolored arc all around. I gasped.

A ring. A thick gold band with the biggest, brightest diamond I had ever seen in my life. It must have been in an accident, because the band had been dented and bent out of shape. I squeezed it onto my middle finger and examined it. I could tell that it used to be much bigger, but with all the dents, it fit my finger perfectly. Looking down at it, I had the strangest sensation. It was like a tight knot inside me that made me want to scream or cry or laugh, I didn’t know which. All of them.

I could have stared at it all day. But I had to get back. Glancing down at my hand every few seconds just to check that the ring was still there, for some reason I couldn’t help smiling to myself as I swam back to class.