Ice Crypt (Mermaids of Eriana Kwai Book 2) (24 page)

I glanced around, again failing to see the shoreline through the fog.

“Yeah, let’s get away from here,” said Blacktail, reading my thoughts.

Tanuu stuffed the parchment inside his jacket. “Okay if I take this?”

I shrugged. “You’re the only one who can read it.”

“I’ll keep it safe. I wanna re-read it a few times and see if I get anything more out of it.”

As we made for the road, I imagined myself controlling the leviathan. How would it feel to have power over the most fearsome creature to ever exist? I could make it do whatever I wanted. I could kill Adaro, and then ensure no one ever threatened my people again.

It would be like when Eriana originally had the serpent under her control. We’d be invincible.

I glanced to the others. They were lost in their own thoughts, watching their feet—all with slight grins.

I grinned, too. With my friends at my side, I finally felt like we were gaining ground. We knew what the Host was and how to free it—and if the Ravendust bushes didn’t let me down, we’d soon know where it was hiding.

If Eriana’s Host was ever meant to be freed, we were going to be the ones to do it.

From the kitchen table, I watched my mother pull a casserole dish from the oven. She placed it on a vaguely circular hot pad I’d knitted in grade five. Her lips puckered in concentration as she sprinkled spices over it.

I was trying to think of the best way to ask about my ancestry without letting my parents know this was about the Host. Could I ask out of nowhere? Would they wonder where my sudden curiosity came from?

My father lay sprawled on the couch, reading some newspaper comics that must not have been very funny, because his expression was blank.

Maybe I could try and segue into it. But how?

My mother glanced at me, seeming to feel my stare.

“Hi,” she said.

“Hi.”

She tasted a piece of whatever was in the dish and glanced back at me.

“Hungry?”

“Smells good,” I said.

I couldn’t think of an appropriate segue. Maybe it would be best to jump into the question.

My father seemed to detect the weird silence. He lifted his eyes from the newspaper.

“I was thinking about … our family,” I said to both of them. “Tanuu was talking about his grandparents yesterday and I thought … I never got to meet mine.”

“You would’ve liked them,” said my father. “Interesting lives. Good people.”

“Nilus knew my parents,” said my mother. “But only as a child. My mother passed away when he was six. He might not have even remembered …”

She trailed off, shaking her head. I wondered if the memory of both her son and her parents was too much to think about at once.

“Tanuu said his great-great-great-grand-somethings came from Haida Gwaii,” I said.

“Most families migrated a couple hundred years back,” said my father.

“Did we?”

He rose from the couch, stretching so I heard his spine crack. “I’ve got a family book somewhere. Let me find it.”

He shuffled down the hall. I wanted to tell him I didn’t need to see a family book, and I only wanted to know if we were descendants of Eriana, but I held my tongue. That would make it too obvious that I wasn’t just asking on a curious whim.

From the kitchen, however, my mother’s eyes flicked over me sceptically.

“Anyo said you were asking all sorts of questions the other day. You’re not still on about that silly legend, are you?”

I traced my finger along a groove in the wooden table. Why would Anyo tell my parents that? Did my mother read too deeply into our visit at the school, or was Anyo warning my parents about what I was up to?

“Meela …”

“No,” I said. “I was only saying hi to Anyo. That’s all.”

It pained me to pretend I’d given up because the committee had told me off. But now was not the time for stubbornness.

My mother set three plates on the table and sat across from me. Each had a fair portion of meat and carrots in gravy. My mouth watered. With my mother’s garden turning out decent vegetables this summer, dinners since my return had tasted nothing short of fine dining. I’d have to commit this meal to memory and think back to it when we were all living off spruce again in mid-January.

“Speaking of Tanuu’s family, I got this meat from them, so you can thank them for tonight’s dinner next time you’re there.”

“I will,” I said, digging in. “This looks amazing.”

I assumed it was the same mystery meat we’d had at the beach. Bring on the fluffy kittens.

“How is Tanuu, anyway?”

Though my mother’s tone was polite, the question irritated me.

I scrutinised her over my plate. “Fine.”

“He’s such a nice boy. You know he graduated with honours?”

I made an indiscernible noise. He’d mentioned it.

“He’s a catch, Meela. Don’t let go of him. I can see him being a great father one day.”

My fork slipped from my fingers. It clattered onto my plate then to the floor, taking a carrot with it. I stooped to get it.

“Mama, please don’t talk to me about this.”

I plucked a hair from the fallen carrot before eating it.

“I’m just saying, you’re a grown woman. You’ve dealt with more responsibility than any other girl your age. You deserve to settle down now, and start a life with a man who has a career planned.”

“Tanuu doesn’t have a career planned. He just graduated.”

She raised her eyebrows. “Sure, he does! His mother says he’s got a talent for carpentry.”

“I bet he does,” I mumbled through a mouthful, thinking of how easily he’d pieced the deck of the Enticer back together.

In fact, he’d never mentioned it—but I also hadn’t asked.

“Anyway,” said my mother. “Now you’re done with all that Massacre business, it’s time for you to start thinking about your future. You’ve had five years of warrior training and no time for much else, which is a real shame.”

“I’ve been reading books,” I said defensively. “I even read some of Tanuu’s textbooks.”

“I mean starting a family, Meela.”

I paused with my fork halfway to my mouth.

“I don’t even want … You know I’m not …”

“You’ll be a great mother, Meela.”

“Ew, Mama. I can’t stand babies. They’re annoying and not even cute.”

She waved it off. “Don’t say that. You’ll feel differently when they’re your own.”

I leaned back, staring at her. How could she bring this up right now? Yes, I’d been through more than most adults I knew, but I was still only eighteen.

“How old were you when you had Nilus?” I said.

“I was your age.”

The year my father went on the Massacre. I narrowed my eyes. “Same year you got married, right?”

She hesitated for a fraction of a second. “Right.”

Her hesitation told me everything. I made a repulsed face.

“Nice summer wedding, I guess? About five months before Nilus was born?”

“Meela, Nilus was the best thing that happened to me at eighteen.”

“I don’t care,” I said. “I’ve spent a third of my life in warrior training. I need to live my own life now.”

“I wouldn’t have a problem with that if
living your own life
meant you were doing something worthwhile. Instead, you choose to spend your days hunting for some silly myth.”

I clenched my fists. “I’m trying to stop more of our girls from dying!”

“Use your head, Meela! If we don’t send warriors to kill the demons, we’re letting them spread like bacteria.”

“They’re not bacteria,” I said. “They want something. Until we use that to our advantage, they’ll keep attacking us.”

“This is exactly the type of thinking that got you into trouble as a kid. Sea demons don’t think like us. They’re savages.”

I wrapped my fists in my hair, trying not to explode.

“Your mother’s right.”

I hadn’t noticed my father come back. He sat down, placing a cloth-bound book on the table.

“We need to assert our power over the demons,” he said. “At the very least, we need to thin the population so they stop eating all our fish.”

I didn’t know what to say. Nothing seemed to convince them that they were wrong.

“Do you think you’re reaching for alternatives to the Massacres for other reasons?” said my mother. “I know as a little girl you felt sorry for the mermaids, and sometimes I wonder if you still—”

I stood. “I’m done. Thanks for dinner.”

“Finished already?” said my father, tucking into his meal.

My mother’s lips tightened. My father scraped the rest of my plate onto his.

“Can I borrow the book?” I said shortly.

My mother seized it from the table, turning it over as though checking for a hidden message.

“Why the sudden interest?”

I made an exasperated sound and turned on my heel.

They didn’t stop me from leaving.

I kicked a clump of dandelions as I walked down the driveway, causing the flowers to pop off and scatter.

“Start a family,” I muttered. “They’ve got a shock coming if that’s what they’re expecting.”

I’d wanted to go back to school and start a career before thinking about any of that stuff. Nobody had talked to me about career plans, but somewhere in the back of my mind I’d always wanted to work with animals. A vet, maybe. I was probably being stupid. A vet needed years of education, and I hadn’t even gone to high school.

Between their attitude towards mermaids and my mother’s infatuation with Tanuu, how was I ever supposed to tell my parents about Lysi?

Voices carried from around the bend ahead. It sounded like our neighbour, Elaila, and the widow from the Massacre Committee. I pulled my hood over my head and cut through the bush so I wouldn’t run into them.

The sun wouldn’t set for another four hours. I wandered through the forest, not sure where my feet were taking me. I didn’t feel like talking to Annith about this. Besides, she was likely with Rik.

My desire to see Lysi was more painful than ever. I scowled at the enormous trees, not wanting their still, insulating silence, but rather the crashing waves and the cold, salty spray on my face.

I watched my feet. I’d chosen a difficult part of the woods to navigate. Moss-covered logs crossed my path in every direction, slowing me down as I climbed over and sought ways around them. Ferns grew out of every surface—an entire ecosystem sprouting from each fallen tree.

Following an unexplored route, I passed under a rocky outthrust that must have formed in some huge earthquake tens of thousands of years prior. The rock was so splintered and crammed together, the face angled so acutely, it looked like the cliff might fall on me at any moment. A fallen cedar leaned against it, forming a canopy over my head and giving the impression that the tree was the one holding up the rock.

I brushed a hand along the face, poking my fingers into deep cracks where the earth had smashed the rock together. This formation was so close to my home, yet I’d never come across it before. What else had I yet to discover about this place?

Everyone liked to complain that the island wasn’t big enough—but now that I was trying to find something, it felt vast and insurmountable. I could spend my whole life combing every bit of this place and never find Eriana’s Crypt.

Of course, none of that would matter if I didn’t know my ancestry. I would have to sneak my father’s book away.

I moved slowly through the dense bush, not caring if I got lost. Several times, I had to backtrack to get around some deep ravine or impassable clump of logs.

Eventually, I came to a well-worn dirt trail. I followed it for a minute to get my bearings, and arrived at a marsh full of skunk cabbage. To my right, a less boggy path would lead me through. This was the route to the training base.

I hesitated, considering whether Dani and her trainees would be there. It was likely, given the Massacre would depart in mere days.

I crossed the marsh with new purpose.

Dani’s shouts met my ears before I was anywhere near the Enticer.

“I don’t care! You think the sea rats will let you rest because you’re out of breath? Get moving!”

I left the path, slowing until my footsteps were silent over the carpet of moss. When I was close enough to see the glade, I stopped, scanning the trees. The spruce to my left had a few solid, low branches. I climbed it. The scaly bark dug into my palms.

“Keep going!” Dani shouted. “
Get
 
- up!
”

I peered into the clearing in time to see her swing something at one of the trainees. The girl scrambled away on hands and knees. Dani’s iron prong, apparently the one from the fire pit we’d stumbled on, sliced through the air without making contact.

The girl kept running, joining her classmates. They sprinted back and forth in the clearing, stopping at either end to do a push-up.

Every face looked sweaty, miserable. One girl convulsed at the end of her push-up, as if about to be sick. But without question, these trainees were at the peak of fitness. Their muscles appeared chiselled out of wood. I looked down at my own bicep, which was admittedly impressive, but even from a distance I could tell these kids would knock me flat in a fistfight. Was the new training program really turning out better warriors?

“A demon won’t pause to let you stand if you stumble,” yelled Dani. “She will catch you and sink her teeth into your flesh. I’m the demon here, and I’ve got a few more days to prepare you to fight for every second aboard Vindicti.”

She swung her iron at a passing runner, who had to leap to avoid being caught in the shins. She landed with a grunt, tripped, swung her arms for balance, and kept moving. Dani’s next swing grazed her calf.

“Good. This isn’t unlike the weapons you’ll be seeing out there. Sea spears. Harpoons. A sea rat might strike face-on, or she might wait until you least expect it, popping out of nowhere to launch a dart into the eyeball of the first girl to lower her guard. She’s stronger than you, faster than you, with better vision in the dark and better balance on a careening ship. She will have every advantage, except for one thing: feet. You have your legs, and you can run and jump where a sea rat is stuck to the blood-soaked deck.”