Moonfin (15 page)

“
NICE TURNS BY KAI KANE! ANOTHER BASH OFF THE TOP—SHE PULLS OFF A SWEET REVERSE AND AHHHH—HER BACK'S AGAINST THE WALL AND SHE GOES FOR BROKE! FIERCE FREEFALL! THE WAVE POSIES OUT ON HER AND SHE PULLS IT OFF—WHAT A SMOKER, SCORING ONE FOR THE CHICKS
!
”

The horn blew signaling the end of the heat. Kai, with her board leashed to her foot, pulled up out of the water and trotted up the beach. Plopping down in the hot sand, she unstrapped her ankle and listened carefully for her score.

Sugar handed her a baked apple tart. “Sweetie, where'd you learn to surf like that?”

“Self-taught, mostly … and by my dad a little. He was so busy teaching my brothers, I don't think he noticed I was listening.”

“And all those days you played hooky from school to practice,” teased Jeff. She probably wasn't surfing, but more likely having to care for her sister, Lizzy knew.

“
AND KAI KANE IS IN THE LEAD WITH A 7.0 IN THE FIRST HEAT
!
”

They all whooped and shouted wildly.

“I know you'll win this thing,” Sugar said proudly.

“Thanks!” Kai jumped up and gave her a big bear hug; Sugar always knew the right thing to say to encourage her.

“I need to get some shopping done at the grocer's—I plan to pick up some barbecue for dinner, so don't be late. Jeff and Kai, I expect you to show up—y'all are getting too skinny. You need some more fat on your bones if you're going to swim in this cold ocean.”

She picked up her beach bag and started to leave, but halted.

“Oh, and by the way, your mama wants you to stop by the lab … something about those shiny thingamabobbers you gave her.”

Lizzy had completely forgotten about those. “You mean the scales we found on the yacht?”

“Yeah—those crazy doodads. Says she's found something interestin' and wanted to show you. Stay safe, y'all,” she said then left.

“Hey, speaking of which—” Kai pulled two leather necklaces out of her knapsack and handed one each to Lizzy and Jeff.

“Yours,” she said to Lizzy, “has beads like mine.”

“Nice.” Lizzy turned it over in her hands and watched as the sun reflected off its silvery-green surface.

Jeff made a face like he'd just eaten a sourgutz drop. “Thanks, but no thanks—guys don't wear
necklaces
.”

“Sure they do—all the surfer dudes, anyway. Like shark's teeth and stuff.”

“Well, maybe …” He tied it around his neck, unsure. “It does look kinda cool—like a shard of steel. I wonder where these came from.”

“I dunno, but it's made of pretty tough stuff. I had a hard time drilling the hole to string it—took several tries after borrowing my brother's titanium drill-bit.”

“How does it look?”

“Manly.”

“Yeah, thanks for leaving the pink beads off mine—wouldn't match my complexion,” he joked. Jeff considered throwing it back in the ocean first chance he got, but since she did a good job of making it
non-girlie
, he'd keep it for a while.

Lizzy admired the scale's glistening colors. “Hopefully my mom can tell us something about them when we get to the lab later.”

 

The announcer called a series of heats throughout the morning and afternoon until two o'clock. When the final rounds were to begin, Kai was one of the last four contenders in the junior girls' division. The semi-finals ran two sets of two surfers in each. Two winners from that heat would move up to the final set.

Kai wiped and waxed down her board nervously and wouldn't let herself think about what would happen if she won. Only the top three girls would be invited to compete in the upcoming Rebel Surf contest. She kept visualizing the wave over and over in her imagination, racing down the face, doing tail-slides, spins, and airs …

They called her name and she took off, plunging down on her board in the smooth, undulating waves. Her eyes stayed focused on the rising peaks, feeling their rhythms in her heart. The ocean was beautiful and dangerous, playful yet unrelenting. When she stepped into the water, she felt instantly at home and scared at the same time. There was nothing like it in the world for her.

Kai recognized her opponent. It was a girl from the high school and surfer from the local beat. She was older and had won other competitions—Kai knew because she had watched her win them in sweet style. A small doubt began to creep into her mind:
Maybe my mom is right—I never win anything.

Her thoughts did battle with her arms and legs, beating them into wobbly submission. She panicked. A massive wave blindsided her and knocked her from the rail of her board, pulling her down into what felt like the vortex of a washing machine on spin-cycle. She let the hefty wall of water pass over her, bobbing up in its wake in time to see her opponent catch the peak of the wave and carve down the face.

“I can do this!” Kai exhaled. “It doesn't matter what anyone else thinks.” She pulled up on her board and set herself in ready position. The next big one rolled in and, mustering all her strength, she charged down the face.

The announcer went wild:

“
THE GAME IS ON AS KAI KANE JAMS DOWN THE LINE—SHE SLASHES OFF THE TOP AND SPRAYS OUT THE BACK—LOOK OUT! WAY TO GO!—CRANKIN' OFF THE LIP WITH A BEAUTIFUL INSIDE TURN AND A LITTLE SOFT MOVE THERE. HER FINAL HIT SHE THROWS IT OUT
!
”

One wave down, three to go.

The next set of waves seemed to be starting deeper and deeper in the ocean, growing larger with each pass, easily ebbing above the thirty-foot mark. She sat on her board and watched as they rolled by. It was now or never. She went into the push-up position and jumped to her feet. The announcer started his commentary as the spectators watched excitedly on the beach—

“
KAI KANE TAKING OFF AND FLOATING THE LIP—BEAUTIFUL LINED-UP WAVE—AND SHE CLUTCHES IT. COMIN' IN AND SMASH! SPINS OFF THE TOP AND WHOA! HUGE TAIL HACK AND
—
”

Silence.

The announcer stopped speaking. The beach went quiet. Everyone searched the waves for the surfer who was there a moment ago, slashing like a pro, but had now vanished. Whispers trickled up the coast—

“
Where is she
?”

“
KAI KANE IS DOWN
!
” blared from the loudspeaker.

Loud gasps and words of shock rumbled through the audience. Intense moments passed as the medical team ran down and pulled something out of the water. The safety crew rushed back and forth on Jet Skis. Cries ran along the beach after it was discovered the object they pulled out of the surf was a half–eaten yellow shortboard. Word spread like wildfire along the shore—

SHARK!

The beach broke into chaos. Shrieks rose up as frightened parents yelled for their children to come out of the water.

Lizzy went frozen.

“
What do I do … what do I do …?”

Time ticked slowly between each heartbeat as she watched at the water's edge, searching desperately for a head to pop up. Nothing. Then a thought burst into her mind—

“Ohhhh, no, no,
noooo
,” she argued with herself. “I can't do it—I know I'm supposed to be different—I can breathe underwater even—but a shark! I can't take on a shark—Kai is my best friend. I have to try to save her. Xili said she was never far from me—noooooooo….” And the longer she argued with herself, the more convinced she became of the right thing to do: Kai was floating around in the ocean in danger, maybe even hurt, and she had to go and help her.

“Oh for
goodness
' sake!”

She grabbed a nearby surfboard that had been standing upright in the sand and ran as fast as she could, diving straight into an oncoming wave. She heard Jeff screaming behind her, “LIZZY, WHAT ARE YOU DOING!”

Lizzy took a beating getting past the break and had to tip her board under each bashing wave to avoid being carried back to shore. She paddled and searched and spun and dove and paddled some more. It felt like an eternity of swimming and still no sign of Kai. Her muscles began to tire.

What was I thinking? If Search and Rescue couldn't find her on their Jet Skis, what made me think I could?

Then her surfboard began to move …
on its own
.

She was getting a push from behind and careened farther and farther out until she saw something floating on the open sea—a blue and yellow speck against the gray-green ocean. It was Kai. But she wasn't moving, and as Lizzy got closer, she could see why—

“Oh no,” she breathed, paddling harder.

 

Kai sat still on her half-chomped surfboard. She was drifting out into the open sea away from land: when the tide got this strong, it was almost impossible to get back. The roiling ocean blocked her marker on shore, a fixed point whereby surfers could tell if they've drifted too far. The last thing she remembered was doing a lip-turn on the crest of the wave when a massive mouth of sharp teeth wrapped around the back end of her board, hurtling her headlong into the surf.

Crud. That was my best board
, she thought.

While she strained to get her bearings, her predicament just got a whole lot worse: a fin cut through the surface and was coming right for her.

“Looks like the board wasn't tasty enough,” she murmured, looking for a way out.

The great white started to circle.

Then she heard someone call, “Kai!” from out of nowhere. She turned toward the voice and couldn't believe her eyes—
Lizzy
!

“I don't think you get points for battling the men in gray suits,” said Lizzy, pulling up next to Kai.

“What are you doing here?”

“Couldn't let you have all the fun by yourself!”

“Welcome to the party then. He's circling, and you know what that means.”

“Time to tango.”
But how to tango with a shark,
wondered Lizzy.

“Any ideas? Please tell me you came out here with a plan.”

“Sure. Well, not really.”

“Super, we're both beef jerky.”

The shark streamed past them several times and disappeared, resurfacing closer each time, marking out its territory. It was still several yards away when something overtook Lizzy.

It was an
instinct
.

She slid off her board and swam cautiously toward the shark. Kai was shouting at her from somewhere, but she could barely hear for the rushing blood pounding in her ears. Lizzy felt her body changing. For one moment the water surrounded her, the next, it moved with her and through her—it was like she was phasing with the water molecules themselves!

The whole scene only got weirder because she flashed some sort of translucent green color and then something happened—something unbelievable: She rapidly washed over the toothy beast and trapped it in a sphere of constantly moving water. How she knew to do this was a mystery. A flood of new words from deep inside rushed her mind and forced their way out—

“Apu markara! Bad!”

The brute became disoriented with all the movement and jolted to-and-fro. It broke away, whipping off course, and tried to move back toward Kai. This only made Lizzy push harder, coiling swiftly around, caging it in. Several times it snapped and ground its teeth at Lizzy only to crunch down on empty bubbles.

“Kriyaa! Feed elsewhere!” she shouted in a commanding voice.

The shark grew tired. After many failed attempts to reach Kai, it moved off for good, seething and shamefaced, giving Lizzy a long, hateful look before departing. Lizzy's body transformed back to normal and, relieved, she started swimming back up to the surface.

But wait! I can hold my breath without the conch this time!
She noticed something else too. She felt brave
.
That was an unusual feeling for a dedicated chicken. It was a new feeling. It was at that moment she saw her clearly for the first time—Xili!

She was sure it was her, hovering gently in the folds of the sea. But Lizzy could only see her for a few seconds, and someone else behind her—it was a boy with black hair staring piercingly at Lizzy.

Xili's silvery locks wrapped around her like seaweed strewn through the ocean. To Lizzy, she looked like pure light and the essence of jewels, but without the burden of the minerals themselves. Then she disappeared and only the bubbly water remained.

“Xili?” Lizzy spoke into the quiet water.

“Shapayra Yam, little one. It means—”

“Sea Beauty,” she said, remembering those were the exact words etched in the sand when Krista and her goons were hit with that rogue wave.

Lizzy suddenly realized—

“It was
you
who wrote them!”

“Yes, it was me.”

“And you brought that wave so close to shore?”

Lizzy smiled. The shocked look on Krista's face after being drenched in cold seawater was
priceless!

“I did have a little help there—oh dear! Where are my manners? This is Tevu.” Xili motioned to the mysterious boy behind her, who nodded briefly toward Lizzy.

“So you understood the words you just spoke to the shark?”

“Yes, kind of.” She seemed delighted.

“Bravo! You told it to change direction, and you also said, ‘begone.' It was wonderful!”

“You were here the whole time?”

“I told you, I am never far from you.”

The dark-haired boy continued to stare at Lizzy, which made her very uncomfortable. He examined her every move, as if he'd never seen a human before. Maybe she was as strange to him as the Waterpeople were to her.

“I don't get it. Why me?” she asked, confused.

“It was your choice,” Xili said slowly. It seemed like she was hoping her words would spark a response somehow. Xili and the boy stared steadily into Lizzy's eyes.

“The Fierce One we spoke to you about earlier—”

“Moonfin?”