The Riverman (The Riverman Trilogy) (8 page)

There was no seeing through it, so Fiona reached out to touch it. It slapped her back like she was an insolent dog.

The haze let Fiona touch it.

She reached for it again, and again it slapped her away.

“I think this is something beyond your control,” Toby said.

“But I need to know what’s behind it.”

“Remember how I told you that Aquavania is where stories are born?”

“Yes.”

“There are many stories to tell. Yours is not the only one. Maybe this is the end of yours.”

“Mine ends when I decide it ends!” Fiona barked as she tried to step into the haze. It knocked her onto her rear.

“I’m only saying what you already know,” Toby said.

This was true. Fiona was not so arrogant as to think she was the only person who’d ever come to Aquavania. Toby had already told her as much. But then, she had never wished to meet anyone else here. This was a place to be alone with her creations.

Just as she thought this, there came a whisper through the haze.

The girl named Chua needed nothing more than to meet someone smart and new so that she could share her story.

This wasn’t Fiona’s thought. It was someone else’s, and as it emerged, it brought with it a wave of water that snatched Fiona from the bridge and pulled her through the haze.

That fuzzy feeling—the bubbles in her body that accompanied trips to and from Aquavania—tricked Fiona into thinking she was returning to the Solid World, but instead of emerging next to the boiler in her basement, she emerged in the center of an ice cavern.

The cavern was as large as a football stadium. Its roof was at least one hundred feet high and covered not only in icicles but in numerous polar bears that hung upside down by their feet like bats. A few other polar bears were flying through the air, aided by fleshy and furry propellers that grew out of their backs.

Not far from Fiona, a girl wearing a parka with a woolly hood sat on a throne made of ice.

“Hot chocolate!” the girl hooted. “Success!”

“Hello?” Fiona surveyed the cavern. Toby was nowhere to be seen. She didn’t recognize this place.

“Welcome welcome welcome!” The girl pushed herself off from the throne and slid with a surfer’s stance across the ice to Fiona’s side. She stuck out a hand. “Name is Chua.”

“Mine’s … Fiona.”

As she shook Chua’s hand, Fiona took in more of the surroundings. The walls of the cavern were covered in tiny lights that were constantly changing colors. The changes appeared random at first, until Fiona realized they were broadcasting messages about her.

S
HE
’
S
SCARED
.

S
HE
’
S
COLD
.

“You’ll catch your death,” Chua said. “How about a walrus skin coat?”

“That would be”—before she finished speaking, Fiona felt the warmth of animal fur on her skin and looked down to see that she was now wearing a perfectly tailored coat—“fine.”

Fiona needed Toby to be there with her, to tell her what was going on.

It didn’t work.

Fiona needed to go back to her world, to a safe place, a place where she was in control.

This wish didn’t work either. No matter what Fiona thought, it didn’t come true.

“First time crossing over?” Chua asked.

“Excuse me?”

“Don’t sweat it,” Chua said. “You’re a guest. Relax. Enjoy your visit.”

Chua stomped the icy ground, producing a ripple of cracks. From the cracks, a small beak poked up like a bud. A head followed the beak, and suddenly there was a penguin in front of them, shaking wet ice from his velvety coat.

“Greetings and salutations,” the penguin said with a bow.

“This is Baxter,” Chua explained.

“And who is this lovely young lady?” Baxter asked.

Fiona was too dumbfounded to respond.

“I know it’s ludicrous,” Baxter said. “Penguins and polar bears existing in the same geographical region. Yet it’s how our Chua likes it.”

“This is Fiona,” Chua told Baxter. “She crossed over for the first time. I was lonely and I wished for a new friend, and she must have been near the folds.”

“The folds?” Fiona asked.

“That’s what we call them. The borders of our worlds.”

“So I’m in your world now?”

“She learns quickly,” Baxter said.

“Yes,” Chua said. “But don’t worry. Anytime you want to go home, go ahead and tell me and I’ll wish you back.”

“How many worlds are there?” Fiona asked.

“Oh, I don’t know,” Chua said. “Hundreds? Thousands? Millions?”

Baxter tilted his head and held out his wings like two open hands. He didn’t have the vaguest idea.

“I’ve met six other kids here,” Chua went on. “I’ve been to four other worlds. But they know other kids, who know other kids, and blah blah blah. So I suppose there could be countless worlds.”

“Are the other worlds like this?” Fiona asked. “Icy and strange?”

“Oh, no no no,” Chua said.

“Are all minds the same?” Baxter asked Fiona.

Fiona shook her head. “In my world I have a bush baby and miles of vines that you can swing on and braid into just about anything.”

Nodding, Chua seemed mildly impressed. “I have this.”

She put two fingers in her mouth and whistled. The ground softened and sagged like elastic. And like elastic, it held their weight for a moment and then snapped back, sending Chua, Fiona, and Baxter rocketing into the air. As they went up, the polar bears went down, fluttering past them like a snowfall of fur. When it looked like Fiona would strike the icy roof, Chua whistled again and the roof burst into a glittering cloud.

At the apex of their flight, the two girls and the penguin hung in the air for a moment, and Fiona looked down to see that the polar bears had never hit the ground. They were hovering and swarming together like bees to a hive. Gravity took hold again and pulled the three back toward the bears.

As they fell, Chua whistled twice more. With the first whistle, the ground exploded exactly as the roof had, leaving nothing but a dusty sparkle. With the second, the walls of the cavern exploded too, but not before broadcasting a final message.

P
LANET
P
OLAR
B
EAR
I
S
C
OMPLETE
!

When they touched down, Fiona, Chua, and Baxter landed on white fur. The polar bears were no longer individuals. They had merged into one enormous ball of fur that was pulsing and floating in the open air like a miniature planet. The dusty particles left over from the walls and roof and ground were now stars in the endless sky that surrounded them.

“Holy moly,” was about all Fiona could say.

Chua winked and said, “Baxter, be a good li’l bird and fetch us some potato chips.”

Baxter nodded and jumped in the air, his pointy wings poised like a diver’s hands. There was no water anywhere, so Baxter dove straight into the furry ground. It swallowed him completely, and he was gone before Fiona could make sense of what had happened.

It didn’t faze Chua one bit. “Stay the night if you like. Sleepover?” she asked.

“I … I…” Fiona was rarely one to stutter, but she was also rarely one to attend sleepovers, let alone ones in magical lands. There were occasional birthday party invitations back home in Thessaly, and her friend Kendra had her over on a few Saturday nights to hang out and watch videos, but that was it.

Chua clearly sensed Fiona’s apprehension. “If you’d rather return to your world, I can wish you back,” she said. “But I think we can have some fun here, don’t you?”

“I think … I might like that,” Fiona finally replied. Why not, right? Chua was obviously a girl of great talents and knowledge. There was no telling what she could teach Fiona about Aquavania.

Chua stepped forward and put an arm around Fiona. It felt nice to have a new friend.

“You know there’s only one thing left to do, then?”

“What’s that?” Fiona asked.

Chua’s dark hair brushed against Fiona’s face as she leaned in and whispered, “Riverman, Riverman, blood to ice.”

The words reeked of menace, and Fiona’s body felt like it was split in half. She looked down to see a bright blue icicle embedded in her chest and Chua’s hand pulling away. Falling backward, Fiona clawed at the icicle to try to get a grip, but it was burning cold and far too slippery.

“What did you do?” Fiona cried.

“Riverman, Riverman, blood to ice. Riverman, Riverman, blood to ice.”

Fiona arched her back and planted her shoulders in the fuzzy ground and tried to dislodge the icicle. It was no use. The icicle was melting, and the liquid was seeping into her as if her body were a sponge.

Chua loomed, arms out and eyes wide, as if in a trance. “Riverman, Riverman, blood to ice. Riverman, Riverman, blood to ice.”

“Why are you saying that? What have you done to me?”

Fiona closed her eyes and began whimpering, and she didn’t stop whimpering until she realized that she wasn’t in pain. She had been stabbed in the chest—she had felt the icicle tear into her!—and yet it didn’t hurt anymore. Not one bit.

Opening her eyes, she saw that the icicle was no longer there and there was no injury. She wasn’t even wet. Chua was standing above her, smiling.

“I’m sorry,” Chua said. “I didn’t think you were him, but I had to know for sure.”

“You didn’t think I was who?”

“The Riverman,” Chua said.

This is where I stopped Fiona. It had taken her almost three hours, but she had finally mentioned the name that had haunted me for nearly a week. I blurted out the inevitable question. “Who the heck is the Riverman?”

Fiona sighed. “He’s the one who’s coming for us. All the kids in Aquavania.”

Headlights swept over the backstop behind the swings and splashed our shadows onto it. In the empty lot, a truck engine rumbled.

“Fi!” someone yelled. The voice had teeth.

“Crap,” I said. “It’s late, isn’t it? Is that your dad?”

“Uncle.”

A cigarette torpedoed out of the truck window and hit the lot with a flurry of sparks.

“Well past dinner,” her uncle called out from the cab. “Been sent to find ya.”

Fiona stood from her swing as I turned myself in a circle, twisting and tightening the chains like the rubber band on a balsa plane.

“We’re just talking,” Fiona called back.

“Don’t matter one bit. Need you home, Fi.”

The look Fiona gave me could have been two things: panic or longing. Maybe it was both. Whatever it was, it struck me hard. She wanted nothing more than to stay there with me.

“I have to tell you the rest, as soon as possible,” she said.

“Call me.”

“Can’t risk it. He could be listening in on my phone.”

“Your uncle?”

“The Riverman.”

“He’s here?” I asked.

The moon was strangled by clouds. It was as dark out as it gets. “He could be anywhere,” she said.

There were pebbles at my feet, and as Fiona lifted her bike and walked away, I worked my feet through those pebbles and kept tightening those swing chains. There are countless stories where a boy tosses pebbles at a girl’s window and she opens it and climbs down and he saves her. He always saves her.

Fiona hefted her bike into the truck bed. Opening the passenger side door activated the interior light and illuminated the face of her uncle. It was the same man from the backyard and the garage.

Lifting my feet, I launched into a spin. I closed my eyes and tucked my legs to spin faster as the truck pulled away.

T
UESDAY
, O
CTOBER
24

On the walk to school the following morning, Kyle’s van pulled up alongside me and Keri. “Got a second?” he asked.

Sniffing toads might have induced a similar expression on Keri’s face. Her lip curled, and her head sank into the valley between her shoulders.

“Don’t worry about it,” I told her, placing a hand on her backpack. “He’s cool. Go on without me.”

Your funeral,
her eyes said, but she wasn’t going to mourn. She kept moving, leaving me next to the van.

“Get in.”

“I can’t be late,” I said.

“Get in.”

We drove around the block, circling a couple of times while listening to the radio. When I tried to speak, Kyle turned up the volume to quiet me. At first I thought it was because he wanted to enjoy the music, some oldie with a lot of
ooo wa ooo
s. By the third loop, I discovered the real reason. Kyle was crying.

He wasn’t bawling, but there were tears, plump and real, and he was wiping them away. I’m not exaggerating when I say that this shocked me more than any story Fiona had told.

“Hey, are you—”

“Shut your face,” he said.

He eased the pedal down, the van sped up, and he cranked the wheel to make the next turn. The tires yelped.

“I don’t know if you should drive like—”

“I almost killed the little prick,” Kyle sniffled. “Can you believe that? Chriiiist! Five fingers. If it wasn’t bad enough for him already.”

“It wasn’t your fault.”

He shook his head. “Does that make a difference?”

I wasn’t sure if I knew the answer. I tried to roll down the window to get some air, but the handle didn’t budge.

“I never told anyone you came with me for the fireworks that day,” he said.

“Okay.”

“Not that it matters. But I want you to know I can keep secrets.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

Kyle cranked the wheel again to make a left turn, and it felt for a second like the van might tip. I braced myself against the door until we were on an even keel.

“You’ve never once ratted me out,” Kyle said. “You knew I stole the stop sign from Seven Pines and Cheshire. You saw me doing donuts in the field by the playground. I ain’t ever been busted for those things.”

“Uh-huh,” I said, because this was basically true. The sign I had found in his clubhouse years ago, and I was too intimidated by Kyle to report it to my parents. The donuts happened more recently. It was an early Sunday morning, and I was out on my bike when I spied Kyle’s van tearing away from the playground, muddy curlicues in its wake. Again, I didn’t bother telling anyone. Kyle was in trouble all the time, and it didn’t seem necessary to pile onto his problems.