Tides (21 page)

“Mara.” Maebh reached toward her, pleading. “Think of Dolores. We’re linked. She knows I’m afraid, but she doesn’t know why. Even if you’re right about Noah—and I believe you, of course I do,” she added quickly, “I can’t make myself believe that Dolores would hurt the pod like this.”

She spoke confidently, but Mara thought she felt a shadow of doubt cross over their link. “Please, Mara, come with me. You shouldn’t lose your faith in humans, simply because some have wronged us so.” She smoothed her hands over her sealskin. “Besides,” she said, “Dolores is Noah’s grandmother, after all. Perhaps she’ll be able to help us find Lir.”

Lir and Aine,
Mara’s mind whispered. Her sister’s name rose in her throat, but she couldn’t say it. She pressed her lips together.

Three dark heads appeared in the harbor and started toward them—Ronan and the younglings.

“Tavis, Branna,” Maebh said, stroking the fine fur on the younglings’ heads, “I need you to stay with your brother for a little while.”

They crawled out of Maebh’s lap and into the water. Mara watched them until they reached their siblings.

Ronan nodded at them, his eyes guarded and sharp. They disappeared under the water.

“All right,” Maebh said. “It’s time to go.”

Mara had to try one more time. “Surely you won’t leave the younglings alone again so soon?”

Maebh shook her head. “You underestimate your brother, Mara,” she said. “He is strong, and he bears the weight of his own guilt tonight. He will not let them be harmed.” A subtle look crossed her face, as if she’d just thought of some clever secret. “Besides,” she added, “an Elder must know how to divide responsibility. It’s a lesson you will do well to learn.”

Mara frowned. It sounded as if Maebh were giving advice to an heir, a future Elder. Mara thought she’d never be ready, after Aine was lost, and now Lir . . . Mara had buried her hope of becoming the Elder, of restoring the pod, in the deepest part of her soul, far away from where she kept her dreams.

But now Maebh was pulling that hope to the surface again. Mara wanted to be the Elder much more than she wanted to stay away from Noah; Maebh knew that.

So when the Elder plunged into the water and started swimming toward White, Mara followed. She knew she didn’t have a choice.

thirty-two

N
OAH
held his breath. He knew he had to be absolutely quiet.

Quiet hadn’t been easy, not in this house. Noah was thankful that at least the den window had been cracked open, or he didn’t know how he would have gotten in without making noise. But Professor Foster’s staircase creaked even worse than Gemm’s, and the pain that still throbbed in his foot made it hard to tread softly.

He’d made it to the top of the stairs, at least. There were three doors in the upstairs hall, and Noah stopped, unsure which to try. It was dark, and the strongest impression he got was the smell, something that made him think of expired cleaning solutions—at once too clean and not clean enough. Something chemical.

He heard Professor Foster behind the farthest door.

“It’s okay,” the professor murmured. He sounded genuinely concerned. “You’re okay.”

Noah walked slowly down the hall. Was it possible, even now, that Professor Foster was innocent? That he had a dog, after all?

The door was slightly open. He kept still. He hoped, he wished, that he’d been wrong.

“See? It’s over now.” Professor Foster spoke quietly, gently. “I told you it wouldn’t hurt much.”

He looked down and saw two sliding bolt locks on the outside of the door. They were both undone.

“All right. Stay. I’ll be back soon.”

It took Noah a moment to understand—Professor Foster was coming out. If he found him like this, hiding in the hallway . . . Noah couldn’t let that happen. He glanced around for a place to hide. He didn’t know if he could get to one of the other doors before the professor emerged, and anyway, they might be locked.

It was still possible that he was innocent. That Noah had misjudged him, this man he admired so much.

He wrapped his hand around the edge of the door and pushed it open.

“I’m sorry—” he started to say.

Another hand gripped his and wrenched him inside.

He felt an arm wrap hard around his neck, and before he had time to register anything else, a sharp slip of pain under his shoulder blade, something invading, something cold. And something else, hot and wet, sliding down his back.

He shuddered. His knees unlocked under him and he fell.

“You . . .” He tried to speak again, but oh, his shoulder didn’t like that. He hissed his breath back in.

Professor Foster knelt beside him, a knife slicked bloody in his hand. “Noah?” he asked. “You—why in God’s name did you come here?”

Noah pushed himself up. His vision fogged and then cleared.

Two children huddled together in the far corner of the room, two pale children with black hair and wide black eyes, wearing old, worn white T-shirts too big for them. They looked almost identical. One, though, was scarred—scarred everywhere, in an angled grid over her face and neck and arms. Old scars.

Aine.

Noah pulled away from Professor Foster. Slowly, every muscle crying out with the effort, he stood. His legs trembled, and he felt the blood pulse faster from the wound in his back. He knew he wouldn’t be able to stand for long.

But Professor Foster didn’t have to know that. “You can’t do this,” he said. “I came to—” His ribs convulsed under a fresh wave of pain. He leaned back against the wall behind him, trying to stand as if he didn’t need the support. “You have to give them back to their family. They’re just—they’re just kids.” He looked over at Aine’s grid of scars, at the way the children clung to each other and stared. “I know you hurt them.”

Professor Foster closed his eyes. He nodded, slowly, heavily. He stayed silent for a long time, and Noah waited, just praying he could stay standing.

“I know it seems that way,” the professor said. “I know what this must look like to you. And I’m sorry. I am. But think about this, Noah.” His eyes darted around the room, not focusing on anything there—it seemed he was imagining some other place, somewhere far away. “You’ve read my work on sealskin. This is a whole other level. I’ve done amazing things with selkie skin already—I’ve had Hope’s skin for years now. Just ingesting it makes me feel—it’s incredible. They—I—
we
could save the Center with this. My God, we could save lives.”

His voice had grown quick and manic as he spoke. He’d been inching closer to Noah, and now he laid a hand on his shoulder, then slid it around his neck.

“I’m sorry,” he said again, and his grip tightened, and he slammed Noah’s head backwards.

Noah felt a crack and dropped to the floor, black rushing over his eyes.

thirty-three

T
HE
cottage looked the same as it had earlier that evening, shabby and comfortable, warm light pouring from the windows. The crooked path to the front door reminded Mara of Noah holding her hand as they walked in together, the day she’d told him the truth. His fingers had been gentle against hers, his sweatshirt soft on her skin. The door creaked, and she remembered how he’d opened it for her on the very first day they’d met.

Inside was worse. The pink couch, the worn kitchen table, the old whitewashed walls—they felt so familiar, as if Mara had been coming here her whole life. As if she belonged here. She’d thought the walls would be darker, the photos hung on them more sinister, but everything was as cramped and cluttered and wonderful as it had been before.

She closed her eyes, unable to bear how she still loved this house and treasured her memories of it. She hated herself for feeling this way.

When she opened her eyes again, Maebh and Noah’s grandmother were sitting together on the couch. Maebh wrapped her arm around Gemm, as if the human were the one in mourning.

Mara’s lip curled back in an almost-snarl. No relative of Noah’s had a right to Maebh’s comfort, not now.

“I didn’t know; I didn’t know,” Gemm whispered in an empty voice that nearly softened Mara’s anger.

Then she saw Noah’s sweatshirt slung over one of the kitchen chairs, and she hardened again.

“I know you didn’t,” Maebh said, twirling a length of Gemm’s gray hair in her fingers. “I’m so sorry.”

Mara scoffed. She stalked to the bathroom door, the farthest she could get from Maebh and her disgusting human romance. It was all weakness, and stupidity, and loss. Mara’s humanskin prickled with anger, and she hated the feeling of it.

“I’m sorry I didn’t come earlier,” Maebh said. “We didn’t know what had happened, at first, and I needed to keep the other younglings safe. I know you must have felt it; you must have wondered.” She pressed her lips to Gemm’s cheek.

Mara’s heart cramped and ached, but she didn’t look away again. Instead, she sent Maebh all her impatience, all her fear about where Lir could be, what he could be enduring.

Maebh turned to Mara, her eyes hard. “Yes, Daughter,” she said. “I know your fears. Patience becomes an Elder too.”

The dream grew in her again, and an image appeared clear as water in her mind. She saw the younglings changing, Ronan free and searching for other pods, and Mara herself leading all of them, helping them, letting the pod evolve and change as it should always have done. When Maebh offered the dream to her like that, Mara knew she’d do whatever she could for the chance to reach out and claim it.

She would even stay human. She would even listen to Gemm try to defend Noah, pointless as she knew that would be. She grudgingly walked back toward the couch and perched herself on its arm. She crossed her legs, folded her hands together, and attempted to radiate patience.

Maebh chuckled. “Thank you, Mara.”

Gemm lifted her head, wiping away the tears that had settled into the wrinkles around her eyes. “I don’t expect either of you to trust me,” she said.

“Oh—” Maebh started, but Gemm hushed her with a look.

“I’ve betrayed you before, love. I know it was years ago, but I don’t deserve your trust. I know that. All I can do now is tell you the truth, and hope that somehow you will believe me.” She glanced up at Mara.

Mara nodded slowly. She tried to look patient and encouraging; she tried to make sure those were the only emotions Maebh could sense through their link.

“I understand why you think Noah is involved,” Gemm said, “but I promise he’s not.”

Mara couldn’t hold her growl in this time. It ripped from her throat like a clawed animal, low and fierce. “You’re wrong,” she hissed, her human voice sounding animal too.

“No,” said Maebh, shaking her head gently, “she’s not.”

Mara almost stormed out to the ocean then. Only the call of the dream, the hope that Maebh might make her the Elder soon, held her back.

She tried to ignore her other reason for staying: the bright and throbbing and all-too-human part of her that wished Gemm were telling the truth about the boy she’d kissed.

“All right,” she said. “I’ll listen.”

Gemm settled closer to Maebh. “I saw Noah tonight, after the dance. He was scared—terrified—that you were hurt, Mara. He didn’t know what was going on. He didn’t understand anything. All he wanted was to help you. He was looking for your skin”—Mara bristled—“because he was looking for
you.
After you came, and he realized what you thought of him, he was so miserable and exhausted that I told him to go to sleep, and still he snuck out and rowed to the Center to see if he could find the kidnapper there. I suppose he found something, because he came back here half an hour ago and—and he took my boat to the mainland.” Tears shimmered in her eyes again. “He didn’t tell me where he was going, but I know well enough it’s somewhere dangerous, and he’s doing it for you.”

Mara shook her head. “No. No, he’s not.”

“Mara.” Maebh’s voice was kind but firm. “I know you linked with Noah tonight. I could feel it—the whole pod could feel it, for Goddess’s sake.”

Mara’s face burned, but Maebh and Gemm only smiled at each other, sharing some secret memory.

“Search that link, child, and tell me if Noah means you harm.”

Almost against her will, a curious tendril crept up in Mara, searching out Noah’s emotions. She sensed nothing, at first. Then came confusion, disorientation, fear.

She frowned—
Is he hurt?
—then chided herself for caring if he was. Nevertheless, she could find nothing dishonest or cruel in his feelings toward her. She recognized heat and longing in him, and she trembled as those same feelings leapt up in her.

She hardly trusted herself to speak, with her heat twining through Noah’s in their link. She shook her head.

“Good,” said the Elder. She looked at Gemm again. “Now, did Noah tell you anything else about who might have . . . taken Lir?”

Gemm exhaled. “No. He didn’t tell me anything.” She raised her eyebrows, and a tiny flash of hope warmed her face. “But Lo’s still upstairs,” she said. “Maybe he told her.”

The door to Noah and Lo’s room was closed. Gemm opened it quietly, so as not to surprise Lo while she slept.

Her bed was disheveled, the white sheets twisted into peaks like foaming waves. Mara could see part of Noah’s bed beyond a folding screen. She stepped forward, curious to see where he slept, then stopped, hoping Maebh hadn’t noticed.

Both beds were empty.

Gemm sucked in a deep breath. She stepped back into the hall. “Lo?” she called. They all knew there would be no answer.

A bang sounded from the kitchen. Mara jumped, and by the time she turned to find the source of the sound, Maebh and Gemm were already rushing down the stairs. She followed after them.

“Gemm? Are you here?” Lo stood just inside the cottage door, her chest heaving. “Is Noah gone?”

Even while she waited desperately for Lo’s news, Mara felt a fresh wave of aching for Noah. She prodded their link and felt that rushing heat again. She told herself she would find him soon, and she tried her best not to think about the pain and fear and confusion that pulsed in him. She tried to believe he was not too badly hurt, and to ignore the part of herself that felt foolish for changing her mind about him so quickly.