“No Air Person must see this. No divers in Ingo,” I say aloud.
“I knew you’d understand once you’d seen this place,” says Faro, as if he’s read my thoughts. We look at each other in agreement, on the same side.
“What do you mean?” Conor breaks in. He swings round to us, turning his back on Limina. He’s not listening to any music now. His eyes are sharp on me and Faro. “Do you mean Roger? How are you going to keep him out? What are you going to do?”
“We won’t do anything,” says Faro. His gaze drifts toward the patrolling seals. Gray seals are formidable creatures in their own element. It’s not safe to anger them. The swipe of their tail, their powerful muscles, their huge shoulders, the gouge of their teeth, their claws—
“I see,” says Conor. He looks at me and then at Faro. His look is a challenge. “Oh, yes, we will do something,” says Conor quietly.
“What?” asks Faro.
“I’m not going to stand by and watch Roger get hurt. You think it’s all right for Roger to have an accident, do you? Just because he’s strayed into your world without meaning to? It’s not Roger’s fault. He doesn’t know this place is here. This Limina. It doesn’t mean anything to him—how could it? He’s got to be warned, so he doesn’t come here. He won’t dive if he knows.”
“Won’t he?” asks Faro. “Look over there. No, there. That shape in the sand.”
“I can’t see anything—”
“Yes, you can. There.”
But all I can see is a dark mound, covered in weed.
“Part of a ship’s hull,” says Faro. “That’s what your diver is looking for. It’s buried there in the sand.”
“Wow,” says Conor, suddenly focusing on it. “Maybe it was a treasure ship.”
“Maybe it was,” agrees Faro.
“Haven’t you ever explored it?”
Faro shrugs. “What for?”
“Gold? Jewels?”
Faro shakes his head. “We don’t bother with them.”
“But I thought…” I say. “I mean, in pictures, Mer kings always have crowns and jewels.”
“That’s because Air People are drawing the pictures. They draw the things they’d want themselves if they were kings. But do you know how heavy gold is? Just think of trying to surf a current with a lump of gold dragging you down.”
“Faro, people don’t wear lumps of gold. It’s far too expensive. They wear a chain or something like that.”
“A chain! Really, Air People are strange. Why would they want to chain themselves up?”
“They don’t, it’s—”
“Air People are in love with metal, as far as I can see. They’ll do anything to get it. We hear them sometimes, digging tunnels deep under Ingo, mining for tin.”
“That can’t be true,” says Conor. “All the tin mines round here closed years ago. You can’t hear miners digging these days.”
Faro shrugs. “They mined here for thousands of years. They’ll be back. Air People will do anything for metal.”
He looks out over the quiet plain, at the drifting, silvery figures in the ghostly light. They look as if a puff of current would carry them away.
“Look!” exclaims Conor, under his breath. “Over there! What’s wrong with the seals?”
He’s right. They’ve stopped patrolling. They are massing on the borderline, about fifty meters from the farthest outcrop of the Bawns. Two seals…five…seven. More are swimming toward the group from the far side of Limina. How fast they swim. How strong they are.
“They’ve seen something,” says Conor under his breath. Faro says nothing. He just watches.
“What is it? What’s wrong? Do you know what’s going on, Faro?”
Faro shrugs. “Can’t be sure. It’s too far away. It could be anything.”
His voice is carefully casual, but his face is tense. Something is going on, and it’s serious.
“You’ve got to tell us, Faro!”
“I did tell you. The seals are guards. If they sense a threat to Limina, they’ll deal with it.”
“What threat?” Conor’s voice is harsh. “What can they see that we can’t?”
But I’m watching the seals. They mass together, move apart, turn, raise their heads as if they’re—
“They’re listening!” I say. “They can hear something.” And suddenly knowledge leaps into my head. They’re listening to something that I’ve heard too. A noise that doesn’t belong to Ingo. The throb of an engine. A boat’s engine, far away up on the surface.
“Roger’s boat,” says Conor.
“They’ve come then.”
We stare at each other. The fear in Conor’s face mirrors and doubles the fear I know must be in mine. Only Faro isn’t afraid. He looks relaxed, but his face is intent, like a cat’s when it’s watching, waiting.
“Faro, you can’t let this happen!”
“I can, Sapphire,” he says very quietly, but with complete determination. “They’d think nothing of destroying the Mer, your divers. Can’t you see what will happen to Limina once divers get near that wreck? Once humans know there’s gold there? We’re nothing to them. They don’t even see us. They’ll destroy our world, and they won’t even know they’re doing it. Why should I help them? I am Mer, Sapphire. I belong to Ingo, not Air. I’ve made my choice.”
I feel as if Faro has claws that are tearing the two halves of me apart. I could never say what he’s just said. I could never say I am Mer without betraying the part of me that is Air, and human. Faro knows what he is, and I don’t. I half belong, but I’m half a stranger.
I don’t even like Roger. I wanted him to disappear out of our lives. And now I’m terrified, because it could be about to happen.
“Faro can let it happen,” says Conor, with a determination that sounds equal to Faro’s. “But I can’t. I’m going to stop the seals.”
“Conor, they’ll kill you!” Their teeth, their claws. One seal would be hard to stop, and there are dozens of them. I swallow the taste of fear. Can’t Conor see? These gray seals are the guardians of Limina. They’ll do whatever they have to do to protect it.
“I can’t let it happen, Sapphire,” repeats Conor. “I can’t let them kill Roger.” He isn’t boasting. He just sounds quiet and determined.
“But you’ve forgotten one small detail,” says Faro in his silkiest voice. “You need to hold on to my wrist. Sapphire’s strength isn’t enough for you. And I’m not going anywhere.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
FOR LONG SECONDS FARO and Conor stare at each other like enemies.
“I’m not going anywhere,” Faro repeats..
“So you think you’ve won,” says Conor. Slowly, deliberately, he unclasps his hand from Faro’s wrist. “But you haven’t,” he says, looking straight into Faro’s eyes, every word full of purpose.
“Conor! Don’t let go of him!”
“I’ve already let go, Saph. I’m going.”
“Conor, no, no, you can’t—”
But he’s turned away.
“Conor!” I plunge forward, forgetting Faro. “Wait for me!”
He’s swimming slowly, and I catch up with him in a few seconds. We are side by side, and as he glances at me, I see that already he’s paler.
“Take my wrist, Conor!”
“I’m going to the seals, Sapphire. Don’t think you can stop me.”
It was instinct that made me rush after Conor. My brother, going into danger. I had to follow him, stop him. Nothing else mattered.
But something else matters to Conor.
“Got to warn Roger.”
Roger. In Ingo everything human seems far away. Even Mum, even our home. They don’t seem real. But when Conor says those words, Roger comes into my mind as clear as day. He’s standing in our kitchen. He’s telling me about his black Labrador, Rufie.
Rufie was the best thing in my life, after we came back from Australia.
Roger told Mum she should change her mind about us having a dog. He didn’
t have to do that, but he did. Maybe—just possibly Mum was telling the truth when she said Roger cared what happened to us.
“Don’t try to stop me, Saph,” says Conor.
“I won’t. I swear I won’t. I’ll—I’ll help you.”
“Swear and promise?”
“Swear and promise.”
It’s the strangest swear and promise we’ve ever done. We slap hands though the water and press our way forward, to where the sea is thrashing with the movement of the seals. We skirt the jagged edges of the Bawns, keeping well clear of the borderline we must not cross. On one side there’s the calm of Limina. On the other the wildness of angry water. Through the churn of waves around the Bawns the bulk of a gray seal looms, then vanishes. I peer through the seethe of bubbles. A great bull seal shoots up toward the surface; then another seal follows, and another. We stare up at them. So many seals. Now they’re so close together that there isn’t a chink of light between them. I can’t count them, but more are still arriving.
What are they doing?
A wall of seals, solid, shoulder to shoulder. And then it parts. They are separate creatures again, twisting and diving. One, two, seven, nine—they’re leaving the surface, coming back into Ingo—
But surely that’s not a seal? Not that one there, the thin, spindly one? It looks puny and out of place next to the strong, sleek seals. And that’s not a seal either, that black, sticklike body, turning over and over as it sprawls through the water—
“Oh, my God,” says Conor. “They’ve got them.”
I see what Conor’s already seen. Those sticklike creatures are two divers in wet suits with air on their backs. The seals have got them. The divers’ limbs flail as the seals toss them high, then let them fall. As each diver falls, another seal butts his body upward. The divers’ heads flop back like puppet heads.
“They’re playing football with them.” I can’t believe what I’m seeing. I’m watching a game in a nightmare. The divers tumble in slow motion, and every time they fall, the seals are ready for them. Up they go, booted by the lash of a seal’s tail.
“They’re playing with them! It’s horrible!”
“No,” says Conor grimly, through lips that are already turning blue. “It’s not a game. They’re pushing them in one direction—look. They’re taking them somewhere.”
He’s right. The seals aren’t just tossing the divers randomly. Each fall has a purpose. Each fall brings the divers closer to us, each brutal shove is in our direction. The seals are coming toward us. They want the divers here. Why?
The jagged underwater peaks of the Bawns glint like teeth, ready to rip and tear. If a man fell on them—if a diver was thrown onto them—
“They’re going to smash them against the rocks,” says Conor.
“They’ll be killed, Con!”
“Yes. Come on!”
He’s holding my wrist, but now he’s the one driving us. We shoot up through the thick, churning water, toward the seals.
They sense us before they see us. They turn. For a moment they forget to toss the divers, whose bodies start to drift downward. The bull seal faces us, his shoulders huge, glistening with muscle.
Every detail of him burns into my mind. His eyes and whiskers, the sleek fullness of his skin, the bunched muscle under it, the power. And the anger of a guardian. Anger beneath his skin like muscle, powering him.
The seal comes closer. He seems to swell in my sight until nothing else is there. The bull seal blocks out everything. His head lowers, and he starts to measure the space between him and us, ready to charge.
Until the day I go to Limina I’ll see that seal’s face. Behind him Roger’s body drifts slowly downward. I don’t know how I know it, but I recognize Roger as clearly as I recognize the seal’s power. Roger, drifting through the water like a broken toy. Rufie…best thing in my life…
And then I hear the strangest sound. Like music, but not music. Syllables that fit together in wonderful patterns, like a puzzle in four dimensions. A sound you’d want to listen to forever if you once heard it.
The bull’s whiskers quiver. The focus of his eyes shifts. He looks away from me, toward Conor.
I look sideways at my brother. His bluish lips are open, but his eyes are already half closed and dulling as they did before. His head falls back. He can hardly move, but he can sing. All the strength he has left is pouring out of him in song. Conor sings, and the seals listen. The bull seal and his companions listen. Slowly their heads lift. Their shoulders relax. The bull seal’s eyes are so close to mine that I think I see them change and soften.
Conor, you have your own power that belongs to you, never doubt that. The time will come to use it.
It only takes a few seconds. Before Conor finishes singing, another seal has dived beneath Roger and caught him. Her teeth grip his wet suit, but even from this distance I can tell that she has made her mouth soft to catch him, just as Poppy used to make her mouth soft to pick up her pups. She isn’t hurting Roger. Another seal has captured the second diver, Gray. They bring them to the bull seal, the divers’ limp bodies dangling in the water. Their heads loll. I think they must be unconscious.
But the bull seal doesn’t look at what the other seals have brought him. He won’t take his eyes off Conor. He opens his seal mouth and begins to sing back his own long and patterned song, which is like the brother of the song Conor has sung. And this time I can hear the seal’s song. Maybe it’s the other half of that puzzle in four dimensions that Conor was making. As the song ends, the bull seal shakes his great shoulders. The other guardian seals have fallen back, except for those who hold the divers. The bull seal calls to them, and they rise up toward the surface, taking the divers with them. Their movements are gentle now, as if the divers are as breakable as eggs.
The divers’ wet-suited legs trail. Their bodies are lifeless, and their heads have fallen back. Maybe it’s too late. Maybe Roger and Gray aren’t unconscious but already dead.
“Boat’s up there,” gasps Conor. “Got to get them into…boat. Seals can’t do it. Come on.”
“Will they let us?”
“Yes.”
It feels like a nightmare, slow and heavy and tangled. We swim up and up, pushing against the weight of the water. Conor is heavy against me, barely breathing now. If the seals weren’t supporting Roger and Gray, we’d never get them to the surface. The weight of the divers is terrible. We push them up, but they sag down again. There is no way that we’re ever going to get them into the boat by ourselves. Conor’s growing weaker by the second. No matter how tight he grips me, he can’t get enough oxygen.
The seals aren’t hostile any longer, but they make it clear they think their job is done. They push Roger and Gray toward us as if saying they’re our problem now. They’ve delivered the divers over to us. They have done their duty and protected Limina. The bull seal calls through the water one last time, and the seals who were helping us turn and dive toward the Bawns, leaving us alone with the divers. Immediately we start to sink under their weight. Conor surely can’t go on much longer.
“It’s time to get Conor out of Ingo,” says a calm, familiar voice behind me. I turn, and there is Faro. And not only Faro. A girl as well, who is familiar even though I’ve only seen her at a distance before. A girl with long dark hair, almost the same color as mine and Conor’s. It floats around her as mine does, like seaweed, below her waist. She has the same cool green eyes as Faro.
“Elvira.” The name comes out of Conor’s throat in a sigh.
“Quick, Sapphire,” says Faro, “push up with all your strength. You can do it. Get Conor up into the Air. Elvira and I will look after the divers.”
“You won’t hurt them?”
“After all your heroic efforts?” he asks with a glint of malice. “No, we won’t hurt them. Ingo has defended herself.”
The weight of Roger and Gray falls away from me. Conor’s eyes are closed as I push upward with all my strength, thrusting him toward Air. And there it
is, just above us, like a glittering plate of light. Air.
We burst through the skin before I have time to know that I’m leaving Ingo. The first gasp of air is like a knife going down into my lungs. I’m out of Ingo, coughing and spluttering, and it hurts. It hurts, and it shouldn’t hurt. I’m human. I take another breath, and the knife goes in again, doubling me over. The taste of Air makes me retch. I want to go back…let me go back—
“Saph!” Conor grabs my arm. “You okay? Here, hold on to me.”
Conor’s color is better already. He dog-paddles vigorously, shaking his head so the water flies off it.
“I’m okay now,” I gasp, and it’s nearly true, even though each breath of air rasps like sand. “Give me a minute.” I don’t want Conor to guess how much it hurt for me to come out of Ingo. He’ll be afraid. Conor will know what it means, when the Air hurts me.
We’ve come up a few meters from the boat. There’s the ladder. But I can barely swim. The short distance to the ladder looks impossibly far. My arms are heavy, and I float helplessly as air stabs in and out of my lungs.
“We’ve got to get in the boat, Saph. Come on, you can make it. Hold on to me.”
“Roger?”
“They’re coming. Don’t talk. Swim.”
I cough out a mouthful of salt water. I’m full of sea; that’s why the air hurts. I cough again, choking, and spit out more water. That’s better. For the first time a long, easy breath of air goes into me. I tread water and wipe my hair out of my eyes. “Conor. The divers. Are Faro and Elvira bringing them?”
“Yeah. I forgot Elvira was here,” he says. The color in his face deepens. Oh, yeah, you forgot. I believe you, I think, but I haven’t got the breath to say anymore. The sun’s too bright. The air’s too sharp.
“Look, there they are!”
I turn. But I see the pain on their Mer faces as they enter Air and it stabs into their lungs, and I look away. I know how much it hurts. Like a thousand knives inside you. Faro won’t want me to see him weak and suffering.
“Elvira!” calls Conor, flipping over and starting to swim toward her. Conor’s strong now, stronger than any of us. I can’t really swim yet. Elvira coughs, wiping the tears that have sprung into her eyes. Her wet hair clings to her neck and shoulders. She’s supporting Roger, and Faro holds Gray.