“You could drive the boat, you know. The controls are right next to the water. As long as you turn off the engine first, you can get back in the water whenever you want.”
When Zazkal didn’t immediately respond, I continued, “I could probably rig something up with stuff from my bag that would make the pilot’s seat more comfortable for you too.”
With a look of scorn on his face and a grunt in Ollie’s direction that was the equivalent of a direct order, he dove below the surface.
With Zazkal, you had to be good at reading the non-verbal signs, and I had become an expert. I sighed, climbed back into the boat and took the controls putting her into forward gear. My anger was used up and I couldn’t be bothered with another tantrum.
Ollie, having read the same message, had already followed Zazkal under the surface. They reappeared together just ahead of the boat, swimming north.
Two hours later, I saw the orange water tower with a sailboat painted on it that I remembered from the first trip. I put the boat in neutral and hailed Ollie and Zazkal. They detached and swam over to the side.
“This is it,” I said. “The spot where I was picked up by the Hazmats is straight out to sea, less than an hour traveling if we stay on the Maiden Voyage.”
“We came from the south,” Zazkal said, “so we have a pretty good idea of the sea-bottom structure in that direction and we know what it’s like between here and the land. We could have missed something, but I think that we’ll find what we’re looking for further out at sea.”
I raised my eyebrows. When did Zazkal tell us what we were looking for? Wasn’t it the Hazmats? Did I miss something? Maybe he told Ollie while they were insea.
“So, what are we looking for?” I asked in my best ‘polite’.
“Ollie, you stay with me,” Zazkal said next, ignoring my question. “These waters are not too cold for sharks. If there are any hanging around, you won’t be bothered as long as you’re with a Sky.”
I suppose ignoring me is better than yelling at me.
“Miriam, take the boat to the shore and find a place to leave it, preferably where there are a lot of other boats so it won’t stand out. I don’t want to leave it here announcing our presence in case those predators are flying or floating around some where.”
“Before you go, give me a jar.” I did. “Now I want purple algae,” he said. “More. Serrated kelp fronds. Too much. Just one piece. Put the rest back.
“Never mind,” he said impatiently. “Just give me the bag.”
I recognized enough of the things he took out of the sampo to realize that he was planning another traveling bubble. That was one mystery solved, but what he wanted it for and whatever it was that he was looking for seemed to be TMI for a mere apprentice.
This time, Zazkal looked up and saw the giant question mark on my face.
“It’s for later,” he said, like it was some big secret. He closed the jar, took a cord out of the sampo, tied it around the jar and around his waist and then handed me the sampo.
“Why don’t you just keep it?” I said.
“You will be out of the water. Anything could happen.”
“Zazkal, I will be on the land where I spent my whole life. What could go wrong?”
“You will be outsea,” he corrected me. “Drylanders are not to be trusted.” He scowled and pushed the sampo at me.
‘Xenophobic idiot’ was what I thought, but limited myself to a small eye roll and accepted the bag.
“I will send for you when I’m ready. Ollie, let’s go.”
After hauling Zazkal around on his back all morning, Ollie knew the drill. We may have no idea what Zazkal has been talking about, but Ollie now knows what I do. It’s better not to ask. It’s not worth the aggravation and you won’t find out what you want anyway.
CHAPTER 29
FEED THE BIRDS
I cruised along the shore for a few minutes before finding what I was looking for, a marked channel leading to a cut that fed boats into a broad inland waterway. Not far in was a run-down jetty with half a dozen boats tied up to it and a couple of bigger boats anchored in the shallows.
There was a park with picnic tables nearby, sheltered from the sun by bushy Australian pines. As lunchtime approached, the jetty and the water around it would probably be filled to capacity with picnicking boaters.
This is perfect. It’s just a short walk to the ocean and the boats already here are all different sizes.
I took the boat a little way past the jetty and put the engine in neutral while I dropped the stern and aft anchors into the shallow water close to shore. Once she was secure, I turned off the engine, dropped the key into my sampo, took off my sneakers and climbed down into the shallow water.
With one last look back at the Maiden Voyage, I waded ashore promising to do something about the rusty anchor and the splintery deck when I returned.
Sitting down on an empty bench near the water, I took a towel out of my sampo, dried my feet and put my sneakers back on. A little further in was a clothesline strung between two trees with the damp towels of previous foot-dryers on it. The clothesline was next to a picnic table with a big cooler on it. The owners were presumably doing some pre-lunch exploring among the pines.
I took a cell phone out of my sampo and called Mom and Dad. There was no answer. My parents weren’t home.
I tried both their cells. Right to voicemail. Well, I know what that means. They’re home after all. Mom and Dad both work at home. They always turn everything off when they’re working.
After all, they weren’t expecting me to call, and they knew – or thought they knew – that I was safe and sound with Grandma and Grandpa. Why should they hang around the phone all day, just because I might want to say hello?
I left the park and headed for the ocean.
The street I was on eventually dead-ended in a parking lot with an entrance to a public beach. There was a snack bar, bathrooms, an outdoor shower and lots of people
I had no idea how long I was going to have to wait for Zazkal. Time to explore. Tying my sneakers together, I hung them over my shoulder and waded along the tide line.
Eventually, I got to the far end of the beach. The ground there was too rocky for sunbathers, making it a haven for flocks of seagulls plus a smattering of other shorebirds.
I put my sneakers back on and walked along the rocks, scattering the gulls as I passed. Finding a flat rock to sit on, I took a peanut butter and jelly sandwich out of the sampo. The seagulls spotted the sandwich right away and flew over. They stayed at a safe distance watching me intently as each bite moved from hand to mouth.
When nothing was forthcoming, a few at a time they started to move back to their business of sunning and preening themselves. There was also plenty of squabbling and a little desultory pecking among the rocks for a snack.
Some of the birds flew off to form a new group further down the beach, but most of them stayed in the rocks, nearby, patently ignoring the human. Having become a non-source of food, I ceased to exist for them in any real sense of the word.
There were still a few hopefuls, hanging on for a handout when I finished my lunch. I pulled a handful of popcorn out of my bag and tossed it in the air. Less than ten seconds and they were all back.
All of the available space around me in the air and on the ground was now filled with the noisy, contentious birds. I pulled out another handful of popcorn and threw it as far as I could to get some breathing space and the entire flock immediately moved to the new feeding spot.
They were fast. They had to be. They grabbed the popcorn on the ground and caught it in the air with all the adroitness that a fisher bird learns, and the passion of a scavenger who insists on hanging around with the competition.
“Like city people,” I thought fondly, remembering the year I spent with my parents as a city kid in another country. It was a noisy, exciting and scary year. The friendships I had formed there were more intense than those of even my best friends at home.
I was liking the seagulls more and more as I fed them, thinking about my best friends from that year, Dana and Anna who were really nothing like seagulls, but somehow, when we were all together, Miriam, Dana and all of my city friends in a big noisy flock…we were all seagulls.
I should try calling Mom and Dad again. Being back on the land had started me thinking about my family and my land friends. It made me realize that I felt the same way about my friends and family in the ocean. With a start, I suddenly understood just how much I had already become part of the ocean, how I missed it when I wasn’t there.
“I wonder,” I thought aloud, still thinking about my city friends, “what it would be like to really be a seagull. I wonder if they have as much fun as we did.”
“You betcha,” came a scratchy voice from above and behind me.
CHAPTER 30
FEATHER PILLOWS WITH FEET
I turned around and looked up to see who was talking, but there was no one there. All I could see were three super-sized seagulls flying above my head. Compared to the smooth, snowy feathers of the rest of the gulls, these guys were scruffy and dirty-looking.
Instead of hanging around at the food distribution center a few feet in front of me they had been flying around my head, just out of sight. It was almost as if they were looking me over.
Experimentally, I tossed a piece of popcorn straight up. One of the birds snatched greedily, catching it neatly in mid air. Meanwhile, the rest of the gulls saw the new feeding location and began closing in.
Bad move. And moving is what I won’t be able to do in a minute. Grabbing more popcorn, I quickly tossed it over the rocks and onto the sand, sending everyone back to a more comfortable distance.
Funny how their squawking sounds like speech in a language that you can almost understand.
“That’s her all right,” came a scratchy voice in front of me in a language that I did understand.
There was a fourth big, gray gull on the ground at the front of the flock. It didn’t seem particularly interested in food, but stood looking at me with its head cocked to one side.
At the same time, I felt two hands grab hold of my upper arms and pull hard.
“Hey! Let go!”
I looked up. All I could see was a huge feather pillow. No, that wasn’t right, the feathers were on the outside. If it was a pillow, then the feathers should be on the inside. Right?
I was more confused than frightened when I looked down and saw the seagulls surround and attack my sampo, trying to get the food out that they knew must be there.
“My bag! They’ll shred it.”
That was when I finally realized from what distance and angle I was viewing this scene.
I screamed.
“Ahhh! I’m up and going upper!
“Down! I want to be downer!”
I had already transitioned from confusion to fear. When I turned my head to the side I moved from fear, directly into heart thumping full-blown panic. My arms were not being held by hands, but by two giant claws.
I kicked and wiggled for all I was worth.
“Cool it, kid,” came the same scratchy voice. Instinctively looking for the source of the voice, I saw the bottom of a huge bird’s head that was firmly attached to the feather bed above me.
I stopped wiggling.
“Aren’t you rather large for an eagle,” I whispered, mostly to myself, my eyes bulging at the sight of an impossibly large bird.
“I’m not an eagle, kiddo. I’m a roc. Don’t you know the difference?”
I did indeed know the difference. “You don’t exist.” I was still whispering. “You’re a Greek myth, just a story about a giant bird that makes a habit of carrying off people to feed…it’s…young…
“…Oh, dear.” The whisper was beginning to waver. “You don’t exist. I’ll just close my eyes and you will …”
“You’re right. I don’t exist. But I do now. Pretty good trick, huh.? Haw, Haw, Haw, Haw,” and the great bird began to make a nasty crowing sound.
I had to admit the truth of this. Whatever this was, giant roc or something worse, it definitely did exist. So I did what any sensible person does when all of their other resources are exhausted. I whined.
“I want my sampo back. I want to go home,” I cried pitifully.
Unable to think of anything else to whine for, I said it again.
“I want my sampo back. I want to go home.” …and again, and again, until slowly my brain slipped back into gear, or at least something close.
“You’re not a roc. You’re one of those seagulls, aren’t you.”
“Wrong, wrong, wrong,” came the scratchy voice. “I was a seagull. Now I’m a roc. These dumb kids don’t know anything.”
Now I was pretty sure who I was dealing with, but I wasn’t sure that it was an improvement on some improbable mythological creature.
“You’re not really going to carry me to your nest and feed me to your babies, are you?” We were flying along the shoreline, away from the public beach with all the people.
“Right you are, kiddo. I don’t have any babies. I’m going to eat you myself. Har, Har, Har, Har.”
“Very funny.”
“Tasty, too. It’s been a long time since I’ve eaten anyone, but then, it’s been a long time since I’ve been a roc.”
This was sounding less and less like a joke.
CHAPTER 31
I YAM WHAT I YAM
“You can’t really eat me,” I said, but not very confidently. “You’re not really a roc or a seagull. You’re really a pirate, aren’t you.”
“I’m always that, but right now I’m a pirate roc.””
“But your real self, you know, the one you started out with.”
“You don’t listen good do you? I am what I am,” and I didn’t think he was referring to Popeye the Sailor. My...real...self...is...a...roc. Right now. Before that I was a seagull. A real seagull. Before that, I don’t remember.”
“I bet you can’t change back into a seagull,” I said, saying the first thing that came into my mind.
“Why don’t I just change into a mouse and then you can pounce on me and gobble me up. Haw, Haw, Haw, Haw.”
“Oh, I guess you’ve heard the story of Puss and Boots.”
“Haw, Haw, Haw, Haw.”
“Wait, I’m very wiggly, especially when I’m scared. It will make me hard to eat. If you drop me from here, I’ll land on those rocks and probably break up into nice little easy-to-eat pieces.”
Without missing a wingbeat, the great head turned to look at me. His sharp curved beak reminded me of the giant squid. What is it with these mythological monsters?
He swerved, and we were back over the water again. Instantly, I knew what to do.
Quickly, before he had a chance to turn his head away, I muttered the words to the sleep spell under my breath and then stared hard, hoping to hold his glance long enough to make him fall asleep. Miraculously, the roc didn’t look away or speak. It was as if I had captured his gaze. I could feel his grip getting looser and looser.
One sharp jerk … and I was free. Free to fall, to plummet to the sea.
“Concentrate, Miriam,” I was talking to myself again.” Don’t fly yet.” I knew that I couldn’t fly as fast as the roc. I would be caught before I came anywhere near to the water. The only way I could move faster than the bird was by falling. Falling faster and faster. A free fall to freedom. But it still took all the nerve I had and more to keep my eyes open and my wings closed while I watched the waves racing towards me.
“Don’t look up. Don’t think about the roc. It will need a minute to reorient itself after nearly falling asleep in midair. Get ready … get ready … wait … Now!
I switched to tail and opened my wings to float the last few feet to the water.
With a jerk I was hoisted back up into the air. But it was not because I was flying. My wings didn’t have room to open. They were pressed up hard against the feathered belly of a roc, my arms,
again, tight in its grip.
I could see a tiny island just ahead of us. More like a mangrove-covered sandbar than an island.
The roc dropped me on a sandy spot in the middle. I rubbed my tush. I only fell a couple of feet, but it hurt.
Two more rocs glided down next to us. They didn’t seem to notice that I now had a tail instead of legs.
Overhead, a fourth roc was coming in to land. From the wonkey path of its descent, I knew that it was the one I had worked the sleep spell on.
Four of them. I never had a chance. They must have been flying behind us.
“Lunchtime!” one of them said with a happy lilt in his voice and they started to move closer.
Terrified, I could only manage one word.
“Why?” and my voice quavered with the effort
“Because,” answered another one, “because we’re rocs. Stupid.”
“No, I know that why, you already told me why you want to eat me. I mean why did you change into rocs in the first place,” I said, hoping to get anything but the same unpleasant answer.
“So we could be big enough to catch you,” said a third roc.
“Seagulls don’t eat people. You must have had another reason when you were seagulls for wanting to catch me.”
“Oh, yeah, we wanted to ask you some questions.”
“Wouldn’t it be a good idea to ask your questions before you eat me?”
They looked at each other and started talking. I couldn’t understand a word. They seemed to be switching between languages with each sentence. It sounded like a dozen people talking all at once. These guys have been around.
Languages were on the very short list of approved games I was allowed to play on my junior-tablet when I was little, but the four of them were talking so fast, that I could only pick out a couple of languages. I know I heard Spanish and I definitely heard Latin.
“Latin? Nobody speaks Latin.” They turned at the sound of my voice, and one of them spoke.
“We do. Where’s our boat?”
I took a moment to answer. I knew what I wanted. I wanted not to be eaten.
“I won’t answer any of your questions while you are rocs. You have to be something different. All of you.”