That Other Kind
Gloria Piper
Copyright 2012
Cover art adapted from https://www.freenaturepictures.com/ocean-cliffs-pictures.php
Chapter 1
The tide was rising.
From black rock Seagren saw slanted eyes mirror up, then vanish among the swirling seaweed hair where an hour before there had been wet sand.
A crash! Spray.
Her hair ran rivulets, her clothes clung. Water churned, cutting her off from shore. Soon the water would engulf bare feet. Soon it would sweep her away.
She smiled.
“Come, sea. They say you’re a dragon. If so, then I am your cub. Come, let’s play.”
She stretched over the rock’s edge nearer the swirling froth. “Shall I come to you?”
“Seagren!”
She almost fell, then pulled herself back. A figure in a boat advanced from shore.
“What are you doing out there?”
Seagren sagged. Father had come to “save” her. Now she would have to leave, put on dry clothes, and go to school.
The bearded figure, in black waterproof robe and boots, rowed nearer. Too soon the sea’s wildness was marred by the presence of one who called himself Seagren’s father.
The boat rolled against the rock. Father steadied himself and reached out. “Grab my hand. Get in.”
Nimbly Seagren landed in the boat and settled quickly in hopes of avoiding a scolding.
Yes, Father was angry. Seagren felt emanations mixed with animal strength as sinewy arms propelled them shoreward.
Raising dust that muddied wet bodies, they marched along canals and reservoirs. Seagren struggled to keep up, stumbled, and choked in the dirty air. Father lifted her by the arm and pulled her along until they reached home where Seagren staggered over the threshold.
She found herself between glares of these giants who called themselves her parents.
“Look at you! Wet and muddy!” Mother said. “Where are your boots?”
“At school.”
“You ran away to swim?”
“She was sitting on a rock in the tide when I found her,” Father said.
Long skirts swishing, Mother turned to rummage through a trunk. “You risk your life for her in the dread-sea too often. Should have changed her as a babe.”
“We could not afford the price then,” Father reminded her.
She paused momentarily. “Too late when we could. Features got set and she grew rebellious. No other daughter so rebellious as ours.”
“Our training may yet take root. We can’t exactly lock her in or send her away.”
“T’would be our shame.” Mother tossed dry clothes onto the dirt floor at Seagren’s feet. “What of our present shame?”
Seagren shimmied out of wet garments, rubbed them over herself to remove mud, and pulled the others on.
“Look at those feet!” Mother said. “Removes her boots and shows those feet.”
“People would have to look closely to notice anything different.” Father watched Mother bend to pick up the wet pile.
“They see she’s graceless. Pupils call her Fumblefoot. Teachers, too.”
Father shrugged. “She looks normal enough, and she’s becoming a young woman. Boys are beginning to notice. If she’s fumblefoot, she’s a pretty one.”
Seagren marveled. Had they noticed? Was she pretty?
“Don’t forget, she misbehaved.” Mother placed her hands on her hips and fixed Seagren with a scowl. “We must correct her so she may yet learn and gain worth.”
Seagren felt shrunken. The anger had died. The authority remained. Don’t play in the water. It’ll turn your skin to scales. It’ll shiver you to death.
Lies.
Seagren wanted to obey, but water lay like fields along every road, beside every house, except for villages on land which had been drained and surrounded by dikes in a forgotten time. When she closed her eyes or escaped indoors, it remained with her, for she smelled it. Sweet. Clean. She yearned after it, to swim in it, to live in it, with as much passion as one has for breathing.
Father spoke. “Very well. Since you ran from school, since you left your boots behind, since you went to the sea, you shall not have supper. Run along and think about why you’re being punished.”
Seagren fled, tripped, regained her balance, and continued down the road, gasping and blinking in rising dust. Obediently she mulled the reason for the punishment—even while dashing to the sea.
She had a sea name. Webbed toes. Nictitating membranes. A craze for water. When they could afford it, her parents—were they her parents?—had taken her to the doctor. Too late. She’d already reached toddlerhood, so the doctor refused to operate on her feet, saying webs were neither unusual nor disfiguring. As for the nictitating membranes, Seagren had stubbornly covered her eyes. Yes, even early she had been rebellious.
Long before seeing it, Seagren heard the tide’s roar. Birds squalled in the yellow-brown sky. She sprinted over trembling ground, breathing easier through thinning dust. The water curled its arms, slapped the rocky shore. She slowed, picked her way among the debris, and scanned rocks for life. Expertly she plunged a hand into tide pools and fed.
***
Months passed.
Over rotzen rolls and rotzen brew, Mother and Father would reminisce.
“Was it my punishment that sent her away?” Father asked, not too sadly as he chewed.
“I doubt she’d have drowned or starved.” Mother wiped her mouth with the back of her hand after a drink. She broke a roll. “She had ways. Probably took to the dread-water. To the haunting deeps. It’s best. We did what we could, and now she’s happy.”
Father nodded. “We needn’t feel any shame, for we didn’t send her away. She chose to leave.”
“Good for her and us. Good for everyone.”
Chapter 2
There were countless things in the great deeps to intrigue Seagren . . . caves, sub aquatic forests, colonies of strange creatures. She supped on delicacies, lounged in sweeping currents, and catalogued every experience. She forgot Mother and Father. Forgot school. Forgot everyone she had ever known.
Months of play later, waves carried Seagren toward a brown cloud. What was it? She rode—until levees appeared. Of course! Into remembrance rushed reservoirs, lakes, canals, and people who disapproved of a girl who loved water.
Run! Seagren hurdled oncoming waves, alternately leaping and diving. . . . Then slowed and let the current carry her back. Something beckoned. Instinct? Longing?
She shook herself. The feeling persisted. Why would land draw her? She had no desire to meet her parents’ kind. They called her useless, an embarrassment. Sea was home. Didn’t it murmur comfortingly, shielding her in its lap? Stay where you belong, child. Stay where it is safe.
She sliced through the waves, trying to escape the lure.
It remained.
She hovered, hands and feet stroking the current. Land was still visible. Slowly it grew more massive.
What called her to enter this foreign country? Adventure? Adventure abounded in the ocean. Curiosity? A closer look suggested a country like one she’d fled. A trap? Why trap something as useless as she? Need? Surely a dusty land of sickly vegetation offered nothing. Silly even to consider it. Listen to the ocean. Abide in its safety.
Giving a kick,
she glided landward.
***
Seagren drifted down the canal. When beings, who resembled her parents and all those she had fled, tramped by above water, she watched from rotting vegetation. After they passed and all tremors faded, she floated into the day sun. She crossed a reservoir, skittered a short distance overland, and plunged into a lake, following whatever it was that called. Always she remained alert.
Despite this the net surprised her. She rounded a corner in a canal, and there it was, encumbering swarms of creatures.
She spun, flicked her feet. Webbing everywhere. A purse, closing. It caught her arms. Legs. Fish leaped and thrashed. She clawed and tried to tear an opening. Slipping against fish, Seagren lost her balance within the net’s drag onto the sparsely green bank. Tangled, she lay amid slick scales.
Someone grasped her foot. She peered back at a squatting figure.
“Yep, it’s That-Other-Kind, all right.” A white-bearded fisher released the foot and stood with his fellows, a grizzled beard, a black beard, and a brown beard.
“Humph!” the grizzled beard said. “Surprised to find one nearly grown. I’d have thought someone would’ve remedied it long ago.”
“A bit late now. What’ll we do?” the black beard asked.
Grizzled-beard scratched his head. “Can’t let it go.”
Seagren’s gaze roved from face to face. Like Father they dressed in black waterproof coats, hoods, and boots. Only their accent differed.
“Cute looking, don’t you think?” Brown-beard said.
“Doesn’t matter,” Grizzled-beard said. “We gotta turn it in.”
Seagren raised her head as they untangled the net. They worked gently, faces kind. Doing what they thought best.
“How wild she looks!” White-beard removed the last of the net.
“We have to turn her in.” Grizzled-beard raised Seagren to her feet. “She’ll be kept safe, a menace to no one.”
Locked away. Away from water.
The men gathered the fish, leaving a pool of sweet mud.
Brown-beard and White-beard flanked Seagren, Black-beard came behind with the catch, and Grizzled-beard led. Seagren reached only to their shoulders. Steadily they walked, exuding strength that left her weak. Smells. Of fish, mud, and water. Of fishers, their clothes, and sweat. Powdery dust invaded eyes and nostrils and became grit on teeth and meal on the tongue.
Power vibrations grew, for they were entering a village.
“Oh look!” The quake of feet. A tangle of faces. “What is it? What do you have there?”
“That-Other-Kind.”
“Ooh.” Excitement tensed brown air.
Between the cage of fishers Seagren glimpsed robes and beards, skirts and braids, youths and maidens who scurried in for a squinty-eyed look as the five trod the talcum street.
The fishers halted. Seagren peered around Grizzled-beard at a stern-looking man in a robe and tall brimless hat. Village lord. A chain clanked in one hand. How quickly he had appeared.
The fishers stepped away. Seagren felt like a snail yanked from its shell before a silent mob, singled out by this terrible lord.
The lord stepped forward, shaking the earth. Lifting the chain.
“This should never have been allowed.” The voice was a hammer. “A shame on those who did not correct this creature! It can only exist in misery because of such cruel neglect. Let That-Other-Kind be exhibited as a lesson not soon forgotten. It shall be chained in the street one full day for all to view.”
“Lord,” White-beard ventured, “mightn’t there be a way of salvaging this poor creature? A physician could still operate.”
“Changing its appearance would not alter its soul, for it knows its difference. Too late for it. But not for others! It shall be locked away forever.”
Chapter 3
Seagren melted before the lord’s advance.
Water. Twenty meters away.
Always it lay in sight. A meter deep, it covered a field of red rotzen. Rotzen, the seed of which was used in rolls, cakes, and dainties. The flower and bud, in salads. The leaves, in brew and bedding. Rotzen provided food for livestock and fill in the mud for houses. The tuberous root was a vegetable. Without immersion rotzen could not survive.
Water. Once so accessible. No more.
Seagren cowered on the ground, her hands sifting and clutching silt. The lord stood over her and raised the chain.
Seagren cast a wild glance at it, another at the water that twinkled in a light wind over the rotzen field, and still another at the dust devils that twirled on the bank.
The chain descended; she felt its cold shadow. Before the links could touch her, she sensed their weight, their unforgiving hardness.
She screamed, flung dust about, and shot to her feet.
The crowd cried out! The chain clanked to the ground!
Seagren continued her scream, her broad feet slapping up more dust with each leap. Onlookers shied back, shielded their eyes against the dirt cloud and their ears against her keening.
On the bank she stumbled. It didn’t matter.
Through water rushing by her ears and blood rushing in them, Seagren heard, “You there! Drive her to the end. You! Run and cut her off!”
Swarms plunged waist deep in pursuit, splashing side by side up the field, pushing through dense rotzen that also slowed the fugitive’s flight. Well ahead, Seagren raised just enough to see others speed along the path toward the far levee. They would line it and wait for her to be driven into their clutches. In open water she could have outraced the runners. A flooded field created a forest of difficulties.
Rude stalks and leaves grabbed, slowing swimmer and waders. Nothing slowed those on land. A dust curtain, churned by speeding feet, drew along the trail, gradually closing the view to the side. Shoving against rotzen, Seagren kicked faster.
When they gained the far bank, when the dust curtain was drawn along its length, all chance of escape would vanish. Seagren must reach the bank first.
Violently she kicked. Viciously the leaves seized—like the village lord’s chain. Water boiled over her, carrying the curses of waders who also fought the vegetation. She did not hear their faltering as she tore at stalks and watched the dust curtain move . . . move . . . drawing out fully, until it blocked the way to freedom.
Seagren slowed. Behind, the mob struggled nearer, their sloshing thrumming her with growing intensity. She scanned for holes in the advancing line, holes in the waiting line on the bank, holes in the bank.
How long could she survive without water? How agonizing would it be? If only—
A tunnel!
Well guarded, probably. Probably a trap on the other side. Still, choices were limited and time would allow only the flimsiest trap to be set, wouldn’t it?
Waders were halfway across the field, closing the vise.
Don’t panic.
Seagren settled lower. Drifted. Plants waved gently aside, betraying no evidence of passage. She glided closer to the tunnel. A guard stood above. Could Seagren slip past unseen? The beat in the water increased, but calmness vied with fear and took control. She waited among rotzen. The guard did not see. Slowly, deeply, she neared, keeping to shadows and plants.
“She’s here!” The guard leaped into the water. Sploosh!
Seagren whipped forward.
“She’s in the tunnel! Block her off!”
Echoes. Was it running feet or her heart thumping? No plants here. She sliced through and whipped out the other side through reaching arms, into a lake.
***
News of her spread. Hunters appeared, like flies on rotting seaweed. S
ometimes she could sneak by. Other times she hid until the sun arced well across the sky before they left.
Seagren kept to canals, lakes, reservoirs. Goats grazed the banks bare until powdery silt slid to the water. Birds flipped dust through their wings. Here and there beside a road stood a rotzen and wattle hut with round windows and arched door. Children trooped to school, carrying rotzen-paper tablets, rotzen toys, and munching rotzen candy.
She mused on when she first had recognized her difference. She’d discovered a special Zest existed. Something not understood. Yet something Seagren had wanted to happen. Whenever she entered the water, she felt Zest begin to build.
She had first surrendered during toddlerhood when Mother and Father were harvesting rotzen.
Safe on land the babe splashed in dust that clouded sore eyes and smothered aching lungs. Eddies from the rocking boat rippled shoreward. Chuckled. The babe gurgled in return and crawled to the ripples. A tiny hand dipped in.
Mud caked her hand and swirled away. Her skin glistened. She slipped both feet in. Mud . . . sparkling cleanness. Caressing tongues of liquid.
She slipped completely in and opened her eyes. Moisture soothed, caressed. Rotzen fibers swayed. Her hair swayed in unison. She kicked experimentally and glided without effort. All around, a forest splintered sunlight. Rufous fibers in blue-green faded to purple.
The slap of her parents’ oar on the surface reverberated against her body. The new world invited her to explore, to test discovered abilities. All was strange, yet all seemed natural.
For the first time, she asked, Are those two gathering rotzen really my parents? Is their world mine? Or is this wet world my true home?
Then because she had submitted to the water’s temptations, she submitted to a new urge. Time to come out. Time to re-enter the world of dust and bring part of the water world along.
Inside her, vibrancy developed. Zest happened.
She crawled from the water, careful to maintain the spell. Through an iridescent mask she watched her parents bent at work. Darkly glistening rotzen half filled the boat. They would turn soon and come ashore.
She sat. A prism of light made everything beautiful. No dust touched her to abrade her flesh. She was a nacreous jewel, for she wore an envelope of liquid. Ionic zest sang through her.
Mother and Father quit their toil. Bent like brutes they rowed shoreward.
Seagren lifted an arm in greeting.
Two heavy figures froze mid stroke, then rowed feverishly.