Maelstrom Read online

  And we couldn’t? Ronan asked. We should have asked Mum and Da about this sort of thing. They’d know.

  So will Sky’s hundreds of relatives. So, race you back to the river. Last one there’s an otter’s uncle.

  The twins raced through the icy waves, enjoying the freedom of the sea as they had the rivers. The Honus waited for them near the river mouth. They were not pleased with the new plan.

  It is too cold to wait here. We must swim to the new warm water. You have fur and no shells to shatter in the frozen tide. We must go now.

  We’ll not be long, she told the turtles. We’ll just change and get into the dry suits and— She stopped talking to the Honus and said to Ronan, That’s it! The dry suits! We can let Ke-ola and Keoki wear them. They keep out the wet, but they keep out the cold and the wind too.

  The suits had hoods, mittens, and booties that could be attached as firmly as a space suit’s boots, gauntlets, and helmet. They were also expandable to fit the twins as they grew.

  Honu, if you would tell Ke-ola to take the packs from the harnesses strapped to our backs, Ronan said, he and Keoki can wear our dry suits to keep warm and dry on the trip out to the volcano. Since Murel and I are in seal form, we’ll not be needing them till we return from the volcano.

  Ke-ola and Keoki did as the Honus instructed and removed the twins’ packets from their harnesses. The two boys, though older and larger than either twin, easily skinned into the suits.

  Then, booties, gloves, and hoods secured, they waded into the water. The largest of the Honus waited for them where the river became the sea. Each boy grabbed the top of a Honu shell and was carried away as easily as driftwood.

  With the Honus in the lead, Ke-ola and Keoki trailing in their wake, and Ronan and Murel following, they set off for the volcano. The sea otters did not go. Sky did not want to go either, at night and in salt water, which was not what a former river otter preferred, but he could not bear to be left behind, so in the end he too hitched a ride on the shell of a Honu.

  “Their” Honu, the small one, was a little slow since he didn’t have as much paddle power as the larger ones. Before long Ronan surged ahead of him. Shortly thereafter, he amused himself by letting off a continual stream of the snore-fart noises he used for sonar.

  Ro! she called, her head aching with the force it took to get through to him. Cut it out. You’re not even stopping long enough to let the sound bounce back to you.

  Am too, he said. For your information there is a sizable iceberg off our bow at two o’clock.

  That’s very interesting but we’re not ships. Even if we ran into it we wouldn’t hurt ourselves. We can’t go that fast.

  Ouch! For your information, you can so hurt yourself if you run into this iceberg while you’re listening to your stupid sister instead of the echoes from your sonar. Ran right into it.

  And over the top of the next wave she saw it, her brother outlined against it before he dived. The Honus, not relying on sonar, swam neatly around it.

  Undeterred, her brother called back, If you don’t want to navigate properly, please don’t distract me. Then he recommenced his series of snore-fart blatting, managing to sound pompous this time.

  She stayed purposely behind the Honus, feeling somehow that their rear needed guarding. If she lost sight of them, she used her own sonar, emitting a sound that was not nearly so rude as the one Ronan produced. Hers was a throaty roar with a high-pitched tweak at the end. It sounded to her almost musical in its range.

  She noticed that there weren’t as many icebergs as there had been even in the summer, when they’d rescued Da and first saw the volcano spew.

  But the water seemed warmer too, even so far away from the crater. Of course, the big volcano wasn’t the only one warming the waters. Though they were still some distance away, there were smaller chimneys of gas and liquid venting from the planet’s belly in the same volcanic caldera. These were called black smokers because, well, they were black from the solidified mineral deposits left behind when the hot gases cooled off rapidly in the frigid waters. And they continued to smoke as the gas continued to rise. All around them were the rich beds of specialized sea plants and animals, including white crabs and clams. The otters loved those so much they risked dodging the hot water and acid pumping from the active vents in order to snatch up some of the delicacies.

  And even though the bed of smokers began farther out to sea, the warmth from them raised the temperature of the sea enough that it explained the relative scarcity of icebergs.

  She had thought that the higher watermark on the coastline was due to displacement from the volcanic island, but now she reconsidered. Farther up the coast, where there was a year-round ice pack, that ice would have been touched by the warmer flow too and melted, perhaps for the first time in many years. For the first time ever. Petaybee was definitely rearranging its furnishings to accommodate its latest creation.

  At some point during the night, Murel fell asleep, which she had never done before while still in the water. She didn’t mean to. It just happened. She opened her eyes and found herself floating below the surface. How had she breathed? Her nostrils were closed. But then, without intending to, while still half asleep, she surfaced, breathed, and submerged again. Interesting. You never knew what you could do until the occasion arose, just like Mum always said.

  However, she had no idea how far ahead of her Ronan and the others were. No doubt he had been having way too much fun making loud noises to think to check on her or the Honus or anyone. She sent out her signal and listened as it enveloped the sea within its reach. Four more icebergs floating on either side of her and three black smokers beneath the waves—she had drifted a long way in her sleep! She also detected eleven Honus—two weighted down with humans, one with a river otter—and a seal making rude noises perhaps five kilometers ahead of her.

  She had been swimming at a leisurely pace, to stay behind the Honus. With a powerful undulation of her sleek body, Murel pulled out the stops and torpedoed ahead, using her sonar not as wantonly as Ro did, but judiciously emitting her helpful—and yes, quite musical—signal at even intervals to keep her on course.

  Then, suddenly, where there had been nothing, there was something very large. Very, very large, and it was coming straight toward her. When she changed course, so did it. Apparently she wasn’t the only one with sonar in her immediate situation.

  The thing drew close enough for her acute hearing to confirm her theory, at which point Murel realized that the large creature was not one entity, but many, all large. Very large. She swam for all she was worth, calling to Ronan as she did, hoping he would tire of the sound of his own signal long enough to hear her thought.

  Something’s chasing me, she said. A school of something, I think.

  We’ll come back for you, he told her.

  But she realized that probably wasn’t a good idea. She recognized the shape of her pursuers now, first by the shape of their sound, then as her eyes caught the white markings on their black hides. Orcas. Seals were part of their diet, she remembered from some natural science lesson. She and Ro had never had to worry about the creatures when they were allowed to swim only in the rivers. She couldn’t remember whether they ate otters or not, or sea turtles.

  Probably. There were so many of them and they hunted in schools, like wolves in packs. In fact, weren’t they called the wolves of the sea? And they looked so friendly and cute when she was walking on two legs and safely dry on shore.

  CHAPTER 13

  SHE WANTED TO tell Ronan not to come and at the same time she also wanted to yell for help, but she had no chance to do either. The grinning whales circled past then surrounded her like a lot of footballers intent on the ball, only they were much noisier. They used their voices not only for sonar now, but to bewilder her. Swimming in an ever tightening spiral, they frothed and churned the water so that all she could see was their dark shapes whizzing around her and under her; that and flashes of humongous mouths filled with teeth
the size of her foot, when she had feet.

  It was great sport to them, which was all it could be since even one of them could gobble her down in a couple of bites.

  Over here! To me to me! three of them cried at once.

  An underpass! another sang out as he swam beneath her so close she could have hitched a ride had she had opposable thumbs at the time.

  Something solid and black shot toward her, then into her, knocking her over and over in the water.

  A side pass and a coup! Score one! called her attacker.

  She had almost stopped spinning when another one did the same thing and cried a triumphant, Coup and score!

  She spun dizzily away again, but this time pushed herself down as she spun, and actually landed on the back of the orca underpassing her. She was thoroughly confused, and she hated being confused so she was mad too. What worked on shark fins should work on whales as well, she thought, then clamped a black dorsal fin between her sharp teeth and bit.

  Hey! the victim bellowed.

  Score one for the seal, she called back to the lot of them. You lot leave me alone or I’ll make a meal of your fin before you make one of me.

  Us leave you alone? You’ve got my fin. You’re confused about who’s the prey here, seal. Orcas eat seals, not the other way around.

  You’re the one who’s wrong, she said. I’m not just any seal. I’m Murel Shongili, a girl and a selkie, and my family is going to be pissed if you kill me and will come after you with harpoons and guns.

  Back off, pod. There’s something strange about this one. We may have made a mistake here.

  You bet you did, Murel said. I did not swim this far to be a whale snack. I’m on an important mission for Petaybee.

  We are too. We cull the seal population of specimens too slow to avoid us, said a voice above her. She looked up into a door-sized, spike-lined mouth.

  Okay, eat me. I hope the sharks return the favor.

  What’s a shark? they asked in unison.

  It’s a fish as big as you guys with teeth as big as yours and a nasty attitude.

  There’s no fish as big as us in the whole world, the toothy whale scoffed.

  Didn’t used to be, she said.

  Pod members, wait, said a calmer whale voice. This is all familiar. Remember the stories our elders told of fish like that long ago on ancient Terra, when we ruled the coastlines? The fish were called—yes—they were called sharks. And they were fierce good sport. But they did not prey on us. We preyed on them!

  The orca she was riding flipped over suddenly, then righted himself, and she felt the fin tear as she slid off his back. He let out a high sound that made her head feel like it was going to explode, and flipped again, leaving her by herself with a mouth full of torn fin. She spit it out and tried to swim under the pod but they were too many, too large, and too fast.

  Once more she was entombed in a wall of darkness with teeth. She felt/heard another attacker an instant before he slammed into her shoulder and neck, but he was too large and she was too small and too surrounded to escape.

  High on the inside! Strike! Her attacker gloated.

  Swim aside, she’s mine. She took a bite of me. Now it’s my turn.

  She screamed the scream of a terrified seal, and silently she cried for help as she had not done before, though she knew there was nothing Ronan, a bunch of sea turtles, a little otter, and two unarmed boys could do except become whale food too.

  RONAN HEARD HIS twin’s first cry of alarm and didn’t wait for further explanation. He felt her fear charge through his spine. Flipping over, he swam back toward her.

  “What’s the matter, little bruthah? Where’re you—where’re we—goin’?” Ke-ola asked, revising his question as the Honu whose shell he held spun around to follow Ronan.

  Ronan couldn’t answer him but the Honus could. Murel is under attack. The Honu was silent for a moment then continued, Whales, she thinks, orcas.

  “Whales wouldn’t do that,” Ke-ola protested, remembering his stories. “Whales are good people. They wouldn’t hurt a girl like that without—”

  She is no human child to them, but a seal who is their rightful prey, another Honu told him.

  “If we explain it to them?” Ke-ola asked.

  “Bruthah, you are such a dreamer!” Keoki, who also understood the Honu’s thoughts, told him. “You don’t know any of these things, any of this land. You got a head full of Aunty Kimmie’s tall tales about the old days, which she never really lived through either. Things are different now.”

  Keoki had to sneer at his brother’s notions very quickly because the Honu he was on was swimming much faster than he would have thought possible.

  Ronan sent out one sonar signal after another.

  Slow down, boy. Pace yourself so you can receive, a Honu cautioned.

  What do you know about it? Ronan demanded rudely, because he was in a hurry and upset and he didn’t want to slow down to listen. He had never felt such fear and panic from his sister before.

  I may not have sonar, the Honu replied, but it just makes sense that if you ask your world a question, you should wait a second for the answer.

  Ronan forced himself to wait a nano between signals and immediately sensed an enormous presence dead ahead about three klicks to the north. A mass of enormous presences.

  The sonar didn’t pick up Murel at all, but for another few furious lengths Ronan felt her desperately trying one thing after another to elude or dissuade her attackers.

  He didn’t send anything toward her. He didn’t want to distract her. Maybe he should send to Da? But no, what good would that do? Da was far away, too far away to help. But what if the next thing he had to send to his father was that Murel was gone?

  No!

  The waves rose and he dived, cutting through the currents with strong undulations of his torso. Eight of the Honus dived with him, but those carrying Keoki and Ke-ola hesitated. The one carrying Sky dived too, in a moment, and the otter loosed himself and darted forward.

  Otters are very brave and ferocious in battle! he cried. Your sky otter friend is coming to save you, sister river seal! Do not give up!

  The seas ahead of them grew confused and murky. Ronan’s sonar detected something shooting upward from the sea floor and swimming toward Murel and the orcas.

  He couldn’t tell what it was but it did not feel like a single creature.

  Da! he cried. Da! Help!

  Then, realizing, as Murel had earlier, that the whales could kill him and the others as well, he added, Killer whales are trying to kill Murel. We’re on our way but— He didn’t finish the thought: that their efforts might be fatal as well as futile. Instead he said, We love you, including both parents.

  ODDLY ENOUGH, YANA was the one who first knew her daughter was in danger. She was working late, finishing up some paperwork, while Sean escorted the shark tank as it was being transported to the coast.

  In the middle of a stack of immigration applications, she suddenly felt a bolt of panic shoot through her. A seasoned veteran of the Company Corps, Yana was not personally given to bolts of panic. But although this one didn’t originate with her, it caused her a bolt of her own. “Murel!” she cried, and stood straight up, knocking her chair over.

  Then she sat back down again and called her husband.

  The com unit to his mobile beeped five times while Yana paced and snapped her fingers repeatedly. Finally, Sinead, Sean’s sister, who also was working on the shark relocation project, answered.

  “Sinead, where’s Sean?”

  “He just now sealed out of here without an explanation and started swimming coastward,” Sinead said. She didn’t sound sleepy, but then, moving the sharks was a tricky operation. The barge and the powerful but makeshift tugboat towing it had brilliant lights so they could see the waters around them far enough to avoid trouble. Sinead didn’t even sound particularly tired, but like Sean, she was apt to focus on the projects she undertook to the exclusion of creature comforts. Yana rec
alled when she had been like that herself, before motherhood and bureaucracy became her projects. Now she got plenty tired plenty often. “I had to fish the mobile out of the river. Why? What’s wrong?”

  “It’s the kids—Murel, I think. I just got this terrible feeling that she’s in trouble.”

  “I think Sean must have had the same feeling, Yana. How can I help?”

  “I don’t know. If I think of something, I’ll pick you up on the way out to the coast.”

  “Okay, I’ll continue shark wrangling until then.”

  Yana’s next call was to Johnny Green at the helipad, and Marmie, who promised to make a call that would have what Yana thought she needed loaded and ready to go.

  Meanwhile she went out to the moonlit corral and whistled for her favorite curly coat, Pi. When Pi came to her, she patted the horse and vaulted onto her bare back, hanging on to her mane as they jumped the corral fence and galloped along the river to the old Space Base, where the helipad was.

  She saw the landing lights and the copter’s beacon from a mile away. The rotors were whirling. She jumped off Pi before her mount became startled, swatted the horse on the rump, and sent her home. Johnny and Rick O’Shay, Yana’s flight instructor—a former Company Corps pilot now retired to Petaybee—waved at her from the cockpit.

  Pet Chan, Marmie’s security chief, leaned out and gave her a hand up onto the inner deck. Beside her sat a burly barrel-chested man with grizzled hair and mustache. Pet introduced him as Raj.

  Raj handed her a headset, like the ones everyone else wore, and Pet stopped shouting. “Raj is Marmie’s personal jeweler and armorer,” Pet explained. “When Johnny told us Murel was in danger, Raj grabbed a few of his favorite toys.”

  Raj shook her hand. “Raj Norman, Colonel. You’re the mama, right?”

  She nodded, and he said fiercely, “Don’t worry. If anything’s got your little girl, we’ll make it beg us to take her back. Now this is a Colt dual mode laser mini mortar . . . ”

  He continued describing the arsenal of weapons that were strapped to his and Pet’s bodies and were in a compact array at his feet. “You’re welcome to anything,” he said. “Help yourself.”