Carousel Seas (6 page)

CHAPTER SEVEN

TUESDAY, JULY 4

LOW TIDE 6:22
P.M.
EDT

SUNSET 8:26
P.M.

The Fourth of July is the centerpiece of the Season. People had started hitting town in earnest Thursday night, but the real announcement that the celebrations had begun was the triumphant—not to say noisy—arrival of the motorcycles, precisely at noon on Friday, June 30.

The annual motorcycle cavalcade wasn’t a town PR stunt, though maybe it should have been. It’s the result of a concerted and considerable effort on the part of motorcycle clubs statewide, not to mention those from places Away, like Massachusetts, Detroit, New Hampshire, Baltimore . . . as well as numerous indie riders.

It’s a big show, and a big noise—kind of a foretaste of the formal fireworks on the Fourth—and most people have fun. There are those from other parts of Away who flinch when they see Saracen colors or an Iron Horsemen patch, but, really, you’re more likely to have trouble from an unaffiliated kid on his first ride drinking too many beers and deciding to take on the bar than you are from an experienced rider from one of the clubs.

That as was, the bikes arrived at the crack of noon, just as Jess and I were leaving Marilyn’s office, having delivered the letter, signed by every owner-operator in Fun Country, with the exception of the log flume’s Doris Vannerhoff, who we hadn’t expected to sign, anyway.

Marilyn had also done what we’d expected; she read the letter, then told us that the park’s open hours and Season length were Management decisions. She promised to fax the letter to Management right away, thanked us for our time, and, if she didn’t actually tell us to leave, she did look pointedly at the door.

Usually, you can hear the bikes coming in from ’way down Pine Point, growling and roaring up Route 9, the sound rolling toward town like a thunderstorm coming across the ocean.

Jess and I having been in Marilyn’s office, we’d missed the slow reveal, and stepped out onto the midway just as the lead bikes hit the center of town and swept up the long hill of Archer Avenue, toward Route 5.

“Summer’s here!” Jess screamed into my ear, and I gave her a thumbs-up before she headed off down Baxter Avenue to reclaim Tom Thumb from one of Donny Atkins’ on-loan greenies.

Well, long story short, the town started to fill up, like the people had heard the motorcycles’ roar all the way up to Quebec, out to Chicago, and down to the hills of West Virginia—had heard it and come running to Archers Beach, to merge with and be part of the big noise.

By the time the day itself rolled ’round, the noise was a constant underlying roar, drowning out the sound of the sea, muting the racket of the rides and the games, and even the auditory mayhem spilling out from Ka-Pow! Every square inch of sidewalk on Archer Avenue from Fun Country all the way up to Wishes Art Gallery was filled with people. Fountain Circle had ’em stacked three deep, and there were lines waiting at all the rides, and most of the restaurants.

You work a seasonal job in a seasonal town, you don’t want to complain about the place filling up with people, but the sheer number of them was the reason that Borgan and I had decided to watch the firework display from the deck of
Gray Lady
.

Even there, though, we didn’t completely outwit the crowds; as night came on, and well before the 10:15 posted start time, big boats and little boats began to nose into Kinney Harbor, jockeying for the best position, setting down anchor while folks settled into deck chairs, their voices carrying over the water as they drank their wine or their beer and waited for it to be time.

Borgan made dinner, which we ate up on deck, watching the boats come in and the slow appearance of stars in the darkening sky.

“That was wonderful,” I said, helping him carry the plates below.

“Glad you liked it. Was afraid you’d be offended.”

I frowned at his back. “Why would I be offended?”

“Well, it being fish.”

“I like fish,” I said, handing him my load of plates. “Did you think I didn’t?”

“Now, it’s like this,” he said, turning ’round and leaning a hip against the counter. “Back aways I knew a man—lobsterman, he was. And one day his little daughter come to meet us at the dock, and she says to him, ‘Daddy, why don’t we ever eat lobster?’

“Now, he straightened right up like she’d smacked him, and he raps out, ‘Because we can afford meat!’”

I laughed.

“That’ll’ve been
quite
some time ago—lobster’s a luxury food now, even in some parts of Maine.”

“Well, he was old family lobster; likely his ideas had been formed by his daddy.”

“There’s that.”

We washed up, comfortably. After the galley was shipshape again, he got down his two wine glasses, while I dealt with the bottle.

The cork came out with a satisfying pop, and I looked a question to Borgan.

“Might as well take the whole bottle up. That way, we won’t have to move from the comfy seats if we want another glass.”

“Is that efficient, or lazy?”

“Efficient,” he said promptly, and I laughed again.

He took one step forward, carrying the glasses, frowned slightly, and turned back to open the cabinet and take out a coffee mug decorated with an image of Bug Light.

“Company?”

“Could be. Now I’ve gotta figure out who gets the mug.”

* * *

If company was coming, she/he/they/it hadn’t arrived while we were below. More watercraft had, though.

“If my legs were longer, I could walk across the harbor on the bows of boats.”

Borgan looked out over the accumulated company.

“Is getting a little thick, isn’t it? I’d hate to have to try that walk myself, but I take your meaning. Wine?”

“Please.”

He poured and we settled side by side into deck chairs. Idly, I wondered where our visitor would sit, when or if they arrived. If
Gray Lady
carried a third chair he wasn’t being in any hurry to bring it out.

I raised my glass, “To the land and the sea,” I offered.

Next to me, he raised his glass in answer.

“Stronger together than apart.”

We drank. I sighed . . .

. . . and a high, fretful voice reached us clearly across the water.

“How much
longer
, Grandpa? I wanna see the fireworks!”

“Should only be another couple minutes, Eddie. Now, remember what I told you about keeping your voice down, because sound carries over the water, and we don’t want to bother our neighbors.”

“But our neighbors aren’t here!”

“Sure they are,” said a second high voice that seemed older than the first child’s voice. Possibly a sister. “Everybody around us on their boats, they’re our neighbors, because we’re near each other.”

Depending on how old she was, that was either a good or a darn good parsing. It probably wouldn’t satisfy her little brother, though.

I sipped my wine, listening to other, lower voiced conversations, and watching the stars. It was good and dark by now, and I was starting to enter into Eddie’s feelings. When
were
they going to start the show?

It was just about then that I heard a faint plash, as if someone had thrown a beer bottle into the water. I turned my head toward the stern.

“That’ll be her,” Borgan said comfortably.

“You were certain of me, then?” came a deep, rich voice. A shadow moved in the darkness at the stern, resolving almost immediately into Nerazi, quite completely naked, save the sealskin thrown over her shoulder.

She’s a queenly woman, is Nerazi, her skin brown and smooth, her face round, her eyes large and dark and liquid. Her hair is silver, and worn in a single long braid, much like I’ve taken to wearing my own black, much shorter hair.

“I thought you might stop by,” Borgan said. “Mug o’wine?”

Nerazi dropped her sealskin on the deck somewhat in advance of Borgan’s right, from which point she would be able to see both of us and the fireworks, if they ever got going.

“Did Princess Kaederon not instruct you in the proper vessel for wine?”

Back some years ago, a lot of people had called me “Princess Kaederon,” now Nerazi’s the only one. She might just do it to tweak me, though I doubted it. Nerazi rarely does anything for only one reason. It was possible that she wanted to be sure that I remembered that I’d
been
a princess, once, though all of my House is dead, our servants unmade, and our lands forfeit to the enemy who had destroyed us. Who had then been destroyed himself, by my hand, so it was anybody’s guess who held the Sea King’s honors now in Sempeki, the Land of the Flowers, since the heir-by-blood—that’s me—has no intention of returning.

“Ahzie told me it wasn’t nice to give a lady her wine in a coffee mug,” Borgan admitted, “and he sold me two wine glasses and a bottle of wine and a contraption to open the bottle with. But, see, I never figured to be entertaining two ladies at the same time, so you caught me short-glassed. Other thing I can do is offer a beer.”

“Thank you,” Nerazi said drily. “I will hazard the mug.” She settled cross-legged onto her sealskin and met my eyes. Hers showed red in the starshine.

“Good evening, fair Nerazi,” I said, showing off my court manners. “I trust that all of your affairs prosper.”

“It is seldom that
all
of one’s affairs flourish, my lady, but I have no cause for complaint of my treatment at the hands of the universe.”

“Does the universe have hands?”

“Thank you,” Nerazi said, taking the Bug Light mug from Borgan, and, “Surely it must, for are we not warp and weave of the universe?”

Fortunately, I didn’t have to answer that, because Nerazi raised her mug with great seriousness.

“For those present: joy, constancy, and hope.”

The air shivered a little as her words struck, which meant that a true and powerful well-wish had just been bestowed upon us by one of the most puissant
trenvay
I know, period. Borgan might be badder than Nerazi, magically speaking, but Borgan has the edge of being a Guardian.

“How fares your grandmother, Princess Kaederon? Her passings up and down this land are sorely missed.”

Nerazi and Gran go ’way back. I’m not sure I want to know
how
far back, actually—but at least I didn’t have to dance with the truth here, as I’d had to do with Henry.

“She’s entered her tree and is taking healing there. It’s the opinion of my grandsire that she has taken a wound to her soul. Sempeki is not . . . kind to souls, and especially to those souls rooted in the very heart of the Changing Land. I hope—but cannot know—that she will emerge soon, and hale.”

“That must be the hope of all of us who value her,” Nerazi said solemnly. “And your lady mother, does she thrive? She also was struck to the soul in Sempeki, was she not?”

The torment my mother had endured had nothing to do with Sempeki. She’d freely given her soul to the man who had murdered our House, in exchange for my safe passage to Gran. The man who had taken my mother’s soul and sinned upon it as if it were his own—he was dead now; my mother’s soul was returned to her, and she had the . . . courage, I suppose it is, to have forgiven him. To
pity
him, who had laid waste to Houses and bloodlines not only in the Land of the Flowers, but across all of the Six Worlds. We got off light here in the Changing Land, but we really don’t have much for an Ozali to want.

“My mother is frail, but improving. Dancing at Midsummer Eve was a tonic for her.”

“Excellent. Her many friends hope to see her soon and often among us.” Nerazi sipped wine. “Friend Borgan, you may wish to know that the
ronstibles
have again taken up residence in their natural abode.”

I sat up straight, my heart cramping in my chest.
Ronstibles
are sea witches, close enough, and not too very long ago, the pair of them tried their very best to kill Borgan—or at least imprison him indefinitely. He’d managed to elude them, but—

“You told me you’d taken care of them!” I blurted.

Borgan threw me a startled glance over his shoulder, then held out a hand.

“It’s okay, Kate,” he told me.

I put my hand in his.

“How exactly is this okay? If they’re on the loose, they can start hunting you again. And if they catch you, they might not stop at just putting you to sleep this time!”

“Well, see, I can’t destroy them—I told you that, remember it? They’re the sea’s children; I’m the Guardian. They’re just exactly how the sea made them.” He paused, his fingers warm around mine. “I could’ve imprisoned them, but that brings a whole ’nother set of problems. Nerazi and I did sort of suggest that they not come back into Saco Bay, but Saco Bay’s their home.”

“So, if you didn’t kill them, or imprison them, what did you do to make yourself safe from them?” I asked, in what I felt was, under the circumstances, a reasonably calm tone of voice.

Borgan glanced at Nerazi.

“We made it so, besides not being able to directly do me harm, which the sea enforces—Nerazi and I, we made it so they can’t touch me; can’t come within ten feet of me without being repelled.
That’s
written in the Gulf now, wave and water.”

“It is also,” said Nerazi, “written into the
ronstibles’
souls.
I
made sure of that binding, Princess. The
ronstibles
will break themselves before they are able to place one webbed finger upon Borgan’s knee.” She moved plump shoulders in a shrug.