Guardian of the Dead (45 page)

There was
something
in the bay, beyond the reef; a long, sinuous shadow gliding through the water. For a moment, moonlight glinted off something that could have been a scale.

‘It's a taniwha,' I said, wondering why my hands were trembling. Then my brain caught up with my body and I sat down hard on the step. ‘
Mark
?'

‘Ah,' La Gribaldi said, sounding surprised and pleased. ‘Well. I'll start putting together food packages.' She squeezed my shoulder, and went back to the kitchen.

I stared past the ruined city and watched him swim through the moon's silver path over the uneasy sea.

Then I got up, and went out into the world, to do what I could.

EPILOGUE
MAYBE TOMORROW

‘A
ND YOU PROMISE
you're okay?'

I clutched my new mobile phone between shoulder and ear as I sorted my old clothes into piles. ‘I'm fine, Kevin. I'm doing much better than most people. The main roads are clear, and food's getting through.'

‘I only ask for the sake of my social life. You're not much of a friend, but you'll do until someone better comes along. So you're really okay?'

I rolled my eyes. ‘If you don't stop asking me that, I'm going to figure out a way to punch you over the phone line. You remind me of Mum and Dad.'

‘Have you heard when they're getting back?'

‘Not sure. The airstrip here isn't open to passenger flights. They're flying into Christchurch in a week and driving up. Magda might get here a bit earlier.'

‘How pissed are they? About you running away from Mansfield and everything?'

I sighed. ‘Let's just say Magda's looking forward to being the good daughter for the rest of the
century
.'

‘Well, you've achieved legendary status here. The last time we had a runaway was Jeremy Chalmers, and he only got as far as Ranfurly.'

I groaned. ‘So now I'm notorious?'

‘You're
respected
,' he amended. ‘I would tell everyone that I helped you, just to get the street cred. But I really want the Rutherford Scholarship, and I don't think aiding and abetting counts as good service to the school community.' There was some urgent whispering on the other end of the line, and Kevin's voice came back bemused. ‘Iris says, remember happy endings.'

I grinned. ‘Tell her I miss her too.'

‘Have you two been talking behind my back?'

I laughed at the indignation in his voice. ‘Yeah, you'll want to get used to that. Look, Kevin . . . about the week you gave me to tell you what's been going on.'

‘It's okay,' he said immediately. ‘Whenever you're ready.'

‘No, I mean . . . Iris is going to tell you all about it tomorrow. And you'll really wish she hadn't. But try to keep an open mind, and I'll demonstrate some of the more unbelievable bits if my parents ever let me out of their sight again.'

‘Cryptic,' he noted.

‘You have no idea. Good luck for opening night. Break two legs.' The show would go on. All the profits were going to the quake survivors' benefit.

‘Wish you could be here. Love you, Ellie.'

‘Love you too.'

I hung up, and realised that the mask had woken up again, humming at me from its hiding place in the back of the wardrobe. I was going to have to construct a better hiding place than a couple of old blankets; something that would protect the mask from the people who might be very happy to take possession of it, and something that would protect me from the mask. It was a living thing. I couldn't just destroy it.

But as long as I could feel it promising love and endless devotion, it was a very dangerous temptation.

I told it go back to sleep with all the firmness I could muster, and walked into the living room. Hinemoana Simpson was arranging the new donated mattresses on the floor, trying to find a way to fit in our three new arrivals.

‘I'm going for a walk,' I said. I felt guilty every time I saw her, a reminder of what principles I'd compromised. True to my orders, she hadn't called my parents, even after the quake; I'd had to do that myself, choking on the shame.

She nodded, but it was her own nod: a judicious agreement, not a forced compliance. ‘Good idea. Clear your head.'

‘How's David?'

‘Getting better,' she said briefly, and I withdrew without asking more. Her son might never walk again. But when she wasn't at the field hospital, she was here, organising volunteers and working, every minute, against the destruction that had nearly crushed the city.

Nearly, but not quite.

The last week had taught me a lot about courage. It was time to be brave – brave enough for this final thing. I snagged an apple from the pile on the kitchen table, and set off for the sea.

On most other days, a teenage girl with as many bruises as I had walking past two police officers might have got a second look as they wondered where I'd received them. A week after the worst natural disaster in New Zealand's human history, I got a distracted glance and a curt warning to stick to the middle of the street. Unstable buildings still crumbled irregularly, the sound of masonry hitting asphalt enough to startle me out of my dreams, sick and shivering on the living-room floor.

I'd picked a beautiful day for this meeting. The air was drenched in the Napier winter light that saturated everything with bright colour – the white and yellow chunks of painted stone, the orange police tape, the enormous blue sky. Plastic bags and scraps of paper blew about. Every now and then there was something more horrible – photographs, torn pieces of clothing. I might have tried to ignore them once, but now I looked steadily at everything I saw, scratching absently at the needle mark in the crook of my arm. The nurse taking my blood donation hadn't had much time to be gentle.

I took my time wandering down Marine Parade, eating the apple and watching my feet as I negotiated the broken road. I was rehearsing questions and explanations in my head, hoping that I'd get a chance to use any of them.

The bronze statue of Pania of the Reef had fallen off her stone plinth when the quake hit. Someone had lifted her back on, and left a black-lettered note scribbled on the back of a supermarket flier: ‘warning: Pania is wobbly!' The ornament in her hair had snapped off and the formerly flowing locks were dented, but she gave the same head-tilted smile to the ocean. I touched her polished hand for luck and for courage, and walked out into the bay.

The newly raised land was strewn with fish carcasses and white patches of salt. I pinched my nose shut, already regretting the apple. The tide was coming in. As I approached the sea, so slowly that it was almost imperceptible from moment to moment, mist began to gather. I waited until it hovered thickly before me, squared my shoulders, and walked into the heart of the fog.

It was the first time I'd met Mark since his transformation. He sprawled in the shallows, his head planted on the wet sand, watching my approach with opalescent eyes. His scales were a glossy green, undimmed by algae or chipped by time. He didn't have the enormous bulk of his grandfather.
Only as long as a bus
, I thought. Well, clearly that was all right then.

‘Hi,' he said, through jagged teeth. His voice was the same.

All of my carefully prepared speeches vanished. ‘Hi, yourself.' I impulsively leaned in to touch his neck, as thick as my torso. He shivered under my hand, a sinuous writhe that shook water free in a clean-smelling spray. I let my hand drop away. ‘I'm sorry I didn't come here earlier. I've been volunteering at the Civil Defence centre at my old primary school. You know their motto?'

‘Nope.'

‘“Lay Well Thy Foundation.” ' ‘Ironic,' he said cautiously.

I shrugged. ‘I don't know. The school's still there. All of the kids made it.'

‘Do you— I mean—'

‘A lot of people lost everything,' I said. ‘A lot of people died.' My cousin Reeve had died in Whangarei, crushed under the roof of his apartment building. Two of my old high-school classmates had been killed driving home from hockey practice, and another was clinging to life with the fingernails of her remaining hand. I remembered them, and I grieved, and in the really bad times, the grief was needles in my throat.

The needles were stabbing me now, making my voice hoarse. ‘I don't think there are many people who didn't lose someone.'

‘I'm sorry,' Mark said, very simply, and I let myself cry for a while, wrapping my arms around myself and wishing they were his.

When I was done and wiping at my swollen eyes with my damp sleeve, he heaved himself a little further onto the sand, tail whipping up clouds of sand as he rose. ‘I need to tell you again. I'm so sorry I deceived you.'

I looked up into the alien face, trying to read emotion from the enormous features. ‘It doesn't— well, it does matter. But I don't really care right now. Are you okay about . . . everything?' I gestured at the length of him.

He didn't pretend not to understand. ‘I hated you,' he said. ‘When I opened my eyes and realised I was breathing underwater, that I was a monster again, I couldn't stand it. I had followed you the whole way, never saying a word, with my hands clamped together so I wouldn't steady you when you stumbled. I stared at the back of your head for hours when all I had to do was reach out and touch your hair. And I came back to this. At least I'd
looked
human before.'

I let out a shaky breath. ‘I'm noticing a lot of past tense.'

His lips split to display the jagged array of teeth. After a second, I identified the gesture as a smile. ‘I kept remembering how you kept going. The muscles jump in your back when you climb over rocks, did you know? It was hard to hate you then.

‘And when I worked out that the curse had been broken, and I
still
wasn't human, it was just funny. I laughed so hard I scared a school of tuna away.'

My heart clenched. ‘What?'

‘Tuna. Big-arse fish, sharp teeth, very tasty.'

‘No! The curse! It's broken?'

‘Sure,' he said. ‘It was meant to last until death, and I died.

Does Sand know I'm back yet? I bet he'll be pissed.'

‘Shut up,' I said, and planted my fists on my hips, staring up into his glorious eyes. ‘Sand's gone. I love you.'

I tensed against the transformation that never came. Mark blinked at me, lipless mouth hanging open over those horrifying teeth.

‘I love you too, Ellie,' he said, and something quivered under my breastbone, light and beautiful as a butterfly's wings: the immense, ordinary magic of hope.

‘Oh, good,' I said, and scrubbed at my wet cheeks. ‘After I'd gone to all that trouble, it'd be a shame if—' ‘Shut up, Spencer.'

I floundered into the cold water and leaned into his wet body. The scales were softer than they looked, slick and cool against my hands. ‘This is such a mess.'

His laugh rippled right through him. ‘I think Reka's a step ahead of us.'

I jerked back from him. ‘She's still
here
?'

‘No, she's gone back. But she asked grandfather to visit, so that he can teach me how to take a human shape.'

I let out my breath in an incredulous laugh and slid down his side to sit in the water, hissing as the cold salt water washed against my raw patches. Mark twisted his neck to watch me, and I felt the easy glide of his muscles against my back. He was stronger than me now. And still beautiful.

He hesitated. ‘She's matchmaking, you realise. She can't take Kevin, and she knows she'll have to fight to take anyone else. Maybe she'll settle for grandchildren.'

‘
Grandchildren
? I'm seventeen!'

‘Her view, not mine.' he said. ‘Anyway, the change takes a long time to learn.'

I exhaled. ‘Well, I can't exactly pose on a window-seat and wait for you. If my parents don't make me stay in Napier and Mansfield doesn't expel me, I'm thinking about doing Classics at Canterbury. Iris wants to direct
A Winter's Tale
for February Orientation.' I paused. ‘And La Gribaldi wants to give me some extracurricular tuition. She said I did a good job. Can I trust her?'

He tilted his head. ‘You could do a lot worse. “You did a good job,” is Gribaldi-speak for, “You saved the day.”'

‘No,' I said flatly. ‘Hine-nui-te-p
did that.'