The Tree of Water (18 page)

And all around them, they could hear its song, low, easy, slow.

Char's color was starting to improve, and while he looked very tired, the unhealthy black circles under his eyes were beginning to fade.

“You all right?” Ven asked after a while.

Char nodded. “What's that up ahead?” he whispered.

Ven tried to see farther down the pathway. On the ground, a large, low object seemed to be taking up the entire floor of the path.

“Can't tell yet,” he replied, “but we'll be there soon enough. It doesn't seem alive, at any rate.”

When they finally got close enough, Ven could see that it was what appeared to be an old, overgrown stump, the trunk torn from it long ago. But unlike the trees of the kelp forest, the largest of which had trunks as round as he was, this had been a tree of immense size, bigger around than three oxcarts side by side. It was covered with colonies of rainbow algae and lichen. Its dead roots stretched out in all directions over the forest path and into the glades of kelp and algae to the north and south.

But, strangest of all, it did not appear to be the stump of a giant kelp plant.

Instead, it looked like it had once been the base of an enormous tree of the variety that grew in the upworld, but seventy or so feet below the surface of the sea.

Unquestionably dead for a very long time.

Ven's stomach clenched, though his curiosity was roaring inside him. He floated up high enough to pass over the massive stump and kept swimming, supporting Char until Coreon stopped next to a large bed of floating kelp past a clump of purple ferns.

Within the forest drift over the bed of kelp, small white puffballs that looked like milkweed seeds were floating. When Ven looked closer, he could see that they were actually tiny fairylike creatures, clear like the Vila, but much smaller and delicate.

“Water sprites,” Amariel said quietly. “They usually can be found near where magic is strong. They're harmless. Thank goodness. But they're a sign that the dragon is around here somewhere.”

Coreon pointed toward the bed of floating kelp.

“Here,” he said simply. “Spicegar, these are my companions, the merrow, the human, and the Nain.”

Pleased to meet you.
The familiar soft voice seemed to come from all around them.
What is a Nain?

Ven blinked to clear his eyes, but he saw nothing but the bower of kelp.

“Er, me, sir,” he said as politely as he could. “A son of the Earth.”
Perhaps Spicegar is invisible, and this seaweed is a pillow for his, er, claw?
he wondered.

“Where's the dragon?” the merrow whispered.

Coreon's kelp-like eyebrows drew together.

“Right in front of you,” he said. “Can't you see him?”

I looked as hard as I could, but all I saw was a leafy mass of floating weeds.

Then a few of the tiny leaves rustled.

I stared at them.

And then, above what looked like a twig the size of my thumb, was a tiny eye.

Smaller than the smallest button on my shirt.

“Can you come out a little?” Coreon asked. “I think they're having trouble seeing you.”

Another sigh filled the drift.

Oh, all
right.
I suppose so.

The seaweed rustled again.

A tiny creature no longer than Ven's two hands side by side floated up out of the weeds. It was shaped a little like a sea horse, but bony. Hanging from it were appendages that looked almost exactly like leaves of seaweed, so much so that had the creature not come out of hiding, Ven knew he never would have seen it there. It had a few small spines that resembled stripes and a long, thin snout, but otherwise it looked more like a loose piece of floating seaweed than an animal.

“What the heck is
that
?” The merrow's thrum exploded, disturbing the peace of the forest glen and scattering the water sprites.

Coreon pulled himself up straighter, his kelp-hair bristling in anger.

“This is Spicegar,” he said. “A little respect, if you please.”

“I thought you said he was a sea dragon.”

“I did,” Coreon insisted. “And he is.”

An ugly sound, half laugh, half choke, came out of Amariel's throat.

“That's no dragon,” she said. “That's—that's a
fish
!”

The low, soft thrum voice cleared what sounded like a throat. The small creature ruffled its foliage.

I am no fish, madam. If anything, I am related to the hippocampus. But I assure you, I am indeed a sea dragon.

“That's impossible,” the merrow said. “Sea dragons are enormous creatures of immense power. They're the size of sailing ships, giant serpents that collect hoards of treasure and defend those hoards with fiery breath that burns like acid. At least that's what I've been told.”

And I've been told that merrows are lovely creatures with sweet voices and nice manners. So I guess we have both been somewhat misled.

“Amariel,” Ven said quietly, “stop it.”

“What kind of a dragon
purrs and barks
, Ven? This is ridiculous.”

“You are embarrassing yourself, and us. And especially Coreon. Now stop, please.”

“Fine,” said the merrow. “Fine. At least I'm glad to know that Coreon thinks a floating
salad
is a dragon, and I was frightened out of my mind for nothing.”

“Well, at least you didn't have to go too far to be that frightened,” said Coreon angrily. “Your mind is obviously pretty small.”

The merrow dropped Char's arm, gave a sweep of her beautiful tail, and swam off deeper into the forest. Ven watched as the small, leafy creature sank back into its seaweed bed again.

“I am terribly sorry,” he said. “I apologize on behalf of myself and my friends. The situation with the Vila scared everyone and has left us all out of sorts. Thank you for what you did to save Char.”

Don't mention it.
The thrum of the sea dragon's voice was courtly, almost as if he was amused.

“We really do appreciate—”

No, really, don't mention it.
The thrum had become slightly more annoyed, and the kelp around the fern bed shook with the vibrations of Spicegar's undersea voice.
I'd like you to move along now, if you please. You are drawing attention to my hiding place
.

“Of course. Sorry. Thanks again.” Ven nodded to Coreon, who grabbed Char's other arm, and the two of them swam off, helping him along. “Thank you.”

“That was embarrassing,” said Coreon as they continued on the path. “If that's the way she's going to be, I'm not introducing her to any more of my friends.”

“I'm sure she didn't mean what she said.” Ven peered into the lush green of the forest ahead of them where the movement of the merrow's tail was making a wake in the water. He looked over his shoulder one last time at the giant stump.

“Coreon, by any chance have you heard of a tree named Frothta?”

The sea-Lirin boy nodded. “Just the old legends.”

“Do you think it still exists?”

Coreon thought for a moment, then shook his head.

“Don't think so. I'm not sure it ever did. I haven't been too far off the reef, but I know lots of Lirin-mer who have crossed the desert and even have been down into the Twilight Realm. They tell great stories of the amazing things they've seen, but no one has ever mentioned seeing Frothta, or even any sign of it. Lirin-mer have been around a
very
long time. Most think that it may have always been a myth.”

Ven sighed.

“I wish I knew what happened to it,” he said.

They were too far away, too deep into the sleepy forest of waving towers of kelp, to hear the thrum of Spicegar's reply.

Well, if you had asked, I could have told you.

 

20

The Desert Beneath the Sea

After that it was just day after day of swimming through kelp.

The days blended into each other. Amariel and Char apologized, in their own ways, to one another, and went back to the same uneasy companionship they had always shared. They both apologized, sort of, to Coreon, who continued to be silent and helpful, guiding us past places he thought were dangerous or through others he thought were especially interesting. We showed him the key that we had found in the bottle, and the paper with the word
Athenry,
but it didn't mean any more to him than it did to us.

It was sort of sad that he had so little of the Cormorant's respect, I decided after a while. I knew how that felt. Each of my siblings has a job in my father's factory, a specialty all his or her own. My father had made me train in all of those specialties, and just when I was getting competent in one, he would appear one morning at the door, signaling for me to get my tools and follow him. He was actually training me in each different department to be his Inspector all the while, but I didn't know that.

I only know it made me feel useless.

Until the albatross who has been watching over me since the morning of my birthday brought me a letter from my father, explaining his plan for me, that is.

The Inspector is one of the most important jobs in the family business. That's the one I may have someday, when I finally return to Vaarn.

Because to the Nain, there is nothing more important than being good at your job, and doing it well.

Maybe this mission will redeem Coreon in the eyes of the Lirin-mer. Maybe he will be seen as a great leader. Maybe he will be the Cormorant someday, who knows.

He certainly would make a better one than the current fellow.

Finally, after more days than we could count, we came to the end of the forest. The lush growth of kelp began to thin, then grow sparser, until it was just occasional clumps of seaweed and schools of fish passing through.

And a lot of sand and empty water once again.

It's hard to put in words how we knew that we had reached the desert's edge.

In spite of that, each of us did know it.

The drift changed first. We had been swimming so long that it took a while to notice. Tired as we were, we missed the early signs, like the seaweed growing paler, the schools of fish fewer. The sun beat down on the water's surface, creating great patches of moving sunshadow, which made it hard to see into the distance.

And yet, when we were at the desert's edge, we all knew we were there.

All four of us came to a halt at the same time on a sandy ridge as smooth and clean as a beach in the upworld, without a shell in sight.

The bottom of the ocean before us was almost completely free of plant life. There were no wrecks visible, no coral reefs like the one where we met Coreon, just silence and empty blue water as far as we could see.

And, for some reason, that water felt
heavier
.

 

“Look at all the nothing.”

Amariel's thrum echoed in Ven's ears. He took a deeper breath of the elemental air from the bubble around his head. He remembered the last time he had heard her use those words.

She was describing a place her father had taken her, a sea beneath the sea.

And she had described it as the most frightening place she had ever been in her life.

“What do you know about this place?” Ven asked Amariel and Coreon.

“Just what the Cormorant told you.” Coreon's thrum was steady, but high. Ven wasn't sure if that was a sign of nerves, or if his undersea voice was just unsure what its pitch wanted to be. “If you want to find out if the Tree of Water still exists or is just a legend, the only one who may know is the Sea King. You have to cross the desert if you want to get to the Summer Festival.”

“It's so quiet here,” Char said. “I don't feel any thrum at all, just the drift. Maybe it's completely empty, like the vast deserts of the upworld.”

“They say no desert is completely empty,” Ven said. “They just look that way. I once heard tales of a great desert from a storyteller who came to the town square outside my father's factory in Vaarn. I was working in the front office that day, so I got to hear some of his tales through the window. He said that there are as many creatures living in that wasteland as there are stars in the desert sky. By day the desert animals hide in caves from the sun, but at night they come out looking for food.”

“Well, it's the same in the sea,” said Amariel. “Only it doesn't have to be night here. The Sea Desert is so vast that you never know when you might come upon one of the great predators—the big sharks, octopi of enormous size, even—”