Tides Read online

  “I know it seems that way,” the professor said. “I know what this must look like to you. And I’m sorry. I am. But think about this, Noah.” His eyes darted around the room, not focusing on anything there—it seemed he was imagining some other place, somewhere far away. “You’ve read my work on sealskin. This is a whole other level. I’ve done amazing things with selkie skin already—I’ve had Hope’s skin for years now. Just ingesting it makes me feel—it’s incredible. They—I—we could save the Center with this. My God, we could save lives.”

  His voice had grown quick and manic as he spoke. He’d been inching closer to Noah, and now he laid a hand on his shoulder, then slid it around his neck.

  “I’m sorry,” he said again, and his grip tightened, and he slammed Noah’s head backwards.

  Noah felt a crack and dropped to the floor, black rushing over his eyes.

  thirty-three

  TRUTH

  THE cottage looked the same as it had earlier that evening, shabby and comfortable, warm light pouring from the windows. The crooked path to the front door reminded Mara of Noah holding her hand as they walked in together, the day she’d told him the truth. His fingers had been gentle against hers, his sweatshirt soft on her skin. The door creaked, and she remembered how he’d opened it for her on the very first day they’d met.

  Inside was worse. The pink couch, the worn kitchen table, the old whitewashed walls—they felt so familiar, as if Mara had been coming here her whole life. As if she belonged here. She’d thought the walls would be darker, the photos hung on them more sinister, but everything was as cramped and cluttered and wonderful as it had been before.

  She closed her eyes, unable to bear how she still loved this house and treasured her memories of it. She hated herself for feeling this way.

  When she opened her eyes again, Maebh and Noah’s grandmother were sitting together on the couch. Maebh wrapped her arm around Gemm, as if the human were the one in mourning.

  Mara’s lip curled back in an almost-snarl. No relative of Noah’s had a right to Maebh’s comfort, not now.

  “I didn’t know; I didn’t know,” Gemm whispered in an empty voice that nearly softened Mara’s anger.

  Then she saw Noah’s sweatshirt slung over one of the kitchen chairs, and she hardened again.

  “I know you didn’t,” Maebh said, twirling a length of Gemm’s gray hair in her fingers. “I’m so sorry.”

  Mara scoffed. She stalked to the bathroom door, the farthest she could get from Maebh and her disgusting human romance. It was all weakness, and stupidity, and loss. Mara’s humanskin prickled with anger, and she hated the feeling of it.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t come earlier,” Maebh said. “We didn’t know what had happened, at first, and I needed to keep the other younglings safe. I know you must have felt it; you must have wondered.” She pressed her lips to Gemm’s cheek.

  Mara’s heart cramped and ached, but she didn’t look away again. Instead, she sent Maebh all her impatience, all her fear about where Lir could be, what he could be enduring.

  Maebh turned to Mara, her eyes hard. “Yes, Daughter,” she said. “I know your fears. Patience becomes an Elder too.”

  The dream grew in her again, and an image appeared clear as water in her mind. She saw the younglings changing, Ronan free and searching for other pods, and Mara herself leading all of them, helping them, letting the pod evolve and change as it should always have done. When Maebh offered the dream to her like that, Mara knew she’d do whatever she could for the chance to reach out and claim it.

  She would even stay human. She would even listen to Gemm try to defend Noah, pointless as she knew that would be. She grudgingly walked back toward the couch and perched herself on its arm. She crossed her legs, folded her hands together, and attempted to radiate patience.

  Maebh chuckled. “Thank you, Mara.”

  Gemm lifted her head, wiping away the tears that had settled into the wrinkles around her eyes. “I don’t expect either of you to trust me,” she said.

  “Oh—” Maebh started, but Gemm hushed her with a look.

  “I’ve betrayed you before, love. I know it was years ago, but I don’t deserve your trust. I know that. All I can do now is tell you the truth, and hope that somehow you will believe me.” She glanced up at Mara.

  Mara nodded slowly. She tried to look patient and encouraging; she tried to make sure those were the only emotions Maebh could sense through their link.

  “I understand why you think Noah is involved,” Gemm said, “but I promise he’s not.”

  Mara couldn’t hold her growl in this time. It ripped from her throat like a clawed animal, low and fierce. “You’re wrong,” she hissed, her human voice sounding animal too.

  “No,” said Maebh, shaking her head gently, “she’s not.”

  Mara almost stormed out to the ocean then. Only the call of the dream, the hope that Maebh might make her the Elder soon, held her back.

  She tried to ignore her other reason for staying: the bright and throbbing and all-too-human part of her that wished Gemm were telling the truth about the boy she’d kissed.

  “All right,” she said. “I’ll listen.”

  Gemm settled closer to Maebh. “I saw Noah tonight, after the dance. He was scared—terrified—that you were hurt, Mara. He didn’t know what was going on. He didn’t understand anything. All he wanted was to help you. He was looking for your skin”—Mara bristled—“because he was looking for you. After you came, and he realized what you thought of him, he was so miserable and exhausted that I told him to go to sleep, and still he snuck out and rowed to the Center to see if he could find the kidnapper there. I suppose he found something, because he came back here half an hour ago and—and he took my boat to the mainland.” Tears shimmered in her eyes again. “He didn’t tell me where he was going, but I know well enough it’s somewhere dangerous, and he’s doing it for you.”

  Mara shook her head. “No. No, he’s not.”

  “Mara.” Maebh’s voice was kind but firm. “I know you linked with Noah tonight. I could feel it—the whole pod could feel it, for Goddess’s sake.”

  Mara’s face burned, but Maebh and Gemm only smiled at each other, sharing some secret memory.

  “Search that link, child, and tell me if Noah means you harm.”

  Almost against her will, a curious tendril crept up in Mara, searching out Noah’s emotions. She sensed nothing, at first. Then came confusion, disorientation, fear.

  She frowned—Is he hurt?—then chided herself for caring if he was. Nevertheless, she could find nothing dishonest or cruel in his feelings toward her. She recognized heat and longing in him, and she trembled as those same feelings leapt up in her.

  She hardly trusted herself to speak, with her heat twining through Noah’s in their link. She shook her head.

  “Good,” said the Elder. She looked at Gemm again. “Now, did Noah tell you anything else about who might have . . . taken Lir?”

  Gemm exhaled. “No. He didn’t tell me anything.” She raised her eyebrows, and a tiny flash of hope warmed her face. “But Lo’s still upstairs,” she said. “Maybe he told her.”

  The door to Noah and Lo’s room was closed. Gemm opened it quietly, so as not to surprise Lo while she slept.

  Her bed was disheveled, the white sheets twisted into peaks like foaming waves. Mara could see part of Noah’s bed beyond a folding screen. She stepped forward, curious to see where he slept, then stopped, hoping Maebh hadn’t noticed.

  Both beds were empty.

  Gemm sucked in a deep breath. She stepped back into the hall. “Lo?” she called. They all knew there would be no answer.

  A bang sounded from the kitchen. Mara jumped, and by the time she turned to find the source of the sound, Maebh and Gemm were already rushing down the stairs. She followed after them.

  “Gemm? Are you here?” Lo stood just inside the cottage door, her chest heaving. “Is Noah gone?”

  Even while she waited desperately for
Lo’s news, Mara felt a fresh wave of aching for Noah. She prodded their link and felt that rushing heat again. She told herself she would find him soon, and she tried her best not to think about the pain and fear and confusion that pulsed in him. She tried to believe he was not too badly hurt, and to ignore the part of herself that felt foolish for changing her mind about him so quickly.

  Lo held out a dark leathery bundle, her face twisted with pain and sympathy, and all Mara’s thoughts of Noah vanished. It was a sealskin—a youngling skin, years old and unused.

  She snatched it from Lo’s hands and clutched it to her chest, gasping. The scent was unmistakable. It was Aine’s.

  “Maebh,” she said, her voice cracking. “Maebh—”

  She uncoiled the skin, but something was wrong. It was too small, too light—the size of a newborn, not that of a youngling grown to her first change.

  She dropped it, recoiling.

  Maebh picked the skin up, cradling it as if it were Aine herself. “No,” she said. “Oh, no.”

  It lay flat and unfurled in Maebh’s arms, and they could all see the black scarring that edged it. The tail was still intact, but there was nothing left of the head or chest.

  “Who could do this?” Maebh whispered, touching her finger to the scars, then pulling back with a wince. Mara knew that Maebh, too, was picturing the wounds on Aine’s humanskin that would exactly match these.

  “You didn’t—” Mara hesitated, wondering if she or Maebh could bear any worse news. “You didn’t find the—the other half, did you?”

  Lo shook her head. “No. I mean . . .” She cleared her throat. Mara could tell she was trying to be gentle, but she was through with gentleness.

  “What do you mean?” she demanded, her voice hoarse again.

  “It’s—um.” Lo hesitated, and Gemm went to her and put a hand on her shoulder. She took a deep breath. “Professor Foster’s had it for a long time, and it looks like he’s been . . . doing things to it.” She stopped, closed her eyes, looked sick. “I think the rest of the skin is preserved, on slides, things like that. It’s—it’s in pieces.”

  Mara’s stomach lurched. She ran to the sink, barely making it before her throat opened and she started to retch. Her stomach was empty, but thin bile leaked from her mouth, drooling into the sink, and the smell stung her eyes. She coughed and heaved, unable to stop herself, the picture of Aine’s mutilated body unbearably clear in her mind.

  She felt a cool hand on her forehead, stroking back her sweat-slicked hair. She managed to look up and saw Lo standing beside her.

  “I know,” she said quietly. “It’s awful. It’s more than awful. I’m so sorry.” Still stroking Mara’s hair, she turned and spoke to the rest of the room. “But Noah’s gone, he went to Professor Foster’s house with no one to help him. And Lir’s there too, I’m sure of it, and maybe—maybe the girl, too. Ann?”

  Maebh’s voice wavered. “Aine.”

  “Right. Well, we have to go find them. We just have to.”

  Mara wiped her chin on a dishtowel. “You’re right,” she told Lo. “Let’s go.”

  She felt a spike of fear from Maebh, but the Elder quieted her feelings and nodded. “Be safe, Mara,” she said. She chuckled sadly. “I will not be able to deny it after this. You’ll make a fine Elder, my daughter.”

  Mara couldn’t bring herself to smile, but her heart thudded with relief. “I’ll try,” she whispered.

  Lo glanced toward the door. “We can take the boat from the Center,” she said. “It’s as old as the Minke but it should get us there fine.”

  “Lo—” Gemm seemed about to protest, but then she shook her head. “Well. I let him go too, I suppose. Just—please, be careful.” She looked at Mara. “Both of you.”

  Mara nodded. “Let’s go now,” she said. “We can’t waste any more time. They—” Her voice faltered.

  Maebh stood and laid a hand on Mara’s shoulder. “I know you can do this,” she said. Mara pretended not to notice the fear in her voice, or on Gemm’s face when she looked at her granddaughter.

  She led Lo out the door and into the humid darkness, down the island’s slope and onto the dock.

  Her link with Noah throbbed with pain and fear. Mara cringed. “I’m coming,” she whispered, even though she knew the link couldn’t carry words. I’m coming.

  thirty-four

  VOICE

  AINE gasped. The feeling that broke over her skin was fierce, almost painful—as if a huge weight had lifted from her body and her muscles didn’t know how to move without it. Her lungs convulsed and she coughed, deep wracking coughs that shook her ribs.

  Lir touched her shoulder, and she looked up at him. His eyes were large and steady and frightened.

  “It is all right,” she whispered, and then she gasped again. She stood and backed against the wall, shaking harder still. She looked at her palms. A mist of blood was spattered over them where she’d covered her mouth.

  “I—” She tried to speak. The sound of her voice moved through her ears like a stranger’s.

  She touched her fingers to her lips, prodded at her tongue and teeth and the soft insides of her cheeks. Her fingers were slick with red film when she looked at them again, but she didn’t care.

  For five years, even her screams had been silent.

  “Aine,” she whispered. She laughed, but that brought on another coughing fit, and she doubled over, shaking.

  When she recovered, she wiped the tear tracks from her face and looked around the room. The young man was sprawled on the floor, his eyes closed. She felt a faint thread of understanding, of trust, emanating from him, as if she already knew him. The feeling was odd—something she could almost remember from the time before the fisherman.

  She bent over him. His breaths were shallow, but his bleeding had started to slow.

  “Who are you?” she murmured in his ear. “Why are you here?” Every word made her throat ache.

  He groaned softly, and his eyes opened. “Noah,” he said, his voice nearly as ragged as hers. “I’m here . . .” His eyes fluttered closed, then open. “I want to help you. Your sister—” He stopped, glancing toward the door.

  Aine heard it too—the fisherman’s steps on the stairs.

  She leapt backwards, joining Lir in the corner. Noah closed his eyes and rested his head on the floor, so that it looked as if he hadn’t woken.

  She swallowed, pulling the taste of blood from her mouth. She curled into her body and shielded her face with her hair. Still, she was sure the fisherman would see the change in her.

  Lir put his arm around her shoulders. They crouched together as they’d done when the fisherman had first left them with the strange, injured boy.

  Just as the door began to open, she thought she saw Noah nod toward them.

  The fisherman opened the door so hard that it slammed against the wall. He pulled Noah’s arms behind his back and tied them with a rope, tugging the ends tight.

  He looked from the rope to Aine and Lir and then back, warning them. Aine’s wrists ached with the memory of the ropes he’d used on her in the first year.

  Eventually, the fisherman had learned that he didn’t need the ropes. He had her skin, and that was enough to keep her docile—mostly. Aine had tried so many times to escape, or at least to hurt him back the way he’d hurt her, but she’d never managed anything more than a few bites when he fed her.

  She watched the fisherman pace around the room, staring at Noah as if he didn’t know what to do with him. His face was creased with worry or panic. He looked so weak, so confused, and she couldn’t remember why she’d been so afraid all these years. She pressed her lips together to keep from laughing at him.

  She watched Noah, wondering if he might have a plan to save them. But he’d barely been able to stay awake a few minutes ago, so she decided she and Lir were on their own.

  Her legs tensed, and she felt her mouth start to open in a snarl. She had her voice back now, and she was done with being docile. She wante
d to attack.

  The fisherman turned toward her and met her eyes. He twisted his key chain, the little circle of her skin clutched tight in his fist. She felt the pressure of his hand over the circular scar on her cheek. A tremor of fear returned, small, but enough to make her close her mouth and retreat into a crouch again.

  Still, her mind raged to be free of him. She wanted to scream, just to show him she could. She bit the tip of her tongue to keep from crying out. Something was telling her to wait, to see what he would do before she struck.

  She made herself tremble, entwined her arms with Lir’s, and hitched her breath as if she were crying.

  She felt Lir’s hand move on her shoulder, and suddenly she didn’t have to pretend to cry. Even with her voice returned, she had no words for the happiness of being reunited with her brother.

  “Don’t go anywhere,” the fisherman said, facing Noah. He prodded Noah’s bound arms with his foot. Worry washed over his face again, and he backed away, frowning. “I’ll be right back.” He closed the door behind him. The lock clicked into place.

  Aine stood, pulling Lir up with her. “It is all right,” she repeated.

  Lir looked at the floor.

  She walked to Noah and dug her fingers into the knots at his wrists. He pushed against the floor with his shoulder, wincing, and together they brought him up to lean against the wall.

  “We have to be quiet,” Noah reminded her.

  She nodded, tugging at the rope. “I do not think I can do this,” she whispered. The knots were thick and complicated, and she had never had to undo even a simple knot before. Her child’s hands were short and stubby.

  “Can you, um, bite it?” Noah looked at her apologetically, as if unsure whether he was being rude.

  Aine grinned. She sank her teeth into the rope and sliced easily through its fibers. She knew she wouldn’t have been able to defy the fisherman like this even an hour ago, and that knowledge made her savor the bitter taste of the rope on her tongue until she had bitten through the last knot.