The Deep

“Thank you,” I whisper, and the lights glow more strongly, as if the little creatures have heard and are glad to help me.

Slowly, slowly, the rock lets go of me as I relax. I’m easing myself forwards again. There is clear water between the rock and my body. I carry on doggedly pushing myself along. A few centimetres, a few more. The tunnel is curving round to the left, and surely it’s growing much wider now…

There’s a shimmer of light ahead, and a shape, moving—

A conger eel!

No. A familiar shape, strong and supple and like a seal’s tail. Faro’s tail. He’s swimming up ahead of me.

“Faro!”

“Little sister, I was beginning to wonder what had happened to you. I tried to reach you with my mind but all I could find was rock.”

I swim up alongside, so overwhelmed with relief that I’m afraid I’ll cry if I try to talk. Faro turns and smiles impishly.

“So those conger eels didn’t eat you up after all.”

I laugh feebly.

“You’re bigger than me, Faro, however did you get through so easily?”

Faro shrugs. “We’re used to it. Our bodies know their way through rock passages. As long as you don’t think about it, you’ll always get through.”

The tunnel’s opening up like a flower from a stalk. In the distance there’s a murmuring ripple of sound. Faro takes my hand.

“Wait, Sapphire.”

We float, listening. The light is even stronger now, and I see that the sides of the tunnel aren’t black at all. They are a deep, rich ruby red. It looks as if the tunnel is carved out of a huge jewel. Faro’s face glows with reflected light.

“We’re close to the Assembly chamber,” he whispers. “Listen. You can hear my people.”

So the murmuring ripple isn’t the far-off noise of the sea. It’s the sound of Faro’s people, gathered together.

“How many are there?”

“Hundreds. Maybe thousands. Listen to the echo. You can tell that the chamber is full.”

“What are they doing?”

“Waiting.”

“What for?”

“For us, of course. Or strictly speaking, my dear little sister, for you.”

I stare at Faro in horror. “You’re joking.”

“They’ve been travelling for days to get to this Assembly.”

“How do you know? Morlader only just came to – to fetch us.”

“I know the ways of my people,” says Faro proudly.

For a second I even wish that I was back in the tunnel again, talking to the worms. I try to imagine stepping out in front of hundreds – maybe thousands – of Mer. How disappointed they’ll be when they see that I’m just an ordinary girl, with no special powers at all.

“They’ve got it wrong, Faro. They can’t be waiting for me. Let’s go back—”

“What? Back through that tunnel? You’ve got to be joking. Even for me it was a close thing.”

“Were you scared, Faro?”

“Me? Scared?” His eyes glitter indignantly. “I was – extended, my dear Sapphire.”

“So was I. Very extended indeed.”

The murmur of voices seems louder now. I try to imagine what they look like, all those hundreds and thousands of Mer gathered together. Suddenly I’m curious as well as nervous. I’ve always wanted to meet the Mer face to face. Faro’s people. Maybe my people, too, in a way.

“Will my father be there?” I ask abruptly.

“No.”

“Why not? He’s Mer now, isn’t he?”

“He’s still recovering.”

“Recovering! You didn’t tell me he was ill.”

“You knew that he was hurt when the Tide Knot broke. His body felt the anger of the tides.”

“But I thought he’d be all right by now – I didn’t know it was serious. Why didn’t you tell me? What’s wrong with Dad?”

Faro touches his right arm, just above the wrist. “The bone was broken here. He had broken ribs too, and cuts and bruises all over his body where he was hurled against a rock. My sister’s teacher has been healing him. She is a great healer.”

“Oh.”

I feel sick at the thought of Dad being hurled against a rock. I know what it’s like when a current seizes hold of you. It must have been terrible to be caught in the full force of the escaped tides. I knew Dad was hurt because he didn’t come back to help us in the flood, but I didn’t realise how bad it was.

“And his mind is heavy,” goes on Faro quietly, as if he’s confiding a secret.

My father is trist, I think. My father is kommolek. The words are like shadows on my heart.

“Yes,” says Faro, reading them, “you are right, little sister. His mind troubles him more than his body.”

I wish I could reach Dad with my mind. I wish I could say to him, Hold on. We haven’t forgotten you. Conor and I will do anything to get you home.

But Dad can’t hear me.

I listen again to the murmur of voices.

“What about Mellina? Will she be there?”

“She may be. I don’t know.”

If she is, I’ll see Mellina face to face at last. The Mer woman whom my father loves. The woman who enchanted him away from our home, away from Mum and Conor and me and everything in the human world.

I wish I was away in Ingo…

Mellina sang that to Dad, and he believed it. He wished for Ingo, and his wish came true. When I saw Mellina’s face in Saldowr’s mirror she looked young and soft and gentle. But I’m not going to be tricked by her. I’m going to find out the truth, and tell Mellina that she’s got to let go of Dad, and allow him to come home.

“All right, Faro. Let’s go in.”

We swim to the edge of a thin screen of rock. I tread water to steady myself. Warily, keeping my body in hiding, I peer around the side.

It’s a vast underwater cavern, as big as a cathedral. The walls curve inwards and they’re carved into tier after tier, like rows of seats in a theatre. I wonder if the sea gouged out those tiers, or if the Mer carved them.

And there are the Mer. Hundreds of them, as Faro said. Maybe thousands. They are as real and solid as a football crowd, and as strange as a dream. Their tails glisten. Their long hair streams in the water, half veiling their bodies. Some are wearing shining cloaks of net and pearl, others bodices of woven seaweed.

The source of the light is above us. The light of the open sea filters down to the heart of the underwater mountains. For a second I think of the sun and its light, then I lose my grip on the thought. The human world feels as distant as China or Paraguay.

I stare around the chamber in wonder. The far wall shimmers with phosphorescence. The skin of the Mer glows too. There’s a tinge of blue in their skin that isn’t like any colour I’ve seen in a human. The same blue sheen ripples over their tails. I’ve never noticed that colour in Faro’s body. Maybe the light of the cave changes everything. They look so foreign, and so beautiful.

“My people,” says Faro, with such pride in his voice that I turn to look at him. His shoulders are braced, his hands are clenched into fists, and his face is stern.

“My people,” he repeats, “and I will give my life to defend them. You are the only human who has ever seen such an Assembly.”

“I’m honoured,” I answer quietly.

Faro’s face flashes into a smile, then he says urgently, “Sapphire, promise me that you’ll listen to them. Even if – even if what they ask sounds impossible.”

“I promise, Faro.”

We swim slowly forward, out of our concealment. First one head turns, and then another. A ripple of sound flows through the chamber.

So many pairs of eyes, fixed on me and Faro. So many faces scanning us, taking in every detail. It’s like being on stage, except that I don’t know the play, or what my part is.

Now everything’s still again. The water in the chamber is as clear as glass. There’s nowhere to hide, even if I wanted to hide. But I don’t. I swim forward. At long last I’m here, in the company of the Mer.

They stare at us, waiting. The atmosphere is tense with expectation. What are we supposed to do?

“Come farther forward, Sapphire. They want us to go into the middle of the Chamber. There, above the Speaking Stone.”

He points to a stone set in the floor of the cave. It’s pearl coloured, with veins of green and blue and crimson, like the veins in an opal. But it can’t be an opal. No precious stone could ever be that big.

“Follow me, Sapphire.”

We swim to the centre. It feels as if our bodies barely disturb the water. We’re part of its stillness. When we reach the Speaking Stone, Faro dives and touches it with his hand, as if he’s touching it for luck. As he rises again he says to me, “Dive down, Sapphire, and touch the Stone.”

“Why?”

“It makes us speak more clearly.”

I dive down, and touch the stone lightly. I’m expecting to feel some charge of power in it, like the power that surged in the Tide Knot, but it’s just a stone.

A tall Mer man with a strong, hawk-like face uncoils his body from the front rank of seats, swims forward and holds his hands out to us, palm up.

“Greet him, Sapphire,” whispers Faro, and I hold my own hands out in imitation. Faro does the same. With a quick, easy flick of his body, the man dives to touch the Speaking Stone, then swims back up to where we are. His hair swirls around his shoulders.

“I am Ervys, Morlader’s uncle,” he tells me. “We are sea rovers. We gather news from all the oceans, and bring it to our people wherever they are. You are welcome here. I have come to share with you the thoughts that I have, and the thoughts of our people. These are painful thoughts, dark and violent. You would not want them in your head or in your dreams, and so I will not pass them into your mind. We will speak our thoughts aloud at this Assembly.

His eyes are fixed on me. They are very clear. I’ve never seen human eyes with that silvery light in them. He looks more – more Mer, somehow, than either Faro or Elvira. More Mer than Saldowr, even. I push the thought down, to consider it later. I need to concentrate. All those faces, all those eyes. But somehow the fact that we are floating above the Speaking Stone makes the hundreds of watching Mer a little less intimidating.

“These are dangerous times for us all,” says Ervys, “since the tides turned and the Deep awoke. Or since the Deep awoke and the tides turned.”

Suddenly I’m impatient. After such a journey, I don’t want to hear clichés. I know that these are dangerous times. I know all about the aftereffects of the flood. They are like the aftershocks of an earthquake, and no one could fail to notice them. The tides turned and the Deep awoke. What’s that really supposed to mean?

My impatience must show on my face because Ervys says sharply, “Do you expect me to deliver all my thoughts in a moment?”

“No,” I say meekly, but I don’t feel very meek inside. Faro shoots me a warning glance, and I remember my promise. “I’m a friend of the Mer. I’m ready to listen,” I say, and this time Ervys’s face relaxes.

“You are very young,” he says, looking at me with a certain doubt in his expression. “But we have been told that you have a gift. Saldowr tells us that you have visited the Deep.”

I feel the hush in the chamber, the tension stretched out so tight it might snap at any moment.

“Yes,” I answer, “I visited the Deep, before the tides broke.”

A gasp runs around the chamber, followed by a murmur of voices. Ervys turns and raises his hand. Silence falls.

CHAPTER FOUR

I wish I had Conor by my side. Ervys is looking at me so intently. What does he want? His face is hungry.

The eyes of all the assembled Mer are fixed on me. It’s like standing on a stage with all the lights on you. The silence is eager. If only I knew what they wanted from me. I glance sideways at Faro for support, but he’s gazing down at the Speaking Stone, his head bowed as if in respect for the Assembly.

Maybe Ervys is waiting for me to speak first. If Conor were here, he’d know what to say.

“You visited the Deep,” repeats Ervys at last. “I was told that this had happened, but now I hear it from your own mouth. It seems… beyond our beliefs. Saldowr himself cannot enter the Deep. And yet it opened to you. Tell me how you did this. Tell me what force you used.”

“I – I don’t know.”

Ervys throws back his head. His hair eddies around him. “You don’t know!” His voice is full of disbelief.

“It just – it just happened. I was in a rogue current. It threw me off. It threw us all off. I couldn’t see Faro or Conor. They were dragged away from me… I don’t remember all of it,” I say slowly. “Maybe I was knocked out. When I woke I was in the Deep. It was so dark…”

My voice trails off. I should never have started talking about it. The memories claw at me. Everything is coming back. The crushing darkness and silence of the Deep. The weight of my hand when I tried to move it, as if my hand was made of lead. I was trapped, a prisoner of the Deep. If I hadn’t met the whale who rescued me…

“But you lived,” goes on Ervys sternly, like a teacher trying to find out what you’ve really been doing when he’s out of the classroom. “If Saldowr had not told us it was true, how could we believe it? How could a human do what none of the Mer can do?”

Suddenly my fear is swept away by anger. How dare he doubt me? How dare he think I owe him anything? The Mer want something from me. That’s why Ervys sent his nephew to fetch us. But Morlader didn’t even guide us safely here. He went ahead and abandoned us. We had to struggle through that tunnel on our own. What if Faro hadn’t found the way? I’d never have guessed that the tunnel entrance was hidden behind that curtain of weed. Those Claw Creatures could have got us.

Why do the Mer have to make everything so difficult and complicated? And now, after all that, they still refuse to trust me. The way Ervys is interrogating me, you’d think I’d committed a crime and was lying about it.

I clench my hands into fists, and dig my nails into the palms of my hands. I try to guess what Conor would say if he were here. Conor would keep his head and think clearly to the heart of what was happening. Conor doesn’t lose his temper and lash out like me. People listen to him.

I must be like Conor now. I can’t blurt out my anger. I must make it speak clearly, so that the Mer have to respect what I say.

Wait, Sapphire, wait. Let the silence stretch. Ervys needs something from you. All these Mer are here for a reason. Take control. You don’t have to let Ervys question you as if you’re on trial.

“It’s true that I’m human,” I say at last. My voice is reedy, but at least it doesn’t tremble. “It’s true that I’m not in my own world here. You knew I’d need a guide to find my way to this Assembly.”

“I sent my nephew to guide you.”

“But Morlader went ahead of us, out of sight. We had no guide.”

“Faro knew the way.”

“Not well enough for our safety. Was it a test, Ervys?”

I look straight into his eyes. He frowns, and for a moment I’m afraid I’ve gone too far and his anger is going to flare out. I don’t look round, but I sense that Faro‘s watching me closely now. He’s on my side, I know it for sure. Faro is Mer, but he is no friend of Ervys. The tension between me and Ervys stretches as taut as a guitar string. Then, slowly, Ervys’s face cracks into a smile.

“Saldowr gave us a true picture,” he says slowly. A ripple of relief goes around the chamber. They were worried, too. Does that mean the other Mer are afraid of Ervys? “Saldowr told us, ‘These human children look as helpless as seal pups on a rock. Don’t be deceived.’”

“Where is Saldowr?” I ask eagerly. “Is he all right? Has he recovered?” Surely the wound Saldowr took on the night the Tide Knot broke must have healed by now. Saldowr is so powerful. His magic is as deep as the ocean, just as Granny Carne’s is as strong as a rock. Even if no one else can heal him, Saldowr must be able to heal himself.

Ervys doesn’t reply. Instead he nods at Faro, asking him to speak. To my surprise Faro dives down and touches the Speaking Stone a second time, as if he needs more strength, and then turns to face the Assembly.

“You all know that Saldowr is my teacher,” he says proudly. I suppress the thought that the Mer seem to spend a lot of time telling each other things that they already know. Faro is deadly serious.

There’s a murmur of agreement. Suddenly a broad-shouldered man leaves the front rank of seats and swims down to the Speaking Stone. As he swims up to face Ervys, challenge flashes between the two Mer men. Then he turns to Faro.

“You are Saldowr’s scolhyk,” he says, “his student and more than that. You are his follower. You are not his son in the flesh but in all other things you are Saldowr’s heir.” His gaze travels over the ranks of the Mer. “Am I speaking the truth?”

The ranks of Mer sway as if a strong current has swept into the chamber. Many clench their hands together, and hold them out towards the speaker as if they’re offering support to his words. But I can see some who look sullen and angry, and sit back with their arms folded. Ervys’s followers, I think.

“You are speaking the truth, Karrek,” says Faro calmly. “I am Saldowr’s holyer and his scolhyk. You all know how Saldowr is now. He cannot leave his cave. His wound refuses to heal.”

“I have not visited Saldowr, but I have been told this,” says Ervys, as Karrek swims back to his place. “But tell us, Faro,” he goes on smoothly, but with an underlying eagerness in his voice, “is there more we should know? Is Saldowr’s condition worsening? I hear rumours that he may be readying himself for the journey to Limina—”

“No!” cries Faro. “Never! Never, Ervys!”

Ervys waits again, as Faro’s cry dies away in the huge space of the chamber. Limina… that’s where the Mer go when they’re ready to die. Faro took me there once and I remember how the old and the sick waited on the white sand, patrolled by guardian seals. Faro told me that they were waiting for death. Limina is very peaceful – even beautiful in a way – but it’s on the other side of life. Once the Mer cross that threshold, they can’t come back.

Saldowr mustn’t go there! Saldowr holds the secrets of the past and the future. What would happen to Ingo without Saldowr? How can Ervys even think of suggesting that Saldowr might be ready to go to Limina?

“Everyone goes to Limina one day,” says Ervys, as if he’s read my thoughts. His voice is calm but the words are like a clash of weapons. What does he mean? Is he trying to suggest that Saldowr is not so special, that he is just one of the Mer like any other? But that’s not true. I know in my bones that it isn’t true. Saldowr has power – he has magic that Ingo needs.

“Saldowr is the Keeper of the Tide Knot,” says Faro boldly, as if that answers all arguments. But even I know that it doesn’t, not now that the Tide Knot has broken.

Sure enough, Ervys continues smoothly, “But the Tide Knot did not hold. Can Saldowr help us now, when we have to face the – consequences?”

Faro’s face is dark with fury. “Who is there to take his place, Ervys?” he demands. The question flashes through the chamber like the blade of a sword. The Mer begin to mutter. Ervys holds up his hand.

“We are not here to debate Saldowr,” he says. There’s nothing wrong with the words, but the meaning behind them is another weapon-thrust. Ervys is hinting that Saldowr can be put aside. He has lost his power, and decisions can be made without him now.

“Then what are we here for?” I ask. Both Ervys and Faro stare at me in surprise, as if they’ve forgotten I’m here. “What are we here for?”

Ervys folds his arms.

“We are here because the Kraken is awake,” he says.

Again the ranks of Mer lift their hands. This time they cross them as Faro did in the face of the Claw Creature. Their crossed hands touch their foreheads, hiding their faces. Their index and second fingers are crossed too.

“Raise your hands, Sapphire,” says Faro urgently. “Ward off the evil.”

I begin to raise my arms, but it doesn’t feel right. Why am I doing this? I look at Ervys and Faro, who have crossed their own hands. I shake my head, although they can’t see me. “The Kraken,” I say, tasting the ugliness of the word. “Who is the Kraken?”

For a long moment, no one answers. Very slowly the hands uncross, and the Mer settle back as they were before.

“The Kraken lives in the Deep,” says Ervys. “He sleeps, and while he sleeps the Deep does not trouble Ingo. As you know, none of us visits the Deep. None of us has ever seen the Kraken. But we know that he has woken before, in the time of our far ancestors.”

“How long ago?”

“About ten life-spans.”

Ten life-spans… how long would that be? Six hundred years, or maybe seven hundred. But suddenly I realise that I don’t even know how long the Mer live. I’ve been assuming that they live as long as humans, but maybe that’s a mistake. They might live a hundred and fifty years – or fifty.

“What does the Kraken do when he wakes?”

“Don’t you know?” asks Ervys, in a voice that says, Can you really be as stupid and ignorant as that?

“Nuclear warhead,” I say. Ervys stares at me in bewilderment. “Chemical weapons,” I go on.

“Sapphire, what are you saying?” asks Faro.

“Don’t you know?”

There’s a silence, and then Ervys gets the point. Again his face stretches unwillingly into a smile. “The Kraken is a creature of the Deep,” he says.

“A monster?”

“We Mer have never seen the Kraken,” says Ervys carefully, as if even to put the Kraken into words is dangerous.

“But then what – what kind of thing is it?”

And why is it so frightening? I want to ask, but I don’t dare. The atmosphere bristles with terror. The Mer sit as still as if they’ve been carved into their seats.

Faro says, “Some say that the Kraken is like us. That he has Mer blood. But he belongs to the Deep, and the Deep has taken his Mer nature and made a monster of him. No one can look on him, Sapphire. The sight of the Kraken would freeze your blood and make your body as cold as the dead.”

“But if none of the Mer have ever seen the Kraken, how do you know that he’s a monster?”

Ervys puts up his hand to silence Faro, and takes control. “The Kraken was seen once, in the time of our ancestors, when he came up to the borders of the Deep to claim what was his. Our Guardian saw him in a mirror, and since then the Kraken has never even been glimpsed. He cannot endure to be seen. He struck our Guardian with a cold curse that took a hundred moons to heal.”

“Guardian… do you mean Saldowr?”

“Saldowr!” says Ervys, and this time he can’t hide his jealousy and contempt. “I am talking of what happened ten life-spans ago. What was Saldowr then?”

A mutter of protest rises in the back of the chamber. Faro clenches his fists. I know Saldowr could have been there. Ten life-spans might be nothing to Saldowr, just as hundreds of years seem to be nothing to Granny Carne. But Ervys doesn’t want to believe that Saldowr has such power.

How much support has Saldowr got here? No one stands up to challenge Ervys openly. I wish they would. I wish I could. I’m hot with anger inside, but I daren’t let Ervys see it. Not yet. I’m not strong enough, and this is Ervys’s territory. Even Faro says nothing, although his head is thrown back and his eyes blaze through the water.

“But if the Kraken stays in the Deep, and the Mer don’t go there…” I say hesitantly. I can sense the fear but I still don’t understand why it’s so strong.

“You speak from ignorance,” says Ervys.

This is too much. I don’t care if he’s on his own territory. I don’t even care that his arms ripple with muscle and one blow from his tail could kill me. I’m not letting him get away with this.

“So would the Mer speak from ignorance, if they came into the human world,” I answer him. “Even you, Ervys. You asked me to come here. I’ve visited the Deep, which none of you have. If you want my help, why not explain things to me instead of telling me how ignorant I am?”