Were they talking about her? Was she the one who swam away?
Of course she was. She had left in a panic, a shock of breaking heart and breaking lungs. She had sought shelter in her secret, her lax.
Everything inside of Gryshen began to sear and bubble. It threatened to pour out of her and explode all over this casket and crowd, this garish group who only disgusted her with their wails, their fingers clawing at her dead father, like they were trying to drain one more drop of his goodness.
And who were they, and what did they ever know?
She began to quake, the ink filling her eyes, feeling like a chained shark, unable to bite them all in the way they must be bitten, these useless monsters. Her brother just kept on crying.
And now he was before her, her dad. All lanterns circled them, her family on display. She could barely look at him, and she didn’t dare to touch him, for of all the wild grasping and groping that had filled her with such a sickness, she was positive that no one had the need that pressed upon her, the need and will to seize her father’s body, to wrap her arms around him, and take him up to that private spot on the shore, a place where they could drink cups and cups of tea and live and decay there.
A place where his spirit would be kept safe. In her cradling arms, in the sunlight, it could be all the spirit she needed. It would be enough for the both of them.
There was a moment, a consideration, when she felt a hand touch her shoulder.
“I’m here now. I’m sorry it took me so long, but I’m here now.”
She didn’t need to look to recognize the tone. It was somewhere between a salty wave and a cool lagoon, and it was as sweet as the pink flowers that dappled the water of its owner’s home.
Hena had arrived.
Long after the crowd had buried her father and made their way to their respective sleeping chambers, Gryshen, Hena, Jode, and Bravis were posted in a nook beside one of the smaller oxygen chambers deep in the interior, between the sleeping ilorays and the bone pit.
“Jode, don’t you need your rest?” Gryshen finally broke the silence between the four of them.
Jode gave her a look that would have been baffled amusement had the joy not been drained from his face, now puffed from an almost endless stream of tears.
“What? Are you serious?” His snort sent a swirl of bubbles her direction. “You think I need rest? What about you? You’ve set up quite the time for yourself come light, am I right?” He shook his head, his eyes beginning to burn, fear visible in their flame. “Or maybe you have the energy you need. I guess not giving a damn about anybody but yourself keeps you in peak physical—”
Bravis had placed a warning hand firmly on his shoulder. Hena hissed.
“She’s lost more than any of us, Jode. And we’ve lost a lot.” Bravis choked on the last words of his signal.
But something around Gryshen’s heart reflected the fire in her brother’s eyes. It was a burn in the hollowness, like the fires the makers kept in the earth-level caverns.
“Gryshie, I didn’t mean it.” She saw the regret washing over him. As if his sorrow could be any greater. “I just—I just . . .”
“I know, Jode. I know I haven’t been who you’ve needed me to be.”
Her brother tucked the fear away from his face. “Gryshie, you don’t need to be anything for anybody.”
Now it was Gryshen who snorted. And no one could argue with the gesture.
“Please, I will come back.” She signaled in a tired tone. Gryshen couldn’t believe it had only been hours since everything had been destroyed—such a short time for her whole world to wash away. “I will come back,” she repeated, more to herself than to the other three.
“Come, Jode.” Bravis gently patted her brother on the back. “Gryshen, I will see you at first light. Before your paces begin.”
Jode swam a couple sweeps, then stopped to turn. “Grysh, I really didn’t mean—”
She held her hand up.
He accepted this, bowed his head, and the pair moved down the hall, leaving the sea’s two youngest chiefmaidens to talk.
Hena was still boiling at Jode’s accusations.
“He should never have said that. What a terrible thing to tell you! And right after your father’s funeral?” Hena seemed to move as gracefully as any dolphin, every gesture like a dance. But she never danced around the ugliness of things.
“He’s just broken. We all are. But I will . . .” She nodded, staring off, feeling that hollow flame grow. “I need a plan.” She turned to Hena. “Can I rely on you?”
“For anything.”
“I’m going to get the pearl back.” And the flames shot up from her heart, licking her throat, warming the water with her words.
Hena nodded calmly, then narrowed her eyes softly at her best friend.
“There’s a lax involved in this, isn’t there?”
Gryshen just stared back at her.
“I can feel the sting in your signal, Gree.” She was the only one who called her that.
“He’s not important.”
“Oh, I disagree.” Hena widened her eyes, brows soaring. “‘He’ is always important.”
Gryshen remained silent. What could possibly be said? There was no time. And she certainly didn’t have an ounce of room in her mind to open this up. Besides, she was busy keeping her heart tucked deep inside her thin chest.
“I know you. I know you’re doing your best to keep afloat. I heard about the Rakor’s visit while they were still here with you. Some of your hunters encountered some of our scavengers while on their search for wreckage.
“I met that Coss once before, on a visit they paid us many cycles back. You know they’ve always left us alone. We are strong like them.”
Hena was right. Her ilorays were not barbarians like the Rakor, but they all had a thick, solid build. Even graceful Hena had a wide pink tail and flat, sturdy hands the color of clay, limbs that appeared to be able to take anyone down with one good slap.
“That’s not to say we can’t all beat them. They don’t know what they don’t know about you, Gree,” she said cryptically, after staring into the electric blue glow of the torch she was holding.
Gryshen was relieved to be wrapped up in the mystery of battle preparations. Hena was exactly what she needed—the antidote to the poison inside her.
“What does that mean?” Gryshen asked.
The jellyfish in the lantern had been pulling in its tentacles, tucking them under its body, curling its exoskeleton within. Now, upon Gryshen’s question, as if silently directed by Hena, it unfurled in full glowing glory, acting as a spotlight on Hena’s wide face.
“They don’t know you’re wild.”
Gryshen thought of the way Coss tore into the face of the shark.
Then she thought of the measured methods her pod used to hunt and kill. Her brother prided himself on bringing back clean kills, a good shot with the spear often doing the job.
War was far from clean.
She could feel her long, skinny form as she crossed her arms and touched her pointed elbows.
“My pod.” She had come back into focus enough to imagine her tribe fighting with the most ruthless crew of ceasids. Even the Rone’s toughest hunters—how could she put them at risk?
“I’ll have to go myself,” she signaled it into the lantern, as if it would bounce against the glass and explode into a wish so powerful it could build her an immortal army to back up her bony figure.
“You are an idiot. Stop.” No, Hena was definitely not soft. “Gryshen”—she slowly sounded out her name as if she were talking to someone who couldn’t speak her language—“what do you think your pod is doing at this moment?”