Shelly seemed bemused by it all. “Will you? Why?”
“Well . . . I’ve got this big ol’ boat to myself these days and I rarely take her out, but now I’ll have a top-notch bar pilot along. I always did have a yen to cross the bar on my own. I’m sure Gary can teach me a few things—being half otter he must have a feel for the water I don’t. I think that would be a fine adventure. And . . . well . . . it would be my pleasure to do something for you.”
“You would take this risk for me? How can you trust him after what he has done? His presence nearly got your boat destroyed,” Shelly objected.
“Oh, I imagine your folk and his folk will want to check in on us once in a while . . . won’t you?” He turned his attention to Fielding with a gimlet eye. “And you won’t dare give me trouble. Will you?”
Fielding looked horrified but he nodded docilely enough.
Zantree looked back to Shelly. “First we’ll have to drop these folks off, though. If it’s all right with you.”
“Yes,” she replied. “It’s a wonderful plan. If Father Otter agrees . . .”
The dobhar-chú gave a stiff nod.
Zantree turned to me and asked, “You have any objection to being dropped off at Victoria? You can take the hydroplane in the morning and be home before lunch. I think Gary and I’d be best served to head straight on down the coast as soon as possible. Don’t you?”
I agreed. “That sounds like a plan. Can we pause long enough to drop this off?” I added, pointing to the Valencia’s bell lying on the deck.
“Where do you want to take it?” Zantree asked.
“Back to its proper home. Out where the Valencia went down.”
“Well . . . it’s a bit of a ways . . .”
Shelly smirked. “Not with my help.”
Zantree smiled like a kid with a present. “Would you?” I had the feeling Paul Zantree was utterly enchanted with the new sea witch—though not in the usual way.
Shelly’s smile warmed to something genuine. “Of course.” Then she turned to Fielding. “Be a better man this time, Gary. The nature of a second chance is that you only get one.”
EPILOGUE
As wonderful as it had felt releasing the spirits that had so long lain imprisoned by the previous sea witch, I was exhausted, sore, and miserable, and I wasn’t convinced I was the only one—just the worst off. The human vote was to head out in the morning, after we’d all had a chance to rest. Fielding went off with Father Otter, unhappily but not actively resisting, to be watched over by his furry kin for the night—just in case. With the assistance of Shelly and her merfolk, the cruise back up Spieden Channel in the morning was as smooth and swift as an ice cube sliding down a satin tablecloth and we passed the turn for Victoria Harbour about ten in the morning, making Pachena Point less than two hours later. There we broke a bottle of red wine over the bell at Zantree’s insistence, and, asking for the help of Poseidon—I was a bit leery of this, but Zantree claimed we had to—we ceremoniously heaved the Valencia’s bell overboard and let it sink to rejoin the last remains of the ship from which it had been taken long ago.
We entrusted the emptied shells, bells, bottles, urns, bowls, and boxes that had contained the spirits of the drowned and shipwrecked to the merfolk for disposal in the most appropriate places. All but the first brass bell, which we carried away to return to Seawitch.
Shelly’s merfolk, though not much seen, were in evidence throughout the trip in the persistent strangeness of waves and wind that ran fair on our stern even when every other boat in sight was caught up the other way. We couldn’t do much about the tide, but with Zantree’s knowledge of the currents, we didn’t have to. We slipped back to Victoria ahead of the turn of the tide and Quinton, Solis, and I disembarked on the pier at Victoria Harbour at last, carrying our baggage and feeling altogether grubby, sore, and disconnected from the normal world. Since it was Sunday, the Victoria Clipper’s morning hydroplane was full and we had to wait for the next boat. We did have some complications because we had appeared pretty much out of nowhere, but both Solis and I had our passports with us all the time and I am still not quite sure what Quinton said to earn a startled look and a quick escort to a private office before he was released again under a barrage of nervous smiles from the Victoria Harbour master.
On the high-speed ferry trip back to Seattle, Solis and I discussed the reports we would file. For the first time in my experience of him, he had no interest in telling the unvarnished truth about a case. As far as I could tell, he was as ready to bury this one in obscure paperwork and oblique wording as I was. It was weird to feel so much in tune with him and I wondered if I was going to feel this new oddness forever. I found myself calling him Rey more often than I’d meant to. It was a strange way to build a friendship but it looked as if that’s what we had. Solis even invited us to come home with him for dinner but we declined. I didn’t want to know what he would say or not say about our trip—not yet at least.
It was a long bus ride from the Clipper terminal downtown to my place in West Seattle, since the sporadic foot ferry to Alki was not running. Quinton and I leaned our heads together and didn’t talk. I loved the quietness we fell into after our hectic weekend of monster seeking and ghost saving. We barely spoke for the next two days, thinking about what had passed and simply enjoying the quiet of being together at home again, while I gave my ribs and my arm the rest they needed.
Quinton’s anxiety about his father died away once we’d been able to talk for a few minutes in bed one night. I still felt sore and delicate in body, but my emotions were calm. I did not need to fret about my friends, my lovers, or the vicissitudes of guardians and ghosts.
The first day at home I checked my computer for anything that really needed my attention before I stuck myself in the shower. In the backlog of weekend e-mail, I found a note from Mara and Ben Danziger. It was long and rambling, as Mara often was, and I found myself tearing up a bit over the familiar tone.
On the subject of the dobhar-chú, I can’t say as I’m the best source. Although they’re of Irish origin I’ve never seen one and most folks say they’re long gone—by which I mean the beastly ones, not the common otter, as the term is now used. All tales agree that they are vicious and entirely animal in nature, having only the instinct and cunning of a beast and none of the reason of higher creatures. I do hope you haven’t had to tangle with them. Perhaps Ben and Brian will wish to go in search of them. . . .
But it’s truly a pleasure to hear from you! We’ve been out in the English countryside with a circle of mad druids preparing for the summer solstice and entirely out of touch with the computer for weeks. It’s a pleasure all of its own, yet I’m missing my friends in Seattle terribly. I had not thought I would feel so much a foreigner, yet I often do—and I am no longer the cleverest witch in the room—which quite puts me back on my heels. But the news is that Ben has been offered another teaching position here in England now that the primary work on the book is done, so we are likely to remain a while longer on loan, so to speak. I shall certainly miss you and Quinton and now that the research is over, I suppose I shall pine for the excitement of investigating things. I know we had a rough patch before our parting, but that has not put an end to our friendship. I hope that in distance we may rediscover the value of compassionate friends. . . .
If Mara meant me, I was afraid I didn’t really measure up, though I was trying. I was struck by the phrase “compassionate friends.” This was what the Guardian Beast was not and what I had been lucky enough to find in the people I was able to call friends: the Danzigers, Quinton, Solis—I found it strange to think of him as a friend, but that was surely what he was now—and Phoebe Mason, with whom I needed to do some fence mending. Friendship wasn’t always easy and I thought of Linda Starrett and her lost friend Odile and wished there was something I could have done to comfort that lonely woman. But there was nothing in my power. No amount of compassion in me would mend the hole in her life.