The pulling and pulling of limbs.
“Intruder!” someone yells.
“Get off me!”
It’s coming from the main deck. The crowd gathered there reminds
me of when fights break out in school. Everyone gathers around in a
circle watching the brawl. Layla is being dragged across the deck by
two guys who are stronger than they look. Their bodies are wire thin,
with mostly human faces, and the scalps of sea urchins. They hold her
wrists and ankles and sling her onto the center of the deck.
I’ve never seen Layla’s eyes this wide. One by one she stares at
the faces on the ship until she finds me in the crowd. Tiny gasps of
air leave her lips, like she’s trying to breathe and hiccup at the
same time.
A second set of footsteps rushes up to the deck. The guy and his
cardboard box.
“Arion,” one of the urchin guys says. “She is an intruder.”
The black ropes that bind Arion to the front of the ship stretch,
pushing him up so he can turn around and look down at the scene. He
glances back at the island. The speck of land is getting bigger by the
second. “State your name and how you managed to get on board.”
“Layla,” I blurt out. “Her name is Layla. She’s my friend.”
“Yours?”
“Yes.”
She pushes herself up, standing with her hands down and out to
create a barrier between herself and us. When did I become the us?
The urchin boy stands with his hands at his sides. Now I can see
his face. His nose is like a button pushed down on his face, which
from the temples up to the top of his hair is dark blue. He points to
her without smiling. “It is against the king’s wishes that humans
enter the island. Unless, of course, they’re for play.”
The other boy, almost a replica, only more purple, smiles
wickedly.
“P-play?” Layla’s eyes remind me of the insides of a Magic 8 Ball,
moving around dizzily, trying to predict what might just be
unpredictable.
“She must be sequestered until the king can decide her fate.”
The crowd gasps. The only human guy chews on his toothpick and
scratches the back of his head, then puts his cap back on. He cranes
his head to peek at the horizon. We are very, very close.
The urchin guys grab her, one by each hand. She kicks and screams,
her eyes burning holes through me.
“Wait, wait a minute.” I jump from the top deck, where I’ve been
standing, to land on my feet. “She’s off limits. Didn’t you hear me
before?”
The blue one puffs his skinny, nonexistent chest at me. “Yeah, I
heard you. What of it? Rules is rules.”
“You’ve got no authority, half-breed,” the purple one says.
Half-breed? No one’s ever called me that.
“Even though I am not your king, I’m still the king’s grandson.
I’m of the royal-royal f-family.” I catch Kurt’s eyes and take his
small nod as a sign that I’m on the right track. “Unless you want to
explain to the king how you let a human best you and board your ship.”
The urchin brothers back down, but not without showing how deeply
they’d probably want to ram their spiky little heads into my gut. The
crowd looks pretty bored with us, and the group breaks up little by
little. Some of them bow to me before turning away to mind their
business, and others look down their noses-or the equivalent-at me,
cursing me in grunts. Some are just completely disinterested and
continue to stare out at the water.
Arion clears his throat. “Lord Sea is right. She can stay with
him. The Sea King will decide her penalty-”
“ Penalty? ” Layla and I blurt out the word at the same time.
“Outcome,” Kurt corrects, but that doesn’t make it any better. My
dream of her drowning flashes in my mind.
“Come with me.” I shove the two urchin boys off her and pull her
with me, tripping down the stairs and landing below deck. “What. Are.
You. Doing. Here?”
She’s shaking. She lets go of my hand and wraps her arms around
herself. Her wrists are red where the urchin boys were holding her.
Something in me is on fire. I want to hold on to her and tell her that
it’s going to be okay, even though I don’t even know what we’re going
to see when we reach the shore.
“What am I doing here? What are you doing here? Where is here ?”
“A ship? The water?” I reply.
“Do not mess with me right now, Tristan!” The low light of the gas
lamps around us casts shadows over her face so that all I can see are
cheeks, lips, eyes. She looks away, sniffling.
“Is this what you couldn’t tell me? You joined a-circus?”
Wow, I wish I’d thought of that one.
“How did you even get on board? Why would you even get on board is
probably the better question.”
“To help you, duh ? I thought you were involved in some Sharks
versus Jets kinda crap.”
I rub my palms on my face. “Well, there are sharks.”
I lean against a stack of barrels. How did I even get here? I’m
the worst at protecting the people around me.
The stairs creak under Kurt’s weight. I recognize his sneakers as
he makes his way down. He stands like a soldier, stone faced, arms
behind his back. His stance totally clashes with the outfit and his
windblown hair. His eyes scan Layla’s face. “I can’t promise that you
will be completely safe. But, as you are important to Tristan, you are
important to me. We will do all we can to keep you safe.”
She takes a step forward, and the light from upstairs shows the
red corners of her eyes, the dry trails of dirty tears. “I hate you,”
she tells me. “Who the hell are you ?” she asks Kurt. “His
Canadian-Irish-Italian cousin?” She turns back to me. “How long have
you been lying to me?”
Seven days, six hours, and forty-five minutes, I want to say.
The ship shakes, and a barrel falls out of place, knocking me to
the side. Layla falls forward and Kurt catches her. He helps her to
her feet. Don’t worry about me, guys, I’m fine. Just almost got
flattened by whatever is in those barrels.
“We’re almost there,” Kurt says.
“No shit, Legolas,” Layla snaps.
Kurt stares at her. I don’t know if he’s going to kill her or let
my grandfather do it. “How much does she know?”
“Sharks,” I answer.
He nods, even though it shouldn’t make sense. “Very well, keep it
that way for now. She needs to see for herself. Perhaps we can
interest the king in her.”
“Eww, no way!”
“Not like that, stupid.” I try not to picture Layla in a metal
bikini being offered as a trophy bride to the King of the Seas. “Wait,
it’s not like that, right?”
“Hmm? Oh, of course not.” Kurt shakes his head in that way he does
when he sighs humans. “Do you have anything to offer the king, besides
your virtue?”
I don’t know whose jaw drops lower, mine or Layla’s. I can smell
her anger like lit kerosene. She balls up her fists and steeps in her
own fury. Upstairs the footsteps have faded. Thalia sticks her head
into the opening. “We’re here. Hurry up. Vamos! ” She quotes my dad,
and I can hear her scamper around on the deck.
Kurt grabs onto the ladder and stops halfway up. He bends down so
he is face-to-face with Layla, their noses just shy of touching. For a
moment, I think he’s going to hit her. But then he says, “Whatever you
do, do not leave Tristan’s side.”
I can practically hear her roll her eyes. Up on deck, the sun
shines so brightly that I have to shield my eyes against it.
“Where did this come from?” I hold my arms out and welcome the sun
against my face. My body is buzzing with excitement, like the first