“I wonder how we would go about doing tests on Chris’s metabolism?” Donal mused. “Does he eat so much because he simply never sleeps?”
“If we starve him, will he let us sleep?” Amalia asked. She held out her mug blindly for a refill of coffee, and Donal’s mom filled it.
“He’ll be quiet tonight,” Jes promised. “Mrs. Clemens packed her wooden spoon.”
After the letters about her skill with cutlasses and firearms, a wooden spoon seemed tame. Still, Chris settled down to his usual four course breakfast. Donal caught his mother’s eye at the other end of the table and smiled.
“We’ll see how far the communications work,” he said. “We’ll have to be back in a week for more supplies, even if we haven’t found anything yet.”
“I know you’ll be fine,” his mother said calmly although she was twisting her sleeve again. “And I hope it will be a good break for all of you.”
Amalia muttered about breaking Chris, and the moment was over.
* * *
The skiff did look like a bubble with brass fins. Mrs. Clemens had stored supplies under the floor, under the seats, and around her own seat in the back. There was barely room to walk in the craft, and Jes had to duck her head a little when she did. She had grown from the spring, and she was the tallest of the five.
Jes had also brought the dictionaries as she had threatened. She settled back into her seat with them while Amalia and Chris argued about who would sit up front with Donal.
“I think Mrs. Clemens had better be first,” Donal decided. “Everyone else has a basic idea of how to fly the skiff, so it’s her turn.”
Amalia pouted but didn’t object while Chris grabbed the back chair by the food. He was reaching out a hand when Mrs. Clemens spoke up from the front. “If food is missing, Your Highness, I’m taking it out of your lunch ration.”
“She didn’t even turn around!” Amalia hissed.
“I told you she was great,” Jes replied.
Chris had both hands back inside his chair, so Donal turned his attention to Mrs. Clemens. She grinned at him and gestured to the controls.
“Ready when you are, Captain.”
“That tunnel to the left leads under water, and we could take off there if we didn’t want to be seen. This way is prettier, though.” Donal pushed the throttle slowly open and eased the skiff through the tunnel straight ahead. They came out through an opening in the cliff below the castle, with the rest of West Waveborn spread below them like a collection of children’s toys surrounded by ocean.
Take off was easy with no one shooting at them, and Donal honestly preferred it that way. The sun was bright, the sky was clear, and the sea beneath them was a thousand shades of blue. The skiff rose quickly in the sky, hovered like a bumble bee, and then picked up speed as Donal turned them west.
* * *
By sunset, each of them had taken a turn flying the skiff. They were still, barely, able to communicate with Donal’s mother and had sent word that all was still well. The person on lookout used Donal’s new distance goggles to see further. They saw a few ships, one airship headed towards the south, and a pod of dolphins on their way. Sea birds were common at first, but soon there were none. West of the Waveborn islands, there weren’t any land masses or islands on their maps for a long distance. The sea looked vast, and a little lonely.
Jes had deciphered two more words on the map, although they were still guesses. “Su appears to be a preposition and might mean in or under. I think tace is a noun, but related to height, falling, or climbing.”
Amalia threw up her hands. “So, it might mean that we’re going to fall into a fire or look up at a light.”
“Or a hundred other things,” Jes agreed. “That’s what makes it fun!”
“How far into the night are you planning on flying?” Mrs. Clemens asked.
“If the night stays clear, all of it,” Donal said. “If I slow our speed a little, we should be right on target at about true noon and can check by the clock. If it clouds over, it’s safer to go underwater to travel, and that’s slower.”
Mrs. Clemens nodded. She didn’t make any comment, but Donal felt that her nod meant approval. “What order did you want us to sleep in?”
Jes and Amalia both yawned, and Donal grinned. “Why don’t Chris and I stay awake for now, and we’ll wake the rest of you as I need you.”
The chairs reclined—another improvement—and Donal dimmed the interior lights to make it easier to fly by starlight. Within minutes everything was quiet.
“So, about the treasure,” Chris stage-whispered.
“Chris,” Donal said very, very softly, “if you mess up anybody’s sleep tonight, you’re going to walk the plank.”
* * *
Mrs. Clemens took second watch, and Amalia and Jes took third. Sunlight was pouring in through the glass when Donal awoke the next morning. It was approaching noon when Jes pointed to a dim outline of a mountain coming up from the ocean. Smoke wafted up from it.
“I think I know what those words meant now,” Jes said as they approached the volcano. “Fire mountain.” Lava bubbled down inside the caldera.
“Let’s hope su means under and not in.”
3
The communications did not reach as far as the island. Donal confirmed their location at true noon and then took them underwater. There was no beach to land on, only the volcano’s peak rising from the waves.
“At the very least, we get to map an active volcano,” Donal reassured the others.
Chris sighed melodramatically. “How can you think about science when there’s a chance at treasure?”
Donal shook his head, trying to imagine why anyone would prefer gold or jewels to discovering something new. Mrs. Clemens, at least, had her priorities straight. She offered to map the structures around the volcano as he piloted.
The falling lava, mixed with earlier lava tubes, had produced rock walls almost like lace. Small indentations held schools of fish, and there were tunnels that looked big enough to take the skiff into them.
A shark almost the size of the skiff swam by them, causing Amalia to grab her sword convulsively. “That’s a whale shark,” Donal reassured her. “They eat things too small to notice. Their mouths don’t open enough to hurt us.”
“What about that?” Chris asked. Just beyond the lights of the skiff, something bigger than a large ship stirred in the dark.
Donal cut the lights. The natural lights of some of the creatures—bioluminescence—lit the scene eerily. They could make out a snake like body, a head the size of the skiff, four limbs that were almost fins.
“Oh, that is a beauty,” Mrs. Clemens breathed. “That could take down a whole ship of the line if the crew were stupid enough to turn their sixty-four cannons on it and make it mad.”
That was not exactly reassuring, but Donal already knew that not making it mad was key. They slowed down to a stop, closer than he would have liked.
“Are those eggs?” Jes asked. “It’s a mother sea monster!”
The great head nuzzled eggs a little larger than cannon balls, and one baby emerged and uncurled. It was maybe three feet long, tiny next to its parent.
“Father,” Donal said absently. “In sea monsters, the mother lays the eggs and leaves, and the father raises them.”
They watched as egg after egg hatched, then Jes gasped. “The whale shark! Are the babies small enough for him to eat them?”
“No,” Donal said. “And nothing will get past an adult sea monster. I’d worry for the whale shark, not about him.”
“Too late,” Chris said cheerfully.
They watched as the whale shark wandered close. The sea monster’s neck snaked out, and in another moment, the babies were eating pieces of shark meat.
They stayed quiet while the babies fed and then were rounded up by their father and ushered away. Donal shook himself slightly, remembering.
“These are very few good examples of sea monster shells. Let’s try to grab som
e.”
They inched closer and then put on the exterior lights. Donal sent out an external arm to collect shards.
“That one didn’t hatch,” Jes pointed out. Sure enough, one luminous egg was still whole on the sea floor.
“That would be an amazing sample,” Donal said. He maneuvered the arm closer, brushing against the shell.
The shell dimpled slightly, then burst open. A dark blue sea monster baby spilled out, blinking at them through huge green eyes.
* * *
At first, everyone except Donal had seemed paralyzed, just staring at the baby. Even when Donal had grabbed meat from Mrs. Clemen’s stores, then maneuvered it out to the baby, everyone had stayed still and silent. Now, Donal was talking to it gently through the external speakers. The baby, in turn, was rubbing up against the skiff and crooning.
Jess shook herself, as though she’d been falling asleep. “How will it survive without a parent?”
“Maybe we could lead it to its family, not get eaten ourselves, and sneak away?” Amalia offered. “It works with baby birds.”
Chris made a rude noise. “I’d bet the parent birds weren’t trying to eat you, though.”
“We don’t look like food,” Donal said. He almost looked at Mrs. Clemens. She’d probably have an answer, but then he’d feel like this was her mission, not his. “I like Amalia’s idea. We can spare four days before we have to head home for more supplies, and it’s worth a try.”
He called to Blot—the baby’s color was like an inkblot, and it seemed as good a name as any—and headed in the direction the sea monster had gone. Blot followed along.
“Mrs. Clemens, do you want to try to catch a fish or two for Blot with the robot arm?”
“Aye, aye, Captain.”
“Everybody else, look for sea monster signs.” Donal sighed. He’d never had a pet—explosions and fur didn’t mix—but he was starting to understand why people got so stubborn about them. He couldn’t leave a small being that needed him. Some responsibilities were too important to abandon.
* * *
Donal’s voice was getting hoarse, and they still hadn’t caught sight of the sea monster and the other hatchlings. Blot ignored any voice that wasn’t Donal’s, although it seemed happy enough with the fish Mrs. Clemens caught.
“There’s a bunch of fish all schooling that way,” Jes pointed to the right. “Should we look to see what they’re running from?”
Amelia gripped her sword again but murmured her agreement. Donal nodded, keeping the skiff between Blot and the possible threat. There were plenty of things down here that would eat a baby sea monster if they got the chance. What on this skiff could be used as a weapon?
There was a shadow ahead, a hammerhead shark, but it was following the school of fish without any effort to catch them. It’s running, too.
“Hold on,” Donal called, then crooned to Blot to keep him close. There was a rock formation to their left, and beyond that was whatever the fish were trying to escape. Donal killed the lights and eased back on the power so that they were drifting as they turned around the rocks.
He slipped on the night vision goggles from Chris. Spots of bioluminescence in the darkness became a twilight scene with dozens of moving creatures that looked like Blot. “Hey, I think we’ve found them!”
The skiff shook suddenly, and the view port went dark except for some stalactite-looking masses on either side. “Um … the dad has found us?” Amalia suggested. “I thought you said we didn’t look like food!”
“We don’t.” Donal flipped up the goggles and turned back on the lights. The full-grown sea monster had them gripped in his mouth but, fortunately, wasn’t big enough to swallow them. Donal noted that the inside of the creature’s mouth was violet rather than red, but the giant teeth were white; it had been too dark to notice what color the outside was.
The others were quiet although Donal saw that even Mrs. Clemens was holding on with white knuckles. He took a deep breath, discarding idea after idea. The safest thing was to act like a rock and wait for the monster to lose interest.
There was a worried sound from Blot, and Donal gave a reassuring croon on the external speaker. Outside of the skiff was a small thud, and then the giant mouth released them. The skiff’s lights shone on Blot, who was being nuzzled by the giant head—purple against Blot’s indigo.
Donal held his breath as the other babies came up to their missing sibling and tasted the water around him with their tongues. They ranged in color from green to their father’s purple, but the few others Blot’s shade had purple eyes, not green. Maybe they recognized Blot as family, or maybe they were just getting to know him, but Blot seemed accepted.
Donal felt a little pang as he cut the lights again and set the skiff to slowly back out, away from the family of sea monsters. Blot didn’t turn around, and Donal didn’t want to distract the baby with any farewell. He pushed the goggles down to get a good look at the dark blue shape, and then he forced his attention back to the skiff.
They went slowly through the darkness for several minutes, no one talking, until Donal put the lights back on. “That was successful,” he said. His voice sounded flat to him, and he remembered to smile. “Everyone okay?”
“That was awesome!” Chris exclaimed. “Only the skiff needs some kind of weapons.”
Chris and Amalia got into a heated discussion on the best way to arm an airship that was also a submarine while Jes soon turned back to her dictionaries. Donal started a little at a touch on his shoulder.
“Would you like to find a secure spot to stop for the night?” Mrs. Clemens asked gently. “We’ve got three more days to search, and I suspect we’ll all do better after a full night’s sleep.”
It was the closest she’d come to anything like taking charge. Donal knew that if he said no, she wouldn’t argue, but he was tired. Probably they all were. He found a tunnel empty of apparent threats and set the skiff down. A few dials and switches, and the external alarms were set to wake them if anything troubled them.
Chris and the girls were talkative during supper, but Donal was silent. Mrs. Clemens was quiet, too. Once their eyes met, and she nodded slightly, as though she understood what he was feeling.
It would have been nice if he knew what he was feeling.
4
A tiny earthquake—seaquake?—woke them all at what was probably dawn on the surface. Pebbles fell on the skiff, but nothing more seemed to happen.
The external lights cast shadows in front of them, and Donal maneuvered them just a little further in to look … and found that the old lava tube they were in had been much wider ahead. They had a lively discussion over breakfast before unanimously agreeing to go a little further in.
Unanimity lasted until the tube in front of them split.
“We need breadcrumbs,” Jes announced.
“Breadcrumbs float away,” Chris pointed out.
Jes scowled. “You know what I mean. We need to mark the path we take.”
Amalia fingered the hilt of her sword. “But then people could follow us.”
Jes threw up her hands. “Amalia, you are so paranoid! Who’s going to follow us here?”
“Bad people,” Amalia said ominously. “Spies. Maybe pirates.” She glanced over at Mrs. Clemens. “No offense.”
“None taken.” Mrs. Clemens smiled. “Some pi—people use codes for just that reason. Mark your path without giving away which one it is because you mark the others, too.”
That sounded somewhere between sensible and brilliant. Donal nodded. “The external arm can mark the entrances. We can mark the first five choices with our initials in order of age—M for Mrs. Clemens—then back is S for sea monster, ahead is T for treasure, not taken is L for Lava. So, the one we just came through is MS, and we have to decide which will be MT and which ML.”
“Stick to bigger places. The people who left the treasure probably had to be able to turn around,” Chris advised.
It only took a few moments to mark them. Th
e tunnel on their left was definitely the smaller of the two options, so they took the tunnel straight ahead.
Some chambers had only one way out and didn’t have to be marked. Still, they had gone through A, D, and J with only C for Chris remaining when they reached an immense cavern that could have held a fleet of ships. The wreckage of an ancient frigate was at one end upon a sandy beach. Bizarrely, the chamber opened up into air. Multiple tunnels led away from the beach, all apparently above water.
“Oh, man. Do you know what this means?” Chris asked.
“Amazing discoveries,” Donal answered.
“The translations were right,” Jes added.
“Room for sword practice!” Amalia crowed.
They all looked at Chris, enjoying his look of frustration, until Mrs. Clemens took pity on him.
“And perhaps treasure, too.”
* * *
The cavern was enormous. The lights of the skiff had only been able to illuminate it partially, but Donal guessed that it was perhaps a thousand yards long and half that wide. The walls curved up into a ceiling about fifty yards above them. A chimney-like opening at the far end held a suggestion of daylight and explained the fresh air. There were no stalactites or stalagmites coming down from the ceiling or up from the water. This cavern had been carved by lava, not water.
The old ship on the beach was too close to ignore—and, as Chris was quick to point out, its sailors might have had a treasure map with them. The ship was surprisingly intact, suggesting that the tunnels had once been partially above water, allowing it to sail or row its way in. Their torches glinted off the walls and the water, adding a general sense of dim light to the cavern. Given the lack of lava, the chimney had to open up high in the wall of the caldera. Donal imagined that they were in a vase next to a soup bowl, so that when the soup bowl’s lava overflowed, it couldn’t get up high enough to enter the vase of their cavern.
Royal Trouble: The Mysterious Sea Page 2
