Seaborn 01 - Saltwater Witch

by Chris Howard

  “That’s how they always look in the beginning, talkin’ nicely and then they call you monstrous things, call you a witch, and say you’ll cut ’em up and eat ’em raw!”

  “Who says these things?”

  “People, right to my face.” She smiled menacingly. “Do I look like I’d hurt anyone?”

  No one answered, and the man outside knocked again, this time harder.

  Parresia broke the silence, waving a hand at Olivia. “Look in a damn mirror. You look half wild. When was the last time you were around a human? And actually spoke to one?” She wanted to add “normally.”

  Olivia looked at the ceiling, picking at her lip thoughtfully with her pointed teeth. “Must be forty years, maybe more.”

  “I was with you,” Limnoria said, nodding and wagging a finger at her accusingly. “We were out east, the Chesapeake. Remember? Those kids with fishing poles came through the woods and surprised us on the shore.”

  “And then some men showed up,” Olivia started defensively. “Their fathers. They called us names and told us to go away.”

  “They were a little more forceful than that, and they were yelling at you not me.”

  “What’d I do?”

  “You squeezed that kid’s arm and said something like, ‘Nice, but you need a little plumping up before you’re ready.’”

  Olivia flew into a rage as if Limnoria had dredged up an old unsettled argument. “Ready to use the giant fishing pole he carried! That’s what I meant. You remember that thing? He coulda pulled in a hundred pound flounder without bendin’ it. And the boy was a scrawny thing. They were starving him. If one of them big river carp grabbed his hook it would’ve taken him to the bottom. I was just protectin’ the boy from a horrible fate.”

  “The men thought you wanted to eat him, which is, frankly what I—”

  “Why’d they think that? We’d just lunched, a dozen bluegills, a fat little tautog and a couple a sandbar sharks.”

  The corners of Parresia’s mouth tilted up, as if amused by the dispute.

  Limnoria shook her head, exasperated. “Talk like that scares people.”

  “Should I open the door or not?” Helodes shouted and put her hand over her mouth as if she’d been a bit louder than she’d have liked.

  “See what he wants.” Parresia turned away from the argument. Olivia grumbled and sank into her chair.

  Helodes pulled the latch free and swung the door in. A young man with thick-rimmed glasses stood in the hall, his fist raised, ready to knock again. His crisp white short-sleeved shirt hung on his skinny body like armor. Even his shoes were polished. He looked as if he was trying to please someone higher in the motel management.

  “Pardon me for disturbing you, ladies,” he started out politely.

  “Oh, that’s fine. We’re just chatting over some nice cool water,” said Helodes, waving her hand at him as if to dismiss some indiscretion that he need not have brought to their attention.

  “Yes...” He lowered his hand slowly, still a white-knuckled fist, looking past Helodes at the dozens of cups of water around the room. There were glasses full of water on the television, mugs along the windowsill, on the nightstand, peeking out of open drawers, under the writing table, and balanced precariously on the arms of the chairs.

  “Yes,” he repeated stiffly. “It has come to my attention...Yes, that’s what I wanted to ask you about...um...You see we track how much water our guests use. The water usage report was brought to me this morning, and the amount of water you ladies have poured down the drain since you checked in...well, it’s more than everyone else in the motel combined.”

  “Hmmmm...” Limnoria nodded seriously, tapping her chin. “That sounds right.”

  “Doesn’t surprise me.” Parresia nodded along with Limnoria.

  “Sure. We’re quite the water users, the four of us.”

  “Couldn’t live without it,” added Helodes with a cheerful shrug.

  “But...” His voice went high, and he was breathing rapidly.

  Parresia looked at him coldly. “But what?”

  “If—if you cannot keep the water use down I’m afraid...”

  “Afraid of what?” said Olivia. She got up from her chair, crossed the room, eeling between her sisters. She jumped out right in front of him, and suddenly she was glad they had opened the door.

  “...I’m afraid I’m...” His voice came out in shuddery squeaks. “...going to have to ask you to leave...please?”

  He looked relieved at getting all the words out.

  But only for a second.

  Parresia threw him one of her iciest glares and his mouth went dry, powdery and burnt tasting, like the floor of a cold fireplace. “If you had not tacked that ‘please’ to the end, young man, I’m afraid I would have had to...do something about it.”

  The man clamped his mouth shut after his teeth started clicking.

  “Olivia,” said Parresia, not taking her eyes from the minimally polite young man. “What do you think we should do with him? He’s awfully skinny. What would you do with him?”

  Olivia moved in closer, her clawed fingers picking at her lips and her eyes moving over him in appraisal. She showed him a pointy-toothed smile and fear shuddered through his body.

  He kept blinking, and his thoughts were plain on his face: Was her skin kinda green? He tried to move, but terror anchored his feet to the floor. The rest of him shook like jelly.

  Olivia reached out and squeezed his arm. “Dinner. I’ll have to fatten him up first, but he’d be good for dinner.”

  The man’s feet came unglued from the carpet and he ran, screaming hysterically down the hallway.

  “Ah, go on, you scrawny boy!” Olivia leaned out of the room, watching him run away. “I was just having some fun!”

  Helodes pulled Olivia back inside before anyone else saw her, closed the door and double-locked it.

  Chapter 13 - Another Wreath-wearer

  I was dragging my book bag—and every other part of me—back to the hall by the time the afternoon came around. So damn tired, but my brain was running at high speed. Most of the time it didn’t even feel like me, but something else in my head shifting gears and driving me faster.

  Praxinos made a disappointed ticking noise. You are not thinking like a seaborn. You are thinking like a thinling. You are the Wreath-wearer. The water is yours to command. Use it...Use the water.

  “How?”

  It will obey you, Kassandra.

  “Okay.” I said it slowly, dragging out the second syllable, not really convinced.

  I kicked off my boots and they fell over the end of the bed, thumping to the floor.

  It was as if Praxinos had told me to fly to the clouds because the air was mine to command. I knew without even trying that flapping my arms would not do any good.

  I’d look really stupid doing it, too.

  Well, I wasn’t totally certain. There was the strange spinning sensation that started when I’d touched the muddy water by the playground faucet. I had been so dizzy I’d ended up by the sidewalk with no idea how I’d landed there.

  I stretched out lazily on my back, holding The Odyssey above my head, a pretense for my conversation with Praxinos. I hadn’t read a word of it for days.

  I frowned. How can I command water? I imagined myself walking bossily into the bathroom and ordering the toilets to flush and hot water to come out when the cold water taps were turned.

  A pleasant little “hmmm...” sound escaped my lips, but then I could feel someone’s eyes on me, several sets of them. I felt their hate, and I scooted up against the wall and buried my face in the book.

  The day had started out bad and went swiftly downhill—all through classes, until after dinner when the other girls finally got tired of trying to hurt me, finally left me alone, content with scowling and making nasty remarks.

  I’d been tripped twice. The second time caught me completely by surprise, and tossed me hard on the sidewalk. My schoolwork flew from my hands and
my knees were bloody. The laughing hurt even more. It always does.

  Mrs. Vilnious, as strict as they came, had always been fair. I remembered her kindly look—the first week of school—when I’d answered a difficult question correctly. She was pissed, but still allowed me to go to science today, and it had turned out to be the most interesting class yet.

  All day long I’d tried to keep my mind on the science. Earth is an ocean world. But the laughter of the girls in the yard had intruded every few minutes. It merged with the pain from my torn knees and little spasms of shame swept through me.

  Then I was glad that Praxinos only seemed to be able to hear my voice, not my thinking. He couldn’t read my thoughts, even though it seemed like he could plant thoughts and teach me things, Ancient Greek for instance, without me being involved. I shoved the humiliation aside to make room for more important thoughts, like how I was going to squeeze through a fucking water pipe.

  “Okay, let’s say I can command the water. I can travel through it...”

  Somewhere in the deep ocean, my father was clawing at the inside of a stone prison, and I had to save him.

  “Praxinos, if I go through the water...” I couldn’t seem to get the question started. In my imagination, girls laughing had been replaced by the nightmare of the witch in the lake, grinning with sharp teeth. “Are there things out there waiting to catch me and...hurt me?” I wanted to say “kill me” but couldn’t.

  Probably kill you.

  “Who was that lady in Red Bear Lake? She had dark hair, her skin was sort of greenish, and when she looked at me, well…it was like her eyes told me I was going to die.”

  Interesting. Did she say anything to you?

  “She screamed, and it hurt. It was like she threw needles and they stuck into anything she shrieked at—mainly me.”

  Praxinos was silent for a space and then said, Hmmmm. Could be one of the river witches, the naiads. The seaborn rarely travel out of the sea and saltwater. You won’t ever find them this far inland without a life and death reason.

  Praxinos went silent as if he’d stumbled onto something important.

  “What is—”

  I didn’t get to finish my question or hear what he had to tell me.

  The book flew from my hands. I blinked and tried to focus on the world around me. The Odyssey bounced off the wall above my head and flapped through the air like a wounded bird, landing on the floor, sliding next to my trunk.

  Praxinos was speaking but I couldn’t hear him.

  “That’s enough reading for the night.” Deirdre Milhorn stood over me, one hand grabbing me by the hair. “You’ll ruin your eyes.” She dropped a sheet of paper into my hands, shoved me back against the wall and walked away. “Those are your tasks tonight,” she said over her shoulder, and as she passed Autumn, gave her a knowing smile.

  I sat up, pulled the paper around, scowling at it before my eyes focused on the words. Coming from Deirdre, it couldn’t be good. It was a formal looking list of jobs I was supposed to complete before the end of the day.

  Hall tasks for Kassandra

  September 8th

  To be completed before 9:00 PM:

  Collect all laundry, bag, tag, deliver to basement.

  Empty trashcans in the recreation area.

  Dust television set.

  Clean gum off the bottom of the tables and chairs.

  “I also expect you to finish your homework.” Deirdre wagged a finger at me. “From what I hear you shouldn’t have a problem doing your math plus the tasks I’ve given you.” She laughed at what she thought was a witty use of the word “plus” to tie in my math abnormality.

  What a dipshit.

  But the whole school was talking about it.

  My face went hot, my fingers crumpling the paper, and it rattled, scratchy and dead. I got up without really thinking, following her to the end of the hall, spinning the rolled up paper in my finger tips.

  When Deirdre turned, a little spark of fear in her face—she hadn’t been aware of me following. And the struggle in her expression was easy to see—should she keep her eyes on me, or should she call for Autumn’s help?

  I overhanded the paper at her and it bounced off her forehead. “Go screw yourself.” Then I turned and walked away.

  Peripherally I noticed a couple of Deirdre’s other acquaintances giving me nasty stares as I passed, but I kept my head straight and my face expressionless.

  Girls who normally didn’t even notice me, looked up as I went by and made some snippy remarks. The trouble I’d caused running away had pushed most of them into the if-we-can-just-get-rid-of-Kassandra-all-our-problems-would-be-solved camp.

  The closer I got to my bed and as more girls turned to watch me, the harder it became to keep my face from showing what was stirring inside me.

  I looked down at my feet. I didn’t need to see at their faces. I couldn’t read their minds, but I knew what they were thinking.

  Anger banged around inside my head like a handful of rocks in a metal pot, and through the noise, I picked up Praxinos’ faint chattering voice. Now that I heard him, I knew he’d been speaking for a while, probably the last five minutes.

  My eyes widened when I didn’t want them to, and then I felt a surge acid in my stomach, a sour burn in my mouth. I swallowed it, holding my teeth firmly closed. My anger, usually out of control by this point, drifted off like a flight of birds.

  One of the girls I passed threw a retaliatory wad of paper that hit me in the back of the head, stuck in my hair for a second and then dropped to the floor. I ignored it.

  Catching the edge of my truck with a couple toes, it should have hurt. I didn’t notice. I stopped next to my bed, faced the nightstand, and stared through the window at the faint slate outlines of trees, the black expanse of the play yard, and all of the rest of Nebraska beyond.

  My shoulders dropped, vaguely aware of Nicole, Jill, Elizabeth—another fifteener who had the next bed—watching me.

  I just stared through the window over the nightstand and listened to the voices in my head.

  Praxinos wasn’t talking to me. He was in the middle of a fierce argument about...

  Fighting? With a sword? She’s only fifteen!

  Enchantments! Sorceries! Praxinos, you will gain nothing, and only weaken her position! It was a strong woman’s voice, with an accent that was vaguely British. And there was a forceful snobbishness in her tone. Failure to learn from prior mistakes is the dominant trait of an idiot! The girl needs to learn to fight, you droning fool! Not mouth a bunch of useless spells at our enemies!

  “Ar—are you Ampharete?” I didn’t even realize—and at the moment didn’t much care—that just about every girl in the hall could hear me.

  Yeah, the freak’s talking to herself…

  Focusing now, my own eyes stared back at me in the window’s dark reflection. Everything else was a blur.

  I’m afraid not, snapped the woman. I am Queen Andromache. You must be the new wearer, Kassandra? She did not seem very pleased to meet me. Inauspicious name. I never liked the choice of your mother’s. Kassandra, the same name as the daughter of the king of Troy, the one with foresight.

  “Yup,” I nodded gloomily. “She could see the future but was cursed to have no one believe her.”

  I looked up, clamped my mouth shut, but caught myself too late.

  The hall swept into focus, mirrored in the night-backed glass. Like indistinct ovals, the girls’ faces were turned toward me, eyes blinking and their brows arched down in questioning stares.

  The laughter started at the far end, and a few seconds later, most of the girls, from nine to sixteen, were chuckling, smiling sharply and snapping little comments like, “I always knew she was a freak.”

  Jill and Nicole exchanged worried looks.

  I closed my eyes, ignoring everyone, and turned back to the window.

  “An-drom-uh-key,” I whispered it, stressing each syllable. “Andromache.” I knew that name.

  Our fir
st ambition should be to get you a superb Telkhines sword, young lady. Andromache brushed aside one of Praxinos’ sounds of protest. Greatest metal workers on earth and undersea. I started sword training when I was ten. By my sixteenth year I could have taken on twenty of the most powerful of my father’s abyss mages.

  Ignorant weaklings, snorted Praxinos. They knew nothing of the old magic. And you, praising the Telkhines for their craftsmanship when that was simple for them, and took little of their thought. They had powers that few of you later seaborn have ever witnessed. Most of you, anyway. There was one, Praxinos said in a shaky voice as if remembering something particularly horrible. A couple hundred years ago. You remember him? Imprisoned in stone, far away in a canyon—

  “You’re named after Hektor’s wife,” I whispered excitedly, my words trampling all over whatever Praxinos was saying. I’d always pronounced it Andro-maitch because I’d never heard anyone say it correctly. “Hektor, prince of Troy. Andromache is the name of Hektor’s wife.”

  Praxinos! You wordy rump-fed perch! You have her reading the Iliad of Homer?

  That is not my doing! Praxinos shouted defensively. She was halfway through The Odyssey when I woke!

  Glancing over my shoulder, I was startled to see half the girls in the hall still staring at me, a few still laughing.

  I went around to the end of my bed, retrieved The Odyssey, and crawled over the blankets. Then pulled my back against the wall and buried my face in the open pages.

  For the next half hour, I slouched in bed, easing the book closer every few minutes until my nose was almost in the binding. I couldn’t get a word in with these two rattling off the names of kings, far off places, and submarine mountain ranges, and that led right into a tandem lesson on “divers powers and magics” with Andromache and Praxinos alternately speaking on the same subject.

  I only understood half of it, and I didn’t dare interrupt with questions because I had too many of them, and the truce these two had reached in order to speak civilly seemed fragile.

  Apparently Andromache was used to having the first and last word on any subject.