Surrendering (Swans Landing)

by Norris, Shana

  I grabbed my bag and fished the key out, squeezing my hand around the twisted metal. Coral was right all along. We needed the key.

  Mara stood and grabbed my arm, spinning me around to face her. “Wait,” she said. “Why would we go to Finfolkaheem? Is there something there that can help us?”

  “I don’t know,” I told her. “But it’s the only option we have right now.”

  Sailor studied me from her position on the love seat. “We’re not supposed to leave the house, remember? We’re being baby-sat.”

  “I don’t care,” I said. “For all we know, everyone else is either dead or under Domnall’s control. I’m going to find the way to Finfolkaheem, and if I find the rest of the finfolk there, I’m asking for their help.”

  Miss Gale watched me from her seat, her mouth set into a straight line and her forehead creased in thought.

  “I’m sorry,” I told her. “I don’t meant to disobey you, but we can’t sit here forever when we may be able to find help.”

  Miss Gale shook her head. “You’re not disobeying me, sugar. Go, find help. Lord knows we need it.”

  I looked at her for a long moment, frozen in shock. Miss Gale wasn’t going to stop me. She had given me permission to break Lake’s rules and leave the house.

  I rushed forward, leaning down to wrap my arms around Miss Gale, hugging her frail body tight. “Thank you,” I whispered.

  Miss Gale let out a long, weary breath. “No sense in me stopping you anyway, is there, sugar?” She pulled back and smiled up at me. “Your daddy would be proud of the man you’ve become,” she whispered.

  My vision blurred and I blinked quickly to keep the tears back.

  Elizabeth pushed herself up from the space on the floor where she had sat the whole time. “I’m going with you.”

  “You can’t,” I said. “You’re not finfolk.”

  “I’m not staying here,” she said through clenched teeth. “They have my daddy. I’m going with you as far as I can.”

  I sighed. “Fine.”

  “I’m going too,” Mara spoke up. She shot me a look like she dared me to protest.

  “So am I,” Sailor said as she stood.

  Dylan let out a frustrated sigh. “Well, I’m certainly not getting left behind again.” He sat up and raised his eyebrows. “How do we get out of here without Mr. Richter knowing?”

  I pressed my lips together as I thought about this obstacle. Then I said, “Is your little brother still upstairs?”

  Dylan nodded. “Should be. Why?”

  “How good is he at providing distractions?”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  “I want to go too.” Reed crossed his arms and glared up at his brother.

  Dylan sighed. “I already told you, you have to stay here and provide the distraction.”

  Reed shook his head. “No way. I’m going with you. It’s boring sitting here all day.”

  We weren’t even out of the house yet and already the plan was in danger.

  “I’ll give you twenty bucks to stay here,” I said.

  He tilted his head to the side and tapped a finger on his chin. “Fifty,” he said.

  What did this kid think I was, an ATM? I reached into my pocket and pulled out a couple of crumpled bills. “I have twenty bucks. Take it or leave it.”

  Reed scowled, but he snatched the money from my hand and stuffed it into his pocket. “You got a deal.” He smirked at his brother. “At least someone around here knows how to negotiate.”

  He slid off the barstool and then disappeared into the hall. I heard the door to the attic close and then the muffled sound of his footsteps going up the stairs.

  “Okay,” I said, “now we just have to get out of here without being seen.”

  “We did it once before,” Dylan said. “Should be easy.”

  The only problem was that when Dylan and I had snuck out the first time, it had been 6:00 A.M. and most people were still asleep. Now it was after eleven A.M. I worried about who might be looking out their windows, or where the finfolk and everyone else might be. We had to get to Pirate’s Cove without running into anyone that might try to stop us.

  The five of us slipped out of the back door of the Mooring house, moving as softly as we could to keep our footsteps from being too loud. The afternoon was cold and windy, and my eyes watered at the blast of icy air that hit me once I was outside.

  We didn’t speak as we raced across the backyard toward the house directly behind the Mooring home. I barely even dared to breathe. At any moment, I expected Domnall to step out of a shadow or from behind a tree. I was the oldest of the group assembled behind me and I was leading them all into danger. If anything happened to them, I didn’t think I’d ever forgive myself.

  We made it out of the neighborhood without any problems. The streets were empty. There was no sign of the finfolk or of Lake and the others. Was that a good thing or bad?

  As we dashed past businesses and trees along Heron Avenue, a figure appeared in the path ahead of us. A small, blonde figure stood there, facing us as we skidded to a stop.

  “Claire,” Mara said. She started forward. “Claire, what are you doing out here? There are people—”

  I grabbed her arm, stopping her in her tracks. Another figure stood nearby, half-hidden next to an old, abandoned store. He stepped out of the shadows, the wind whipping the hem of his robe around his legs.

  Artair, Domnall’s guard.

  “Let her go,” I called to him. “She’s just a kid.”

  Artair gazed back at me. He was too far away to hear, but I was sure he was humming and keeping Claire under the trance of the song. We had never used the song to control humans, but I wondered what it was capable of making them do. What could a finfolk who had much more experience with the song use it for? My stomach twisted at the empty, glazed look in Claire’s eyes.

  I scanned the area around us, but we were alone. It was just us and Artair and Claire, standing on the empty main street of Swans Landing. I dug my fingers into Mara’s arm, shifting my position so that my body partially blocked her.

  Then Artair moved, but he didn’t come toward us. Instead, he turned away and walked back into the shadows of the shop. Claire stood there for a moment, then she too turned and followed Artair, disappearing from sight.

  “What’s he doing?” Sailor asked.

  I shook my head. “I don’t know.”

  My body was rigid as I waited for the attack I was certain would come. My gaze darted from right to left and back again, searching the shadows for movement. My ears strained to hear any sound other than the wind whistling past us.

  But there was nothing.

  “I…I think he’s letting us go,” I said at last.

  Mara raised her eyebrows. “Why would he do that?”

  “We don’t have time to question it,” Dylan said. “We need to get out of here. Now.”

  Our feet pounded against the asphalt as we raced toward Pirate’s Cove. We reached the little parking lot at the edge of the trees and I was relieved to see it was empty. I had half-expected to find everyone there fighting, or an ambush waiting for us.

  Tree limbs scratched at my face and arms as I ran down the narrow dirt path that wound through the maritime forest. Elizabeth tripped over a tree limb and Dylan paused to grab her hand, pulling her to her feet before continuing.

  My lungs felt like they were in danger of bursting by the time we broke free of the forest and reached the little sliver of beach. The ocean roared and foamed as it crashed onto the shore, the water almost as gray as the sky overhead.

  “What do we do now?” Mara asked me. “How do we get to Finfolkaheem?”

  The five of us stood at the edge of the water. I could already feel the ocean soaking through my shoes and my body responding to the call of it.

  “We need to swim,” I said, kicking off my shoes and then pulling off my socks. “There’s a whirlpool. My dad wrote about it, and Dylan and I found it the other day. I think it’s part
of the door.”

  “A door?” Dylan asked as he pulled his shirt off over his head. “In the ocean?”

  “Callum told Sailor and me that Hether Blether once had a door to Finfolkaheem,” I explained, speaking quickly as we all stripped down. “My dad wrote about the finfolk homeland and his theories about the song. It doesn’t just call finfolk home, it creates the mists that protect the vanishing isles. That’s what we’ve been doing all these years, every time we sing we’re turning Swans Landing into a vanishing island. That’s why the fish are disappearing and why the ferry isn’t coming. The island is vanishing from the human world.”

  Mara froze, her hands on the waist of her jeans. “That’s insane. How can the island vanish?”

  “It’s happened before,” I said. “Domnall told me that the finfolk sing to protect Hether Blether and with the declining population there, their protection is fading. What if ours here is growing? And if it is and we are turning Swans Landing into a vanishing island, then it must have a connection to the city under the sea now. We have the key. We can open the door.”

  I pulled the key from the pocket of my jeans before tossing them into the sand and squeezed it tight. It had to work. If it didn’t, I was out of ideas. I didn’t know what else my dad might have wanted me to find if it wasn’t this.

  “What about me?” asked a voice behind us.

  Elizabeth stood on the beach, her hands crossed as she scowled at us. “I can’t breathe underwater, remember? What am I supposed to do, wait here?”

  Dylan, Mara, Sailor, and I looked at each other.

  “You’ll have to,” I told her. “Sorry. If we find Finfolkaheem, you wouldn’t survive being under water that long.”

  Elizabeth’s chin quivered. “And what if these finfolk freaks find me waiting here? What do I do then?”

  I bit my lip. Elizabeth would have no chance of resisting if Domnall found her. Maybe Artair wasn’t really letting us go. Maybe he had gone to find the others and bring them back to us.

  Dylan walked across the sand toward Elizabeth. He reached around the back of her head and then pulled her face toward his, kissing her for a long moment. Sailor turned away, closing her eyes as she faced the ocean.

  When Dylan pulled away, he said, “If they come, you run. Hide anywhere you can, any place that you can block out the sound of the song. We’ll be back as soon as we can.”

  Elizabeth nodded and kissed him one last time before stepping back.

  “Hold hands,” I said, reaching for Mara’s hand. She grasped Dylan’s and then he reached for Sailor.

  Sailor looked at him for a moment, her jaw clenched tight. Then she slipped her hand into his.

  “Whatever you do, stick together,” I said. “I have the key. It should lead us to where we need to go.”

  Then the four of us stepped into the crashing waves.

  * * *

  Water gurgled in my ears once my head had slipped under the water. The current pushed me one way and then the other. I had to squeeze Mara’s hand tight to keep from losing her.

  Then the change overtook me. I opened my mouth, letting out a stream of bubbles as my body shifted and popped, tore and stretched. I twisted, bucking at the pain. Mara’s fingers started to slip through my grasp. My brain was foggy, unable to focus as the change seized me, but I tried to hold on as best I could.

  Finally, the change was over and I was finfolk. Pain ebbed away, clearing my mind enough that I could remember what I was looking for.

  Finfolkaheem. We had to find the door, if it was here. If my dad’s theories and my guesses were right, and Swans Landing was turning into a vanishing isle, Finfolkaheem might be our only solution. We needed full-blooded finfolk, as Callum had said, and this was the only place I knew to find them.

  The four of us swam forward, pushing against the current that tried to tug us back toward the beach. I gripped the key in my fist, focusing all my thoughts on it as we swam, like I had seen Callum do when we were searching for Hether Blether.

  I knew we had found the whirlpool when the current suddenly changed and pushed me toward the right, sending me almost tumbling through the water. I wanted to tell the others to hold on tighter, but speaking underwater was impossible. Only bubbles came out when I opened my mouth, and I didn’t know if they could have heard me anyway over the roaring water around us. The sea was ferocious and battered us back and forth.

  Where is it? I asked silently. Where’s the door?

  The water pushed at me again, snatching my hand from Mara’s. I fought to get back to her, my arm swinging wildly through the current. I couldn’t lose them now.

  But the current was too strong and the water too dark. I couldn’t see anyone near me or find her hand.

  “Mara!” I called, but my shout disappeared in the explosion of bubbles from my mouth. I swung my arm out again, searching for anyone, slicing at the water around me.

  Finally, my hand found something solid. An arm. I grabbed hold, squeezing my fingers around the limb. I wouldn’t lose them again. The water swirled around me, sending me spinning in violent circles.

  We needed the door. Where was the door?

  A brightness seared through the water under my feet. I peered down at it as I spun on the current. The light was first just an outline, then an entire circle that shone brilliantly. Where there had been only complete darkness moments ago, there was now a golden light like I had never seen before.

  Still holding onto the person’s arm with one hand and the finfolk key in the other, I dove down, swimming and fighting to get through the water to reach the door.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  The gold light was so brilliant I couldn’t keep my eyes open. I squeezed them shut, hanging onto whoever’s arm I had hold of. I drifted through the current that pulled me into the light, wondering for a moment if all the stories about death were true. Maybe this wasn’t the way to Finfolkaheem after all. Maybe instead of going toward the light we should have fought to swim away.

  But then the light faded, leaving me with residual spots in the darkness behind my eyelids.

  Slowly, my body still tensed, I opened my eyes to look around.

  It was immediately clear that we were no longer in the water just off Swans Landing. The water here was the clearest I had ever seen. The Atlantic Ocean around Swans Landing was murky and it was hard to see more than a couple of feet. But the ocean floor spread out for miles around me, the hills and rocks and fish and plant life all easily visible. Before us, in the valley between craggy cliffs, lay a city built from rock and sand, lit with a strange blue glow.

  Mara, Dylan, and Sailor floated next to me. It was Dylan’s arm I was holding and I let go, reaching for Mara’s hand instead. She raised her eyebrows, her face showing the same question that went through my head. Was this Finfolkaheem?

  It had to be. There was no place else it could be.

  But what should we do now that we were here? The key I still clenched in one fist had gotten us here, but I couldn’t feel any more direction coming from it.

  Two figures appeared floating down from above us. They were finfolk, the man with glittering silver scales and the woman with a mix of blue and green. They both had long hair that floated loose in the water around their heads like a halo.

  Memories of our arrival in Hether Blether flashed through my head. We had been taken to the palace by armed sentries who had found us, and then we had been imprisoned for a few days by Domnall. My body went rigid as the two finfolk swam toward us, their faces stern as they studied us.

  “You will come with us,” said the woman, speaking in a musical tone. She nodded to her companion and then they turned, swimming toward the city.

  The rest of us exchanged glances. Sailor looked as nervous as I felt, probably remembering what had happened in Hether Blether too. But these finfolk were not armed, and when they realized we weren’t following, they stopped and gestured to us.

  “It is all right,” the man said. “We are taking you to spe
ak to the council. That is why you are here, correct?”

  I didn’t know what the council was, but it seemed like the best place to start to ask for help. I opened my mouth to say yes, but found that I still couldn’t speak underwater. The two finfolk made it look easy, like it should have been natural. But the only thing that came out of my mouth was a muffled noise and bubbles. So I nodded instead and then the four of us followed them toward the city.

  Hether Blether had reminded me of Swans Landing when I first saw it. Not the sandstone palace, but the decaying village that sat around it. The people there had been fighting to hang onto their homes and history, just like the people of Swans Landing had been doing for years. The two places had had a lot of similarities between them, though it had taken me too long to realize just how similar they were.

  But Finfolkaheem was entirely different. The city stretched on and on, dipping into valleys in the ocean floor and climbing up the sides of the cliffs. Seaweed drifted around us and lush plants grew up from the sandy floor, climbing over the rock walls of homes and buildings as if it were decoration put there on purpose. It took me a moment to realize that the city’s glow wasn’t from any kind of lights that I had ever seen above the water, but from the algae that grew on the rocks and ocean floor. The bacteria gave off a phosphorescent blue light that lit the paths between the homes.

  A song hung in the air around us, songs of water and earth combined into something I had never heard before. Tension left my body as the song vibrated through me, renewing me with a calmness that settled deep inside me.

  A little school of bright yellow fish darted out of the way as we drew close to the center of the city. Finfolk milled about the area, some sitting on rock ledges to talk and children chasing each other in circles.

  All movement stopped once they spotted us following the other two finfolk into the village square. All I could do was stare back at hundreds of eyes that stared at us. I had never seen so many finfolk in one place. The color of finfolk scales were based on family lines and most family members had similar colors. There were only a few different colors still left in Swans Landing, but here there were more variations of colors than I had ever thought possible.