“Quail,” Merrick said.
“I need more time!” Fidelia cried.
“You’re out of time!” Cheapshot Charlie shrouded her in shadow. “Grab your box of junk and start walking.”
Fidelia picked up the crate, her arms shaking. “I can’t — I can’t do this without them.” Before she could stop it, a tear streaked down her face.
How could she ever have believed this could work? She was just a girl, orphaned and lost, treading water alone.
“You have to.” Merrick’s voice rolled like thunder, vibrating Fidelia’s ear as he leaned over her. “Now get your head on straight and think.”
Fidelia walked past the pirates and back into the shed. She tuned out Cheapshot Charlie’s impatient glare and Bloody Elle’s pacing and ducked her head into the cockpit of the submarine. Right here, she thought — this is where Mom and Dad were, right when it happened. What were they thinking, as the water rose higher and higher? She bit her bottom lip, trying to focus through the slow ache of her sadness. If only I could speak to them one more time. Hear their voices. Pick their brilliant brains —
“Wait!”
She opened a compartment in the Egg — yes, her parents’ observation books were still there, wrapped in oilskin. Her mother’s small plum notebook, bound closed with a strip of leather; her father’s square black notebook, with his square bold print.
Fidelia flipped through her mother’s observation book, and entries jumped out at her — notes on the reanimation of starfish limbs, notes on rubber eels, notes on the sleeping habits of carpet sharks. Dr. Quail’s hen-scratch handwriting was difficult enough to read when curled up in a cozy reading nook, but the leaking raindrops soaked the ink, making the letters run like black teardrops.
She scanned her mom’s recap of the day a sea otter sneezed on her dad, sending him toppling down a riverbank — one of the funniest days of Fidelia’s life, and now she had to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from toppling into despair.
“I don’t know what Mom and Dad would do,” she told Merrick, each word wobbling, “but I think I can find out.”
Merrick the Monstrous leaned close, his bloodred eye inches from her glasses. “I hope so,” he said, “or you’ll be closer to the fishes than you ever wanted.”
The autumn morning stayed overcast and wet as the unlikely group walked along the main canal. Fat raindrops fell in a gray curtain. That, combined with the Undertow’s ever-looming presence in the bay, meant Arborley’s streets were empty of people. Merrick nevertheless pulled the collar of his peacoat up as high as it would go, tucking his face out of sight. A turtle retreating into its shell.
He was short, Fidelia realized — not much taller than she was, a detail she hadn’t noticed until his two comrades left his sides to flank her instead, hustling her along.
An intersection came up — Arborley’s high street, cutting in front of them. If they turned left, they’d walk right past the library. Fidelia could see it now — the white-bricked back of the building, the flat roof, the loft window, round as a porthole. Her pulse spiked. What was her aunt doing right now? Finishing the encyclopedias? Working the circulation desk? Still expecting Fidelia to trudge back home from the Quails’ old house for dinner in just a few hours?
Fidelia would be long gone by then.
If she could steer the pirates within range of the library, she could yell. Aunt Julia kept the library bone quiet — maybe Aunt Julia would hear her and run outside, and then Fidelia would be out of this mess. She could go back to the sofa, and the cat, and the books. And the mainland, she reminded herself, and grimly pressed her lips together. A new life on dry land, but a safe one.
She veered to the edge of the curb casually, trying not to give away the fact that her heart had leapfrogged into her throat. “You know, the library will have information on indigenous diving techniques,” she said. Merrick and the other pirates stared at her as if her nose had just turned into a sea cucumber.
“It would probably be good to have a book or two — just as a backup —”
“Books.” Merrick spat the word out like it was moldy. “Enough books.” He gripped her arm roughly. “You stay close. We wouldn’t want you wandering off.”
Look out the window! Fidelia shouted mental messages at Aunt Julia as the library slipped farther and farther away. Come outside! Now, before it’s too late!
Merrick strong-armed her down a side street and an alleyway — a shortcut to the harbor that bypassed the high street and the Book and Bottle.
Fidelia could smell it before she could see it.
A sniff of brine. Of wet rocks.
There it was — the stretch of dappled gray and brown pebbles, white foam lining the shore like antique lace, and the ocean. Fog collected in the bay, so she could barely make out the sea beneath it — slate blue, shimmering, beautiful and terrifying in its infiniteness.
As Merrick corralled her along the boardwalk, dread collected under her rib cage like beach trash. Yes, the ocean had once felt more like home than her actual home. But now all she could think about was how, in these very waters, her parents had —
“Quit your stomping.” Merrick’s fingers dug into the softness of her forearm. “You’re making more noise than a three-legged man.”
This would all be easier, Fidelia thought, if it was a normal day. Not only would the pirates have a devil of a time snatching her in front of a crowd, but if the harbor was humming with the usual business of the cocoa trade, if the sky was clear blue, it would feel more like greeting a comfortable old friend than this silent, still implosion of unbearable memories.
But everything was exactly as it had been on the day she’d lost them. Rows of ships floated, stiff as a line of coffins awaiting their eternal occupants. The earthy smell of cocoa beans was ghostly faint, carried by the rancid, low-tide breeze.
With every vessel they walked past, Fidelia thought of all the sailors who ran it. A carrack with shining turquoise banners — the Puck, Captain Beagle’s cargo ship. An old caravel called the Spanker, which Ida Quail called antique and charming and Arthur Quail called dowdy. The Anemone, Ratface’s clipper — the lazy mermaid carved into its bowsprit in desperate need of a good polish.
All these sailors — sea dogs and rascals, every one of them, but at the Quails’ funeral, their faces hooked down into frowns so sharp, they could’ve fished with them.
Would that be the last time she’d ever see them?
Merrick stopped at the gate of the chandler’s warehouse — a roofed yard filled with shipping supplies. “Open it,” he commanded his comrades. “Grab a dory.”
“A dory?” Fidelia echoed, and her blood turned to ice. Did the pirates think they could paddle a dory in the Undertow? “We can’t take a dory all the way to the tropics!”
“You think I would be so stupid?” Merrick said, his grip on Fidelia’s arm still concrete strong. “I’ve gutted men for lesser insults.”
Cheapshot Charlie jimmied open the lock, and he and Bloody Elle dashed into the warehouse, past bottles of linseed oil, past the buckets of pitch for waterproofing wooden crates, past gleaming new hatchets and lanterns, past brooms and mops. Back in the far corner of the warehouse, a row of white dories leaned against the fence, their long noses pointed up at the sky.
Cheapshot Charlie lifted one of the boats with his massive arms and Bloody Elle carried the oars.
“Nice and easy,” Merrick muttered as the two pirates slunk down an aisle. If the dory knocked against even one of these shelves, they’d all fall over in a domino effect — loud enough to bring someone running to investigate, Undertow or no. Fidelia held her breath, hoping one of them would trip or stumble. But the pirates managed to safely sneak the dory out of the warehouse without a sound.
Merrick tugged Fidelia’s arm until she was forced to follow. “This way.” He led her away from the warehouse, away from the boardwalk, and to the beach.
To the beach.
Cheapshot Charlie carried the
dory to the shallows and threw it on the water with a slap. Instantly the tide tried to pull the boat away from land, out to open water.
Out where the Undertow could tear it to driftwood.
Fidelia froze. “You said we weren’t going out in a dory —”
“I said no such thing. Now move.” Merrick dragged her forward, her feet making parallel tracks in the pebbles.
Fidelia’s boots dipped into the icy water for the first time since —
“No!” her voice was strangled. She locked her knees and skidded to a stop, the toes of her boots sliding beneath a mound of pebbles and sea foam. She couldn’t do it — couldn’t go back in the water.
“Get in the boat.” Merrick clenched her arm above the elbow. His blue eye seared into her with a simmering, subterranean fury.
But just as Fidelia was about to submerge her boot in the water, drown her last hope, Merrick coughed so violently, he bent over, dropping his grip on Fidelia.
Her chance to run.
She took it.
She twisted out of his reach and sprinted back toward the boardwalk.
“Charlie, Elle!” Merrick barked between coughs. “She’s running for it!”
Pebbles crunched under Fidelia’s boots. Her legs were on fire. It had been weeks since she’d stretched them like this — they were achingly out of practice.
Away, away she ran, the sound of crashing waves fading with every step. Which was she running from harder: Merrick and his mates, or the water?
A gunshot.
The pebbles beneath Fidelia’s feet flew into the air.
Behind her, Merrick stood at the bow of the dory like a king riding atop a fur-lined litter, loading his pistol while Cheapshot Charlie and Bloody Elle kept the boat parallel to the shore. “Either we take you with your toes, or without!” he hollered.
Fidelia didn’t stop. Let him shoot, she thought. He’ll wake up the whole hibernating island with that noise — and then they’ll have him.
“You’ll also be missing these,” Merrick said.
Fidelia looked back.
The pirate captain held her parents’ observation books, one in each hand, open so the pages fluttered in the sea breeze.
Fidelia’s stomach flip-flopped. She stumbled to a halt. Their notes. Their research. Their journals, their random thoughts — every moment her parents had deemed worthy of capturing. All of it was there, in Merrick’s hands. He must have stolen them out of her bag, knowing they’d make the perfect hostages.
“They come with me,” Merrick continued, “and I guarantee I won’t be as careful with them as you are.” He dangled them over the side of the dory, letting the spray dampen the pages. “Anything could happen to them, fragile little things. What if they go for a dive of their own —?”
“Stop!” Fidelia shouted, almost roared. She pivoted in the pebbles and ran back to the water’s edge. Losing her parents’ books, their words, her only link to them — she’d sail straight through the heart of the Undertow to keep that from happening.
She waded in the frigid water up to her ankles. Then to her thighs. Then to her waist.
The dory had drifted far enough out that she’d have to swim for it. Her lungs seized — from the cold, yes, and also from the gasping fear that suddenly paralyzed her muscles.
“It’s a shock you haven’t grown gills,” Ida Quail used to say every time Fidelia emerged from the sea, sopping and smiling.
Six weeks since she lost them. Six weeks since she’d last taken to the water.
Oh, Mom, she thought now. Would you even recognize me now, this timid girl I’ve become? A landlubber? A coward?
Summoning every bit of courage she could find, she swam, limbs sweeping through the water as if she were embracing it — or clawing and kicking at it, more accurately. A baby wave gently swept over her head; under the water, she panicked and scrambled for air. Had she already forgotten how to bob with the tide? Or hold her breath?
The cold water seeped into her airways, a salty flood through her nasal passage. Just as she opened her mouth in a frantic, underwater gasp, a huge hand grabbed her collar and hauled her up into the dory. Sputtering, she pulled off her glasses, blinking away seawater, and as soon as the world came back into focus, grabbed her parents’ observation books from Merrick.
“You keep threatening to hurt me or kill me if I don’t do what you want,” she said flatly, her teeth chattering. “Well, the Undertow will turn this entire boat into matches.” She shivered, her nerves raw. “We won’t even make it out of the bay. Nobody sails in the Undertow. Not even my parents would have risked this. Please. This treasure of yours can wait until spring. It’s not worth your life, is it? And Cheapshot Charlie’s, and Bloody Elle’s?” And my life? she added silently.
“The Undertow should be the least of your worries.” Merrick pulled the silver pocket watch from his peacoat and checked the time. Then his good eye brightened, finding something behind her.
Fidelia arched herself around in the dory. Emerging from the swirling fog, anchored to the last shoal before Arborley Bay deepened into true, wild ocean, was the ugliest, sorriest ship Fidelia had ever seen.
It was a monster of a ship, an old sloop of war built at least a generation ago, with dark masts jutting crookedly like the ribs of a beast. Ribbons of paint peeled off the beams, and an emerald slime coated the hull at the waterline.
“That’s your ship?” Fidelia didn’t bother masking the mockery in her voice. “Does it even sail?”
“Better than any on the water.” Merrick spoke as though it were a lover, not a ship.
“Captain,” Bloody Elle said softly — carefully, Fidelia noticed. “Look at her bulge.”
They all tilted their heads, peering at the port side, which curved far more than was desirable. Water damage, Fidelia diagnosed, the wood warped far beyond repair.
Merrick pressed his lips tightly together.
The pirates rowed their captain and their captive to the side of the ship, and the closer they got, the worse the ship looked: grime along her boards, ropes fraying, a tattered red flag hanging on a mast. A red flag — the mark of a ruthless pirate.
“Can she make it, Captain?” Bloody Elle asked.
“Of course she can,” Merrick said.
But Fidelia couldn’t hold back a scoff — this was Merrick’s grand vessel? The ship that would carry them along the cocoa route to the treasure? By her guess, it wouldn’t make it out of the bay. “We just left an entire harbor of ships. Good ships,” she said. “If we turn around now —”
“I don’t sail on any ship but the Jewel.” Merrick’s tone was clear — this topic was doornail-dead, buried and finished. He seized a frayed rope and pulled himself onto the deck of the ship.
The Jewel … What a perfect name for the flagship of a pirate treasure-thirsty enough to kidnap a girl and send her overboard for his gold.
But misshapen boards and faded sails aside, the Jewel embodied speed and nimbleness. Fidelia could easily picture this ship in a previous life, darting through shoals and outrunning the gigantic pinks and galleons of the Queen’s Own Navy.
With Bloody Elle and Cheapshot Charlie on her tail, she followed Merrick up and into the Jewel, landing on the deck just in time to see Merrick touch a brine-wrinkled railing.
“Look at her wood,” he whispered. “So far gone.”
“Does she have one last trip in her?” Bloody Elle asked as she climbed aboard the ship.
Merrick coughed — or was he clearing his throat of some sentimentality congesting there? “Let’s get her out to sea, mates, and find out.”
Fidelia settled herself onto a bench in the lower deck, the lull and sway of the ship rocking her into a trance. She gave in, closing her eyes. It had already been a long day — the longest since September 30 — and it was barely afternoon.
“Are you sure she’s the right girl?” Cheapshot Charlie’s voice could barely be heard above the din of the sails flapping. “She’s panicked at water like a c
at.”
“Maybe so,” Merrick said, “but she’s the one we want.”
The Jewel got her bearings, her cream linens catching the wind. By the time the pirates brought the ship out of the bay, Fidelia was fast asleep, glasses askew on her nose, the bag with her parents’ observation books in it clutched tightly against her chest, a life preserver to aid against this great mess she’d found herself drowning in.
It was a crisp, blue morning, the kind that should exist only in paintings. There wasn’t a swell on the sea as the Jewel sailed, sunshine gleaming off the polished wood, her hold full of spoils from the latest raid: chests brimming with strung rubies, crates of fresh cocoa beans, gold doubloons.
A rolltop desk in the captain’s quarters was plastered in nautical maps — charts of detailed cliff lines, charts of water depths, charts of territories, charts of unknown seas … The papers overlapped and bubbled — mirroring what the inside of Merrick’s brain must have looked like.
On top of the charts were letters. They’d been read and reread so many times, the delicate stationery had started to tear at the creases.
Merrick picked one up and traced its salutation with his rough fingers.
My dearest love …
A knock came at the door.
“Come,” he said gruffly, and hid the bundle of letters beneath the maps.
His quartermaster came into the office.
“Are we there?” Merrick asked.
“Nearly,” Bloody Elle said. “A knot or two away.”
“Tell the crew to unload everything from the hold but the beans. We’ll give those to Taj next time we hit the bodega.” He strolled to his drink cart and uncorked a bottle of rich chocolate rum. “And put Charlie on first watch —”
“A thousand pardons, Captain,” Bloody Elle interrupted, “but you should see this.”
Merrick scowled, smoothed the maps on his desk, and followed her out to the deck.
The Jewel slowed as it came into a stretch of turquoise water. An island with moon-white beaches and a jagged green palm-tree skyline sat peacefully on the horizon, just a mile away — a paradise, but not the Jewel’s intended destination.
Race to the Bottom of the Sea Page 7
