Invisible World (4 page)

F
ELIPE HAD READ THE STARS INCORRECTLY. THE CONDITIONS
near the Bermudas were very turbulent. And the rough weather continued for the next day and through the following night.

That night, I lay in the upper berth of the small sleeping compartment I shared with Kate and Bronwyn. The
Golden Explorer
pitched terribly in the howling wind and I could hear rain lashing the sails. Our only light was the short stub of a candle flickering in a glass lantern nailed to the wall. The candle threw long, wavering shadows against the wall and floor in an eerie display.

Below me, Kate moaned pathetically, one hand clutching her stomach while the other arm was flung across her forehead, in the grip of persistent nausea. How I pitied her! Bronwyn had soaked cold ginger tea in cloths and tied them around Kate's wrists. She had given her another cloth soaked in the ginger to inhale. I had no idea what further help I might be.

The
Golden Explorer
continuously dipped to one side and then rolled to the other. This relentless motion created a horrible queasiness in me, as well. If this was what Kate was experiencing without relief, I didn't know how she could bear it. Sometimes the tilt of the
Golden Explorer
was so extreme that I clutched the sides of my bed to keep from being tossed off. Pressing my head into the pillow, I fought the greasy stew I'd had for supper from coming up.

Strangely, Bronwyn was sleeping soundly on her cot, seemingly unaffected by the storm. “How
can
she sleep through this?” Kate complained to me, her voice thin and miserable.

“Maybe she isn't here,” I suggested. “Perhaps she's left her body.”

There in the wavering light, we both looked to Bronwyn, buried deep in the covers on her cot, noting her shallow breathing. Our governess was a sound sleeper, but she seemed especially lost to slumber's grip that night.

“I wish I could leave my body,” Kate said. “I would give anything to be out of my body right now.”

A deep wave of nausea swept through me and I had to wait for it to pass before I could reply. “So do I.”

Shutting my eyes, I imagined Bronwyn's astral self flying back to the shore of Bermuda, the Isle of Devils. Was Felipe right? Did the Devil himself wreck ships; reach up to pull ships and their crews down into his own fiery home, as Felipe had told me? If Bronwyn was traveling out there tonight, would she encounter him?

Despite these alarming thoughts, and even with the awful rocking of the ship, I drifted into sleep. Within minutes, I was embroiled in a dream so real it was as if I were really there.

In the dream, I was walking through a pitch-dark forest, drenched in a storm. Wind-tossed trees bent nearly to the ground. Lightning scribbled jagged lines of brilliance across the rain-soaked sky. I was searching for Bronwyn, calling her name over and over even though my voice was being carried off by the wind.

Finally, I saw a fire and followed its flickering light until I came to an open hut. Inside it, Bronwyn sat with three other women around the fire. A branch snapped under my foot, drawing the attention of the women. Bronwyn's face was cold when she saw me. A menacing light emanated from her usually warm eyes. She beckoned me to come closer, but something within me wouldn't allow me to take a step in her direction. Then I realized what was frightening me. By Bronwyn's side stood a huge black dog. Its eyes glowed yellow and its fangs were bared. It snarled at me.

My eyes snapped open as the
Golden Explorer
dipped severely to the right. An almost deafening boom came from above, and then a thud as something of immense weight hit the deck overhead, rattling the walls of our cabin. “Kate!” I cried. “What was that?”

“I'm here!” Kate called from across the room. She stood bent over Bronwyn. “I was scared and tried to wake her, but she won't stir.”

Scrambling from my berth as quickly as I could manage, I groped my way over toward the two of them.

“I'm shaking her, but she won't respond,” Kate said, a sob of fear in her voice.

I leaned over Bronwyn's face. At first I could detect no breath, but in the next moment I realized she was emitting slow, shallow puffs of air.

“We should get Father,” Kate said, and then fell back against the wall as the
Golden Explorer
rolled once more. Clutching her mouth to fight down the seasickness, she lost the battle and vomited.

My nausea had subsided, so I volunteered to go get Father. As soon as I left our cabin, I saw him in his nightshirt, hurrying toward me, holding a lit lantern. “Get your sister and Bronwyn and come above,” he said.

Shouting above the din of the storm, I informed him frantically that we couldn't rouse Bronwyn. He dashed past me into our cabin. “Bronwyn, wake up!” he bellowed, shaking her roughly by her shoulder. “Get up!”

When she still did not wake, Father handed Kate the lantern and scooped Bronwyn into his arms. “Put on your capes and bring blankets, girls, and that's all,” he commanded. “Get a blanket for Bronwyn.”

I scurried about the cabin, rapidly collecting those things. In minutes, Kate and I were wrapped in both our capes and blankets. I stepped into my high boots but didn't take the time to buckle them.

“Hurry!” Father commanded us, braced against the doorjamb to steady himself, the slumbering Bronwyn still in his arms. Within seconds, Kate and I were hurrying ahead of him on the narrow ladder to the deck. The moment my head came above the hatch, I was doused with rain as though someone had hurled a thousand buckets of it at me. Pulling myself up, I immediately slipped on the soaked deck and slid until I hit the port-side rail.

Crew members ran in all directions. Some were above, clutching the rigging, battered by the gale as they attempted to lower the flapping sails. Four crew members struggled to toss a rowboat over the side. Other passengers appeared, looking bewildered and terrified.

A sail ripped from its mast and beat against the other sails, drumming with deafening noise. A jagged line of lightning sizzled along the rigging lines that held the sails, and an earsplitting blast of thunder immediately followed. It took only minutes for the sails to burst into flame, throwing sparks down to the deck below.

Father put his hand on my arm. Bronwyn was now slung over his shoulder like a sack, and Kate was at his side. “Get to the boats! This way,” he shouted through the driving rain, above the wind's tumult.

A flaming shard of broken wood pierced the deck between us as though someone had aimed a fiery arrow from above. Before the rain could douse it, the trim of Kate's cape caught fire. Father stomped it with his boot as Kate screamed.

When it was out, we ran alongside Father to the bow of the boat. Fishing nets had been rolled over the side, dropping down to the turbulent ocean below.

Peering over the edge, I saw crew members in three violently rocking rowboats that had been tossed into the water from the ship. Surely there was not room for everyone on board to fit into them.

Men and women were climbing past me over the ship's side, some of them clutching small children, the bigger children climbing on their own. They were the ones I had played with earlier in the voyage. Terror now twisted their faces.

Still slung on Father's shoulders, Bronwyn suddenly opened her eyes and leapt from his arms, tottering for a moment beside him. She was completely alert, assessing the situation. “Girls! Over the side! Quickly! Quickly!” she insisted, as though she had been conscious all along.

Kate's eyes were full of panic, and I knew how she felt. The idea of climbing the nets while being pounded by fierce rain was awful enough. But the
Golden Explorer
was rocking at an ever more severe pitch from side to side. With a thunderous crack, one of the flaming masts crashed to the deck. Instantly, a line of flames raced toward us.

Kate and I scrambled to avoid the attacking fire. Not even the driving rain was sufficient to quell the flames. Father and Bronwyn were quickly beside us, directing us toward the nets. “You can do it, girls. Climb down!” Father said with surprising calm.

Lifting me by the waist, Father swiftly swung me overboard, holding on until I could grip the top netting. Taking courage from his composure, I began to climb down. My hands and feet slid and the soaked ropes burned my skin. The rain was so blinding that I was only dimly aware of Kate's form on the netting some feet away from me. With a howl, a gust of wind tore away the blanket I had wrapped around my shoulders. It sailed through the black sky, a giant sea bird flapping, until it disappeared.

I heard a shout and thought it was Kate calling to me. Instinctively, I stretched out my hand to the blurred shape I took to be my sister. My fingers clutched only air. And then I could no longer even see her form.

A body plummeted past me, only inches away. Looking down, I saw the person splash into the waves below. A rowboat moved toward the spray and I assumed it was attempting a rescue.

I gripped the net, paralyzed with fear. “Kate!” I shouted. “Bronwyn! Father!”

The wind snapped the words from my mouth, racing them out to sea.

I concentrated on nothing but placing my hands methodically one below the other. Rung by rung my foot searched for the net's lower roping until it found a foothold.

With a shrill creak, the ship's hull leaned out over me.

The netting hung at a ninety-degree angle away from the
Golden Explorer
.

My feet slid off the ropes and dangled in air.

I clutched fiercely to the netting, ignoring the burn from the rope. Screams and shouts hit my ears even over the howling wind.

Then a new, even more terrifying reality came to me: The
Golden Explorer
was not rocking back in the direction from which it had come! It would have already been moving in the opposite direction, if it were going to go.

No, it had reached its tipping-over point and was heading steadily downward. If it kept going, it would crash right on top of the rowboats below.

The
Golden Explorer
, with its flaming sails, was capsizing.

It would plunge all of us who clung to the nets into the dark, cold, rain-lashed sea. We would be underwater with the gigantic ship pinning us below.

Down in the smaller boats, the crew was rowing madly out of the way. People fell from the nets on every side of me. I winced and cringed each time the flapping, wind-tossed rope flung another screaming person into the black ocean.

The
Golden Explorer
's hull menaced us with ominous creaks as it continued its slow descent into the sea.

My terror was almost too much to stand. Where was my sister? Bronwyn? Father? Were they already floundering in the water below?

My hand slid and I lost hold of the net.

Suddenly I was in the air, attached to nothing.

My cape ballooned out, and an intense silence enveloped me as I hung like a hawk, riding an air current.

Then I pitched headfirst and tumbled through the air.

I
HIT THE OCEAN WITH MY CAPE WRAPPED AROUND MY HEAD
. The heavy woolen material was instantly soaked and pulled me down like a weight. Seizing its ties, I ripped the cape off.

The instant the heavy cloth fell away, I was in a yellow world, and I swirled below the ocean's surface in a vortex of seawater. Looking up, it seemed that the sun had fallen to earth and its fire was engulfing everything.

People flailed all around me. Others only hung there, feet and legs waving listlessly.

A bubble of air dribbled from my lips and I clamped down on it. I was deep underwater with only a mouthful of air!

Snapping my legs together, I stroked forcefully toward the flaming surface.

Where was my family?

I didn't see any of them. But I couldn't look for long. With only minutes left, nothing could be allowed to distract me.

As I rose, my lungs churned with pain. It took all my self-control not to inhale the salty sea. My chest was exploding. The blinding light on the surface grew brighter still.

Almost there …

A cascade of bubbles shot from my mouth. Gasping and coughing, I broke through the water and inhaled deeply. The air seared my throat. Had I sucked in flame? I expelled it with hard force. Leaving only a cheek full of roasted air, I ducked below once more.

The salt sea burned my scorched skin but it also cooled.

The
Golden Explorer
's massive hull had become an inferno. The bowed wall of flaming wood lay on its side. Its metamorphosis from majestic vessel to underwater shipwreck was now inevitable.

With a thunderous creak and bang, the ship continued tipping. The movement set off a watery surge that pushed me below the surface even farther.

I had to get away from the sinking ship. And I needed to find another place to come up for air. If the
Golden Explorer
sank completely, all of us would be trapped in the masts and sails. We'd surely drown.

Turning, I began to swim away from the boat, but my air was going fast. I headed back toward the top of the water, swimming at a diagonal. This time, when I broke the surface, a wave knocked me back and filled my open mouth with salt water and rain. I spat it back out and inhaled deeply. The rain and waves made it impossible to see anything clearly other than the flaming ship.

It seemed safest not to swim too far because I still hoped one of the rowboats might pick me up. Also, I needed to find Kate, Bronwyn, and Father. I hovered there in the water, far enough from the burning ship but not so far as to be on my own.

Debris from the belongings of passengers and crew members and from the wreckage of the
Golden Explorer
floated on the waves. I thought I saw Father's book of Shakespeare plays float by and grabbed for it but couldn't connect. It certainly made no difference. The book was nearly destroyed.

A large wave swelled toward me, and on its crest was an open barrel turned on its side. The wave tossed the barrel into the air as it curled over me. Fearing that I would be crushed by its force, or hit by the flying barrel, I dove below. When I emerged, the barrel floated nearby.

Swimming to it, I pulled myself inside.

Off a short distance, I could see the
Golden Explorer
. Reaching out, I paddled, but a wave rolled up below the barrel, lifting it and launching it through the air. Gripping the sides with my hands, I braced with my legs as I flew through the dark storm. The barrel splashed back into the ocean, dipped, and took on water, but thankfully didn't sink.

Waves splashed inside, hitting me with salt water over and over. Shivering, I gripped and braced again as once more the barrel was lifted and thrown through the storm-tossed night.

This terrible ride went on and on without end. My teeth rattled each time the barrel landed, only to be swept up on a fresh wave and pitched into the air. Yet I didn't dare to leave the flying container. To be out in the water would be much worse.

The barrel floated peacefully for a few moments, allowing me to loosen my grip on its sides. How my muscles ached! As it bobbed on the tempestuous waters, I thought I saw a hazy full moon appear in the sky. Was the storm abating? The rain seemed less fierce.

From a long way away, white fingers of foam began to roll toward me, picking up strength and height. I watched the wave's ominous approach with dread. The tide was coming and there was nothing I could do about it.

Would it be better to leave the barrel, to avoid this rapidly growing wave by diving under? If I did that, I would lose my little craft for certain and then where would I be? Adrift in the open ocean, where I would surely tire and sink? And who knew what creatures swam here?

Resolving to stay, I gripped the sides of the barrel with all my strength and once more braced my legs across the width of the barrel.

The wave was becoming so gigantic that I couldn't stand to look at it for fear that I would pass out from utter terror. The last thing I saw before squeezing my eyes shut was a wall of water coming at me.

The barrel sped along this giant wall at a high speed. Never before had I ever traveled at such a velocity. My heart raced, slamming into my chest.

I had to open my eyes, needed to see what was happening.

The huge wave shot me from its tunnel. Screaming, I held on for my very life as the wave flipped the barrel onto the top of its mighty arch.

The barrel bounced on the crest for what seemed a very long moment before being tossed so high I felt as if I was being rocketed toward that hazy moon in the sky.

 

Someone was pounding on my head, and it was making me angry. Opening my eyes, I didn't know where I was for a moment. In the next second, though, everything that had happened came to me in a rush of memory.

Blinking hard, I gazed into blinding sunshine. The barrel had flipped up so that its bottom bobbed in the ocean and the sun's rays beat down on me. I sat with my knees to my chin in warm rainwater, my hair dripping and my white nightgown plastered to my skin.

No one was pounding on my head. The hammering was
in
my head.

The spot that hurt the most was above my right eye. I touched it and winced as excruciating pain raced across my forehead. My hand came back smeared in red. Curious, I poked the spot and recoiled in agony. Cautiously, not wanting to tip the barrel and be spilled, once more, into the sea, I rose to take in my surroundings.

I was alone, in a barrel, bobbing in a vastness of sky and ocean, with no sign whatsoever that the
Golden Explorer
, its passengers, or crew had ever been there.