The Islands of the Blessed (35 page)

All this time the coracle had been keeping pace with the celebrating crowds below. Now, as the revelers entered the front gate of the castle, the coracle floated over the wall to a large courtyard where fire pits had already been constructed. The little craft began to sink.

Jack braced himself for water to come flooding in, but nothing happened. The air only seemed to get thicker and richer. It made him feel extraordinarily good, as though he could run a mile and not get tired. He raised his arm and felt the air pushing back. “It feels like swimming,” he said.

Thorgil propelled herself upward with a kick. “It
is
like swimming,” she cried, delighted. “How wonderful! You can swim and breathe at the same time.” She set out with a strong stroke and came to a stop halfway up a tower crusted with coral. “Try it, Jack!” He followed her to the tower and did a couple of somersaults in the air to show off. They clung to the coral, smiling at each other.

“If you're quite finished larking about, come down,” the Bard said crossly. “We have work to do.” He was already on the ground, sea bottom, or whatever it was. The fin folk, as they had done before, paid no attention to the newcomers. They set about cleaning the innards out of Pictish beasts.

But as Jack floated down he heard their voices in his head.
Who invited them? Is that Dragon Tongue? Oh, bother, it is! Hide the humans.
The voices became more distinct the closer he got to the ground, until there was such a babble that he could hardly make sense of it. But he heard,
I wonder if we can keep the new boy and girl.
And:
The boy is adorable. I want him.

“You carry Fair Lamenting,” the Bard instructed Jack. The ruined bell was wrapped in cloth, and Jack wondered what the old man planned to do with it. Thorgil was given the mirror and comb, also wrapped. The Bard had his own parcel, the contents of which he didn't reveal. “You must be on your best behavior. The fin folk have said we can speak to their king, but nothing is certain until it happens. And please don't call anyone a ‘sea hag.' The correct term is ‘fin wife.'”

No one had greeted them yet, but the Bard said this was normal. “It's considered bad manners to force your attention on people,” he explained. “We'll hang around for a while until they're used to us.” He led the way to a platform where a gang of fin men were flensing a Pictish beast. They expertly stripped off the skin, exposing vast strips of blubber. “They'll lay the skin out for fish to nibble clean. The blubber will be used in cooking,” said the old man.

An indescribably foul odor filled the air. Jack swallowed hard; he didn't want to disgrace himself by throwing up. Thorgil also looked as though she was struggling. “You might as well get used to it,” the Bard said. “Beast blubber deadens the sense of smell, and if you can endure it for a few minutes, you'll be all right.” He breathed deeply as though savoring a rare perfume. Jack didn't say anything. He was working hard to keep his breakfast down.

“Good hunting, eh?” the old man said.

Good hunting
, replied one of the fin men. Several minutes passed. Gradually, Jack's nausea subsided and he was able to pay attention to the activity before him. Long strips of yellow blubber were peeled off and put into giant pots. Here it was rendered into a bubbling, oily liquid. The beast's green flesh was carved and put on skewers over a fire pit. A large, leathery bag—the stomach?—was emptied of its contents, a mess of kelp and half-digested fish. Jack clamped his teeth shut again.

The bones were interesting. Jack had been expecting something like the skeleton of a fish, but this was entirely
different. A series of flat paddles flared out from a central column, somewhat like branches of a pine tree. They were large enough to lie down on in the middle but grew smaller and smaller toward the tail. A fin man was cutting and stacking the paddles. “What do you do with those?” Jack asked, and then scolded himself for being pushy.

We make dishes
, said the fin man.

All right so far
, Jack thought. He hadn't annoyed anyone. He put down his bundle and watched for a while longer. “How can a Pictish beast swim with such a long, straight pole in its middle?” he said.

The fin man grasped Jack's arm and walked him to the end of the tail. The boy almost panicked. The creature's fingers gripped him with frightening strength, and Jack didn't know what he intended. The fin man pointed at the tip of the tail.
Bend it
, he said.

Jack touched it cautiously. It wasn't as nasty as he'd expected, and he found that it was amazingly springy. He used both hands to pull it up as far as it would go, when the tail suddenly whipped back into position. Jack was flung head over heels into a wall. Fortunately, the thickness of the air saved him from real harm. He slid down with the sound of clicking in his ears. The fin men's
V
-shaped mouths had reversed so that they resembled smiles.
I'll bet anything that clicking is laughter
, Jack thought.

He walked back with as much dignity as he could manage. “Good for you. You've broken the ice,” approved the Bard.
I could have broken my neck, too
, Jack thought resentfully.
The fin folk seemed to have the same sense of humor as Northmen.

We play that trick on all youngsters
, the first fin man said.
My name is Whush. You are—?

“Jack,” said Jack. He introduced Thorgil and the Bard.

We know Dragon Tongue. He shows up now and then to lecture us.

“Merely looking for stolen property,” the Bard said. “And that reminds me, I saw four human children in the victory procession.”

They've been here for years
, said Whush.
You would do them no service by taking them from their new families.

“You're probably right.” The old man sighed. “I just wish you wouldn't steal toddlers.”

Their mothers were careless. Without us, the toddlers would have drowned.

Now other fin folk shyly approached the flensing platform to inspect the visitors. Mermaids and merlads swam around them, darting away like frightened fish when they were noticed. Jack hadn't thought about the existence of merlads, but of course fin men had to start out somewhere. Like the maids, the lads were much handsomer than their adult counterparts, though they didn't deteriorate to the level of sea hags.
Fin wives
, Jack corrected himself. He saw a few creatures that seemed to be halfway between the two stages. Their hair was falling out and their mouths were broadening into a
V
shape.

The merlads were showing a great deal of interest in
Thorgil, swimming in to touch her and speeding away. “The next time one of them does that, I'm going to smack him,” said Thorgil.

“No, you aren't. We have enough problems,” the Bard said.

The mermaids were just as interested in Jack, but shyer about it. He was uncomfortable with them because they weren't wearing anything from the waist up. At least they kept their distance.
Pretty boy, come with me
, one of them called.

I saw him first
, said another.

You! He'll never look at you, barnacle-face.

He will so, seaweed-for-brains!
The two mermaids fell into a squabble, poking and pinching each other until a sea hag came over to separate them.

Maids! Maids! If you don't behave, you won't go to the banquet tonight
, scolded the sea hag—
fin wife
, Jack amended. He had to keep himself from bolting, the creature was so overpowering close-up. With her brawny shoulders and big hands, she looked stronger than Whush.

She was cloaked in a gown that shimmered with color like the inside of a shell. Hundreds of pearls were looped around her thick, scaly neck. It was such a contrast, Jack couldn't take his eyes off her.

You're a bold one, giving me that fish-eye look
, said the sea hag.

“I—I—was admiring your dress,” he stammered.

Silver-tongued, too
, the creature said approvingly.
You'll make a fine husband for one of our mermaids.

“He's only visiting, Shair Shair,” the Bard said. “You'll have to look elsewhere.” Shair Shair smiled in the fin folk way, as if to say,
We'll see about that.
She lumbered off, for like all the sea hags, she was graceless. Jack caught a glimpse of her toes, long and scaly with claws at the tips, beneath the beautiful, shimmering robe. In spite of her unsettling appearance, Jack rather liked her, as he had liked the troll-maidens Fonn and Forath once he'd gotten used to them.

“At first everyone was standoffish and now they're too friendly,” Thorgil complained, swiping at a merlad who was attempting to grab her hair. “Who was that monster? She had enough pearls on her to sink a ship.”

“Do not insult her,” the Bard said sharply. “She is Shair Shair, wife of the Shoney. She's the
draugr
's mother.”

“Oh, bedbugs,” said Jack, using Pega's worst swearword. “What's going to happen when we tell her about her daughter?”

Nothing happened quickly in Notland, Jack discovered. The fin folk were masters of indirection. They knew that the Bard had come to see their king and did nothing to bring it about. Shair Shair had looked the visitors over and gone away. Whush invited them to follow him around. He seemed to have no particular goal in doing this.

“Can't we just ask to see the Shoney?” Thorgil said. Both she and Jack were tired of wandering around aimlessly.

“That's not how things get done here,” the old man said. “If we try to hurry the fin folk, they'll simply melt away. They have a saying: ‘The longest way around is the shortest way there.'”

“It's already long enough,” said Thorgil.

Whush, for reasons known only to himself, led them on a tour of the farms. They observed the white cattle, the barley fields, and the chicken-of-the-sea coops. They endured a long and exceedingly boring description of kelp harvesting. They were introduced to sea goats, or capricorns. These were handsome creatures with long horns and flowing hair, and Whush informed them that the hair could be used to spin cloth. Instead of hind legs, the goats had fish tails. They could both swim and leap, and were altogether charming in the way they frisked around.

But even capricorns got tedious after a while. Jack was tired and thirsty, and when they came to a dark stream, he asked whether it was all right to drink from it.
Not that stream
, said Whush.
It comes from the
oueems.
It wouldn't be good for you.

“Oueem?”
Thorgil said. “That's the Pictish word for ‘tunnel.'”

Yes. Tunnels of the dead.

Jack looked across the stream and realized that what he'd taken for small hills were in fact barrows. They were covered with thick grass that had turned an autumn yellow and were humped up like cats waiting to be stroked. “Tunnels going where?” he asked.

“Remember what I told you about mirrors,” the Bard said. “They are called ‘endless water' because they are believed to be a portal to another world. The dead swim through them to a long, dark
oueem
that leads to a bright new sea where winter never comes and the water is as clear as sky. Departed fin folk are buried with mirrors for that reason.”

I'll bet the
draugr
's barrow doesn't contain a mirror
, thought Jack.
That's why we've brought one.
He wished they could simply drop the wretched thing off and go home, but that would have been too simple. The longest way around was the shortest way there.

Fortunately, Whush next took them to a farmhouse, where they were offered food and drink. The water was salty and the oatcakes had too much seaweed mixed into them. The farmer's wife, a sea hag with so many barnacles that it looked like she was wearing a helmet, tried to interest Jack in one of her daughters.

Rest here. The banquet will begin late
, said Whush. It was the first time anyone had suggested that they might attend the banquet. The sea hag—
fin wife
, Jack reminded himself— showed them into a courtyard. Kelp was heaped up for beds. It was unpleasantly clammy, but Jack was too tired to care.

It was dark when a pack of small merlads sprang upon him like so many puppies and rousted him out of bed. The dome of cloud over the courtyard flickered with lightning. A distant rumble told Jack that a thunderstorm was taking place in the outside world.

“It's so
humid,”
groaned Thorgil, who had been awakened by a group of little mermaids bouncing up and down on the kelp. “I'd give anything for a swim.”

“You can swim in the air,” Jack said. He leaped upward, much to the delight of the merlads, and did a somersault.

“It isn't the same. I feel hot and sticky.”

Jack realized that he hadn't felt a breeze since arriving in
Notland. Thick, muggy air pressed down on him, and he felt a sudden longing to be on a ship with a crisp wind at his back.

The Bard was still asleep. Jack knelt down to wake him. “What? What's that?” said the old man, instantly coming alert.

“It's nighttime,” Jack said. “I think we're supposed to get ready for the banquet.”

“I don't know how much readying we can do,” the Bard complained, rising painfully from his bed. “Drat this seaweed! It always makes my joints ache.” He walked around the courtyard to get the stiffness out. “I'd give anything to miss the banquet, but we won't get anywhere with the Shoney if we don't attend. He'll insist on showing us his wealth and power. When we're suitably awed, he'll ask for our gifts. Then the bargaining begins.”

The fin wife showed up with two sturdy merlads bearing torches and invited them to dine before leaving. The Bard thanked her graciously. Jack wondered why they would eat before attending a feast. “She's being polite,” explained the old man. “She knows humans don't like ocean meat, and that's all the Shoney's going to serve. There are twelve huge Pictish beasts to get through, and the fin folk won't leave until they've devoured every scrap. They'll wash it down with buckets of kelp lager, a kind of beer. Stay away from the lager. You'll be running for the bushes all day tomorrow, and there aren't any bushes in this place.”