Prince of Hazel and Oak (Shadowmagic Book 2)

by John Lenahan

  ‘Uh huh.’

  ‘And where did you find me?’

  ‘In the water.’

  ‘And what were you doing in the water?’

  ‘Flying.’

  ‘Don’t you mean swimming?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  I took a deep breath and started again. ‘So you were flying in the water when you just came across me drowning?’

  ‘Oh no, I saw Tughe Tine drop you. That’s why I came.’

  ‘You saw the dragon drop me?’

  ‘Oh, everyone did. We don’t see Moran very often – usually only once every twenty years at the blood fete.’

  ‘What happens at the blood fete?’

  ‘That’s when Moran gives dragon blood to the King so he won’t grow old. Don’t you know about that?’

  ‘I’ve heard something about it.’

  This seemed to please her. I sat up higher in bed and as I did I winced where my side hurt. Graysea unabashedly pulled back my sheet and asked me where it hurt. I pointed to my side and she told me to ‘Scoot over.’ Then she sat next to me in the bed, placed her hand on my rib, put her feet up on the bed and crossed her ankles. With her free hand she placed into her mouth a silvery shell that was hanging around her neck by a string of tiny pearls. I watched as her neck thickened, then three slits appeared that began to open and close like a beached fish gasping for air. When I looked down I wasn’t that surprised to see that her feet had changed into one fin. Her fingers, now webbed, pressed hard against my rib. That caused a sharp stab of pain that instantly disappeared as Graysea made a deep gasping noise. She reached up and removed the shell from her mouth and by the time I looked at her fin, it was feet again.

  ‘Oh, that one was broken,’ she said, getting up and rubbing her own side. ‘I’m sorry we missed that.’

  I covered myself up and then flexed the rib. It didn’t hurt at all. ‘How did you do that?’

  ‘I took your hurt and then lost it during The Change. That’s what we do here. It took quite a few of us a long time to heal you. What happened?’

  ‘Have you ever seen a hawk swoop down and catch a rabbit?’

  Graysea nodded yes, but wrinkled her nose to show that she didn’t like it.

  ‘Well, that’s what happened to me.’

  ‘You said lots of funny things in your sleep.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Mostly you said “Brendan, Araf and Tuan”.’

  I wasn’t expecting that and her words stabbed me with a pain worse than my broken rib. I tried to push the thought of them being burned alive out of my mind. I knew I would have to deal with the emotions of that loss – but later – I didn’t have the strength now. I turned my face away from Graysea and slammed my eyelids closed, willing them not to leak. When I looked back, Graysea was upset.

  ‘Oh, oh what have I done?’

  ‘No, it’s OK. They are friends that I have lost. It’s not your fault.’

  ‘Oh, no, I’m not supposed to upset patients. Oh, I have to get matron.’ She turned and ran out of the room. There was no way to stop her.

  A couple of minutes later the older nurse came in and stood at the foot of my bed with her arms crossed. ‘Graysea says that you are upset.’

  ‘I think she is more upset than me.’

  ‘What happened? What did you do to her?’

  ‘I didn’t do anything. She just mentioned the names I have been speaking in my sleep for the last … How long have I been here?’

  ‘Nine days.’

  ‘Wow, I’ve been here for nine days?’

  ‘What did you say to her?’

  ‘Oh, nothing, she just said the names of my companions that … they were killed during my … adventure. She took me by surprise and I turned away for a second. Honest, I told her it was OK but she bolted out of the room.’

  The matron uncrossed her arms and her countenance softened. ‘She is a sensitive little fishy.’ She pushed the sheet away from my feet, held both ankles and closed her eyes performing what I presumed was some sort of examination. ‘So how did you like your chat with our Graysea?’

  ‘It was … interesting.’

  ‘I bet. I should have warned you about the rule of having a successful conversation with her.’

  ‘And what would that be?’

  ‘Don’t ask her any questions.’

  We both laughed. ‘Hey, sorry about screaming when I first saw you. I really—’

  She waved her hand and cut me off. ‘Don’t give it a second thought. If I had seen me when I expected her – I would have screamed too.’ She came behind me and held my head with both hands; when I started to talk she shushed me again. ‘Actually there are some mornings I want to scream when I look in the mirror.’

  ‘Can I ask you a couple of questions?’

  ‘You can ask.’

  ‘You are mermaids – right?’

  <; aight="0%" width="5%">‘Oh my, that is word I haven’t heard in a long while, but yes – I am Mertain.’ She pulled my sheet away. ‘OK, Faerie, let’s see if you can walk.’ ‘You wouldn’t have my clothes around, would you?’

  ‘It’s nothing that I have never seen before.’

  ‘Still,’ I said, standing with my hands in front of my dangly bits, ‘I think you have seen enough for today.’

  She said she didn’t know where my clothes were, so she gave me a white robe, the same as she and Graysea were wearing. I put some weight on my leg and it felt good. ‘It’s a little stiff but no pain. It was broken wasn’t it?’

  ‘Actually it was dislocated at the hip. What in the sea happened to you?’

  ‘I got pounced on by a dragon.’

  ‘Moran pounced on you?’

  I nodded yes.

  ‘Ouch.’

  I walked around the room and everything seemed to be OK. I had a twinge in my knee and the matron had me sit while she did her fish trick and then it felt fine.

  ‘Would you mind if I ask you how old you are?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Sorry, I don’t want to upset you. I’m just trying to sort some stuff out in my head.’

  ‘And what does my age have to do with your head?’

  ‘Well, I think I’m on one of the islands off Fearn Point.’

  ‘You’re under one actually.’

  ‘Under?’

  ‘You’re in an underwater cave about half a league under Mertain Isle.’

  ‘That’s sounds deep.’

  ‘It is. Healing is faster this far down.’

  ‘How did I get here?’

  ‘You will see when you go back up.’

  ‘Which will be when?’

  ‘Soon,’ she said. ‘I think you are ready to travel and I’ll tell them that – once you stop asking me questions. So what does this have to do with my age?’

  ‘Well, I figure you must grow old out here, except for the King …’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘Graysea told me.’

  ‘You got information like that out of our Graysea – I am impressed.’ She folded her arms again. ‘Go on.’

  ‘I guess I just want to know how fast people age out here. Is it as fast as in the Real World?’

  ‘I do not think so,’ the matron said, ‘if you must know I am under a thousand.’

  ‘OK, so no then. And let me say you don’t look a day over five hundred.’ That got my usual dirty look. ‘You are obviously well enough to answer the King’s questions. I imagine his school will be here shortly for your ascent.’

  ‘School?’

  ‘Yes, the King’s guard.’

  ‘Oh, mermaids, fish – schools. I get it.’

  The matron shook her head and left.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  The Mertain King

  It took a half an hour before the school came to escort me to the King. I tried to rest but every time I put my head down I saw an image of Araf, Tuan and Brendan with wide terrified eyes, being burned alive. I just didn’t have the strength
to think about it. I tried using a Fili mind mantra but eventually I just had to get up. I spent most of the time before the guards came peeping into all of the nooks and crannies, searching for my clothes. I didn’t find them so I guess I was doomed to go to see the King in my nightgown, which I suppose was better than my recurring nightmare of going naked.

  Matron and Graysea walked me to a larger cave containing a beach and an underground lake. Waiting for me were six humourless macho thugs – the school. A couple of days previously I would have cracked a few jokes about them being a bit old for school, but it seemed that Moran killed my sense of humour along with my friends. In the centre of the lake was the top of a car-sized submerged brass dome.

  ‘Get in,’ the senior guard said.

  ‘How do I get in there?’

  ‘You swim, Faerie,’ the matron said. ‘Follow Graysea; she will show you the way.’

  ‘Aren’t you coming with us?’

  ‘It is very close quarters in the pressure chamber and I am certain that you would rather have Graysea scrunched in with you than me.’

  ‘I don’t know, after the initial shock you’re not so bad.’

  She scowled at me but it had a smile in it. ‘Good luck, Faerie.’

  Graysea took my arm and walked into the water. I stuck one toe in and then popped it right back out again. ‘It’s freezing.’

  Graysea giggled, grabbed me by the wrist and said, ‘Come on.’ That girl was stronger than she looked. I hit the water and my body exploded with cold. I screamed so loud I was sure that the walls of the cave above the water must have collapsed and crashed down on matron like a bad guy’s lair in a British super-spy movie. Swimming was out of the question. I struggled to get back to the surface but then Graysea, equipped with her flipper bottomf, zoomed me through the water into the underside of the pressure dome. She placed my shivering hands onto the railings before she was finally forced to push me up the stairs with her shoulder. I was beyond cold and just shy of being cryogenically preserved. I flopped down on a metal deck, dripping wet and rattling my teeth so hard I was sure I was going to crack a molar.

  Graysea knelt next to me, looking like she had just stepped out of a garden on a summer’s day. ‘Dry off,’ she said.

  ‘I cccccaaaaan’t mmmoove.’

  She placed her hand on my robe and it instantly dried itself and me. Then it lengthened and heated up. She tucked the material around my feet and slowly I started to thaw out.

  ‘How did you do that?’

  ‘You can do it too. Your robe is made of kelp. If you are nice to it, it will do what you ask.’

  Just as my core temperature was reaching the point where I could talk without sounding like I was riding over cobblestones on a bicycle, the chamber began to move. I looked over the side of the metal platform we were lying on and saw the ocean floor moving horizontally. Periodically a mermaid would zoom past the hole in the floor.

  ‘Aren’t they going to close a hatch or something?’

  ‘Why?’ Graysea said as we lurched upward.

  I looked over the railing and saw the ocean floor disappear at an alarming rate.

  ‘Because I really don’t want to—’

  I didn’t get to finish that quip ’cause that’s when the first pressure change hit me. Pain exploded in my ears and Graysea, looking uncomfortably worried, told me to swallow to equalise the pressure. I wanted to tell her that I wasn’t an idiot and I had been doing that, but the pain was too intense to allow me to speak. Graysea cuddled up beside me as a spark of pain hit me in the ears, which was so bad I thought I was going to pass out. When I pulled my hand from my head it was covered with blood. Graysea placed her hands on both sides of my head and I felt her flipper flap against my leg. The pain subsided and when I turned to look she was changing back from a fish already. We didn’t have much time to talk – the ascent must have happened at a phenomenal speed. In the process I punctured both eardrums – my right one twice. Closer to the surface I started to get pains like I had never experienced before. Tiny strange twinges in my joints grew to the point where I started praying that I would soon die.

  ‘What is happening?’

  ‘I am stopping your blood from boiling – shush,’ she said as she hugged me from behind. Her legs changed from fish to feet with increasing speed – each change brought blessed relief.

  By the time we felt the chamber bob to the surface, the two of us were physically spent. Graysea was crying and I held her.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  Sobbing, she didn’t say anything but nodded her head yes.

  ‘Thank you,’ I said, holding her until her crying turned to sniffles.

  I wiped the tears from her eyes. She was remarkably beautiful, my gigglng angel, and it pained me to see her cry. When she finally had the strength to return my smile, I couldn’t resist it – I kissed her.

  That, of course, is the position that the captain of the King’s school found us in. Graysea got up so fast she banged her head and it rang in the chamber like a bell. My body felt like I had tripped at the opening gun of a marathon and had been trampled by the subsequent five hundred runners. Graysea didn’t look like she was moving all that well either until she hit the water and then she … she flew. I doggie paddled underwater until I broke the surface and saw that we were like a mile from an island. I wasn’t sure I was going to make it but my choice was either swimming or drowning, so I started kicking. Graysea saw me struggling and swam up under me. She turned her back and gestured for me to place my hands on her shoulders. I did and she reached up, grabbed both my wrists and dived straight down underwater. We went so fast the water scrunched my face like an astronaut during a rocket launch. After travelling to what felt like forty thousand leagues under the sea, she turned and we broke the surface, clearing the water by at least ten feet. If Graysea was giggling, I couldn’t hear it over my screaming. We were on the beach in no time.

  As I crawled to the shore I said, ‘Warn me next time you do that.’

  She tilted her head. ‘Do what?’

  Standing shivering on solid ground I willed my robe to dry. It did, but also shrank to the size of a halter top. Graysea ran over quickly and made it become a full-sized, dry, warm robe again.

  ‘You shouldn’t do that here,’ she said with a disapproving look.

  ‘Thanks, I’ll remember that.’

  The walk to the royal residence was a quick march along the sand. Not that I could feel the sand, my feet were like blocks of ice. None of the Mertain, I noticed, wore shoes. I found out later that if their feet were cold or sore all they had to do was a quick change and everything was back to warm baby softness again. It was a trick the Pookas of the Pinelands hadn’t learned. When their animal selves are injured they carried their injuries through the change.

  The King had a cool beach house that had a wide porch-like jetty that stuck out over the water. Graysea had told me that the King was old – when I asked how old, she said, ‘Old old.’

  Me and my frozen feet were escorted to the royal porch where I stood and waited for about a quarter of an hour. Finally I sat on the decking and tried to instruct my robe to cover my feet, but I only succeeded in making it turn pale blue – the same colour as my toes. Talking to this robe was like trying to communicate with a blind Chinese guy. I decided to give up ’cause I didn’t want to be left in a miniskirt when the King arrived.

  A huge whoosh startled me to my feet as the King vaulted out of the water and landed dry as bone, on his feet, on his porch. It was a very ostentatious entrance but I must admit – impressive. I’m sure if I could do it, I would do it all the time too.

  I shouldn’t have worried about showing off my legs ’cause this guy’s kelp robe looked like a very short Roman toga. He seemed youngish, late twenties or early thirties, but the weird thing about him was that he had absolutely no hair. Not on his head, not on his legs and, disconcertingly, no eyebrows. He paced back and fort never once actually looking at me.

  ‘W
hy were you dropped by Tughe Tine?’ he asked the sea.

  ‘Your Highness, that is a long story – that I am happy to tell you but right now I think I’m going to either faint or go into hypothermic shock. Can we have this chat inside over a cup of tea?’

  He finally looked me straight in the eyes. He was as humourless as his bodyguards. I tried desperately not to stare at the space where his eyebrows should have been.

  ‘Tell me, what are your dealings with the dragon?’

  As he spoke my teeth started chattering again. My cold brain started to slip into that state where I just didn’t care what happened to me any more – I got lippy. ‘Do you know who I am?’

  In response the King snarled – I was beyond caring.

  ‘I’m the friggin’ Prince of Duir and I deserve better than this. Now, I’m happy to answer any of your questions but only over a cup of tea and with a blanket over my feet.’

  The only good thing about the Mertain dungeon was that it was warm. I got a cup of water and a leathery piece of dried fish. The fish smelled like sulphur but then so did the rest of the place. I’m sure that if I lived in that cell on a diet of baked beans, no one would notice.

  At that moment in my life, a dungeon was not a good place for me to be. It wasn’t just that it was damp and dark and dingy. The main problem was that there was nothing for me to do, so I was forced to live with my thoughts – and they were far from comforting. War was coming to the Hazellands. I needed to get off this rock to warn everybody about Turlow, but even if I could get out of this cell, I had no idea how to get back to the Tir na Nog mainland.

  I had no idea how Dad was. The last thing I had heard was that he was slowly getting worse. Was that still the case, or was his condition rapidly worsening? Or was he dead?

  I didn’t have to wonder if my travelling companions were dead. I hoped that somehow their end was swift but in my heart I knew it wasn’t and it was all my fault. I should have insisted that Brendan stay in Duir and I should have listened to him when he told me not to trust Turlow. If I ever got out of here, I knew I would have to go back to the Real World and try to explain to his mother and daughter about how he had died trying to help me. I dreaded that moment almost as much as having to tell Queen Rhiannon what had happened to her Tuan. The last thing she had said to me was, ‘Look after my son.’ If there was one thing I didn’t do on this trip, that was look after anybody. And I lost Araf – first Fergal and now Araf – there is just so much a heart can take. Not hearing Araf not speaking was deafening in its silence.