“No,” she said.
“Pearl—”
“NO!” she screamed in my face. “I don’t want to be alone down there!”
I felt so queasy, I thought I’d vomit. She looked at me defiantly. Her face before me seemed frozen for a moment, as if she were a photograph, as if I knew this all would soon be a memory and I was resisting the slip of time. I registered her every surface with a clarity that stunned and frightened me. I didn’t want her out of my sight.
You need to get moving, I told myself, trying to shut my thoughts down. You need to get her a pack in case we get separated. I ushered Pearl into the cabin with me and grabbed an empty knapsack. I rummaged through the shelves, filling the bag with a flint rod, a thin coil of rope, a wool blanket, a jackknife, and a few of the water bottles Marjan was filling from the cistern. I raided the kitchen cupboards for food and found a small tin of salmagundi and a jar of hardtack biscuits.
Then I pulled Pearl toward the hatch. She clawed at my wrists and pried my hands from her shoulders.
“It won’t be long,” I lied. “I’ll be coming down to check on you.”
“What if the water starts coming in?”
I imagined a cannonball splitting Sedna’s hull, water pouring in, the mad roar and rush of a cold force that could bend metal. And Pearl in the middle of it all, her small form shaking.
My stomach clenched. I gritted my teeth and tried to steel myself. My nerves began to snap shut, like an oyster shutting out the sea.
“It won’t. And if it does, I’ll come get you,” I said, climbing down the ladder with her.
“The water is cold here,” Pearl said.
This stopped me. I had been busy thinking of cannonballs and bullets and fire, calculating distances for different attacks. But Sedna sinking would take all of us at once. The water would be so cold that we couldn’t hang on to scrap wood and float to a rocky outcropping. Blood would freeze and rattle in our veins.
The hull stank of mold and mildew. Ever since we got the leak from the storm, it had been musty and damp in the hull. I led Pearl down the short hallway into the food storage room and tucked her between some near-empty barrels of grain.
Footsteps thundered above us. I needed to get back up to help. Pearl grabbed my arm.
“Stay with me,” she murmured.
“I would if I could, honey,” I said. I kissed her forehead and smoothed her hair back from her face.
“The water is too cold to swim in,” she said, her chin trembling.
“I know. But you won’t be in the water.” Sedna shuddered, and for a wild moment I thought we were brushing against an iceberg, but then she moved clear and easy. Just a rough wave.
I tried to steady my breath. “I’ll come back for you,” I promised.
Pearl trembled, but she leaned back between the barrels, her face full of trust.
“Okay,” she said.
Back on deck, Thomas and Abran were at the mainmast, trimming the sails.
“What’re they doing?!” I yelled at Daniel back at the tiller.
“We need to trim the sails, we’re going too fast. I can’t navigate through this ice,” Daniel yelled back.
“If we slow down, they’ll be close enough to fire the cannons,” I said. I ran a hand through my hair and swore.
An iceberg lay up ahead and Daniel steered us to the right. Jessa and Wayne loaded rifles and checked bombs in the cabin. Marjan loaded the water into backpacks. I slung a rifle around my chest, stuck an extra knife in the sheath at my waist, and stepped out of the cabin.
The Lily Black was only a mile away, on the starboard side, charging toward us. The ship’s sails were black, giving it the appearance of a dark beast bounding toward prey. Several men and women moved about on deck, carrying guns. Daniel’s brother stood at the bow, his hair brushed back by the wind, so still he looked like a statue.
Two women carried a wooden ladder with curved ends. To climb aboard. Like using ladders to scale walls, only our walls were the gunwales. They intended to hook us and send men aboard.
My breath went short and shallow, my hands clammy. The pigeon, which flew almost as fast as the Lily Black sailed, was now almost over us. So pale it almost blended in with the sky. I looked beyond it, back at the ship. Smoke billowed from a makeshift chimney in its cabin.
“Marjan!” I called out. I wasn’t worried about deck fires, which would be easy to extinguish. I was worried about the sails burning, the flames fanned by the wind, inching downward toward us like a candle burning.
Marjan emerged from the cabin and I pointed to the smoke and we both ran for the buckets tied to the stern. We dropped them over the side of Sedna, hauled them up by the rope tied to their handles. We dumped the salt water into the now drained cistern, the water foaming and eddying in small currents.
After I’d dumped my fourth bucket into the cistern, Abran caught my arm.
“Myra. If I don’t—”
I shook my head and tried to pull away, but his hand tightened around my arm.
“Just try and fulfill my promise. To my brother. If it’s you and not me,” he said. His eyes were bloodshot, the skin under them so creased and puffy, he looked like he hadn’t slept in weeks. His skin was ashen. I reached out and laid my palm on his cheek.
“We want the same thing,” I said. A home. Somewhere with a future that we’d actually want to be in. I didn’t understand how I hadn’t known this all along. It didn’t stop with rescuing Row. It stopped with making a life for all of us.
He nodded. He took my head in his hands and kissed the top of my forehead.
Behind him I caught sight of the canoe, fastened to the cabin’s west wall. It only held four people, so we always took turns rowing to coasts. There would be no escaping on it. Even if it could hold all of us, the Lily Black would follow us in it.
A single shot rang out and I flinched. The pigeon dropped dead a few feet away, a splattering of blood seeping into the wood deck.
A piece of paper was rolled and tied to its ankle. I squatted before it and pulled the paper loose.
The crew huddled around me.
My heart rose to my throat when I saw the words. “You have one of ours. Hand him over,” I read aloud. They meant Abran, I thought, but Jackson wouldn’t stop until he had Daniel.
“I’ll go,” Daniel said. Daniel walked toward the canoe and began to unfasten the rope.
“Daniel, wait! It’s not you,” I called out to him.
An awful churning began in my chest. A chill spread in my veins.
Row was so close. I could see the Valley. After all this time, she was almost within reach. I had come too far on this journey to be sunk by cannons now. Pearl was in the hull. My mouth went dry and I tried to swallow. I imagined sending Abran out to them, paddling through the icy water to his death.
The image made me light-headed. My thoughts skidded and jumbled. There was a line that couldn’t be crossed, and Jacob had taught me where it was. I remembered Jacob wanting me to abandon my mother and grandfather and to leave early with him before the water reached Nebraska.
I had that same reaction now—the tightening in my gut, the refusal in my chest. After losing my mother and grandfather, I was certain I’d never feel that way about anyone again. But that same irrational loyalty tugged at me. The same loose-limbed feeling of vulnerability. The same defensive resolve. We weren’t handing over one of our own. I intended to rescue Row, and I still would. If I had to survive the Lily Black to get to her, I would.
The crew glanced at each other and I was careful not to look at Abran.
“So someone on this ship is a raider?” Wayne asked, his eyes narrowed in suspicion.
“Someone on this ship was a raider,” I corrected him. “We aren’t giving anyone up. There’s no reason to believe they wouldn’t still attack.”
Daniel returned to working the canoe loose. “We don’t have a chance making it with them on our tail. I’ll go. This began with me; it will end with me.”
“That isn’t the point,” I snapped at Daniel.
“This isn’t just your choice,” Wayne said to me. “Abran, what do you think—”
Abran ripped the handkerchief from his neck, exposing the scars.
“I was Lily Black,” he said, pointing to his scars. Everyone turned to him in shock. His stoicism began to collapse, his face knotting in fear and pain.
“All this time . . .” Wayne said, a sharp edge to his voice.
Jessa crossed her arms and took a step back, eyes narrowed at Abran. Marjan showed no surprise, but Thomas ran a hand over his face. Everyone grew silent and distant.
We can’t withdraw from each other, I thought. I had spent my whole life withdrawing from people. We needed to pull together. “We ignore it and continue on. They are too big to navigate this ice,” I said with more certainty than I felt.
A sad, resigned look flattened the planes of Abran’s face. He shook his head.
“We’ll never escape them, Myra,” he said softly.
“If he goes, they may let us go,” Jessa said, her voice high and anxious.
Abran nodded and began to cross our circle toward the canoe. I wouldn’t see him hanging from the bow of the Lily Black’s ship. My vision tunneled.
“NO!!” I roared, shoving Abran so hard he fell to the deck.
I spun around toward the crew with my fists raised, and they shuffled backward. I saw myself through their expressions: the caution, the shock. The way a person looks at a dog with teeth bared and hackles raised. I must have looked like a woman possessed.
“We don’t hand over one of our own,” I said quietly.
The crew exchanged looks. Marjan nodded. “I’ll get the flag,” Marjan said.
Marjan came out of the cabin with the orange flag, the flag that meant a refused request. Now we weren’t Sedna. We were defiance. Orange as the sky before dark.
For seconds after we raised the flag, there was silence. Then came a sound like air sucked in quickly. A strange tension filled the air, like a line strung between us and them, a fast vibration. And then only sound.
Chapter 49
I fell to the ground and the explosion rattled in my ears. Wood splintering, water pouring in, Sedna heaving. Marjan lay near me, her hands over her head. Thomas peered over the gunwale; screamed at Daniel to get to the tiller. We were hurtling toward an iceberg.
Smoke clouded the air. There was the thick metallic scent of ammunition. I stumbled forward to duck behind the gunwale. A lit arrow struck the deck next to my foot. I ripped the arrow out, stomped out the flame.
Wayne and Jessa fired rifles over the starboard gunwale. I ducked behind the gunwale with them and fired. The rocking of the ship made aim almost impossible, and I’d never been a good shot anyway. I was always better with an enemy in one hand and a knife in the other. Bullets splintered the gunwale. I looked over the gunwale and saw their cannonball had skimmed the front of Sedna, flattening the tip of the prow. Bits of wood littered the sea around us and the top of the bow yawned open with splintered planks.
Across the deck, Abran and Marjan tossed buckets of water against the cabin, where a small fire had spread. The Lily Black slowed as it maneuvered between two icebergs, but it was less than a half mile away.
Bullets were too small. We needed fire. If only I could hit their mainsail. We needed to drown them in this ice water. I had to get to the cabin.
I slung the rifle across my chest and ran low to the ground toward the cabin. A smattering of bullets pocked the wood around me. I heard a scream from the bow of the ship, but the cabin blocked me from seeing who it belonged to.
I burst into the cabin and ran for the kitchen. I fumbled with the matches at the stove, lighting the kindling and fanning it until it caught flame.
I rummaged through the weapons laid out on the cabin table, found a bow and set of arrows. I tied a rag around the tip of my arrow. With shaking hands, I found the rubbing alcohol where Marjan kept it hidden in a secret cupboard. I poured it on the rag and held the rag against the flame until it flared.
The second cannonball hit when I emerged from the cabin. The impact roared through me and shook Sedna. I fell to the deck as the ship quaked under me, the burning arrow scorching my chest.
I pushed myself off my chest back onto my heels. The extinguished arrow lay on the deck and I cursed.
Pearl, I thought. Had the cannonball pierced the hull?
There was a dull roar, like water rushing. Voices clamoring. Disoriented, I pulled myself to my feet, ready to dart back into the cabin to relight the arrow.
The Lily Black plunged toward us, water spraying up on either side of its bow. Its ram was about to hit us broadside.
“Get out of the way!” Abran screamed from somewhere behind me. He grabbed my arm and flung me to the deck.
The Lily Black rammed into Sedna, the impact like an earthquake in my spine. People collapsed to the deck on both ships. Our sails reversed, the wind knocked out of them. We leaned together toward the right and I thought we’d flip over straight into the sea, but the ships leveled. They threw grappling hooks over, hooking our gunwale, straining to pull us closer. Sedna couldn’t pull away.
They’ll board us soon, I thought numbly, my mind jumbled.
Thomas ran toward a grappling hook and cut the rope with his machete. Another was tossed over.
I tucked the extinguished arrow in the quiver on my back and slung the bow across my chest. I crawled to the hatch, pulled it open, and dropped down. Breath lurched in my throat when I plunged into the icy water.
“Mom!”
I squinted in the hull’s shadowy light and saw the silhouette of Pearl, shaking, ankle deep in water, standing in the hallway between the storage room and quarters. Mold mixed with seawater and explosives made a sharp and bitter odor, like a soiled hand over my mouth.
Pearl clutched a burlap sack that was rustling and bulging, the bodies inside coiling and curling over one another. She had gone into the quarters to get those damn snakes.
“It’s cold,” Pearl whispered.
I splashed through the water and lifted her. The roar of water coming in the ship blocked out the noise from above, as if we stood under a waterfall. I ran down the hallway to the hatch, pushing her up the ladder ahead of me. I had to get her off this ship. My mind hollowed except for this one thought. The canoe hung from the cabin; we needed to get to it quickly. Maybe she could make it to the Valley even if we couldn’t.
Once above, I could barely see through the smoke. I looked up and saw that our mainsail had caught fire. Smoke billowed above us, blackening the sky. Marjan swung in the rigging, blood coating one arm, trying to dump a bucket of water on the sail.
Screams, thundering footsteps, rifle fire swirled around me. Explosions from bombs broke the chaos into intervals, like the chimes of a clock. Several men on the Lily Black held the hooked ladder upright, trying to get the angle right before letting it fall and hook over our gunwale.
Ahead of me, Jessa loaded her rifle. A gunshot rang out and she jerked once and crumpled to the deck, folding over herself like a rag doll.
I ran with Pearl around the port side of the cabin to where the canoe hung. All the feeling had gone from my fingers and I fumbled with the knots. Finally, I got them loose, and Pearl lifted one end of the canoe and I lifted the other.
We lowered the canoe over the side of Sedna, rope feeding through our hands until we couldn’t feel the canoe’s weight. I grabbed the rope ladder hung on the cabin wall, threaded it through the shackles on the gunwale, and dropped it over the side of the ship.
Pearl was wearing the warm boots I’d bought her, and I bent down and tightened the laces.
“When you get to land, if these have gotten wet, you build a fire with your flint and dry your feet before crossing the mountain, you understand?”
Pearl nodded.
“Hurry,” I said, reaching for Pearl
to help her over the gunwale.
Pearl jumped back and shook her head. “The water is cold,” she said.
“You won’t be in the water,” I said. I could feel my resolve ebbing away, so I hardened my voice. “Get on the ladder.”
Pearl’s eyebrows knitted together, her chin quivering. “I don’t want to go alone.”
My heart sped like hoofbeats on my chest wall. Looking into her eyes split me in two, so I looked out over the sea, tried to imagine the route she’d row through the icebergs, toward land.
I wanted more than anything to go with her, to get off the sinking ship, to make for the Valley and find Row. You’ve told Pearl you wouldn’t leave her, I thought. I felt a straining in my ligaments, a tightening in my joints. As though I would burst.
The night Pearl was born rose before me. The flashes of lightning, the high waves and rolling thunder. Pearl’s screech, high as a nocturnal animal on the hunt. Her limbs flailing and then settling once I wrapped her tight in a blanket. A sleepy look crossing her face as if she had half returned to the place she had come from.
I’ll fail you, I had thought, holding her in my arms.
Grandfather died a year after Pearl was born. His hands knotted as tree trunks, thin wisps of hair wet with sweat. He rambled on and on the evening he died, telling me, The world is more than all this. You’ll see that you’re more than all this. He had said it like it was a promise.
Grandfather’s face had startled me before he passed. It was so full of trust, a gentle easing into another place. Like Pearl’s face after she was born, as she lay heavy lidded and drowsy, her body warm with that before world of where she’d been and where she’d return.
Maybe we all were born with trust and then lost it. Maybe we all had to find it again before we left.
I had brought the crew this far; I couldn’t abandon them now. I wasn’t alone and drifting anymore; that person was gone. Everything in me reached for Pearl, yet I also felt a resistance in my bones. A knowledge that some choices are places and some places are where you cannot live. I had to go where I could live. I had to finish what I started and to keep stretching toward a future I had no right to believe in.
After the Flood Page 28