by Michelle Tea
The Vulcan was done. It removed its arms and brought them low around its body and they undulated close to the floor, levitating the creature slightly. Sophie’s head tingled and her heart felt full. Battered, but hopeful. At least Angel was okay. And Ella, she hadn’t hurt herself. Her mother—it was impossible to find a silver lining in what she had seen her mother going through. The memory made her blood chill. And her sister. She had seen her sister, and her sister had seen her. She had learned her name—Belinda. She yearned to see her again. Even though it hurt and frightened her, to see this strange, twisted version of herself, she longed to speak to her again. Belinda needed her help.
Such a strong mix of fear and sadness and love swirled through Sophie, and she thought, This is what I took from Syrena. How terrible it would feel to have these emotions taken from her! Would she rather not have her love at all? Of course not. Sophie realized how wise and magic the Vulcan truly was. As much as it had shown her, it had revealed so much more: the makeup of her own heavy heart. Sophie reached out and clasped two of its curling tentacles and brought them to her face, kissed them.
“Thank you,” she said quietly. She could already feel it pulling away, beginning its weird ghostly swim back into the depths. It patted her cheek briefly with one slender tentacle, then drifted deep into the cave and away.
That night, alone in the Ogresses’ cave, her head snug on a firm pillow of kelp, Sophie thought of her people, far away in Chelsea. How could she help them from so far away? She felt happiness at the thought of healthy Laurie LeClair, of baby Alize gurgling on Hennie’s lap. She took comfort in their comfort, as if it were she mundanely studying for a test under the supportive eyes of her aunt. She wished! Her sister, Belinda, was still a mystery. Her mother was trapped, but there seemed to be little Sophie could do to help her. Maybe she could send in Angel to help, but that would be basically feeding Angel to Kishka. Maybe she could handle it, but Sophie wouldn’t risk it. She had to trust that Andrea was Kishka’s daughter, had been dealing with her evil since before Sophie was even born, and would be okay.
But Ella. Sophie remembered the vision of her friend, alone in her room, crying. Ella, Angel could help. With Sophie gone, Ella needed someone, anyone to tell her problem to. She’d never tell her mother or any of her aunts. Poor Ella, surrounded by people but feeling so horribly alone. If Sophie were there she would do anything her friend wanted, anything to help her. Ella needed someone like that, not just a friend but a best friend, someone to listen to her and hug her and light her cigarettes and help her do whatever she wanted to do.
Sophie grew quiet inside herself, became still and went very, very deep. She sunk into herself like she had sunk into the ocean around her. She could feel the support of the salt in the water, the hum of it coming off the walls of the room. In the thin shaft of light her talisman created she watched as the tiniest motes of salt streamed around her. She reached out for Livia’s feather and stroked it gently. And then she sought Angel.
THOUSANDS OF MILES above her and thousands more across the land, Sophie sought her friend’s heart, and she found it, bursting into the familiar space with too much speed, too much gusto, too much excitement. She could feel Angel’s gasp rush up around her, Angel’s instinctive push to raise her walls, but Sophie had already breached them, and she was strong enough to keep them down. She filled Angel’s heart with her essence, and Angel, back in Chelsea, her back against a bench in Bellingham Square, became filled with wonder.
Sophie?
Yes! Sophie’s energy raised, was pure yes, and Angel was filled with laughter, her hands held to her heart as if she could feel her friend there, her eyes wide with delight. “Oh my god, oh my god!” She said aloud, joyful laughter spilling from her mouth, attracting the attention of some elderly ladies sitting nearby as well as a cluster of teenagers hanging on the corner—“Angel be tripping.”
Angel collected herself. The bus with its bold yellow stripe slid up to the curb, accordioned its doors open with a hiss to welcome the ladies and the teens, then crinkled shut. Momentarily alone in the busy square, Angel whispered, “Sophie?”
Sophie buzzed a scolding Sssssshhh! into Angel’s heart. They didn’t need to use real words, and Angel didn’t need to call attention to herself. She could just sit there on the bench and feel what Sophie had to tell her.
Oh, it felt so good to be in Angel’s heart again! She couldn’t help but peek around a bit. She saw her friend hard at work, taking tests, talking to people, and she felt how these people recognized Angel’s goodness. She saw Angel at a desk, talking to teenagers not much younger then she was. She felt the way Angel held them in her heart as they cried. Sophie was impressed. She couldn’t do that. Those teens were the ones who had shouted to her on the streets, forced her to take different routes home, sped by on dirt bikes, hurling catcalls in their wake. Sophie didn’t have room for them in her heart, but Angel did.
She tried to talk to Angel but found that the words didn’t work, not in long sentences. They got lost, fizzled out, or arrived in Angel’s heart slightly off, like a psychic version of the telephone game. She picked big, strong words, and sent them one at a time, like flares. Ella. Pregnant. Help. She conjured the image she’d seen in the bubble, of her friend hunched over the pregnancy test, sobbing. She made sure Angel saw the little plastic strip with the terrible pink lines, Ella’s face swollen and pink with tears. She felt Angel wrap her heart around the scene, as if giving it a hug. Sophie felt the squeeze in her own heart, and it brought tears to her eyes. Angel understood. Sophie was filled with gratitude. Her link to Angel was so strong, and Angel’s own powers so excellent, that they could communicate like this, across worlds.
Even with her message delivered, Sophie didn’t want to leave the familiar space of Angel’s heart. She could feel her friend wanting to know everything. But where could Sophie begin? She could send the words Ogress, Cave, Deep Sea, and hope for the best. But maybe such words would alarm Angel? They did sound kind of scary, if you didn’t know better. And Angel didn’t. She didn’t know anything. Sophie was overwhelmed by the weight of her story.
There was no way to tell it like this. So instead she opened up her heart in a bubble of love. I’m good. She hoped the phrase would land in Angel’s heart with all the happy vibes she’d packed it with. She could feel Angel’s response, one of relief and gratitude and an itch to know more, but Sophie had no more to give. The time spent traversing space and time to leap into Angel had exhausted her, even in this room of salt. She blew a kiss, and like a rubber band she shot out from Angel and back into herself.
Back in Chelsea, Angel felt the vacancy with the same shock as the girl’s arrival, and was glad she was sitting down. Whoa. She touched her heart again, and it was empty of all but herself. Her grin as the bus pulled up was big enough to eat the whole city. Sophie was okay! She was keeping tabs on all of them, somehow. And she needed a favor. Angel was happy to oblige. She strode onto the bus and took her seat, gazing out the scratched and spotted window, watching the city pass by. The world was amazing, bigger than she could ever fully know. She would find Sophie’s friend and see what she could do to help.
Thousands of miles beneath the sea, in the Ogresses’ ancient castle, Sophie slept hard, soaking in salt through the night.
Chapter 15
“This has been quite a difficult stop for you,” said Fenja from the edge of the Swilkie. It was morning, and Sophie and Syrena had feasted one last time at the giantesses’ giant table. It was time to move on.
The Swilkie’s eye was narrow at the mill, the gargantuan contraption the Ogresses cranked and spun, bringing salt into the sea. It was little more than a dust devil in the water. Sophie and Syrena would swim up alongside it and, as it widened, enter the tunnel easily, swimming through its center to the surface.
“We knew it could be hard, just entering the Swilkie, and beholding the Invisible. But we didn’t expect there would be so much hard learning,” said Menja sadly.
&nbs
p; “Is no problem,” Syrena said. “Is even good. Lesson must be learned, what better than here, in Ogresses’ cave? You take good care of us both.”
“Yes,” Sophie chimed in. “Thank you so much. It has been an honor to meet you.”
“The honor is ours,” said Fenja. “We hope you enjoy the Jottnars’ party. We so wish we could join, but—the milling.” Fenja sighed an ogress sigh, a blast of air that rose to the surface, creating a rogue wave somewhere in the middle of the ocean.
“Party?” Sophie gasped. “We’re going to a party?”
“Oh, ya,” Syrena nodded. “And I truly need one at this point, ya? Don’t you?”
Sophie hadn’t really thought about it. The last party she’d gone to had been Ella’s birthday, back in the spring. Ella’s whole family had been there, and they sang a birthday song to her in Spanish. One of her uncles had a drum that looked like a tambourine, and he smacked it to keep the beat. They ate mofongo and tostones and flan. And Ella got a million presents, a big jumble on her kitchen table, a pile of shiny paper trash and ribbon on the floor. Sophie had bummed money off her mother for a month leading up to the party, slowly collecting enough to buy Ella a T-shirt at the decal shop at the mall. BEST FRIENDS read the decal Sophie selected, with two glittery butterflies flying off together. She got her best friend’s name on the back in velvety pink letters. ELLA. Sophie had hoped that when her birthday rolled around, Ella would buy the same shirt for her, with her own name, SOPHIE, spelled across the back. But by the time Sophie’s birthday rolled around, who knew where she’d even be? Were she and Ella even friends anymore? She thought about the image of her friend crying in the Vulcan’s bubble. Pregnant. If Ella ever needed her best friend, it was now. And where was Sophie? A million miles beneath the sea, hanging out with blobfish and giants.
“Oh, I should know you be, how you call it, party-pooper,” Syrena grumbled, giving Sophie a poke.
“When you exit the Swilkie, you’ll find a dolphin pod waiting for you,” Fenja said. “We’ve arranged for them to ferry you to Laeso Island. That’s where you’re headed to, yes?”
“That’s where the party is,” Syrena said in what sounded like a chirp. Sophie had never seen her so buoyant.
“The dolphins have some things for you,” Menja said. “Some gifts from us.”
“You’ve already done so much,” Syrena said, smiling.
“Yeah, really,” Sophie chimed in.
“What you are doing for us, both of you, is beyond anything we could do for you,” Menja said. “Sophia, we have been tending this mill since we were children. Just kidnapped slaves. The king had mistaken us for grown women, but we were just babies. And we worked his mill, slowly growing into our Ogress selves. Eventually we grew large enough to banish the king, but then we understood how close to the Invisible we were. It’s probably what made the king so terrible! And so we continue to mill the salt. Perhaps after you’re done with your duties, perhaps my sister and I can take a break! Or mill something else. Who knows?”
“It’s nice to think about,” Fenja said dreamily.
“I would hug you and kiss you,” Syrena said, “but would be awkward. You both so big.”
“Sending you big, crushing giant hugs!” Menja boomed.
And Sophie and Syrena swam up along the Swilkie, and as it widened, swam easily into the eye.
“Getting in is easy,” Syrena said. “Leaving is hard.”
“Am I going to get caught in the whirlpool again?” Sophie worried aloud. After all she had been through, her resolve to not be a whiny teenager, to behave in a way more fitting to a half-Odmieńce, was forgotten in the face of the Swilkie.
“Not unless you screw it up,” Syrena said. “Must leap out! Like dolphin. Or like mermaid.”
“Leap out?”
“Ya,” Syrena nodded. “Come up to the surface fast and strong. Explode from surface! Like rocket, ya? Leap into the air! Leap away from the Swilkie. No problem.”
“Ya,” Sophie said, in an unfriendly mockery of the mermaid’s voice. “Just ‘leap.’ No big deal.”
“Do not do that, Sophie,” Syrena snapped. “Too cheap for magic girl.”
“Sorry,” Sophie mumbled. She had mocked Syrena, but really she had only envy and respect for the mermaid. They had grown even closer down here in the Ogresses’ world, and all Sophie wanted was to be as confident as Syrena, as worldly—or underworldly. Ocean-y? She wanted to believe she could leap out from the Swilkie, easy and elegant as a flying fish skimming the ocean surface. Even a giant, cumbersome whale could break the surface with grace.
That thought gave Sophie an idea. She had morphed into a shark to defeat her grandmother, so why couldn’t she morph into a sea creature to dive out from the Swilkie? Why couldn’t she become a whale? Or even a mermaid?
I could! Sophie thought, a marvelous thought. I could become a mermaid! Her powers intimidated her, and some of them truly scared her. She didn’t quite understand how she had become the shark, but she knew it had to do with desperation, and fear and anger, powerful emotions that fused with her magic. She wasn’t angry at the Swilkie, and she wasn’t terrified, not like she was of her grandmother. But she was definitely scared.
Swimming behind the mermaid, the water under her command, Sophie watched the way Syrena’s tail writhed and kicked. It undulated elegantly, but with the force of something shot from a cannon. Sophie imagined her lower body moving in such a way. She mimicked the mermaid’s motions, as much as she could in her human body. Above them the sea’s surface was a sheet of glittering blue, framed by the dense froth of the Swilkie. Like jumping through a hoop, Sophie thought. A flaming hoop. What if she missed it and belly flopped into the Swilkie? Well, the water would seize her and spin her and make her its puppet. She’d twirl for days, weeks, months, until Syrena broke the spell or grew bored and went on to her party. No, she couldn’t let it get her again. Sophie kicked her legs like pistons, watching as Syrena burst through the surface, her body arcing in the air above her, casting a sparkling shadow above the water. And then it was Sophie’s turn.
The zawolanie that left her mouth created its own miniature storm inside the whirlpool. Sophie saw the water change as the sound hit it, creating a path for her to follow out and over the Swilkie. The sound of the zawolanie as she broke the surface was an unearthly siren; it rang in Sophie’s own ears, briefly, and then she was up and over, plunging back into the sea. She had done it. She had made it out.
ABOVE THE WAVES, Syrena’s mouth hung open as if ready to sing her own curse. Around them bobbed a pool of dolphins, some wearing packs, like burros, some outfitted with reins of seaweed and linen. All of them were decorated with large chunks of salt, and all of them were looking directly at Sophie.
Eeeeeee iiieeee eieieie, one sounded to Syrena. The mermaid looked confused and a little offended at the noise, and turned back and forth between the creature and Sophie.
“Well, you were correct, there is only one mermaid!” Syrena barked at the dolphin. “And it is I!”
The pod looked at Syrena, and then returned their gaze to Sophie. Where she once had legs, she now had tails—two solid fishtails covered in a mosaic of scales, ending in flukes where her feet had been. Sophie’s own eyes widened at the sight of herself. She lifted her new tails and gathered them in her arms, laughter pouring from her mouth. She inspected her scales, glinting like a chain mail of new jewels. She gazed at her twin flukes, the delicate webbing at the scalloped tips, and rubbed them against her face.
“Oh, come now!” Syrena hollered. “What is this, love festival? That nice, you help yourself out of Swilkie with magic, very smart. Now—” the mermaid clapped her hands together—“back to girl, please. We must go to party.”
“But Syrena—look!” Sophie swam toward the mermaid—swam! Like a mermaid! She tilted her hips and her tails gently propelled her through the water. “Check it out! I’m a mermaid!” She brought her hands, full of tail, up to Syrena’s furrowed brow.
“No
, you not mermaid. You Odmieńce making magic. Now, come on. Back to normal.”
Sophie could not believe she’d just been coasting through the sea—for how long? It felt like ages! Coasting through the sea on a boring current of water when she could have been mermaiding through the water with her twin tails! She gathered her hair behind her and did a triple flip, rolling over and over, her tails muscular and gleaming. When she came to a stop she was dizzy and giggling. Suddenly it wasn’t a big deal to have a head full of tangles. She was not an unkempt girl—she was a mermaid.
“Sophie, no,” Syrena said. “Is not good. Can’t stay in shifted shape for so long. Is moment-magic.” She cleared her throat, and soberly swam over to Sophie’s tails, running her fingers along scales. “Very nice job, though.” She relented. “Very nice, the double tail. Make sense for human girl.”
“Odmieńce girl,” Sophie said proudly, conjuring a haughty confidence.
“Oh, please,” Syrena scoffed. “Odmieńce girl. Enough, now. Dolphins await. Expecting girl and mermaid. You confuse them.”
“I’m going to stay like this,” Sophie declared.
Syrena shook her head sternly. “Over my dead mermaid body.”