The Deepest Blue

by Sarah Beth Durst

  Maybe we can count on being clever and careful.

  Maybe that will be enough.

  Maybe . . .

  She retreated into the cave with the shards and deposited them in a corner. She studied them for a moment. Catching a bit of stray light from the opening, one of the shards winked. She picked it up. Its edges were sharper than any of the rocks, though the glass was more fragile. It could be useful. As she retightened her wrap dress, she tucked the glass shard into her belt. She then scooted the rest out of the light so that no one outside would see any suspicious glints.

  “We’re going to die,” Roe said flatly. “Palia was right.”

  Mayara looked up, surprised. They’d just defeated a spirit! They had the right seaweed to heal Roe’s injury! And they even had mussels and snails to eat. Uncooked, the snails weren’t the best, but mussels were one of her favorite foods, even without her father’s mango sauce. I wonder if I can find any ripe mangoes on the island. . . .

  “Not today,” Mayara said firmly. “We aren’t going to die today, and that’s all that matters.”

  Roe smiled. “You sound like me. I was so optimistic—until I hurt myself within the first hour and nearly died within the first day.”

  “But you didn’t die, and you’re going to heal. All we have to do is keep surviving one day at a time.” Mayara put her hand on top of Roe’s, gently, over the seaweed pressed to her wound. “Just one day at a time.”

  THEY CONTINUED TO NOT DIE.

  They weren’t comfortable. Or clean. Or well fed. But they were still alive.

  Not dying is an excellent start, Mayara thought, as she prepared to leave the cave for her second trip out. She planned to venture closer to the trees today—they needed a freshwater source if they didn’t want to help the spirits out by dying of dehydration.

  “You’re sure this is a good idea?” Roe asked. “You going alone?”

  “It’s a terrible idea,” Mayara said. “Everything here is a terrible idea. But I don’t think there’s much choice.” She didn’t want to go out there at all, much less alone. But she also didn’t want to wither away from thirst, hunger, and fear.

  “I want to come with you.”

  “You need to heal.” She handed her another wad of angel seaweed. I’ll pick up more on my way back. “Reapply and try to get more of the sand and dirt out of there.”

  “I hate feeling helpless. You’ve already done so much. It should be me out there this time, risking myself. Not hiding in here.”

  “You can help when you’ve healed.”

  “And how many of our spirit sisters will die in the meantime? We should be finding them and helping them. I heard another scream last night.”

  Mayara had heard it too. She’d tried to pretend it was a monkey’s howl, but she hadn’t been able to stop picturing Kemra’s body, strangled in vines and pierced by thorns. “We can’t help anyone if we don’t help ourselves first. And for that—”

  “Fine. But if you don’t return . . .” Roe left the threat hanging, presumably because there was nothing to threaten Mayara with.

  If I don’t return, I’ll be dead, Mayara thought. And Roe will need to heal fast or die too.

  “Wish me luck,” Mayara said as she crawled out of the mouth of their cave.

  She blinked in the sunlight. The turquoise water sparkled. A few water spirits were swimming like dolphins to the west, leaping and splashing in the waves. She judged them too far away to fear, at least for now.

  Scampering over the rocks, Mayara hurried up the shore toward the coconut trees. If she could bring back just a few, that would give them enough water to last a little longer without having to venture out for a while. And then if they hollowed out the shells, she could use those to fetch freshwater from one of the streams, or they could set them out to collect rainwater.

  She kept her mind open for spirits, watching the sky as well as the trees, as she crept up to a copse of coconut trees. She didn’t want to be caught halfway up a trunk. It took a lot not to just freeze. Because even though they weren’t that close, her thoughts kept brushing against their minds:

  Three water spirits out in the sea.

  One water spirit, medium size, in a nearby stream.

  Two air spirits, both small, to the east.

  One tree spirit . . . No, that was heading in the opposite direction.

  Even though she wasn’t in their sights, she was still surrounded, and it felt more claustrophobic than the cave. She’d be quick. Up a tree, knock down a few coconuts, down the tree, and then back to Roe. She selected the tree—and then stopped as she saw an odd tangle of vines by the base. Tiptoeing up to it, Mayara knelt and studied the tangle. It was a loop with a knot, laid at the base of the tree, exactly where you’d want to step if you were about to climb the tree.

  It’s a trap.

  She backed up.

  Odd that there was another snare like the kind that had caught Roe, rather than something more . . . well, magical, for lack of a better word. It was more the kind of trap that a human hunter would lay than a spirit that could control the elements. Grabbing a stick, she poked at the vines. She’d never heard of a spirit leaving human-style traps. They were far more likely to force the vines to grow faster than normal and knot themselves around you, like they did with Kemra. Very, very odd, she thought. She resolved to think about it more when she was safely back with Roe. In the meantime, she scooted the snare to the side with her stick and cleared a space to access the tree.

  Checking again for spirits, Mayara unwound her cloth belt and tied it into a one-foot-wide loop. She then stepped into the loop and spread her legs so it was taut between her ankles. That was the trick to climbing a coconut tree: a loop of fabric around your ankles. It would give her feet more stability and thereby give her more leverage. Elorna had taught her years ago. She’d liked to wake early and harvest a few extra coconuts just for herself, before the village harvesters had a chance to claim them. Sometimes she shared with Mayara.

  Mayara climbed, wondering if Elorna had tried to scale these same trees. They’d never been told how she died exactly, only that it was on the island. It was a peculiar sensation, that it was here, so far from home, that Mayara again felt close to Elorna. Then she pushed thoughts of her sister out of her mind and focused on her task.

  At the top, she twisted the stems and then dropped the coconuts. They thudded to the ground. One, two, three, four . . . There, that should be enough. Panting, she began the climb down. Her arms and legs were aching. She hadn’t climbed like this in ages.

  Concentrating, she almost missed sensing the tree spirit flittering through the grove. She caught the high-pitched giggle of its thoughts when it was only a few trees away. It hadn’t seen her yet.

  Barely daring to breathe, Mayara flattened against the trunk. She was too visible and too exposed. She looked across the island—and then wished she hadn’t.

  She knew whose scream they’d heard in the night.

  Splayed with her arms and legs wide, Nissala was pinned to one of the closer cliffsides, only a few trees away from Mayara. Her hands and feet were encased in stone, and her head was cocked at an unnatural angle, mostly severed from her body. Her tunic was stained red. She was undoubtedly dead.

  As I’ll be, if I’m caught.

  It felt as if Nissala had been left as a warning sign. Or a victory flag.

  Mayara looked down. She was halfway up the tree. Not an impossible drop, but not safe either. And if she broke or twisted her ankle or her leg . . .

  She felt the spirit draw closer. Felt its bottomless hunger and rage.

  No choice, she thought.

  She pulled one foot out of the sash and then jumped.

  Landing on bent legs, she felt the impact shake through her. It knocked her back, but she didn’t hear or feel a snap. Getting to her feet, she heard the spirit cry. It’s seen me! She ran, not down toward the shore but up toward the top of the cliffs. She heard it shriek as it chased her.

 
Beneath her feet, grasses sprouted higher, growing impossibly fast. They reached for her ankles, as ahead of her vines wove themselves into a net. Thorns burst from the vines as they thickened.

  Faster! Faster! Mayara ordered herself. But she didn’t let the words escape her own mind. She kept a tight lid on her thoughts, focusing on running toward the edge of the cliff.

  The thorny vines creeped across the edge of the cliff, growing as she watched. She aimed for a spot higher, bare rocks, not yet touched by the impossible growth.

  She felt the spirit’s claws snag her hair, but Mayara barreled forward, strands of hair ripping from her scalp. She didn’t slow as she reached the edge. She exhaled, still running, then inhaled as fully as she could as she leaped off the cliff into the open air, diving toward the sea.

  She plunged into the water.

  For an instant, she was cocooned in bubbles. Breaking free, she swam down, deeper, away from the spirit. She felt its anger behind her. I made it! I—

  And then the spirit claimed control over the seaweed.

  The kelp began to grow so fast that it looked as if it were unraveling large skeins of green, leathery fabric. It wrapped around her. Struggling, she pulled out her glass shard and sliced.

  Slicing and struggling, she fought her way free. She kicked hard, swimming deeper toward the rocks and away from the reef. Her lungs began to burn. She wasn’t thinking—she was only fleeing. Away, away, must get away! She saw a gap in the rocks ahead, empty of seaweed, and she aimed for it as she felt another strand of kelp whip her ankle.

  She kicked hard and shot into the gap.

  She saw a glow above her. Sunlight meant air. Air! She swam up.

  Bursting out of the surface, Mayara sucked in air. She tried to calm herself, breathing in and out. She caught a trickle of the spirit’s thoughts: it was radiating its dismay to as many spirits as it could. It wasn’t words, but she guessed the gist. It was calling for others to help it search.

  Trying to slow down her panic enough to plan, she took stock of where she was: a hole in the rocks. Open at the top, she could see a patch of blue sky, but the hole was too small for her to squeeze out. Her only exit was back down through the water. But she couldn’t go near the kelp again, not with the tree spirit out there waiting for her to do exactly that.

  Can I swim around it?

  It depended on whether the tree spirit had called on any water spirits. Concentrating, she sent her thoughts out again. She brushed against three, aiming for the reef, each filled with glee and hunger so sharp that it made her shake. Fear threatened to choke her, driving away her ability to sense the spirits. Treading water, she tried to force the terror down. She couldn’t let them feel her fear.

  She could send them away, but she didn’t know if she could control so many of them. And whatever spirits she failed to command would come for her. Right now, they don’t know where I am. That gave her an advantage. A very slight, very pathetic advantage.

  Calming herself with difficulty, she reached out with her mind again—only to feel a bit of panic once more, as even more spirits were flowing toward where she’d dived into the sea. What kept her from losing her mind completely was the strangeness of it all, since a few seemed to be coming from beneath the island rather than from above.

  Mayara remembered when she and Roe first found their cave. They’d both felt spirits moving beneath and through the heart of the island. Could there be tunnels that went deeper than the caves that pocked the cliffs?

  Why, though?

  And . . . can we somehow use that to our advantage?

  She felt an air spirit within the island, in the middle of what should be rock. She tracked it as it swam out of the caves and through the reef toward the kelp forest to join in the search.

  It had exited the caves only a few yards away from where she hid. I could swim there.

  But then what? What if the tunnel never came up to the surface? What if it was completely flooded? Yet the spirit she’d felt had been an air spirit, she reminded herself. As far as she knew, they needed to breathe.

  It was a risk. But staying here isn’t—it’s certain death. And I can’t go out there.

  She made the decision. And committed to it. Exhaling fully, Mayara drew in air, preparing as she would for a deep dive, then propelled herself down.

  Mayara swam smoothly, careful not to disturb the water, keeping her senses open and her mind clear. Blue surrounded her. She aimed for the darkest of blues: toward the base of the cliff, where she’d felt the air spirit emerge.

  Ahead, there was a break in the rocks, laced with bits of seaweed that waved gently in the current. Mayara swam through it, flinching slightly when she brushed past the seaweed, remembering the last time she’d encountered kelp, but she pushed on, and she left the clear glow of sunlight behind her.

  An eerie kind of deep blue wavered around her. Only a little light filtered into the cave. She didn’t feel any spirits nearby. A few fish darted around her, streaks of silver. A jellyfish that looked like an iridescent flower drifted by.

  The peacefulness of a deep dive settled into her, and she felt calm as she swam through the tunnel. Ahead, she saw a hint of more light. She swam toward it and then emerged. And breathed.

  She was in a cavern. Light streamed through a hole high above her. The cave walls glistened and sparkled blue and green. Swimming to the side, she pulled herself up onto a rock and panted. Near as she could tell, she was alone.

  And not dead. That part’s important.

  For several minutes, Mayara thought about nothing else. She just breathed.

  And then her brain started to work again. Not only were there caves by the shore, but the entirety of Akena Island seemed to be laced with caves and tunnels. The spirits used them. With a thrill, she thought, So can we.

  When she had rested enough, she began the climb up toward the light. The cave wall was nearly vertical, but it was rough enough to grip. She focused on not slipping. Reaching the hole, she hesitated, feeling for any spirits.

  She felt a clump of them to the north. But none were here.

  Climbing out, Mayara flopped onto the grass in the sunlight. Allowing herself only a few seconds to rest, she concentrated on slowing her breathing and her rapidly beating heart. She was exposed now and couldn’t afford to stay out in the open. As tired as she was, she had to move. Mayara forced herself to stand. She spared an extra second to smear a handful of suka berries on the entrance of the cavern, marking it so she could find it again, and then she picked her way over the rocks. She was just above where the mess had all started, near the coconut grove not far from her and Roe’s cave.

  She didn’t sense any spirits in the grove now, at least as far as she could tell. They were all out at sea, searching for her. She made her way across the sand between the trees and picked up the fabric loop she’d used to climb. She also stored the fallen coconuts in her sash. She did not look up at the cliffs, tried not to imagine Nissala’s body pinned by the stone that the spirits had used to kill her.

  Carefully, she crept down to the shore.

  She felt prickles on her back and neck as she made her way across the rocks and then into the cave, but nothing attacked. And when she crawled deeper, Roe was waiting for her.

  “Lots of spirits out there,” Roe whispered.

  Mayara unloaded the coconuts and then collapsed against the wall of the cave. Feeling the stone against her back, she again thought of Nissala. “Maybe staying hidden for a while would be a good idea.”

  MAYARA SHARED WHAT SHE’D LEARNED ABOUT THE CAVES AS SHE hacked a hole in one of the coconuts. Roe, though, didn’t seem at all surprised. “I think you’re right. While you were going for a refreshing swim—”

  “Ha, very funny,” Mayara muttered, then shuddered. Nissala’s fate could so easily have been hers.

  “—I did a little exploring. Our cave goes back. Far back.”

  “How far?” Mayara peered into the darkness. She’d checked several yards in to make
sure they weren’t sleeping with a nest of spirits, but when the cave had narrowed, she’d assumed it ended.

  “I just said ‘far back’ in a deliberately vague way. No idea. I crawled as far as I could, but the dark was, well, very dark.”

  “You shouldn’t have been crawling around alone and injured to begin with.”

  “I told you: I hate feeling helpless. I don’t want to hide here for a month, waiting until it’s our turn to scream until we die. I won’t do it. If I can’t leave the cave, then I’ll go deeper in.”

  “Fine.” She wished Roe didn’t have this need to be a hero. Just staying alive was heroic enough for Mayara. But there was no guarantee they’d be safe here—it did make sense to see if they could find an alternate exit to their hidey-hole, in case they needed one. “We’ll explore together. After you’ve healed more. I’ll try to find some firemoss—”

  “You can’t go out there again,” Roe said. “You nearly got killed.”

  “For this place, ‘you nearly got killed’ means we’re doing great. It means we’re still alive.” She finished the hole and tilted the coconut up to her lips. The coconut milk was thin, sweet, and amazing. She took several gulps before passing the coconut to Roe. She’d gathered a total of four, which should last them for a while between the milk and the meat.

  “Fair enough,” Roe said after she’d taken a long draft. “But promise me you’ll be careful. The only thing worse than feeling helpless to protect myself is feeling helpless to protect you.”

  “I’m careful,” Mayara promised—and wanted to laugh. That was one word that no one at home, especially Kelo, would ever call her. She’d always been reckless. But then it was easy to be “reckless” at home, when she was just doing what Elorna had done before her. It was harder here, knowing that she did not want to follow in Elorna’s footsteps. “We’ll explore together, as soon as you’ve healed enough.”

  “Good. I’ve been thinking about it. . . . We both felt the spirits going through the tunnels, right? What if we use them to show us the cave system? We can keep track of where we feel them. Draw ourselves a map.”

  Mayara considered it. The spirits couldn’t sense them if they didn’t issue any commands. And they had to stay hidden for a while anyway. “It’s brilliant.”