by C. B. Lee
“Jake, take the boat back to the dock. We’re gonna get ready to get this kid to come with us.”
The boat engine whirrs, and starts speeding back toward the shore, and Amanda flails in the water.
Oh no.
They still think Kevin is the selkie.
“Don’t touch him,” Morgan says loudly, the strength of his voice startling himself. He swims toward the boat, past a startled Amanda, who treads water and stares at him incredulously.
The boat stalls, and Jake gapes at him as Morgan grabs the edge of the boat and peers aboard.
The two men stare at him, and Morgan glares with all the anger he can muster. “Leave him out of this. He’s human. That—” and he jerks his head at the pelt in Nathaniel’s hands— “that is mine.”
Jake grabs for the pelt. “I want to see it, want to see him change.”
“No! Give it back to him now and he’ll swim away and all will be lost. Haven’t you heard any of the stories? We have the pelt, we have all the power. He has to listen to us or he’s stuck.” Nathaniel grins, the white of his teeth blinding in the dark. He must have been a good-looking man, once, but Morgan doesn’t have to ask the Sea what his intentions are, because he can see them from here—this man and his heart are terrifying.
“You’re gonna take us to where the rest of you are, or we’ll cut apart your pelt and you’ll never get it back. And then I’ll call up the rest of my team, and we’ll have all the selkies at our disposal. Shifting cells? Body transmogrification? I’m gonna revolutionize the medical industry, prove I was right all those years ago when I first saw one of your kind.” Nathaniel leers at him.
“No,” Morgan says firmly. A part of him knows he’s already lost, that his sealskin—the only thing that will let him return to the Sea— is already in the hands of people who mean him and his family harm.
“What do you mean, no? I’ve got your lifeline right here, and without it you’re gonna sink, boy.”
“I don’t care. Do whatever you want with the pelt, but I’m not telling you where my family is. And you stay away from Kevin, too. He’s no use to you.”
Tears begin to well up in Morgan’s eyes, and he’s trembling with anger. He refuses to back down—to the hunters, to the traditions of his herd. Why does he have to choose? To live a paltry imitation of his former life just because of the Sea’s ancient traditions about keeping the bloodlines separate? He can outright refuse to go either way— he doesn’t have to only live in one world. This summer it’s clear he’s thrived on both land and sea; the need to separate the two seems trivial. The tears fall, but Morgan makes no move to wipe them away.
It doesn’t matter anyway. Morgan is never going to make it back to his family’s beach. They’re never going to sing his name into the song celebrating the adults of their herd. He thinks of his mother watching Naida lead a song, watching her prepare for leadership; thinks about the pups rolling around in the sand without a care in the world; thinks of the young mated pairs like Micah and Oki, hopeful for the future; thinks of his entire herd, those he loved and grew up with— their safety and happiness is worth losing his freedom.
Morgan climbs onto the boat, standing steadily.
Nathaniel flips open a container and takes out a large, rusty pair of sharp scissors. “I’ll cut it into pieces, I will,” he says, sneering.
“Go ahead. I’m still not telling you.”
Amanda has caught up with them, swimming up behind to Morgan. “Give it back to him, Nate,” she calls out. “Cutting up his pelt won’t do anyone any good. Leave the boy alone.”
The scissors flash, and Morgan steels himself for the sensation of being separated irrevocably from the Sea. He wonders if after today he’ll still lose his memory, stuck as a human.
“Boss, don’t, look at this,” Jake says, pulling the scissors away from Nate. He pushes a laptop at him. “I finally finished cleaning up the GPS data you had me stick on the kid’s car for the past week. Looks like the boy took a trip up the coast yesterday. We’ve got the coordinates right here. We know where they are.”
“We know where they are,” Nathaniel repeats, eyes wide.
“No,” Amanda gasps, next to him. “I am so sorry,” she says, turning to Morgan. “I thought it was only going to be photos, or if we met any of you there would be questions, but I didn’t think that he—”
“Take me instead,” Morgan says, stepping forward. “Leave them alone. You can do your experiments on me. I’ll go with you.”
Amanda is climbing onto the boat next to him, and she hands him something—a large, hooded sweater that was on a bench. Oh, right, I’m naked. Morgan shrugs on the sweater, and it’s so large it falls to his knees. He’s tempted to pull the hood up and tighten the strings as he does with Kevin’s sweater, but this isn’t the time for comfort. He has to look strong.
“Really?” Nathaniel asks, raising his eyebrows.
“Yes.”
“You don’t have to do this,” Amanda whispers. “It’s a huge sacrifice, giving up your family, your ability to transform—”
“I’m protecting them. I do it gladly.”
“Yes,” Nathaniel quickly agrees.
Even though the sun just set, the sky is as dark as midnight. Clouds form above them in violent dark swirls and rain falls heavily, droplets hitting the boat’s deck in a rapid tat tat tat. The humans on the boat yelp in confusion, and Morgan holds steady, watching it all. A large wave rushes toward them, flooding the boat. The others thrash about, searching for something to hold onto. The scene is utter chaos, but Morgan can sense the Sea whispering to him, and a calm settles in as the Sea flows all around him.
For a moment, he forgets he’s on the boat. It’s only him and the Sea, the endless centuries of magic and the ancient consciousness, and Morgan can feel the emotion—not of another selkie or someone else in the water, but of the Sea.
It’s pride.
A pleased voice sounds in his head, and Morgan is so stunned he can’t move. It’s always been rather abstract, the way selkies have described “talking” to the Sea. Information comes and goes, and most people Morgan has talked to refer to it as an encyclopedia of sorts, a collective magic from which they pull stories or memories, and to which they add their own.
You did well, young halfling.
The voice—if Morgan could call it a voice—is like many voices speaking, layered over one another, in different languages, resonating powerfully.
I don’t understand, Morgan responds.
It is a very old custom, choosing between worlds, and one that should have been retired long ago.
Everything changes, and the Sea is no different. The halflings that came before Morgan— and they were few and far between, he barely counts five different stories the Sea shows him—had little desire to see the human world, all but one deciding to stay with their herd. The other, the Sea only saw once more at the end of her life, and it had been a good one. She’d lived as a human for the rest of her years, with an unknowing pull to return to the Sea, and only accomplished that in her old age.
The Sea shows Morgan all of this in an instant, and then says, The usual rule is seven years, to see the maker of a Request again—but I suppose seven months should be fine. Fare well, Morgan.
And with that, the waves recede, and the clouds part. It’s a soft purple twilight again, and the ocean is calm, as if the sudden storm never happened.
Nathaniel splutters, shaking himself. “What the hell was that?”
Morgan shrugs, smiling, feeling lighter than he has in a long time.
“The damn laptop got soaked. Jake, please tell me you backed that information up,” he says, shaking the other man.
Jake frowns, and pushes his hair back. It doesn’t look all that different wet than it did when it was gelled. “I was gonna do that once we got back to shore.”
Ama
nda picks something off the deck of the boat—Morgan’s pelt—and hands it to him. “I believe this is yours.”
“You! You’re fired!” Nathaniel hisses, pointing an accusing finger at her.
“You don’t pay me.” Amanda folds her arms and taps her foot on the deck.
Morgan holds his pelt hesitantly, not sure if this will work. It feels the same, the same current of potential energy hums under his fingertips.
“Go on, get out of here,” Amanda says, nudging him forward.
Morgan jumps off the boat, the discarded sweatshirt floats away, and he swirls the pelt around himself, laughing in surprise when the transformation takes hold.
He dives gleefully and resurfaces, splashing.
Amanda jumps in the water with him, scuba gear all askew, watching him with spellbound eyes. Even Nathaniel and Jake are peering over the boat, gasping.
“You,” Nathaniel says, pointing a finger at Jake. “Where’s the camera, why aren’t you recording this? We should be getting all this down, at least photos, something!” When Jake doesn’t move, Nathaniel raises his voice, loud and shrill in the otherwise calm night. “You can’t do this! I’ve worked so hard for this!” Nathaniel shouts, and at that Amanda gives an affected look, and Morgan gets the idea that she’s done most of the work. “This was going to be my opus! I need to get my name back, and the scientific community will regret ever laughing—”
A sudden wave out of nowhere knocks the boat, and Nathaniel falls into the water, spluttering helplessly.
Jake looks from the man in the water to Amanda and Morgan, shrugs, and turns the boat back toward shore, the engine putt-putting rhythmically as Nathaniel yelps and paddles after him.
Morgan laughs again, and it comes out as a happy little bark. He is about to swim away when he sees Amanda wave goodbye to him.
The Sea finds the information easily: Amanda Everhart, age twenty-four, a graduate student in marine biology, who was trying to publish her work on seal community migration when her advisor, Nathaniel, enlisted her help with his wild goose chase. She is relieved that Morgan is free, and that Nathaniel doesn’t have the selkie herd’s location, but disheartened to have spent so much time away from her own thesis. She’s crying happy, exhausted tears, but wishes she didn’t have to go back to school alone, tail between her legs, without an advisor and with miles and miles of fieldwork to make up.
Morgan thinks about swimming back to the beach, where he knows everyone is getting ready to swim south. They’ll follow the current, ending up on a bright beach where they can enjoy the sun and catch more fish and sing more songs. It’ll be the same, every day.
He loves his family, but now that it’s not forever, now that he doesn’t have to choose—he’d gladly welcome the opportunity to see more of the human world. His older brothers and sisters have all spent copious amounts of time on land. Why not he?
And he has seven months before he can see Kevin again. Why not spend it doing something worthwhile?
Morgan nudges Amanda playfully, and she pats him on the head, smiles at him and wipes her face. Morgan tries to let her know everything is going to be okay, but realizes she can’t understand him when he’s a seal. He transforms and watches the boat trundle back to the docks with her.
Amanda shakes her head. “Good riddance.”
“Hey,” Morgan says. “Thank you for your help.”
“It was nothing.”
“The only reason I would come back to this town is for someone I’m not supposed to see for seven months.” Morgan waves his hand vaguely in the air. “It’s a magic thing. Anyway, I’d like to help you with your research. I mean, I do know a lot about currents.”
“How do you know about my thesis—”
Morgan shrugs again. “The Sea knows your heart’s intentions.”
“And what about you? Don’t you want to go home?”
Morgan looks at the shore, where the lights of the town are blinking awake, and then back at the horizon. “My home is wherever I am. I can see my family whenever I want. I don’t have to choose anymore.”
Amanda scrunches her nose, and Morgan chuckles. “It’s a long story.”
Twenty-one.
Kevin wakes up, for the third time today, and with a headache. He’s on the beach where he and Morgan collected rocks on that first hike so long ago. He sits up groggily, brushing sand off himself, trying to remember what happened. That Nathaniel guy pushed him into the water—to what—to see if he would transform? No, to see if he could call another selkie for help.
How did he end up all the way over here?
Kevin has a vague vision of Morgan holding him, and kissing him, telling him he loved him, but it slips away easily, as dreams do.
His head hurts, and Kevin recalls hitting it on a rock or something. Did the chair break, then, if he hit the rocks on the ocean floor? Kevin recalls moving upward. He swam? Did he make it to the surface and then the tide washed him ashore?
He stands up wearily, rubbing his head; his wet clothes hang heavily on his body. It’s going to be dark soon.
His parents look at him carefully, as if he’s fragile and might break, and Kevin doesn’t tell them about the kidnapping and the near-fatal incident. They’d only worry. He trudges up to his room on autopilot and takes a shower, barely going through the motions. He gets dressed, and stares at his reflection in the mirror. It all seems so pointless. Eventually he flops on his bed.
Kevin ignores the calls for dinner, and stares at the ceiling. He falls asleep, but it’s an uneasy, restless sleep. He dreams he’s in the water, struggling in the dark. Morgan is pulling him to the surface, laying him on the shore, kissing him once more before returning to the waves.
The next morning, Kevin gets up early. Ann’s downstairs, stretching as she prepares to go for her morning run.
“Hey, loser,” she says. “Funny seeing you up.”
“Want some company?”
“Sure.”
They jog to the shore and run up and down the beach. Kevin keeps up with Ann, even though he remembers her being faster. Maybe he’s gotten fitter.
“You missed out on dumplings last night,” Ann says on their third back-and-forth on the shore. “Dad and Rachel made them together as usual, and she made all the funny-looking ones. Not that they taste any different when they’re cooked, but it was pretty hilarious, because the stuffing kept falling out of the ones she made.”
Kevin nods and lets Ann make idle conversation, and they run, their breath forming small clouds in the early morning chill. Kevin gets tired after losing track of how many times they’ve been up and down the beach, and Ann takes pity on him, walking back with him toward the house.
“So you guys broke up, eh?” Ann says, quirking an eyebrow.
“I guess. I mean, I knew he was only visiting for the summer… I just forgot it was ending.”
“It happens. You get so caught up in being happy, you lose sight of what’s coming ahead.”
Kevin sighs and keeps walking.
“You took my car somewhere yesterday,” she adds.
“Sorry. I really, really needed to be alone. I went out for a hike on a beach Morgan took me to before, and I just… wanted to be there, I guess.”
“It’s fine, I’m not mad. I get it, you know. First real boyfriend, and now he’s gone. Distance sucks. I’m guessing they don’t have Wi-Fi on his parents’ boat?”
“What? Boat, yeah. No, they won’t have Wi-Fi. Or phones. They’re, like, not a very technology-happy family.”
“I could tell, the way Morgan was so fascinated with all your stuff. But especially you. He adored you, you know.”
Kevin sighs.
“Sorry, I’m just trying to be helpful. Look, you know I don’t start classes for a few weeks. You’re welcome to take the car out for a drive whenever you want, okay? Heartbreak sucks; I’ve b
een there.”
“Thanks, Ann, you’re the best.”
They walk along the last stretch of beach before hitting the road that leads to town and pass the lifeguard tower. Sally waves at them enthusiastically. “That looked like quite the workout!”
“Thanks,” Kevin says. “It’s way too intense for me, though. Can’t believe Ann does this every day.”
“I know,” Sally replies, lifting her eyebrows at Ann.
To Kevin’s great surprise, Ann blushes, grabs Kevin by the arm and then quickens their pace. “Kaythanksbye,” Ann mumbles, leading Kevin away.
“Whaaaat was that?” Kevin teases as soon as they’re out of earshot.
“What was what? That was nothing,” Ann says, but the blush is deepening, traveling down her cheeks in full force.
“She was totally asking about you all summer. I didn’t know you were—”
“I don’t know if I am.” Ann casts a wistful look back at the beach. “I mean, I never thought about it, actually, until you came out to us. I didn’t even think bisexuality was a thing. I don’t know if I ever told you how brave you were, when you told Dad and Rachel, you know? I know I wasn’t home when all that shit went down in your school with that kid and stuff—”
“You were at college,” Kevin points out. “It’s not like you could have come back and done anything about that asshole.”
“You’re right, but I was really just wrapped up in my own life, and I kind of just took for granted what you were going through here. And then this summer while I’ve been at home, it’s just been amazing to see you really happy, you know. I’m glad you’re my brother.”
“Ann,” Kevin says shakily, overcome with affection for his sister.
She pulls him into a hug, even though Kevin knows she doesn’t particularly like physical affection, and Kevin pats her back appreciatively.
Kevin takes Ann up on her offer that afternoon, driving up the coast back toward the beach. He doesn’t know if this is a good idea or not, but he wants to see Morgan again. Maybe from a distance, just to see if he’s okay. He parks the car on the shoulder, steps out into the wind and finds the same hidden path through the chaparral.