by Heidi Heilig
“They’re not for security, they’re symbolic. Couples come to the bridge and attach a lock to signify their love. Then they throw the keys into the water.”
“That’s foolish.”
“The authorities think so. Apparently a bridge railing collapsed under the excess weight. That was in Paris. City of love; it’s ironic. At least no one was hurt.”
“I wasn’t talking about engineering.” I probed the lock with hook and rake. There was a click, and it came free in my hand. “See? It’s an imperfect metaphor.”
“A weight too crushing to bear?” She shook my head. “It seems apt to me.”
“Interesting.” I lowered my gaze to the lock. But why was I hiding? I hooked the lock around a belt loop and clicked it shut. Then I raised my eyes to hers. “Love has only ever buoyed me up.”
“Joss said I’m going to lose the one I love.”
Misery stole her breath; she spoke no louder than a whisper, and it took a moment to understand. There was a long silence, the seconds measured in the beat of my heart at the base of my skull. “How?”
“The sea. Lost or drowned. She tattooed the fortune on Slate’s back. I’d hoped he’d only misremembered the translation, but . . .” Nix shook her head.
I tried a disdainful laugh, though it came out like a croak. “Fortune-tellers! I knew a few, back in Almaas. Vague predictions, just like that one. They were a waste of good entrails.”
“Kash—Joss was a Navigator. Whatever she knows, it’s already happened in her past.”
“Our lives are before us, not behind.”
“That depends on where you’re standing on the timeline.”
“What of free will?”
“Some people don’t believe free will exists.”
“Some people don’t believe in demon octopus, either. And did she mention when?”
Nix bit her lip. “No.”
“Then it could be years!” I said.
“Or hours,” she countered.
“Even if she’s right, you know the poem.” I looked into her face, hopeful. “‘’Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.’”
“The only people who say that have never seen what loss looks like.”
The implication took my breath away. I stared at the water again, glittering in the sun like a broken mirror—bad luck, bad luck. “You forget, amira. Before I came to the Temptation, loss was all I knew.”
“How could you bear it?”
“Nothing lasts forever. Not even sorrow.”
She only shook her head, and her eyes were faraway—she was back at the ship, back with her father—and I kept picking locks, tossing them, one by one, into the river.
CHAPTER FIVE
The boys and I returned to the Temptation in the buzzy warmth of the afternoon. The black hull of the caravel shimmered in the heat off the asphalt, and the sun was like Hephaestus’s hammer, striking sparks on the anvil of the water. A headache had wormed its way behind my eyes; I was certainly dehydrated, but it was easier to focus on the pounding at my temples than the ache in my heart.
The conversation with Kashmir could not have gone more poorly. I cringed at the memory of my thoughtless words. He had known more loss than I could imagine—but my father was a daily reality too stark for me to ignore. Slate had loved and lost, and it had ruined him. How could I follow in his footsteps?
Then again, how could I ignore the pull of my own heart? This, too, was a loss . . . only a slow torture instead of a sudden shock, stretched on the rack of longing.
I dragged myself down to the galley to stash the pastries in the icebox. Then I leaned against the counter and drank deep drafts of musty, lukewarm water from the barrel in the corner. The walk had left me exhausted. Or was it the nightmares I’d been having? The last three nights, I’d woken, drenched, from a dream where I’d followed Kashmir over the side and my father had thrown me an anchor rather than a buoy.
I should lie down, but where? I had given over my cabin, and with the sails furled, my hammock wasn’t shaded. Rotgut hadn’t returned yet, and neither had Bee; I couldn’t just borrow one of their beds without asking first. Of course the captain wouldn’t mind if I sprawled out on his floor—and though I didn’t relish being in his cabin, it was my best option. I was halfway across the deck when I realized his door was ajar.
Had he left it that way to catch the breeze? I went inside to find his room empty.
And all the cupboards wide open.
Standing on the threshold, my eyes went to one of them as though pulled along on a current: HISTORICAL MAPS OF THE PACIFIC. The map of Tahiti was there, and a dozen other maps of Hawaii that the captain had collected over the years. There was only one missing—I knew it before I even started searching. I would have recognized it from across the room—the creases, the bloodstains. The map of Honolulu, 1868. The map we’d robbed a kingdom for. The one where my mother was still alive, and where my father was going to die.
Where had it gone?
Had Slate gone with it?
And I had thought he’d changed.
“What’s wrong, amira?” Kash watched me from the doorway, his brow creasing as he scanned the open cupboards. “Thieves?”
“I think Slate might have . . .” It was hard for me to say the words. My stomach was roiling. What if I’d driven my father to his fate? Hadn’t I told him I doubted Joss’s prediction? He might have gone back only to prove me wrong. I hadn’t even said good-bye. Tears threatened like a sudden storm—I wasn’t ready. But would I ever have been? “I think—” But before I could finish the sentence, we both jumped at a sudden ruckus from the wharf.
A car horn was blaring, and over it—laughter? From belowdecks, Billie answered with a howl. “Rooooo!”
I rushed to the door. An old Honda was rolling slowly up to the pier. The man behind the wheel—a big man, stuffed into the little car—roared with laughter as the passenger opened the door and staggered out onto the hot pavement.
“Slate?” He couldn’t hear me; I had spoken barely above a whisper. The tide of my fear had ebbed. Relief took its place. “Slate!”
Both men looked up—my father and Bruce, his old friend at the Coast Guard. At first I thought it was a trick of the glare on the curve of the windshield, but Bruce’s face was florid, his eyes unfocused. Leaning over the passenger seat, he asked my father a question and reared back in mock surprise at the answer. He spoke with exaggerated care; I could read the words on his lips: “No shit!” Then he slapped the empty seat and rolled down his window. “Hey, kid! You’re all grown up!”
“Thanks, Bruce,” I said as Slate stumbled up the gangplank, swaying on his feet.
“You look just like your dad!”
I spoke through my teeth. “I hope not, Bruce.”
“All right, all right. Hey, I’d love to catch up, but I’m gonna be late for work!” His voice was warm, and his words only a little slurred. “Take care of your old man! Don’t be too pissed off!” Then he rolled up the window and drove away.
Slate stopped right in front of me, just a hair too close. He was still sweating, but his eyes were very bright; I grimaced. Through his white T-shirt, I could see blood seeping through the bandage over his ribs. Alcohol increased blood flow—I had read that somewhere. My anger was building in a wave. I’d been so hopeful when he’d tossed the box into the sea, but had opium ever been the problem, or only the treatment?
My father peered at me. “You’re not going to, right?”
“Not going to what?”
“Be too pissed off.”
I flung out my hands, exasperated. “Where are your shoes?”
“Don’t remember.” Slate looked down at his bare feet. The skin atop the right one was raised and red under a new tattoo—a simple design, one of his own, I could tell. The cross of a compass with an anchor’s curve at the bottom. “You like it?” He raised his foot toward my face, then toppled to the left. I caught his arms; he smelled sweet and sharp, like an o
verripe peach. “I made it myself!”
“Did you drink an entire bottle of liquor?”
“Not the whole thing.” He wiggled his foot. “I know I used some to sterilize my skin.”
“I’ve never even seen you drink half a glass of weak beer!”
He shrugged loosely and headed toward his cabin. “You know what they say. When you can’t be with the one you love— What the hell happened here?” Slate had stopped in the doorway.
“You did.” I faltered, uncertain now. “Didn’t you?”
“Didn’t I what?”
“Didn’t you take your map of Honolulu?”
“Take it where?” He walked toward his desk and stared at the surface—empty, but for a few coffee cups. “Where is it?”
I swallowed and glanced at Kashmir. Thieves, he’d said. Had someone come aboard while we’d been away? A crashing sound drew my attention back to the captain as he swept the shelves clear. “Slate, no!”
Scrolls scattered across the floor; he tossed heavy books atop delicate parchment. I leaped over a bronze tablet and barreled into him, shoving him away from the shelves. “It was right there!” he screamed, his eyes wild. “Where did it go?”
“You’re not going to find it making a mess!”
His chest heaved; he gripped my arms. He looked so incredibly lost. “Nixie . . . Nixie . . .”
“It’s okay, Dad. I’ll find it. Just sit!” I pushed him back toward his bunk; his knees bent and he sank down. “Stay there.” I took a deep breath. Both Kashmir and Blake were staring in through the doorway. “Blake, bring some water. Kash, can you . . . ?”
Kashmir came to the captain’s side, putting his hand on Slate’s shoulder to keep him in his bunk while I picked up the maps and set the room back in order. By the time Blake returned and put a cup into Slate’s shaking hands, I hadn’t discovered anything else missing—including maps that were far more valuable.
Had Slate only mislaid the map and forgotten? I shooed the boys out and knelt next to my father to ask, but he shook his head vehemently. “No. No, Nixie. How could I forget something like that? That map is everything to me.”
The reminder stung more than it should have. I clenched my fists. “Everything?”
He bridled. “Don’t take that tone. I’m still here, aren’t I?”
“Barely. But why did you have the map out of the cupboard, Slate?” I made a face; he didn’t answer, but of course I already knew. “You tried to use it.”
“Maybe I thought about it,” he said, pugnacious. Then he grimaced. “But I was . . . afraid.”
“Afraid?” I laughed a little, bitter. “Afraid to die?”
“No,” he said scornfully, like the very question was a foolish one. “Afraid to lose you.”
“Well, I’m not going back with you to 1868, to watch you overdose. I couldn’t, even if I wanted to, but frankly—”
“That’s not what I meant!” Slate clenched his jaw, scrubbing his hand through his blond hair. When he spoke again, his voice was soft. “That’s not what I meant. I mean . . . Joss told me something else once.”
I stared at him warily. “Do I want to know?”
“I don’t know. Do you?”
Inside, I struggled—knowledge was power, ignorance bliss. “What was it?”
“She told me . . . she told me that it’s possible. To change things.”
I stared at him, unmoored; the world swirled around me and I felt like small craft tossed on a wild sea—lost, lost, but strangely free. “How?”
He gave me a half shrug. “With enormous effort and great sacrifice. Even then, nothing’s for sure.”
“Fine,” I said, breathless. “But how? Does it take a special map? Or—or is it just a matter of finding the right time and making a different choice? How do you—”
“She never said more than that,” he interrupted. “Maybe it’s best I never figured it out.”
The words made no sense at first, not from him. “But . . . why?”
“Someday, Nixie.” My father peered at me, his blue eyes bleary, but on his lips—a dreamy smile. “Someday when I’m old and nearly gone, we’ll sail together for the last time. We’ll go together to the edge of the world. I’ll give you the helm, and you’ll give me the lifeboat. And I’ll take the map of Honolulu and sail to Byzantium like an old man should. You’ll be captain then. Captain of your own fate. And I’ll be ready to let go. But if I went now . . .” He shook his head. “What would I give to have her back, Nixie? What would I have to sacrifice?”
Though he’d only asked a question, I knew the answer: me. He would have lost me, as I was, here and now, trading a daughter who loved the sea for one born and raised on a golden shore. But that understanding did not chill me, not today. I was already numb. The words echoed in my head: enormous effort. Great sacrifice.
But change was possible. And looking at Slate, his bent shoulders, his hollow eyes—I knew I could not let it happen to me. I would not end up like my father.
What must I do? What must I sacrifice? How would I stave off my fate? I needed answers—answers my father had never been able to discover, in all his years searching. But Slate was erratic, an addict, driven by demons, pulled along on his whims. I was more methodical. I had to be.
So where to start? Where did people go to seek knowledge?
Ideas bubbled up in my mind: all over the world and throughout history, every culture had a way of divination. Tarot cards and tasseography, dream interpreters . . . and fortune-tellers, of course. But those jobs were like chum for charlatans, as my trip to Chinatown had shown.
Maybe I should go back to the source of the prophecy—to Joss herself. I went to the cupboard, still open, and pulled out the maps of Honolulu that my father had collected over the years. Here, one from 1895. But it was useless; she was dead by then.
What about an older map? After all, Joss had known my fate by the time she’d tattooed it on my father’s back. But how had she learned it? My stomach dropped at the next thought: what if by going back to see her in a past Honolulu, I would trigger Kashmir’s loss? Could she learn my fortune from my own lips?
Better instead to meet her on my own timeline—after she’d already given my father the tattoo. I’d have to wait till the Royal Hawaiian Navy gave up the search for our ship, of course. Six months? A year? All I had to do was keep Kashmir safe until then. Maybe a stint in a landlocked country would be a good idea after all. Central Europe . . . perhaps Lichtenstein . . .
“God, my head hurts.”
I turned back to look at Slate; he had scooted back into the shadows of the alcove, his knees pulled up to his chest. “It’s called a hangover,” I told him. Then I frowned—my own temples were still throbbing. “You’re probably dehydrated.”
“Do we have any aspirin?”
Tucking the maps back onto the shelves, I knelt to look in the cupboard under the desk. The first aid kit had been decimated in the last few days, and the little bottle of aspirin was empty. “I’ll go get you some.”
“I love you, Nixie.”
The words made me stumble on the threshold. I licked my lips—I didn’t know how to respond, so I hurried through the doorway, pretending I hadn’t heard. Out on deck, the afternoon sunlight was like a knife through the eyes; my own headache had only worsened. When I looked west, I saw why. The horizon, so blue only half an hour ago, had curdled with clouds, and the air was as hot as steam. A summer storm was coming.
As I closed the door, Blake and Kashmir turned to me, faces expectant. “He’s sleeping off the drink,” I told them.
“And the map, amira? It wasn’t in his pockets.”
“It might be stolen—or it might only be misplaced.” I bit my lip. “He took it out to—to look at it. Maybe it blew into the water. Or he left it at Bruce’s. I don’t know.”
“Shouldn’t we alert the authorities, Miss Song?” Blake’s brow was furrowed. “Are there authorities here?”
“Oh, there are authorities,” Kashmir sa
id. “But they’re not worth alerting. We could search his room again, just to be sure.”
“Maybe later,” I said, glancing up at the sun; there wasn’t much time left before the party. “I need to run to the store for some aspirin first.”
“Do you want some company, amira?” Kashmir’s tone was casual, but the hope was back in his eyes, and it surprised me. How could he be so unconcerned? I hesitated, but only for a moment. After all, he was likely safer on land than on the ship, under my watchful eye.
“Sure.” I took his hand as we went down the gangplank, to make sure he didn’t slip. But when we reached the hot pavement of the wharf, I didn’t let go. Our hands fit together perfectly; our palms two halves of a living shell, and something tender between them.
We matched steps in an easy rhythm. My shoulders dropped slowly as we walked, the tension in them easing; they’d been tighter than the halyard in a high wind. As we stood on the sidewalk, waiting for a bike to pass, Kashmir spoke. “I can’t help but wonder . . . about what you said before.”
“What part, exactly?”
“Joss said you’re going to lose the one you love.” His voice was quiet, as though the words were sneaking out; his fingers flexed around mine. “Is that me?”
I looked at him, startled. “Isn’t it obvious?”
To my surprise, his face lit up, brighter than the noon sky. “It is when you put it that way.”
I felt the color rising on my cheeks. Thankfully, the light changed; I started across the street. “Why do you look so happy about it?”
“Amira . . .” He faltered then. “I won’t let fear of tomorrow steal joy from today.”
“The joy of learning you’ll be lost?”
“The joy of learning I’m loved.”
“My love is a curse, Kashmir!”
“I’d rather be cursed with it than damned without it.”
“Kash . . .” I turned to look at him; he gave me a crooked smile. “How can you talk about love at a time like this?”
His smile fell. “How much time do you think I have left?”
The next block was capped by a bodega with a red-and-yellow awning labeled GROCERY, the window lined with bottles of castile soap and bleach. Over the door, an ancient air conditioner dripped onto the sidewalk and did little to alleviate the stifling heat inside. The aspirin was behind the counter, between the condoms and the religious candles. “I won’t let it happen,” I said at last, as we waited for the proprietor to make change. “I’m not going to lose you, Kashmir.”