I snort lavender-scented water out my nose, doubtful, wondering if that’s a requirement for the job. What if I disappoint her?
She combs for a few moments in silence while a thousand thoughts jumble in my mind. I stare at the wall ahead of me, at the shadows of our heads. Hers is smooth and perfect; mine still sticks out in all angles. Beyond that, for the first time, I see that there is an intricately engraved panel on the wall, and there are letters above it. A N R Y, I think it says, but the letters are very faint.
She catches me looking. “Nobody knows what those things mean. They’re all over the castle. I think they had the silly notion of naming all the rooms, when reading and writing were of importance. Can you imagine, naming a room as you would a person? Absurd! Do you remember?”
“Remember?”
“When you and I were just babies and used to play together here,” she says, which shocks me. So she does know that I was the one who used to play with her. Perhaps that is why she is being so nice to me. “You do remember, don’t you?”
“Not very well,” I admit. I remember chasing down a long corridor after Star’s braided head, her giggles echoing upon the stone walls, but I don’t remember anything else about the castle. I think I lost a lot of old memories. It’s almost as if my life began when the scribblers tore off my hand.
She sighs. “Oh, that is right. You are younger than me by more than two entire seasons, so I often had to explain things to you. Well, we used to run up and down here and pretend we knew what all the words said. The three of us pretended it was our own language, and only we could speak it. You and I thought they were the names of the people who once lived in the rooms. But Tiam said it was a secret code that would lead us to treasure.”
I can’t help but laugh. That sounds like him.
“He made us swear together that one day the three of us would crack the code and find the treasure.” She smiles a little wistfully. “It’s silly. But even after we stopped playing together...after your—” her eyes trail down toward my stump, which thankfully I’ve buried under the suds “—after we could no longer play together...I kept trying to find the treasure. There is treasure here, you know.”
I believe she is right; this whole beautiful building is the most wonderful treasure I’ve ever seen. And yet, she must be very brave to venture out in this castle alone. One of the oldest legends about the castle is that it is haunted by the ghosts of the dead. There are so many dead, it must be quite crowded with them. “Have you ever seen one of the ghosts?”
She laughs. “Oh, there are plenty of ghosts within these walls.”
“So it is true?” I ask, inspecting the walls. While the bed in the corner looks comfortable and welcoming, if staying here means being visited by spirits, I’d much prefer the cramped sleeping compartment.
“I’ve never seen one. But I know how the servants talk. They come up with their own legends. You don’t remember the Dark Girl?” She shakes her head. “Oh, of course you don’t. You were probably too little. But when I was a child, all the servants talked about was the Dark Girl. They saw her all the time—hair black as night, with the palest, most translucent skin, roaming the castle hallways at night. They’d see her one moment, and the next moment, she’d be gone. They were all so terrified! Their stories made me terrified, which was one of the reasons I played with you. I wasn’t so scared when you were around.”
“The Dark Girl?” I repeat. It sounds dreadful.
“Don’t worry, though. Nobody has seen her in ages. And I certainly never have.” She sits back on her haunches and picks up a strand of my hair. “I’m sure that if you go walking the castle at night, they might think she has returned. Your hair is so very odd. It reminds me of...someone....”
“Who?” I ask. Someone from a dream, obviously. No one at all has hair the color of night, as I do. Most have silken white-blond hair that reflects the sun.
She blinks. “No mind. It is a beautiful color. I am jealous.”
Of me? And all this time, I’d been jealous of Star’s reddish hair, like the color of the sunrise. The tops of my knees are sticking out of the water, and goose bumps begin to poke out on them. “Why are you...”
“No, I don’t normally wash my servants’ hair, if that’s what you’re thinking.” She straightens, sticks her chin out. “And don’t think I’ll ever do it for you again.... It’s just...I want us to be friendly.”
“Friendly?” I choke out. Friendly is not something we islanders do. We keep our distance. We’re wary. We do not trust.
She smiles. “Yes.” She looks around, and her face turns serious. I feel something on my head trickling over my forehead and edging toward the corner of my eye, making it twitch. “There was something I could not tell you out there. Something you are not to share with anyone.”
At that moment, the horn in the tower blares. From here, it’s such a horrible and jarring roar that my eardrums rattle. The two tower guards manage the task of sounding the horn. It’s the horn that signals low tide. It means that the tide has reversed and is now coming in, and our completely safe time is over. Usually it means there is still plenty of time remaining before formation, but one never can tell. During Hard Season or a storm, the tides come in with much more fierceness, so one always needs to be on guard once the horn blares. But instead of worrying about that, all I can do is stare at Star, knowing somehow that her next words will be ones which I will regret hearing.
“I don’t need a governess,” she says, rocking back on her knees. I know that my hair can’t possibly be fixed yet as it would take a hundred tides and a miracle to make it like Star’s, but Star sighs and begins to absently play with her long red braid. “Kirba was always checking to make sure I ate up, and washed up, and kept my posture and said ‘please’ and ‘thank you.’ Those things are important to my father, because a royal needs to behave with grace and dignity. But I dare say I’m easily the most graceful and dignified being on this island. Her work is done.”
White foam drips into my eye and down my nose. I try to blink it away, but a moment later it begins to burn worse than jellyfish stings. I yelp.
She reaches for a cloth and carelessly places it in my hand. I swab desperately at my eye. How can something that smells so sweet hurt so terribly? “I don’t even really need someone to dress and converse with me.”
The stinging subsides. I open my mouth. “I thought you said...”
“Yes, I know what I said. That’s what I want the others to think. But I need to trust someone, Coe, and Tiam recommends you. And he says you are an expert at melting into the scenery, at living among the people unnoticed and learning things that may be of use to me.”
“Tiam said that?” I say, shocked. Why would he tell such an outrageous lie? He knows how little I listen to the gossip, how I avoid everyone on the island as much as possible. “You want me to be...like...a spy? For what?”
Her eyes turn cold. “Just as there have always been people who work in the royal family’s service, there have always been people among us who would like to do us harm.”
I stare at her, unsure what she means.
“Some people forget the Wallows’ gift to them so many tides ago. Of course this has happened before. Many times before. And we have to weed these people out and bring them to justice before they...poison the thinking of others.”
I lie there silently, imagining her lying in her tower day after day, fearing for her life. But if her life is in danger, I don’t know it. People respect the king. He has kept us safe.
“In the coming tides, you are going to be more important to me than you realize. But I must know I can place my trust in you.”
Me? My mouth must be hanging open, because somehow I’ve swallowed lavender. It doesn’t taste as beautiful as it smells; in fact, it tastes rotten. “But, Your Majesty, I know nothing...” I begin, but then I realize
what Tiam was doing. He wanted me to have this job for some reason. And I can’t let him down.
“Tiam says you’re a clever person.”
I shiver. The water suddenly feels icy against my skin.
“I am always your willing servant,” I say dutifully, because I don’t know what else to say. I wonder how many tides will pass before I’m exposed as a fraud. “And you can trust me.”
“Oh. And your dressmaking skills are required at once. I haven’t had a new dress in ages!” she says.
My stomach drops even lower. “My— Excuse me?”
She stands and wipes her hands on a cloth. “All done,” she says. “I told you it could be saved. There’s still sand in it, so dunk yourself a few times. Stay in there awhile and let the lavender soak into your skin.... I would get Burbur to bring you more water, but our reserves are low today. It hasn’t rained in so long.”
She wrinkles her nose, and I think she must be able to see my stump beneath the water, but then I realize that nothing can be seen beneath the surface. It’s an oily, dingy brown.
My scalp burns. I bring my hand to my head. The hair feels smooth, and when I look down, it falls over my shoulders quite nicely. Though it’s totally the wrong color, I imagine it shining in the sun like Star’s, adorned with pearl barrettes and ribbons, imagine everybody in the formation gazing at me with envy instead of disgust. I imagine Tiam unable to control his feelings for me and sweeping me into his arms right there, for all to see, the way the prince does to the princess in Sleeping Beauty. And then I shake my head and wonder when I’ll grow up and stop dreaming of things that don’t matter and can’t possibly happen.
She drops the comb beside the tub and then disappears through the doorway.
It’s comfortable in there, alone, almost too comfortable. I spend only another few moments in the tub. Not that I care about the dirty water; it still smells heavenly. But high tide is coming, and I’m afraid of falling asleep. Or of getting lost in this huge castle and not finding my way out in time. People have missed formation before and drowned, usually after small, careless mistakes. I don’t intend to be one of them, not now, when I’ll be inheriting space twelve.
After I towel off my body and hair, I slip into the new garment. It smells sweet, like lavender, too, crisp and new. It’s prettier than the simple tunic that Burbur wears—this one is white and flowing and comes just above the knee, which is rather risqué and not at all practical. I look at the ribbons and barrettes and, not having any clue how to use them, decide to just leave my hair straight. I hope the princess won’t object to that. Standing there in front of the mirror, with my hair beginning to dry and puff out in soft waves on my shoulders, I feel a tingling sensation in my limbs. I look presentable, if not a little pretty.
“Gathering!” someone is shouting down the hall. I hear a squeaking noise, coming closer. It’s Burbur. She pokes her head behind the curtain. Just when I expect her to say something pleasant about my appearance, she barks, “Gathering!”
I turn to her. “Gathering?”
She has a large metal thing on wheels, and it’s filled with square tubs like the ones I saw outside the rooms when I was being led to my quarters. “Yes. Before high tide. This room will be underwater in a bit. Put whatever you don’t want to lose in the tub outside your room, and I’ll take it to the stores in my cart.”
“The stores? In the tower?”
She seems annoyed. “No, underground. There are watertight compartments there. Surely you know that I am the manager of those stores? I daresay it’s the most important job in the kingdom.” She straightens, proud.
Of course I knew this; this is why Burbur is space four. There is no more important job than managing the watertight compartments under the castle. Once, the compartments held boxes and boxes of food and supplies for the survivors of the floods, but now they are virtually empty of useful things, and so the ones that are still watertight are used for storage of necessities we need to keep dry, like firewood. It’s also quite the dangerous job, because of the ghosts and bloodthirsty demons and other vicious creatures that dwell in the hellish never-regions below the castle stores. Many earlier stores managers’ lives have been claimed. I’ve always had questions upon questions about the mysterious stores, and being this close to Burbur, I itch to ask her them. What are the stores like? Had she ever seen any frightening creatures? Is it true that some of the compartments were flooded through carelessness tides ago? But looking at her, I clamp my mouth shut. She’s flitting around like an insect, too busy for conversation.
She walks into my room and begins piling things into a bin for me. The towels, the ribbons, the jars, the pieces of coral and shells for decoration. “Don’t worry, you’ll get it all back. I try to have things arranged soon after the rooms drain.”
“Oh!” I say, marveling at her efficiency. What a difficult task. It makes me wonder even more about the unspeakable dangers of the stores. To think that we have to scramble about on the platform for the last bit of space while the compartments keep safe the ribbons and other worthless trinkets. “There is very little dry room in the stores now, I guess?” I venture.
She grunts, but I can’t tell if it’s a yes, or a no, or a mind-your-own-business. She hefts the bin out of the room, and as she leaves, affixes the curtain over a hook attached to the ceiling. I take another glance at myself in the mirror, and this time, a slow smile pulls up the corners of my mouth. Space Twelve. Then I head off toward the platform.
Five
The Dead Land
I step out into the glare of the setting sun, shielding my eyes, and immediately a cold wave rushes up to greet me. I splash through it, onto dry sand. My skin feels strange, unprotected by the layers of grime that once covered it. The sun is sinking in the sky but still high, and again, no clouds or chance of rain. A drought may be coming. It’s such sweet irony to think that we may all die of thirst, surrounded by all this water.
Trying to keep the short white dress from mushrooming out and showing everything I’ve got underneath, I climb up to the platform, feeling all the while as if I’m forgetting something. My bag. I know Tiam will have kept it safe for me, but it almost feels as if I’ve lost another limb. For the past five thousand tides, I’d never let that bag out of my sight. I’d done everything the same...formation, craphouse, bath, food, sleep, craphouse, formation, craphouse, bath, food, sleep... Now my entire world has turned upside down. Everything about today feels odd. Despite the blistering heat, there are goose bumps on my shoulders.
When I make it to the space that will be mine only until my sixteenth Soft Season, Fern is sitting cross-legged on space number one. She squints in the sun as she looks at me.
“Oh, Coe, what have they done to you?” she says, jumping up.
I grimace. “Is it good or bad?”
She picks up a lock of my hair and lets it fall. “So shiny. So pretty.”
“You think?”
“Definitely.” She sticks out her bottom lip. “I want to grow up. I can’t stand being the only baby in the world.”
“You’re number one, though,” I point out. “That’s the best space there is.”
She frowns. “They’re making me clean the craphouse now.”
“Oh!” I say. I hadn’t thought of that. “I’m so sorry.”
She shrugs. “That’s okay. I like having a job.”
Fern rifles through her bag and produces her wand, which she presses to the skin of my arm. “Your wish is granted.”
Dear, dear Fern. There is so much hope in her. How else would she be able to find a bright side to something so terrible? I wonder how long it will take before she sours of it, before it breaks her. I can’t bear the thought of Fern, the one pure example of what we could have been, broken. I want all of her wishes to come true.
More people are arriving now, and I’m di
stracted from our conversation because so many people seem to be staring at me, wondering what imposter is standing in space two. Blushing, I look across the way toward space twelve, which will be my new space in a matter of tides. It’s a good space, not at the center but very nearly. Much better than I’d ever dreamed I’d receive once I came of age. My eyes scan upward to Kirba, who is glaring back at me. Wherever she is going when she leaves her position, she’s not happy about it. I look away, shameful. Even though it’s not really my fault, it feels as if it is.
The sun is nearly gone before I see Tiam crawl up onto the platform. He’s carrying both bags and his spear over his shoulders, hefting them as if it’s no work at all and striding toward me. He’d always walked confidently, but now he seems even more regal. I pretend to be interested in something behind him, even though the only thing I’ve been able to think about since I left the tub has been his reaction. Tiam is very sensible. He won’t notice something so trivial. If he does, he probably won’t say a thing, I tell myself, preparing for the heartbreak. After all, my skin is still ruddy and blistered, my eyes still pink, my hair still black. I’m still weird, different. A bath can’t change that.
When he is standing in his space, he drops my bag beside me. “Thank you,” I say.
“Anytime,” he says, reaching his hands over his head and yawning with the most luxurious stretch. You’d think he’d just been napping instead of catching the food for the evening meal. “Did everything go all right?”
I nod. “Thank you for recommending me.”
He shrugs innocently. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. What happened to your bracelet?”
For a moment I don’t know what bracelet he is referring to, but then I remember that bit of plastic with RUN on it. It’s gone. I can’t remember where I lost it. “I don’t know.”
There’s a long break in the conversation, and just when I’m sure he isn’t going to say anything more, he smiles. “Did anyone ever tell you, Coe Kettlefish, that you are positively stunning?”
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