I moved the flashlight further along the body. Whale-sized body. Whale-sized and getting bigger which means closer.
My hand was no longer steady, but I kept the light moving until I got to the end where I saw enormous tentacles covered with huge suckers.
Giant Squid!
Aren’t they kind of like the Loch Ness monster? If it’s a fairy, can it eat me?
Instead of following the party-light fish, it was headed right for me…of course it was. I’m a living lighthouse.
Too late to turn out the light. I had a dinner plate in my face.
I was going to need some Giant Squid repellent, but I had done an excellent job of tying the heavy fishnet bag around my wrists so I wouldn’t accidentally drop it.
I tried to speak, but there seemed to be a lump in my throat. The rocks were still pulling me downwards but the giant squid had no trouble staying way too close.
“I hope you realize that I am a fairy,” I finally squeaked out, while I fumbled with the heavy bag of rocks.
“What’s a fairy? You smell good.”
“Sky. I’m a Sky.” My voice was still shaky.
“What’s a Sky? You smell different.”
“Sky. You know, double breathers. We breathe air like the Bubble people. We’re not on the food chain,” I added nervously, because I don’t think this monster got around much.
“You breathe air? Like whales?” It backed off a bit.
I sucked in a big gill-full of water, grateful for the space, my left hand finally in the sampo, trying to remember what I was supposed to be taking out.
“You don’t like whales?” It backed off some more.
“Are you a whale?” asked the slowly retreating monster.
Trick question. If I say yes, will it attack? If I say no, will it eat me?
“Uh…yes…sort of…not really.” I tried to cover all bases. Time to change the subject.
“Uh…I’m a very powerful magician…you should go away.” That would have sounded better if it hadn’t come out in such a high-pitched whine.
“What’s a magician? Why can’t I eat you?” The squid spoke very politely…but…it also moved back in my face. It had a mouth like a goldfinch beak…bigger than my head and now about one inch away from my tender tummy.
“I’M A WHALE!” I shrieked.
The whole squid body shook and turned away so fast and with such force, that if I didn’t have my bag of rocks pulling me down and out of reach, I would have been knocked out the ocean.
In the beam of the flashlight I watched the tentacles trailing behind the retreating giant squid as it disappeared into the black.
I guess that was the right answer.
The hand holding the flashlight was still tied to the bag of rocks, my other hand was holding a small jar. Both hands were still shaking. I shone the light on the jar. The label said Giant Squid Repellent. Great. What was I supposed to do with that? Rub it on the squid? I shoved it back in the sampo together with my flashlight.
Instead, I took out a stretchy headband with three super powerful headlights. It took a minute to put it on my head with only one hand but when I was done, the water was lit up in front of me and on both sides. I don’t care if it attracts every fish in the ocean. I want to know what’s coming.
Even though my Sky body couldn’t feel it, the increased pressure as I descended was slowing me down. I added another rock to my collection to speed me on my way. I didn’t want to get dragged to the bottom of the ocean, but this was not a place where I wanted to linger.
As I was swimming down, I passed a swarm of jellyfish swimming up. Lots and lots of jellyfish, transparent but shining with rainbow colors in my headlights. I lingered.
When the last rainbow jelly finally passed, the ocean was empty again for a long time. I kept following my rock bag deeper and deeper and scanning the sea for whatever was out there. I passed a couple of angler fish. Little guys with tons of teeth and a tiny lantern hanging from their heads, but that was all.
Eventually, I thought I saw a faint light in the direction I presumed to be down. I switched off my headlights. Yes! Lots of light. Not little pin pricks of light that meant another school of stranger than strange fish.
This was a glow. A glow from below. I’m either swimming upwards, or I have finally made it. I caught my breath as my heartbeat increased to match the excitement I suddenly felt.
I watched fascinated, unable to look anywhere but the source of light as the dim glow gradually changed to points as I got closer.
The city was a dome of light below me with long tentacles of fairy lights streaming out of the city in different directions, growing fainter with distance and eventually petering out in the dark.
Now that I could see the city, I thought comfortingly of Bibi waiting below.
Whoops! I had forgotten. Bibi didn’t have any rocks. He had to deal with the current. He could be anywhere. Why didn’t he wait for me? Now I have to go in by myself.
Maybe I can wait for him. Sort of hang around until he shows up. But it will be hours, maybe days before Bibi gets here and who knows if Zazkal will ever get out of that lake.
I was on my own.
I’ll just swim up to the first sky I see and demand to be taken to the king. Right. Like ten and a half years old is old enough to represent one kingdom to another.
I miss Grandma and Grandpa Sky. I miss Stan and Ollie. I even miss Zazkal, although in his case, maybe ‘missed’ is putting it too strongly.
Suck it up, Miriam, I told myself. You need a plan.
“If only Thorn and Reddragon were here,” I said out loud.
I remembered how much the seahorses helped me when I was a very nervous guest of honor at the huge party my grandparents had hosted when I arrived at Casalot.
CHAPTER 15
SEAHORSES
”Actually, we are here,” said a small voice near my head.
“You called. We came,” said a second voice on the other side of my head.
“Thorn, Reddragon, you’re really here. Oh, I’m so glad to see you. But I didn’t think you could survive this deep.”
“We can’t,” said one small brown seahorse.
“But we can if you call us,” said the other. “We can be anywhere that you are. Why do you think we told you our names?”
“Even on the land?”
“Even there,” said Reddragon who I now recognized as the voice at my right ear. “Although I don’t know what good we could do. The only thing we can do on the land is lie around and flop.”
“You’re just what I need right now. You can be my Jiminy Crickets. Only what I need most right now isn’t a conscience, it’s courage.”
“Huh?”
“What’s a cricket?”
“It’s a story about a boy called Pinocchio who didn’t have a conscience,” I explained. “A good fairy gave him a bug called a cricket to be his conscience.”
“I get it,” said Thorn. “If you need a conscience, call a cricket. But if you need courage, send for a seahorse.”
“I feel braver already.”
“What happened to Bibi and Zazkal?” Thorn asked, seriously. “Why aren’t they with you?
“They’re lost. Well, Zazkal isn’t lost. He’s stuck…and Bibi probably isn’t lost. I just don’t know where he is.
“I’m not lost, either. I know exactly where I am…but…now I have to go on my own…and…oh, I’m so glad you’re here.”
“Miriam,” said Reddragon, “I think you should call the rest of us. Even though we’re small, the more of us there are, the more we will look like an official escort.
“Everyone in the city has either never seen a seahorse, or if they have, they know that seahorses can’t live at this depth. In either case, they should be impressed.”
“But will the other seahorses mind?” I asked. “I don’t feel right calling them to come such a long way.”
“Mind!” said Thorn. “Miriam, we’re thrilled. There is no way we ever co
uld have seen a real abyssmal city without you. Besides, this is exactly why we gave you our names.”
“In that case,” I said. “Let’s do this right.”
Taking off the scrunchie that kept my hair in a ponytail, I popped it into the sampo. Next, the headlight headband came off. I wrapped it around my wrist, keeping the light on. Now I had floaty ‘mermaid’ hair, a style no self-respecting Sky would ever wear. It’s way beyond impractical.
Then I took a fancy headband out of the sampo. Stretchy shiny silver satin with eight thin ribbons, in a rainbow of colors attached along the top and sides of the headband. The headband kept most of the hair out of my face. It was really for formal occasions when I didn’t need to see to see where I was going, but it would do.
Thorn and Reddragon wrapped their tails tightly around two of the ribbons and nestled into my hair for extra traction, while I called softly for the rest of my friends.
“Leviathan, Darkflower, Sharktooth, Tidalwave, Flyingfish, Inkjet.”
In less than a moment, I was surrounded by a halo of seahorses, all laughing and talking at once… “Hi Miriam”… “Where are we?”… “Ohh…I’ve never been this deep before…”
Explanations took a few minutes. But they were soon sorted out, firmly attached to the ribbons and with an extra rock in the net bag to give speed to our anticipation, we headed down towards the city’s glow.
PART II
CASTLE DOWNALOT
CHAPTER 16
GLORIA MUNDI
I don’t know what I expected when we finally passed through the dome of lights and saw the city, but it was not a stone forest at the bottom of the ocean.
There were so many plants floating out from the sides and on top of the tall stone pillars that I felt like a bird looking down on the treetops.
“They should call this place Seaweed City,” Thorn said.
Fairy lights were everywhere, not just the dome of lights at the city limits, but scattered all around the ‘stone trees’.
When we got closer, we saw that the pillars were full of holes just like Casalot. Doors and windows. Stone tree houses.
Coming from such enormous darkness into the light, the city seemed bright but there were hardly any people around.
“I guess it’s still early here,” I said.
A salt elf was swimming out of a nearby tree house and we swam over to ask directions.
“Excuse me, I said. “I’ve just arrived from Casalot with a message for King Mundiflure. Can you tell me how to find him?”
“Castle Downalot is not far from here and I’m going there myself. I’ll be happy to show you the way.”
“I’m Gloria Mundi,” the salt elf said. Everybody calls me Glori.”
Glori was the size of a sea sprite only with a tail like mine instead of a sprite’s finny legs. Salt elves are known for their colorful tails and Glori was no exception with bright pink scales and matching super short pink hair. She may have been smaller than me, but she would never be lost in a crowd.
“How do you do, Glori. I’m Miriam, and these are my friends…” I hesitated, not sure how else to introduce them.
“We are her seahorse escorts,” spoke up Sharktooth, side-stepping the need to provide names.
“How nice to meet you,” Glori said. “I didn’t know that seahorses were fairies.”
“We’re not,” said Leviathan.
“Forgive me for contradicting you,” said Glori, “but it is not possible for anyone but fairies to live at this depth.”
I hesitated again but my friends knew just what to say.
“We are here because of fairy magic,” said Tidalwave. “Queen Flora and King Mele’, Miriam’s grandparents, are very powerful magic users.” He neglected to mention that the fairy magic that allowed them to be with me was theirs, not Mele’ and Flora’s.
Glori’s face showed the excitement of recognition. “Of course, I should have known you by your lovely fins. The story we’ve heard described a Sky of great beauty and ability with wonderful dorsal fins.”
I felt my face heat up with embarrassment.
She looked at my wings admiringly. I winced. I had forgotten to tape them down and they floated out behind me like a fancy goldfish.
“Well, you know how stories get exaggerated…” I stammered but Glori was all questions with no pauses for answers.
“The bubble people told us about your adventures. But I would have expected you to be much older. You’re so young to have fought with an evil wizard. How did you actually escape? Has the wizard been banished forever? Did you really change him into a rock? Did your grandparents teach you to use magic? Is it true that you can make anything you want? We heard that…”
Somewhere in the middle of Glori’s non-stop questions, I ceased to be embarrassed and entered a state of mild astonishment.
“Glori, hardly any of that is true,” I said. “I’ll tell you what happened, but first explain how you heard it from the bubble people. I thought you said that only fairies could live down here,” said Miriam.
“It’s true that no one else can live down here,” Glori said,” but sometimes the largest of the squid eaters come on cin rani. They never stay long because it takes almost all of their air supply just to travel this deep and back to the surface again. When they do come, they always tell the most wonderful stories.”
“Now,” she said, pausing to savor the story she was about to hear, “tell me what really happened when you were captured by the wizard.”
“It’s true, that I was kidnapped by a rogue Sky, but I didn’t escape. My grandparents rescued me. And I’m afraid that the reports of my magic ability are way off target. I’m just an apprentice magic user and not a very advanced one at that.
“You’ll never guess what happened to the rogue Sky,” I said.
“We heard that he was banished forever,” Glori said. “Some of the old stories talk about people being banished, but no one can remember it actually happening to a sea fairy.”
“No, he wasn’t banished, although it was considered. Instead, he was expected to show that he could be part of the community by taking on an apprentice.”
Glori looked hard at me and said, “Didn’t you just mention that you were apprenticed to a magic user?”
“Yep, you guessed it.”
“What a great idea, making him be nice to you.”
“He has to teach me magic. He doesn’t have to be nice to me, and he’s not.”
“How unfairylike,” Glori said. “You’re a lot younger than I would have expected. What brings you to Metsoola, anyway?”
“I’m supposed to be here with Zazkal and Bibi, one of the council members, but we got separated.
“My grandparents sent us to collect information about the fairy lights. They heard that the Abyssmal cities were having a problem.”
“It’s true,” Glori said. “Our supplies of power nuts are running dangerously low.
“We’re expecting a new shipment, so no one is overly worried. But we sure would like to find out what’s happening.
“Common talk has it that someone is taking them. King Mundiflure is of a different opinion and he could be right. He thinks they may be defective, and he’s sent a group of Sky to the Kingdom of the Cats to check it out.”
“The Kingdom of the Cats,” I gasped.
“Miriam,” Sharkstooth whispered urgently in my ear, “Everyone knows that the power nuts are grown in Ailuria.”
I could hardly tell Glori that I was only visiting my grandparents as a side visit, and that my actual destination was the Kingdom of the Cats. At least not without telling her a lot of other stuff.
My cat Tefnut was responsible for my fairy gifts. Her sole purpose was to set me up as her replacement in Ailuria. Fortunately, she could beg, plead, and manipulate but she could not force me to accept. I did promise to check it out, so that’s where I’ll be headed this winter.
If Glori knew that I would eventually be going to Ailuria, her questions would tri
ple. Discretion aside, it would take hours to satisfy her curiosity. Time to change the subject.
“I guess that’s why my grandparents got me to bring some extra power nuts. Let’s stop at a light and see if they work down here.”
Grandma and Grandpa had done no such thing, but I had been flustered by Sharkstooth’s remark. The power nuts were the first thing that popped into my head.
“There’s a light over there,” Glori said. “Let’s try it.”
We stopped next to the fairy light. I drew a small stone out of the sampo. This one was a iridescent greeny-gray color and felt slightly warm in my hand.
This pebble, or nut, looked and felt right. It needed only to be put to the test as they were about to do. If it didn’t work I could easily make some excuse to Glori. If it did, why, what a great gift a big pile of power nuts would make for King Mundiflure.
“It feels all right, I mean, it feels like it’s still good,” I said. “Let’s check it out.”
Glori reached out a little too quickly and the round globe of light bounced away from her, which was what they were supposed to do when something bumps into them. Then she reached out more slowly and carefully, and this time her fingers penetrated the globe and disappeared inside. She drew out a power nut that differed from mine only in being more blue than green.
As soon as the power nut was withdrawn from the globe, the light went out. When I replaced it with the one that the sampo had manufactured, the light went on.
I gave a big pleased-for-myself sigh and tried to contain the size of my grin hoping that it did not seen excessive to Glori.
She smiled pleasantly and said, “Well, it looks like they’re still good. That will certainly be a nice surprise for everyone. There are already some roads on the outskirts of the kingdom that have become unusable.
“Let’s push on. We’re nearly at Castle Downalot. You can tell me what it’s like at Casalot,” she said eagerly. “I’ve never been there before.”
We swam on for a few minutes while I tried to describe Casalot. From her comments, I got the impression that life here was a little less casual.
“It sounds like Metsoola is more formal than Casalot,” I said. Glori looked like she was going to say something but instead she turned her head, drawing my attention to what lay ahead, an absolutely classic tall, airy, many-towered fairytale style castle.