30. Pippi
Ice turned its nails into my skin and scraped, peeling off several layers.
At least, that was how it felt when I plunged into the sea.
I sputtered. And choked. And made some very attractive heeeeeeeeeeeee sounds.
Warm air danced over my head as Alistair billowed worriedly.
“This…” I gasped, fighting to get enough air to talk.
“This really clears your sinuses, huh?” I paddled through the water, gurgling when a wave whacked my face, and ended up swimming smack into Alistair’s side.
“Ooops.” I flattened my palms against the craggy surface of his scaly hide and pushed myself back, angling my head up… and up…and up to look at him.
Stars, he was huge.
Even when his neck arched down and the tip of his snout was just above my brow, I had to crane myself way back to look him in the eye.
“How’s the weather up there?” I asked. “Any warmer than it is down here?”
He made a low, grumbly snort and dropped his head down, dipping his nose below the surface.
“Guess— Eeeeekk !” Screeching laughter exploded out of me.
Because Alistair had blown a jet of warm water at me. And it tickled as it cycloned around my legs and torpedoed up the hem of my shirt, making the top poof out of the water like a pudgy balloon.
Then it was Alistair’s turn to laugh when the shirt slapped lightly against my cheeks.
“Better?” he asked, chortling.
“Oh, yes. Loads .” I smooshed the top of my engorged shirt down until it sagged back against my skin. “Why get a life jacket when I’ve got a sea dino to inflate my blouse?”
Alistair’s eyes blinked differently when they were half submerged in water. Rather than the eyelids closing from top and bottom, clear membranes swiped across the eyes from the side.
Which was…freaky.
“Sea…dino?” Alistair blinked again.
“Yeah. Well. I mean, you kinda look like Littlefoot from The Land Before Time , you know? Just less cutesy. ”
“I think I’m cute.”
“Hmmm…” I ran my hand over his shoulder. “Not as cute as Littlefoot. And he’s, you know, little.”
Alistair scooted his head a little closer to me. “But can he do this?” He blew out, sending a geyser of water straight into the air.
I squealed as that mist tumbled down, pelleting me lightly over the head. “Goofball.”
He responded with a sonic boom laugh—and the ocean took offense to having an Alistair detonate in its waters. It retaliated by shooting a barrage of tall, choppy waves at us.
I scrabbled when the waves sloshed over me and raked my nails into Alistair’s shoulder, fighting the slimy pull of the water.
“You’re safe, Pippi.” Alistair touched his snout to my side, holding me steady.
“I know,” I said. “But could you maybe wait until I’m not in the water to launch a tsunami?”
“Ssssssoooooo-nam-eeee,” he gargled the word. “Those are… large waves.”
“Sure are.”
“Much larger than the ones that just passed.”
“Hmmm, those got pretty close to tsunami level.”
“Hmmm,” he lightly mimicked me. “I think not.”
I splashed him, grinning when he chuckled.
“You, sir,” I added, “might be big enough to dismiss monstrous waves, but did you ever see what happens to people when they get flattened by a tsunami?”
“It’s bad, I’m sure,” Alistair drawled.
“They’re pulverized . Every bone broken. Skin flayed to ribbons.”
“Oh dear.”
And that got me.
The slightly high pitched “Oh dear,” like he was Winnie the Pooh, hemming and hawing over the empty honey jar.
I cackled, and then ended up swallowing a big, salty mouthful of seawater, which turned my giggle into more of a barking gag.
Alistair snuffled gently. “Careful, Pippi. The b-b-b-banshees make that sound. When they m-mate.”
I choked again.
“One of them might answer your m-mating cry.”
I laughed.
And laughed.
Until my stomach hurt and I had to hold onto Alistair for dear life because the giddiness turned my muscles to goop. Until I had tears streaming down my face and I was gagging—both on the air, and on the sea.
“This is your fault.” I sneezed when a vat of water flumed up my nose.
“I’m very sorry.” Alistair vibrated with a low, non-tsunami inducing chuckle and sent another warm puff of air over my head.
It took several minutes for the giggles to subside.
And several more for me to catch my breath.
“You’ve color in your cheeks again,” Alistair told me.
“Did I not before?” I pressed a hand onto his side for support when the next wave swelled.
“No. Except where you’d scratched… rubbed your eyes. You were pa-pale. But you have more color now.”
“Laughing will do that to ya.” I stroked my hands over his shoulder, letting my fingers bump and bounce over his scales. Smiling when his contentment poured into my heart, shielding me from the bitterness of the sea.
My fingers caught on a jagged pucker of skin, near the base of his throat, and the heat radiating from it nearly scorched my fingertips.
I frowned, pulling my hand away.
“It’s a rune,” Alistair said.
“Magic?” I tapped my fingers against the crinkled line, hissing when it sizzled my skin.
“Yes. That one stops me from eating.”
“It stops you from eating ?”
“I can only eat when I’m fed. If I eat from the waters, outside of my feedings, I won’t be able to swallow. I-I’ll…” He sighed. “There’s a missing word…when something you eat doesn’t stay …”
“Regurgitate? Vomit? Puke?” I supplied.
“Yes.”
My hand was numb as it slid away from his neck. “That’s barbaric !”
“They do not want me to eat from the waters. The creatures…if I eat all of them, others won’t…they won’t live here. The waters need the creatures.”
If that was supposed to reassure me, it didn’t.
I squinted at him, my eyes tracing the shape of the rune. It blended well. The jagged line flowed with the curve of his scales and the slope of his neck. If I hadn’t felt it, I never would’ve known it was there.
I flattened my hand against it, gritting my teeth through the stinging pain.
This was cruel.
Malicious.
Demeaning.
To not even let him feed himself.
To make him barf if he dared to go against his schedule.
A bitter, lemony taste flooded my mouth. Hate.
I actually, legitimately, hated the people who ran this stupid island.
“Pippi?” Alistair ruffled my hair with another soft breath.
“It’s not right.” I pulled my hand away when the searing pain escalated to unbearable levels. And scowled when I flipped my palm over and found not a single burn or blotch of red.
“It is what it is.” A nonchalant statement, betrayed by the deep, bone-aching sorrow radiating off him.
“And you’ve other runes? They keep you from surfacing?”
“Yes. From surfacing. From getting too close to ships. Or the dock. Or other areas.” He turned, pointing the tip of his nose at something I couldn’t see through the fog. “From crossing the r-r-r-reef.”
So that was why the stars shone here.
He’d taken me to the reef, to the very edge of Niverwick’s magical border.
To the very edge of his cage.
That lemony taste turned acidic. “And those runes…are they also on your neck?”
“No. They are above my eyes.” He cocked his chin slightly sideways, as though showing me, but there was no way I’d be able to see them. Not in the dark, and not when the runes camouflaged themselves so well.
“Alistair, I’m so sorry,” I whispered.
A distressed sound escaped him. “Don’t be. Pippi. Please. This isn’t your…g-g-guilt. It’s not yours to feel.”
“I feel it anyway.” I touched a hand to the burning rune again, forcing myself to savor the pain. “Does it hurt?”
“No,” he murmured. “It only hurts when it’s…ack-act-activated.”
“What about other things? When they force you to stay under the surface? Even if you’re doing what you’re told and don’t activate the rune, does it hurt you?
Like, so, okay…I watched one of those nature documentaries a while back about whales.
And I didn’t realize they were air breathing.
I’d always assumed sea things breathed water.
But whales suffocate if they can’t surface. ”
“I am not a whale, Pippi.” Alistair chuckled.
“Well, I know that.”
“I’m way…there’s a word. C-coo- cooler. ”
And he stressed that word too, in a ‘90s surfer boy style. “ Cooooolllllerrrr. ”
“Oh jeeze, you’re really hamming it up tonight, aren’t you?” I asked.
He blew out a big breath, sending the gills on the side of his neck fluttering like sparkly green streamers.
“Yes.” I laughed. “You’re right. You’re way cooler than a whale. And prettier.”
Alistair tucked his chin up and puffed his chest out.
“Did that stroke your ego enough?”
“A bit more won’t hurt.” He laughed when I gave his shoulder a tap. “But, no, Pippi. Being under the surface, staying there, it does not hurt me. I can b-breathe air. Or water. Both are e-e-easy.”
“Well, thank the stars for that, at least.” I kneaded my hands into the areas around the rune, wishing the magic was a big muscle knot that I could work out with a deep tissue massage.
Or a line of ink that I could scrub away.
But it was more of a brand—burnt deeply into his flesh.
A blistering wound that would never heal.
But I tried to make it feel better.
Alistair nuzzled the tip of his nose to my head, and a warm river of tranquility trickled through my chest.
He loved this.
Being touched. Shown affection.
He was basking in it.
So I kept going. Grinding my knuckles into the tall, slippery slopes of his shoulder. Applying as much pressure as I had the strength for, although I knew my massages wouldn’t penetrate his thick hide. At best, the digging touches probably felt like a light brush to him.
His shoulder, when I worked my hands lower, slipping them beneath the water, never stopped moving.
Hard bands of muscle coiled and rolled beneath my palms. And the sloped plane of it seemed endless.
Even when I’d dropped my hands past my waist, they were still squarely on his shoulder.
I nudged my paddling legs closer, brushing my bare feet against him and stretching my toes to see if they could feel the end of his shoulder.
They couldn’t.