24. In which there are three seals in one day
IN WHICH THERE ARE THREE SEALS IN ONE DAY
“Do you have to start up this racket four times a day?!” Hester yelled at the dogs, who had begun their ridiculous orchestra of howling, sat around their kennels on the lower deck.
What was more perplexing was that just as unpredictably as they started, they stopped and pretended like nothing had ever happened.
Hester gave a frustrated snarl and stomped off to stand at the bow.
She squinted into the vast white, the sun and oh-so-blue sky, and gripped the rail.
A black shape was not too far away. “Seal!” she squeaked.
By God, it had been months since they’d had fresh meat.
She ran for a rifle and then made haste down the ramp and onto the sparkling floe.
Seal steaks for dinner. What a treat, she could almost taste the tender, fishy meat on her tongue.
She skidded over the ice and snow and threw herself to her front, peering through the rifle’s sight and placing her finger on the trigger. Her stomach growled.
Crack.
A shot fired, and the seal slumped.
But Hester had not pulled the trigger.
Frowning, she looked all around. What on Earth?
There, away to her right, a figure in white lay in the snow, the long, black barrel of the gun now visible.
Septimus. She had memorised that particular outline.
Huffing with frustration, she got to her feet and marched over.
“You shot my seal,” she said, a hand on her hip.
“I didn’t see your name on it, witch.”
“Oh, yes. You’re right.” Hester shielded her eyes and squinted into the distance. “Look, I can see there, on its flank. It does indeed spell your name. I-D-I-O-”
“Very funny.” Septimus cut her off. He got to his feet, making his way towards the dead seal through the hummocks of ice.
Hester smirked. The past few days after the siren attack had been full of barbed words, frustrated snarling and shouting matches. Hester laughed when she thought back to how she had been warming to him. She utterly detested him and he clearly despised her. And that was fine.
She caught up with him as he dragged the seal back towards the ship. “You haven’t smelt anything funny in your cabin today?”
He glowered. “I found the rotting pemmicin you stuffed in my pillowcase, if that’s what you mean.”
Hester sniggered.
He said nothing and continued dragging the seal.
“How was losing at football for the third time?” he muttered.
She scowled. “We’ll win next time.”
“Seems unlikely, witch.”
“Stop calling me that.” She liked the way he called her little witch, the mischief that played in his eyes as the endearment passed his lips. Witch, however, he spat out like he’d tasted something bad.
He dropped the seal and turned to face her. “Why? You are a witch. Where are your thunderclouds now? I can see you getting angry. Are you going to smite me?”
She certainly wished she could smite his stupid face off. Alas. “It ran out when I fought Odette.”
He frowned. “Ran out? What do you mean?”
“I used it up fighting her. When I’m not on land the magic runs out as I use it. It’s only replenished when I’m on land.” Or in the Underworld, but she could hardly say that.
His brow bunched. “Why?”
“How should I know?”
Septimus frowned. “What do you mean, how should I know? Surely you know.”
“I don’t know anything about it. I can’t always control it. I don’t know why it flares when I’m angry or how to stop it.” She hated explaining that to him. Hated admitting it. But the words spilled out.
He stared at her, and she could see the information sinking in. “Why don’t you know?”
“Because I was dumped in an orphanage as a small child and left to fend for myself. I’ll never know, unless I find my family.” Why was she telling him this? He certainly wouldn’t care.
He picked up the seal by the hind flippers and started pulling it again. “So the day the Intrepid…” The emotion rang in his words. He didn’t need to finish the sentence.
“You made me angry. I couldn’t control the magic. The orca came.”
“Right.”
Hester looked sidelong at him, trying to work out what he was thinking.
They had reached the Valour, and the dogs stood outside their dogloos, baying and pulling at their leashes at the sight of the dead seal.
He let it fall to the ice and stalked off up the ramp.
She stared after him, then shook her head.
If she thought telling him any of that would make the slightest difference, it seemed she was incorrect.
“What is that?” Charlotte asked Arnold, pointing over the ice, shielding her eyes against the bright sun.
“A second seal? Could it be? We haven’t shot anything for nearly five months and now they all come at once!
Quick, I’ll get the gun.” Arnold ran, slipping on the icy deck, and she chuckled at his enthusiasm.
He quickly reappeared. “Hold this.” He handed her the rifle and her overall.
“Come with me. Bring a sled and Marjorie.”
“Oh gosh, I don’t know. I’m not sure I want to see this,” Charlotte said, biting her lip. A small voice in her head told her to toughen up, and that it was hypocritical to eat animals but not be able to kill them.
“That’s fine. I can get someone else to come,” Arnold said, taking the rifle back, his smile faltering.
She could do it. It would be fine. She was tough. “No, wait. I’ll come,” she said, donning the suit.
“You’re sure?”
“Yes. I think so.”
Charlotte followed Arnold back down the ramp. They harnessed Marjorie to a sled, walking next to her as she pulled it along the snow, their footsteps crunching.
She could still see the black dot in the distance, and swallowed hard against the lump in her throat, gazing back at the Valour.
“This couldn’t have come at a better time. The dogs were starting to weaken from the lack of fresh meat,” Arnold said.
“Poor things. Does this mean the season is turning?”
“Yes, summer is on the way.”
“So the ice will melt? We might get free?”
Arnold hesitated. “Perhaps. But we are about to be drawn into the most pressurised area of the Weddell Sea. I suppose we’ll have to see what happens.”
Charlotte couldn’t imagine even more pressure than was currently pressing in on the ship. The noises the ice made against the hull were monstrous some days.
The black dot grew larger as they approached.
It was a sweet, plump crabeater seal, silvery grey in colour, lazing on the floe.
Arnold halted when they were in range, and they lay in the snow on their fronts.
The cold leached into Charlotte’s belly, but it wasn’t wholly unpleasant after the march to get there.
Arnold braced the rifle butt against his shoulder.
“Can I—can I have a go?” Charlotte asked. She wasn’t quite sure why she was asking.
“Of course.” Arnold passed the rifle to her, and she tried to place her hands as she’d seen him do.
“That’s it, just—” he shuffled right next to her, his arm going over her back and his hand moving her own to the proper place. The rough hair of his beard scratched her cheek, and she froze in place, hardly daring to breathe as heat flared in her core, travelling through her body.
“Now, put your finger on the trigger,” he said.
But she couldn’t. Couldn’t move an inch.
Could only think of his body pressed next to hers, of how very close he was.
And yes, when she thought she was going to be eaten by Odette, she had thought of him.
And yes, he was perfect in every way. All it would take would be for her to lean closer in, to turn her head—but…
“I can’t,” she blurted, the rifle falling with a thud to the snow, her hands shaking. She leant away from him, and the cold air bit at her side where his warmth had been. She screwed her eyes shut, then opened them again when visions of a dark alley flashed behind her eyelids.
“I’m sorry,” Arnold said, his face crestfallen. He snatched his arm back from her. “I didn’t mean—I’m sorry.”
Shame enveloped her just as fiercely as the cold, and she looked upwards into the sky. There was no sign of the albatross today. No sign of her protector.
“It’s not—don’t be sorry. It’s just—the seal. I can’t shoot it. You should do it. Before it gets away.” She looked away and covered her ears, and a few moments later there was a crack as the rifle fired.
The seal lay dead on the ice.
Arnold turned to face her, worry etched on his face. “I’m sorry if I made you feel uncomfortable.”
She gave him a tight smile. “It’s alright.”
Marjorie began barking, and Charlotte got up, brushing snow from her front and trying to quieten the dog. But Marjorie was barking at a second seal that had appeared, and Charlotte hid her eyes as Arnold shot that one too.
“Two! Lucky dogs. We’ll be eating seal steak tonight too,” Arnold said. “It never rains, it pours, as they say. Wait—is that a penguin?”
“Oh, look at it. They’re such dear creatures,” Charlotte said as it waddled along the snow. How sweet they were. Such darlings—
Crack!
Charlotte covered her mouth in horror as the penguin fell to the ice. “Arnold! How could you?!”