Chapter 31
“How are you doing?” Dad calls over the headwind.
I force a smile. “Fine.”
Dad nods with his eyes focused on the channel ahead. The lighthouse on Getholmen blinks in the distance, but the light disappears as Dad steers away.
Oh no. He wants to cross Kanholmsfj?rden Bay. I thought he would take the inshore route, north of Ekno, but it seems he wants to be in the lee of Hasselo to avoid the easterly wind.
It’s too deep here. Deep waters are dangerous. The deep pulls us down.
Dad is oblivious. He doesn’t seem to be in any hurry, and steers with calm movements.
The water is alive beneath us. I can feel it through the boat’s thin shell, hear a voice whispering in that strange language from my dreams, the words that my mind refused to understand.
“Did you have fun with your friend?” Dad asks.
“Yes,” I say with my heart in my throat. “A lot of fun.”
Don’t talk, just drive.
I am hit with a barrage of mental images.
I think of the tattered remains of Jacobsson’s boat, Axel all alone in the mist. His red-eyed mother saying goodbye to her twins on the dock, squeezing their hands as if she never wanted to let go.
“Can we go a little faster, Dad?” My voice is barely more than a whisper.
“What did you say?”
What’s the point? I don’t know how I can make him understand. Fear surges through my veins, spreads throughout my body, and paralyzes my tongue.
“Nothing.”
The islands are blurred shapes, the leafless trees like black-ink drawings scratched into the night sky, silhouettes barely visible to the naked eye. I tuck my hands into my sleeves, but it isn’t just the cold that’s making me shiver.
The temperature has dropped significantly since sunset. It’s a freezing-cold, clear, starry night. The moon is rising, but it barely seems to cut through the dark.
The boat lurches and I grab the rail.
“Did you feel that?” I shout to Dad.
“Feel what?”
“That bump! We hit something.”
Dad puts his arm around my shoulders. “There’s nothing to worry about; I just turned a bit too abruptly. Gosh, you’re jumpy tonight.”
Was it just my imagination?
I’m so tired of being scared all the time, of never being able to relax. Fear has become a constant companion, a lump in my throat that has been there for so long that I can’t remember what life was like without it.
You have no right to do this, I think without knowing who I’m talking to. The sea is mine; you can’t take it away from me.
“Dad,” I say, tugging on his arm, “I want to drive the boat.”
“Huh?”
“Dad, please. Let me drive us home.”
Eventually, he agrees to switch places, and I practically push him out of the way. He doesn’t let go of the steering wheel until I take hold of it, so clumsily that the boat swerves dangerously close to a skerry.
“What are you doing?” Dad yells, bracing to keep his balance.
But I don’t respond. I just concentrate on going faster.
We are north of Hasselkobben, where the water below us is about a third of a mile deep. This is where I almost ran aground last Saturday, even though there is no ground here.
“Tuva, slow down,” Dad says nervously. “You’re going too fast.”
I don’t answer, and focus instead on Haro’s distant, dark landmass. Our only salvation.
But something is coming up behind us.
The hairs on my arms stand on end as I realize just how close the creature is.
How could I think it wouldn’t notice us? How could I?
“I can’t, Dad!” I scream.
We are at max speed, but I beg, plead, pray to any god that will listen to let us go even faster.
It’s not enough.
The thing is fast approaching now, closing in on us, and there’s nothing I can do. I see—or rather, sense—that it’s only a few yards behind us.
It’s too late.
It’s coming, behind us, coming.
Now.
A mighty bang. Everything disappears. As the world turns on its head, part of my mind remains strangely calm.
We have capsized. The boat is upside down.
It all happens in fast motion, yet slowly enough for me to see the sky replaced by sea and the keel of the boat suddenly above the water instead of below it.
We’re in the water.
It’s freezing cold, but there’s no time to think about that. In the water under the hull, I can see much more clearly than I should be able to in such dense darkness.
Everything is illuminated by a bright-green haze. Small objects from the boat sink to the seabed in clear bubbling spirals. A few coins, an old pack of chewing gum, and a lone boot disappear into the depths.
There’s Dad.
He’s a big black silhouette beside the boat’s hull. He should notice me, but something is wrong. He isn’t moving. Now he’s starting to sink instead of swim.
There’s no time to think about what’s chasing us. I tear off my flotation vest and dive after him.
Dad has already sunk down several yards, and my ears should be protesting against the pressure, but they’re not.
How I have missed the sea.
My body recognizes this.
As I swim with all my might down to reach Dad, I feel neither cold nor pain. My clothes are hindering me, so I unzip my jacket and whip it off as I swim. I have to slide my boots off, too, so that my feet are free to kick down and reach him.
An arm!
As I grab it, I see a big gash on his brow and blood suspended in a cloud around his lolling head.
Dad’s eyes are closed.
I’m running out of air, and my lungs begin to ache. But I have to bring him up to the surface. That’s all that matters.
I tug on his arm and kick upward as hard as I can. My lungs are on fire, and my strength is about to fail any second now.
At last, I break through the surface and gasp for air. Dad’s face is above the water as well, but he’s still unconscious.
“Dad!” I scream. “Wake up!”
We have to get to land, but I don’t have the energy to drag him with me. My arms are numb from the effort. I can’t hold him much longer. He’s too heavy.
Then, finally, his eyelids begin to flutter, and he mutters, without looking at me:
“?sa?”
I let out a sob of relief.
“No, Dad, it’s Tuva. You have to swim. I can’t hold you up. You’re too heavy; you have to swim yourself.”
I am panting with exhaustion, but eventually he starts to kick his legs so I can let go and swim alongside him.
Dad still seems dazed but manages to swim on his own.
Maybe we can reach Hasselo. I can see the shore up ahead. We have to make it.
“Swim, please, Dad,” I beg, trying to direct him to land.
“What happened, Tuva?”
“I don’t know.” I twist around to try to see the boat, but it has already disappeared. “Something rammed into us. It might come back. You have to swim faster.”
Then I feel it.
The power of it.
It rises again, all around us. I don’t understand how Dad isn’t aware of its presence, why he isn’t reacting. I can sense it a thousand times stronger now that we are in the water: a persistent pulse that penetrates every cell of my body. It makes my bones vibrate and teeth tingle.
Everything is permeated with death and destruction.
It’s close now. The water bubbles around us. A whirlpool forms and grows deeper with every passing second.
I must keep Dad away from it.
“I’m sorry,” I shout over the waves. “It’s all my fault. I knew we shouldn’t have gotten in the boat after sundown. Forgive me, Dad. Promise me that you’ll swim to land.”
Then I take a deep breath and dive back beneath the surface.