The Magic Mirror of the Mermaid Queen - Delia Sherman [75]
I found a relatively ghost-free spot behind the Castle and changed into the swim skin. It was like putting on wet jeans, only worse because it was too dark to see what I was doing. When I’d finally managed it, I stuffed the troll maiden gear into Satchel and went back to Airboy. I felt like a shiny black sausage.
The water looked black and cold and thick. “Um, Airboy? How am I supposed to breathe?”
“I’ve got a bubble wand,” Airboy said impatiently. “Come on.” And he jumped into the Harbor, pulling me with him.
Sputtering, I scrambled for the surface. Airboy surfaced beside me, the lights of Battery Park reflecting off his eyes and his half-moon grin. “It’s cold!” I gasped.
“You’ll warm up as you swim. Ready for your air bubble, tourist?”
“Can’t wait,” I said sarcastically.
I ducked under the surface. Freezing water stroked my face and ran icy currents through my hair. Airboy, his Harness glowing faintly green through the murk, produced a wand with a circle on top and blew a bubble around my head. I blinked water from my eyes and took a shallow lungful of air. It smelled of fish and stale magic.
“Okay?” Airboy asked.
“I guess.”
“Follow me.” And he darted off.
I’d learned to swim from nixies, but Airboy had grown up underwater. Within six strokes, I knew I couldn’t keep up with him, not swimming in the dark with a bubble of air around my head and Satchel bumping and dragging at my back.
Airboy darted back to me, grinning. “I’ll get help,” he said. “Just keep swimming.”
Alone in the dark, I grimly forced my arms and legs to stroke and kick, stroke and kick. I was moving, but I couldn’t tell whether it was forward or up or down or around in circles. Maybe, I thought, I’ve swum farther than I think. Maybe I’m heading out to sea. Maybe Airboy won’t be able to find me, and I’ll just keep bumbling along until a sea monster gets me. Maybe—
“Your Diplomatic Honor Guard, Madame Ambassador!”
A sleek black streak with a grin on top flashed past me: Airboy, followed by a pod of sleek, black bodies, their Harnesses glowing faintly green. They twisted and darted above and below, calling out cheerfully to each other and me.
“Hello, Airboy’s land girl!”
“Look at her swim! I didn’t know landies could swim.”
“She looks like a seal maiden. Don’t you think she looks like a seal maiden, Godfather Robbie?”
A broad, whiskered seal face popped up close beside me and examined me with dark, mournful, long-lashed eyes. “Not at all,” the selkie said. “Canna you see yon great bubble on her heid? And no more meat on her than a sea otter.” One of the sad eyes winked at me. “Still, she’s fair enough, for a wee skellington.”
I went stiff with embarrassment and I started to sink. Two of Airboy’s friends grabbed my arms.
“It’s like towing an oar,” one changeling said. “Relax, landie, and let your legs trail.”
The other changeling laughed a trail of brownish bubbles. “Yeah, relax. The sharks won’t chase you if you’re relaxed.”
Which was useful information, but not particularly relaxing.
As we zigged and zagged through the water, faint lights stitched the darkness: a kappa, its head-bowl glowing blue, a merman with a lantern, a magic fish with star-bright bobbing antenna. Once a school of lantern fish darted by, their white glare illuminating mer garbage collectors with yellow vests and nets and a pod of police selkies and a small, horse-faced sea monster.
The Mermaid Queen’s Court is in a huge cavern under Staten Island. On Airboy’s magic map, it looked pretty close to Battery Park. Swimming, it seemed a lot farther. Still, when Airboy’s “honor guard” said good-bye, I wished the trip had been longer.
We floated in front of the deep rift in the foundation of Staten Island that was the entrance to the Queen’s court.
Airboy nudged me. “Allies?”
“Right. Allies.”
We swam into the rift side by side.
The last time I was here, I’d found the rift uncomfortably narrow, but I’d been all squished up with Changeling in a huge bubble towed by a team of merguards.