Emily Rodda - The Golden Door

He straightened abruptly and caught a glimpse of Rye’s unguarded face. What he saw there made him blink.

“Kobbs are ferocious monsters of the sea,” he explained in a voice that had no expression. “Quite common in these parts. I wouldn’t have thought there was a child in Dorne who hadn’t heard of them.”

“K-kobbs? Of course I — I have heard of them,” Rye stammered, feeling his face grow hot. “I just — just wondered why kobb grease repels sea serpents.”

“Because kobbs prey on serpents,” Hass said, regarding him closely. “Serpents think twice about attacking anything that smells of kobb. The grease is not a perfect repellent, but it is far better than nothing.”

“My brother Sholto invented a mixture to repel skimmers,” Rye said, thinking only of turning his companion’s mind away from his lapse.

“What is a skimmer?” Hass asked quietly.

A heavy silence fell between them.

“Master Hass, Dorne is my home, I swear it,” Rye said at last. “But I have spent my life far from the coast.”

Hass regarded him thoughtfully. “Then how strongly can you swim?” he asked in a level voice.

“Very strongly, I hope,” Rye said, glancing at the scale in his hand. “I will know when I try.”

Hass cursed under his breath. Without another word, he stripped off his shirt and wiped the fresh handful of grease over his own chest.

“What are you doing?” Rye asked, bewildered.

“You’re off your head, boy,” Hass said grimly, reaching for more repellent. “You’ll drown in that sea. I’ll go in your place.”

“No!” Rye cried. “You would be seen! The Gifters would kill you the moment you reached the rock, and the sacrifices would go on!”

“And you won’t be seen, I suppose?” Hass jeered.

“No,” Rye said. And realizing that there was only one way to convince Hass of what he said, knowing that his only way forward was to trust, he shook out the silken hood and put it on.

Invisible, Rye walked to the little jetty. Hass’s long metal cutters, strapped to his back in a hastily made canvas sling, were very heavy. The foul-smelling goat-hide bag of grease hanging from his belt was heavy, too. The two together weighed him down.

His bare feet made deep marks in the sand. Above each fresh footprint, the ghostly shape of the cutters flickered dimly in the air, because the cutters were made of metal and resisted the magic of the hood.

It did not matter. No one but Hass, standing, stunned, at the boathouse doorway, was close enough to see these faint traces of Rye’s passing.

Rye had abandoned his shirt, boots, and socks. But the little brown bag still hung around his neck, and the bell tree stick was in his belt.

He had left the stick where it lay at first, but at the last moment, he had retrieved it and pushed it back into its place.

The bell tree stick had been with him from the beginning. As a weapon, it had been useless, but it was a symbol of home. It had helped him believe that the time would come when he would see Weld again. He would not part with it now.

He reached the little jetty. The water heaved before him, dark and mysterious, slapping angrily against the old wooden piers, which were encrusted with shells of many shapes and colors.

Rye hesitated, suddenly terrified by what he was doing. This was not the warm, rushing gutter water of Weld, in which a boy could wade, and laugh, and think himself adventuring while facing no danger greater than the chance of getting his trousers wet. This dark, heaving water was part of a great sea where monsters thrived. It was alien to him — alien to all human life.

He looked down at the glimmering scale in his hand. It was such a small, frail thing in which to trust. But then, the braided ring, now back in the brown bag, was a small thing, too, and it had saved him when he had least expected to be saved.

He heard the crowd at the fence roar, and turned quickly to look.

Olt’s throne was on the platform, facing the rock. Bern was standing beside the throne, a dagger glinting in his hand. Behind them, seven Gifters were strutting through the fortress gateway, each one proudly leading a prisoner in chains. Sonia was first in line. Her golden-red hair looked like flickering flame as the wind tossed it around her head.

Rye took a deep breath and waded into the water. It was cold enough to make him gasp. He could feel the sting of salt, and the tide plucking at his ankles like sly fingers, trying to pull him off his feet.

Closing his hand more firmly on the disc, he took another step. The water rose abruptly to his waist.

Instantly he felt an agonizing stab of pain in his closed hand. He yelled and snatched his hand out of the water, expecting to see some vile creature clinging to it, stinging and biting.

But there was nothing. And when he opened his tightly closed fist, his stomach turned over.

The serpent scale no longer lay freely in his hand. It had sunk beneath the surface of his skin. Surrounded by a ridge of puffy, reddened flesh, it glimmered in the center of his wet palm, flat and shining, like a burn or a scar.

It had become part of him. The water had made it part of him.

Rye shuddered, fighting down waves of nausea. Even as he watched, the angry red ridge that surrounded the scale was fading and shrinking. In moments, it had disappeared completely, and the scale looked as if it had been embedded in the center of his palm since the day he was born.

On impulse, he lowered his hand into the water again and held it just beneath the surface. The serpent scale brightened. It winked up at him like a gleaming blue-green eye.

And in that moment, Rye’s shock and sickness vanished. Energy surged through him. His arms and legs tingled as if cold salt water was rushing through his veins. He felt the tug of the tide, and exalted in it. The wild water ahead no longer seemed fearful and alien, but beckoned him. Its call was almost irresistible.

Forcing himself to stay still, Rye glanced quickly toward the fortress, measuring the distance to the rock. The seven Gifters and their prisoners had reached the viewing platform. The prisoners were being forced to kneel in a semicircle before Olt’s throne.

Rye’s heart twisted as he caught sight of Sonia. She was already on her knees, being held down by the Gifter standing behind her. Faene was second to last in line but she, too, was already kneeling. A feebly struggling man at the end was being pushed down beside her. Rye looked for the small, black-haired girl Olt had so despised, but could not see her.

He blinked. Surely in Olt’s chamber there had been three male and four female prisoners. Now there seemed to be three females and four males.

The man at the end of the line was still resisting. The chains binding his wrists and ankles glinted in the light of the lowering sun as he struggled.

Olt bared his teeth and flicked a finger. The man’s body jerked. Slowly he sank to the ground. And it was only then that Rye realized who he was.

The man was Dirk.

Rye took a deep breath, and dived.

The water was like cool silk on Rye’s skin. He cut through it like a spear, feeling its power with fierce joy, knowing he was master of it. He could no longer feel the weight of the cutters on his back, or the pouch of grease on his belt. He could no longer feel the weight of his own body. He was at one with the sea, freer and stronger than he had ever been in his life.

When at last he surfaced to breathe, he had reached the rougher water. The surging, whitecapped waves tried to tumble and buffet him. Rye dived deeper and streaked through them, using their force to speed him, always aiming for the fortress and the rock.