Alexei helped Calum get into bed for a much-needed nap (with only a token protest, so the old man must have really been tired) and borrowed the truck from Bethany, who was acting odd. Women. You could live thousands of years and never understand them. Alexei had given up trying long ago. Of course, he’d spent most of his time with Baba Yagas, who weren’t exactly normal women, so that probably hadn’t helped.
Bethany had asked him if Beka ate twigs and leaves for some reason, to which he’d responded with a baffled, “Not that I know of. I think she just eats, you know, food.” Then he grabbed the truck keys and ran away before she could get any weirder.
As he’s expected, Beka was waiting for him at the docks, sitting patiently in front of Calum’s boat with Chewie stretched out in a patch of sun at her feet. Dragons enjoyed lying in the sun almost as much as cats did.
“I like her,” Beka said as Alexei walked up to her. “She’s tiny, but she’s tough.
“The boat?” Alexei said, not sure that’s how he would have described it.
Beka rolled her eyes. “Your friend Bethany. I’m glad you’ve finally met someone nice.”
Alexei scowled at her. “Bethany is not ‘nice.’ She’s a pain in my ass. Never lets me get away with anything. I’m just hanging out for a little while because I get free drinks and a place to stay. It’s not a big deal.”
“Uh, huh. How long have you been here?”
He shrugged. “Dunno. Couple of weeks. Maybe three.”
Chewie made a coughing noise that might have been dragon-dog laughter.
“And you’re living at her house, taking care of her crippled father, and her pregnant Great Dane?” Beka grinned at him. “Sounds like kind of a big deal to me.”
Alexei growled at her. “I’m living in the guesthouse. I’m just helping with her father for the free drinks and because the old bastard scared off his last minder, and it’s not her Great Dane. Bethany is just fostering Lulu until she has her puppies and they’re old enough to be weaned. It’s a temporary situation, just like me hanging around here. Do not make something out of nothing.”
“I saw you when you got off the boat earlier. You were smiling. That’s a big deal.” Beka patted him on the arm. “I’m just glad she makes you happy, that’s all.”
“I’m always happy,” Alexei protested.
“Sure,” Beka said. “So happy you’ve been avoiding all your friends and your own brothers, who you love more than life itself, and drinking your way across the country.” She sighed. “I get it, Alexei, I do. Mikhail and Gregori both had a hell of a time getting over what happened too. It’s okay not to be okay. But maybe it is also okay to let yourself find a new path, the way they did. They both found a purpose and someone to share their lives with. There’s no reason you can’t too.”
Alexei crossed his arms over his chest. “I don’t want a new path, Beka. I want my old path back. I’m never going to find a purpose as satisfying as being a Rider. It was what I was born to do, and there’s no second choice. It’s who I am. At least it was, until that damn Brenna stole it from me. From us. I’m glad Mikhail and Gregori have made their peace with it, but I’m not them.”
“So what?” Beka asked, a blonde eyebrow quirked up. “You’re going to spend the rest of your life drinking and fighting and never staying in one place for more than a few days at a time? That’s your plan?”
Alexei felt tears of frustration pricking at the back of his eyes. It was ironic - the evil witch had tortured him and his brothers for days, and he had never gotten emotional about it. Never cried, or begged for mercy, or gave in to the gnawing beasts of hopelessness. But since he’d recovered, it seemed as though he fought those things constantly. Nightmares haunted him. It was…hard. And being here had only made it worse.
“That was my plan,” he said flatly. “But lately I don’t seem to enjoy drinking and fighting either. Now I got no plan. No plan at all.” He shook off his melancholy with an effort. “So why don’t you tell me yours? I assume that you’ve got one, or you wouldn’t have needed a boat.”
Beka looked as though she was going to continue to argue with him, but Chewie butted her in the leg and said, “Leave it, Beka. He’s a big boy. He’ll figure it out. We have a job to do.”
“Spoken like a true Chudo-Yudo,” Beka said. “How would we Baba Yagas manage without you?”
Chewie gave one of his barking laughs. “What makes you think you would?”
She bent down and kissed him on the top of the head, her fair hair a stark contrast against his curly black coat. “Well, I hope I never have to find out.” Straightening up, she was suddenly all business, the pretty surfer girl replaced by the powerful witch with a mission to accomplish.
“Okay, yes, I have a plan. Or at least the start of one. We got word that the local ocean dwellers - Selkies and Merpeople, primarily - were having a problem with some kind of mysterious sea monster that suddenly appeared out of nowhere. So I figured the first thing I would do was search out some of the Paranormal folks, so they can tell me exactly what’s happening.”
“Hmm.” Alexei nodded, and gestured her toward The Flora MacDonald. They might as well get underway while they talked, since he had to get back for dinner. “I might know a little something about that. A few of the fishermen who come into the bar have been complaining about the fish vanishing, and one guy swore his boat was attacked by a giant squid.”
“A giant squid?” Beka shuddered. “Ugh. That’s not good.”
“It’s worse than not good,” Alexei said, steering them carefully out into the open sea. “I saw some fish from his hold, and the sucker marks were as big as a dinner plate. I think we’re dealing with a kraken.”
“A kraken!” Beka turned pale under her California tan. “There hasn’t been a kraken sighting in over a hundred years. Where the hell would it have come from, and why show up here now?”
“I guess that’s what we’re going to have to find out,” Alexei said, a trifle grimly.
“Ha! You said ‘we.’” Beka jabbed him in the chest with one pointy finger. “I knew you were going to help me.”
He set his jaw. “I’m just here to drive the boat. I told you; I’m not a Rider anymore. This isn’t my job.”
Beka grinned at him, her blue eyes sparkling like the water that surrounded them. “Maybe not, but it sounds like you need a new hobby. Kraken hunting sounds like an excellent place to start. You know, unless you want to take up needlepoint.”
Alexei just growled at her. Women. They were all going to make him crazy.
* * *
Beka had him sail to the small island of Monomoy. Once inhabited but now abandoned, it was home to about three thousand seals, and apparently, a number of the local Selkies. Not that most people knew about that second part, of course.
During the summer, visitors to the Cape took tours of the island, but at this time of year, they had the place to themselves. Alexei steered The Flora MacDonald into a quiet cove and he and Beka rowed the dingy into shore and settled themselves onto a couple of rocks to wait. It didn’t take long.
Two men and a woman walked out of the wind-battered trees, dressed in only jeans and tee shirts despite the cool weather. All three had straight dark hair, intense black eyes, and strong, lithe physiques. A few steps behind them were an older couple, both of them with long greenish-blonde hair, green eyes, and an odd, slightly limping walk. The Selkies and the Mer had arrived.
They all came to a stop before Alexei and Beka, and when Beka rose to meet them, they bowed in unison. Alexei and Beka bowed back. The Paranormal folk tended to have Old World manners, much more formal than the modern era they now found themselves living in. Of course, they rarely mixed with Humans, so that wasn’t so surprising.
“Baba Yaga,” the male Mer said, clearly the senior member of the greeting party. “I am Niall, and this is my mate Niamh. Our companions are Connor, Sean, and Anna, of the Selkie people. We are grateful you came.”
“Of course,” Beka inclined her head gracefully. “I am honored to come when my Selkie and Mer brothers and sisters Call me. As I’m sure you know, I have many friends in the communities of the water people back home.”
“Indeed,” Connor said. “It was they who suggested we ask for your help.” He shifted his dark eyes, as deep as the caverns of the ocean, in Alexei’s direction. “Is this not…that is, we had heard…”
“Yes I am,” Alexei said, gritting his teeth. This was why he’d stayed away from anyone Paranormal for the last year, and why he hadn’t wanted to get sucked into this particular task. He couldn’t stand the pitying way people looked at him. At least Humans just gave him strange looks because he was so large and intimidating, not for any personal reason. “And yes, it is true. I am no longer a Rider. I’m just along - ” he couldn’t say because “because Beka twisted my arm.” “I’m just here to help out an old friend, because I happened to be in the area.”
The Selkies and Merpeople bowed again. “We count ourselves fortunate that it is so,” Niall said smoothly. He glanced from Beka to Alexei and back again. “I suspect this challenge will require all the strength and magic we can muster.”
“There seems to be a monster infesting our waters,” Niamh said, twisting her hands together. “None of our people have seen it as yet, but we are hearing strange rumors from the fishermen who sail these seas, and our scouts have reported many fewer dolphins and whales than would normally be around in this season. Even the fish are disappearing, and if they don’t return, we face a hungry spring and summer.”
“I think you’re facing much worse than that,” Alexei said in a grim tone. “It is possible that your monster is a kraken.”
The Paranormals looked more resigned than shocked, as if this possibility had already occurred to them.
“You don’t seem very surprised,” Beka said, clearly having expected a bigger reaction.
Anna shrugged. “There are tales from our parents’ time that tell of such a creature infesting our waters during the age of the last pirates. The early seventeen hundreds, that would have been, as Humans measure such things.”
“What do the tales say?” Beka asked. “Perhaps they have nothing to do with our current situation, but it can’t hurt to know.”
Niall shrugged. “Supposedly there was a particularly fierce pirate who had a magical talisman that could call a kraken to do his bidding. Mind you, in the tales, all pirates were fierce. And it seems unlikely that a Human pirate could ever have controlled such a creature. But those are the tales. According to my father, both the kraken and the pirate disappeared over three hundred years ago and were never heard from again. As I said, a story told to children.”
“Hmm,” Alexei said. “Three hundred years ago would have been about the time that the high queen decreed that all Paranormals return to the Otherworld to live, excepting than those like the Selkies and the Mer who could not leave their oceans, or the tree sprites who could not abandon their trees. Did the tales you heard ever suggest that this pirate was anything other than Human?”
Niall and his companions all looked shocked.
“No, that is impossible,” Niall stuttered. “How could that be? It was a story, nothing more. Surely we would have known if it was so.”
Beka narrowed her eyes, looking pensive. “Still, that was the last time this kraken was heard of, right? That would be an interesting coincidence.”
Anna shook her head. “But that doesn’t make any sense. If, perchance, this so-called pirate really existed, and if he could actually call up and control a kraken - which seems unlikely in the extreme - and if he was a Paranormal, who was forced to retreat to the Otherworld, then why would he have suddenly reappeared now? Those who live in the Otherworld have little to do with the lands of the Humans.”
“There is that,” Beka said. “It was just a thought. Anyway, sometimes there is a grain of truth in these old stories, so perhaps you could ask some of your elders if any of them remember any other appearances of a kraken, or something that might have been mistaken for one?”
“Of course, Baba Yaga,” Niall said, and they all bowed again. “In the meanwhile, we are all grateful that you and the Black Rider are here to help.”
“I am not the Black Rider anymore,” Alexei growled. But if he was being honest, he hadn’t felt this alive since the incident with Brenna. Perhaps it would not be so bad to assist a Baba Yaga one more time. Just for the heck of it.
Beka simply ignored him. “We are happy to do what we can. We will investigate, and meet you back here in two days time, to see what information we might all have gathered.”
The Selkies and the Mer walked up and over a dune, and vanished into the trees like smoke.
“Well, this sounds a lot more interesting than cleaning up an oil spill or tracking an odd algae overgrowth back to its source,” Beka said, rubbing her hands together in satisfaction. “A possible kraken sighting after all these years, mysterious pirates, disappearing sea life - Barbara is going to be so sorry she didn’t come handle this one herself.” She chuckled. “And that’s before she finds out you’re here. Ha! I can’t wait to call her and gloat.”
Alexei rolled his eyes. “You know, it might be best to hold off on the gloating until we have actually solved the problem and discovered whether or not the vanishing sea life has anything to do with krakens, pirates, or you know, something completely innocuous, like global warming.”
“There is nothing innocuous about global warming,” Beka said with a scowl, but then heaved a sigh. “Still, you might have a point there. Let’s go see if we can find out anything from the other locals.”
“The fishermen, you mean?” Alexei said.
Beka laughed. “No, silly, the folks who actually live in the seas where this is all taking place. Fire up the boat, big boy. We’re off to talk to some dolphins. Maybe even a whale, if we get lucky.”
Oh, goody. Call me Ishmael.
* * *
They steered The Flora MacDonald out into deeper waters, heading into the ocean off Chatham. They sailed for two hours in ever widening circles until finally Chewie barked at something off the port bow, pointing one paw toward a distant shape. Dragon-dogs had remarkable vision, as he never tired of explaining to Beka.
When they approached the pod of dolphins, they were greeted by eager squeaking and whistling. There were about a dozen dolphins, although it was hard to get an exact count as they swam in circles around the boat, leaping and diving in an intricate water ballet.
“Hello, my friends!” Beka yelled to the dolphins.
More excited clicks and whistles emanated from the group, although one large scarred old male came up close to the side of the boat and seemed to be directing his clicking vocalizations directly toward Beka.
“How do they know you’re the Baba Yaga?” Alexei asked her without thinking. “You didn’t even introduce yourself yet.”
Beka’s eyes widened. “A better question might be, how do you know they know? Since when do you speak dolphin?”