LAST MEAL

I woke next morning squinting at the misty sunlight streaming through my guest cottage windows. Warm and well rested under down-filled comforters on a mattress just as soft, I wondered when I’d have a bed again—or a roof.

Rain had said no runaway knew more than I did the first time around, but real runaways had made some decision to leave, at least. I wasn’t being given any choice—again! I curled into a ball as panic twined around my stomach, lungs, and heart. There’d been no chance to think any of this through the night before, while trying to convincingly portray a boy required to act like a child as wise as an adult.

I threw my luxurious covers off and sat up, half expecting my evictors to be waiting by the door already. There had to be some way to change the plan. Europe sounded great—if Rain could still be convinced to go with me. I scrambled out of bed and yanked my clothes on, then rushed outside to go find someone I could talk with.

Having no idea where else to look, I headed for The Lady’s house, following the path I had taken with Rain. After twenty or thirty minutes, I retraced my steps, sure I must have missed some turnoff, but reached my cottage again without finding any other path to try. Thinking I’d misjudged the distance, I tried again. At least half an hour later, without ever having turned around, I came to a halt, dumbfounded, just across the meadow from the cottage where I’d started. Giving up, I went back inside—and found Piper sitting at the little table, on which a fragrant, steaming meal was laid out for two.

“I was about to start without you,” she said pleasantly.

“What are you doing here?”

“Bringing you breakfast, obviously. I thought we might have a little chat, but if you’d rather I go…” She began to stand.

“No. Stay. I…just tried to find your mother’s house, but the path looped around somehow and brought me here again.”

“She’s with Mikayl and Rain right now,” said Piper, as if that explained everything. “I’m not invited either.” She shrugged unhappily. “So I came here. Aren’t you hungry?”

“Yes,” I sighed, going to join her at the table. “I’m always hungry now. That’s kind of what I wanted to talk to them about.” I sat down and dished myself two wedges of something that looked like quiche and smelled like French toast. “Oh my god, what is this? It’s delicious!”

“It’s called dinbara,” said Piper. “It’s a high-energy food.”

“It’s cruel, you know; to feed me this, then toss me out to eat from dumpsters.”

Piper looked up at me skeptically. “You’re joking, right?”

“No,” I said bitterly, dishing myself another wedge of dinbara before reaching for the pitcher of dark red juice beside it. “That’s what they’re meeting about right now, if you didn’t know. They’re kicking me out of here today to—”

“I know,” she said. “I meant, you’re not serious about eating from dumpsters.”

“I’m about to be homeless. Rain told me to stay out of jail, so stealing food seems…” She began shaking her head in apparent disbelief. “What?”

“How can a man of your age be this naïve?” she asked.

“Naïve? Piper, I know more about you people after one day than I know about living on the streets. Where do you suppose I’d have learned anything about that?”

“Have you never been asked for spare change?”

“Well, sure, but what does that—”

“And you were never curious enough to ask even one of those people about where they lived or how they ate, or how they came to be there in the first place?”

“Of course not. Why would anyone engage a panhandler?”

She looked amazed. “Wow. This may actually be very good for you.”

“What, you’re saying homeless people never eat from dumpsters?”

“Sometimes,” she said. “But if that’s all they can find to eat in a city of this size, they’re either very new or extremely damaged. How long have you lived here, Matthew?”

“In this city?” I asked guardedly. “My whole life, except for college.”

She shook her head again. “Fifty years, and you’re still completely unaware of all the churches and shelters, food banks, soup kitchens, clinics, outreach and counseling programs that help people in need of food and shelter every day?” None of that had ever crossed my mind. “Well,” she mused, “what a helpful, caring person you must have been.” I felt my cheeks heat with embarrassment. “What you’re about to experience may be what some of your kind call karma. But allow me to provide a couple helpful hints. You can’t have lived this long without learning something about getting along with people—which is what the homeless are. Just approach them as such. Keep your eyes and ears open, and ask whatever questions you must. You seem very good at asking questions. I think a boy with your life experience won’t need to eat from—or even sleep in—any dumpsters if he doesn’t choose to.”

I looked down at my cooling food, feeling foolish—yet again.

“I’m not saying it will be easy, or enjoyable,” she said. “Being a child there will put you at some extra risk, but your age will help you too. People care a little more about children than they do about adults. If you do get into real trouble of some kind, just look for an adult who seems like they might care. I think you’ll learn pretty quickly how to spot them in a crowd, if you don’t know already. Most of those won’t hesitate to engage you, if you ask them to.”

“Last night, Rain suggested I try not to get arrested or killed,” I said sullenly. “Are you telling me he was just kidding? What if I get into some kind of trouble I can’t deal with—when there’s no helpful adult to run to? Will there be anybody watching me? Some way to get help?”

“I expect someone will be keeping track of you.”

“You expect? Great. And will they help me, or just tell Rain and your mother how I died?” I smiled, trying to make the question seem at least a little like a joke.

“I’m not privy to their plans either, remember?” she said, unhappily. “But I can hardly believe they’ve gone to all this trouble—”

“Why is that?” I cut in. “Why weren’t you there last night? You’re, like, the princess here or something, aren’t you? Shouldn’t you be involved in something more helpful than just sitting here, taking pot shots at—”

“We don’t have princesses,” she interjected in turn. “That sort of tripe is your kind’s—”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—”

“I know!” she snapped, though I wondered how even my apology could have offended her. “It’s just… Whatever their real reasons are, they’ve told me that…if this goes wrong, they want me uninvolved.”

“What do you mean, ‘if this goes wrong?’” I asked, alarmed. “Do they think this might go wrong? How?”

“You really don’t understand that? Still?” Piper shook her head and looked away. “We talked about it yesterday. If you’re caught at this, then The Lady and Rain are caught too. If I can tell an arbiter or even the Archivist, without lying outright, that I had nothing to do with this plan, then I guess they suppose I might be allowed to succeed my mother—if some more impressive candidate does not persuade our people that a better choice exists.” She sounded far from confident about the outcome of such a contest.

She had alluded to all this during our discussion, or argument or whatever, the day before, I realized. But I’d been focused on other issues then, and given no real thought—then or since—to the idea that they might be in some real danger because of me. “I’m sorry. You all just seem…so in control of things.”

She sighed. “I know. What else could we seem to you? And I don’t mean to seem… I’m not upset with you. I’m the one…who set all of this in motion. Have you ever wished you could go back and make just one terrible decision differently?”

I stared at her. “Are you kidding me?”

“Oh.” She bit her bottom lip and looked down. “Well, yes; I guess you might have.”

“So, these arbiters and…the Archivist?” I said, thinking a change of subject might be more comfortable for both of us. “Are those like your police, or something?”

“The arbiters are…our justice system, more like judges than police. The Archivist…is…I don’t know how to explain him to you. He is…the keeper of our dream. The whole thing. There is no Andinol equivalent. But he is sometimes called upon to…clarify the truth in matters of great importance. He knows…too much, too well, to be deceived by much of anyone.” Piper shook her head. “I can’t believe I bothered advising you to ask questions. …Did Rain ever…?”

“Yes. Last night, after Mikayl left. He told to me…what Anselm’s people do…what that dream thief did to Jordan’s mother. …And all the rest.”

“And how do you feel about us now?”

I shrugged. “The same way I feel about my own people, I guess. Some of them are terrifying, but most are basically good-hearted. I’ve never been one to throw the baby out with the bath water.”

She looked startled. “What?”

I grinned. “Have I found an Andinol saying you don’t already know?”

“I guess so. What does it mean?”

I explained, and got a smile for my trouble. “What Rain told me, though… About what your mother had to do to save Jordan. I won’t say it hasn’t left me frightened. I mean, there’s nothing extraordinary going on in my head like there was in Jordan’s mom’s. I’m…about the most boring person I’ve ever met, really. So maybe I’m in no real danger. But…all of this is frightening, Piper. I just…don’t have a choice about any of it now, do I?”

“Is none of this…what you wished for?” she asked.

It wasn’t like I hadn’t asked that question of myself already—over and over. But, reaching for an answer, I found only a strange, inarticulate grief—and the perfect punch line. “Yes…and no.” The expression on her face turned my fleeting sadness into an actual laugh.

“You’re learning,” she said, then pointed to my now visibly deflating breakfast. “You’d better eat that before it turns to plaster.”

I went back to work on my dinbara, but, oddly, Piper just continued toying with her own food. Something was clearly still wrong.

“Listen,” she said at last. “I came here…to say I’m sorry for all the ways I’ve just…dismissed you. Ever since you saved my life. And yet, even now, you tell me you’re afraid of what’s happening to you because of it, and I make fun of you. I accused you of bad karma!” She threw her hands up in frustration. “I woke up this morning, and saw someone in the mirror that I’ve never seen before. Someone…horrible.” She dropped her face into her hands. “I keep telling myself that I was never like this before you came. But was I? Have you just shown me what everyone else has always seen, but feared my mother too deeply to say so aloud?”

“I don’t think you’re horrible!” I thought back. We’d had arguments, certainly, but… “Have I ever said anything to suggest you’re horrible?”

“Well, you called me a selfish, spoiled child,” she said, bleakly. “But not once after that, despite all the times I have been exactly that and worse with you.” She sat up straighter, and took a deep breath. “It’s my karma that needs attention here, not yours. That’s what I came here to say. I’m very, very sorry that one foolish decision that night has left you in the middle of all this. But I’m also…really very pleased to have met you, Matthew. You’ve made me think so differently about all sorts of things. I owe you, not just for what you did that night, but for…waking me up! So…just once before you go, I’m going to do the right thing, and if it comes to light someday, they can punish me for it any way they wish.”

“Wait a minute, I don’t need you getting in any more trouble because of me.”

“Well, that makes my decision even clearer,” she said fiercely, reaching down to rummage through a pocket or something beneath the table. “You must never say anything to anyone—ever—about this. I am deadly serious. No one for any reason.”

“I…think maybe you just shouldn’t do…whatever you’re—”

She pulled her hand up and tossed three polished, dark green stones onto the table. They were each about the size of a nickel, finely engraved with the same, darkly stained symbols, and strangely familiar.

“I’ve seen these…somewhere.”

Her brows rose. “I can’t imagine where.”

It took me a minute to remember. “Yesterday morning! After he discovered us, Rain took me to some room that was full of stones like these. Racks of them.”

“Oh,” she said. “The casting room. I forgot that.”

“He wouldn’t tell me what they were,” I said.

“Well, I will. They’re called geist-stones, and I’m very definitely not supposed to give these to you. Which is why I need that promise now, that you will never reveal their existence to anyone—unless you need to use them, of course.”

“Okay, sure. I promise.”

“Break that promise, and I will make certain I don’t suffer the consequences alone.”

“So, what are they?”

“They’re a way to summon help. But only if your life depends on it. I’m serious, Matthew: your life. Don’t ever use these just because you’re hungry, or cold and frightened, or really, really want to ask another of your burning questions. The day you use one of these, I’ll pay hell for having given them to you—which I would gladly do to save your life, as you saved mine; but not just to see your hand held through some rough moment. Understood?”

“Yes. But…what’s so awful about giving me a way to call for help?”

“These stones were given to me by my father,” she said. “He rules a realm, as my mother does, but of the river folk.”

“…And, these river folk are…who?”

“Those of us who chose to live in water, rather than on land.”

“In water?”

“Ages ago, some of us decided that, in time, there would be no place left anywhere on land where our kind could live safely. So they turned their gifts entirely toward learning how to live comfortably underwater, where they believed the Andinalloi would be unable to find, much less come after them.”

“So…your father’s realm is underwater somewhere?”

“In the river.”

“Our river? Where?”

“On the river’s bottom or its banks, like any other aquatic creatures.”

“Wait… You’re not telling me they breathe water, are you?”

“No, they are not that different from us. Their union in me is proof of that. But they are as skilled at living in it, and at least as hard to drown, as any whale or dolphin would be.”

“Right…” The question made me cringe, but I couldn’t keep myself from asking. “So…you’re saying there are mermaids in this city somewhere?”

She smiled sadly. “Your kind invented mermaids, not ours. They are mermaids even less than I’m a princess. And half of them are men, of course. My father, for instance, who, if I may tug us back to the point, would be extremely unhappy to learn I’d given you geist-stones with his personal sigil engraved on them.”

“These are his?”

“No, they’re mine. But they bear his authority.” She paused thoughtfully. “Imagine someone gave you letters signed by your president that said, ‘Do whatever this man asks.’”

I looked back down at the stones. “No…way…”

She nodded. “Now you see how dangerous these could be in the wrong hands, and how much trouble I could suffer if anyone ever found out what I’ve done.”

“But…why are you doing it?” I looked up at her, incredulous. “We’ve barely met! Why give me even one, much less three of these?”

“Oh, I have met few people in my life more forcefully than I feel we have met,” she said. “And I give you all of these because they’re all I have, which is no more than you have given me. Giving you any less would not make it easier to look into that mirror once you’ve gone. Besides, in some moment of true mortal danger one chance might not be sufficient. A single stone could be dropped, lost, or destroyed. You have three chances here. I’ve done all I can to keep you safe, the least that seems acceptable—to me, anyway.”

I looked at them again, boggled by such trust in an Andinol stranger who might do anything with such power. “How do they work?”

“Throw them into any water that connects, even distantly, with the sea: from the river itself to a drinking fountain or even a toilet. Any fixture connected to the sewer system would do. They carry powerful song, of course. As they dissolve, any river folk within miles will feel the call, and follow it to its source as quickly as they can. When help arrives, say that the River King’s daughter commands your safety until the threat has passed.”

“But if I’m on land somewhere—”

“They live in water, but I did not say they are confined to it. They are able to take many forms, and have frequent business throughout the city, like the rest of us. At least one would likely be somewhere nearby, and could reach you very swiftly.”

“And then…you’d have to explain.”

She nodded. “It would likely go easier for me if your use of them had not been unwise. So, please do not use them unwisely.” She gave me a crooked smile. “And keep them dry, of course, as well as hidden.”

“Well…okay, but…if I’m living on the street now…”

She sighed. “Good point.” She paused to think, then gathered up the stones again, and stuffed them back into her pocket. “I will see that these—”

She was interrupted by a knock at the door. I turned to stare at it, then looked back at Piper anxiously.

“—get to you there,” she finished, already rising. “I’ll let him in. You eat the rest of that—cold or not. You’ll need it.”

As she went to get the door, I started wolfing down what was left on my plate.

“Ready to go, Matthew?” Rain asked as he stepped in.

“Is there time for me to finish this?”

“Of course.” He followed Piper back to the table. “Don’t rush.”

I took the last wedge on the platter, and another glass of juice. My stomach was suddenly a knot again, but I kept eating until there was nothing edible left on the table but Piper’s scraps.

“So,” Rain said, “one more time, just to be sure, let’s go over your story.”

“What?”

“The story we invented yesterday,” he said. “Tell it to me now.”

“I, uh…have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Much better. You’ll have lots of idle time on the street. Use it all to tell yourself that story, over and over until you can say it in your sleep, but under no circumstance are you to—”

“Yes,” I said. “I’ve got that now.”

“All right then.” He dug a small silver flask out of his pocket, and offered it to me. “Drink this, please.”

“What is it?”

“Something to help us guard your safety while you’re being delivered.”

“But—”

“There can be no risk of conspicuous drama this time,” Rain said patiently. “Our methods require that you do nothing unpredictable along the way. This will help ensure that.”

“It’s another Micky Finn?” I asked bleakly.

“Just so.” Rain smiled slightly. “Remind me someday to tell you where that odd phrase came from. It’s a tale worth hearing. Now, bottoms up, as I believe your folk also like to say.”