Lost Voices by Sarah Porter Read Free Book Online Page B

Luce stayed with him, though, 42 i LOST VOICES
    even as they drifted deeper and deeper into the smooth darkness. No one had ever looked at her that way before, and she wanted more than anything to see that gaze again. Down and down she went, watching the man’s quiet face, his wrinkles, and the faint gleam of his white hair.
    Too far down. All at once she wasn’t sure if she could find her way back to the surface. The water began to constrict her chest and head, hundreds of tons of dark weight squeezing from above. It was too far down because she did need to breathe. She knew that now. Her lungs were crying for air, but the air now seemed so impossibly far away, and she was still sinking deeper.
    A violent sinuous shape ripped past her, catching her waist in a thin, strong arm as it went. She was moving again, faster than ever before, but now that was because the shape beside her was pulling her along. It was definitely a human arm holding her, but the shape didn’t seem to be a person, at least not in the usual way, though it did have a head that looked like it might belong on a girl. Luce couldn’t make out the face, though. It was hidden in a storm of fire- colored hair that seemed to have its own light. She tried to tell the shape that she needed air, but the words wouldn’t come to her. Parting water ripped around her face as if she were rupturing endless layers of silk curtains.
    They were rushing so fast that shapes began to blur in Luce’s eyes, and the cry in her lungs became a long, aching scream. The darkness turned narrow and hard, with long stony sides. Where was she? She could feel the rising urge to thrash and fight, to claw at the shape holding her and the brutal rocks closing her in. Luce opened her mouth to shout, and at that moment the water broke around her head, and the sweet air flooded into her chest.
    i 43
    Luce heaved hungry lungfuls of air, lying in the cold water with her face on the rocks. She was in a cave with a tall, arching roof and brittle ruffs of crystal sparkling on the walls. Stalactites dripped from above and the rocks gave out a very faint green glow. It was almost totally dark, she knew, but she could still see. Her hearing seemed strangely sharp and vivid, too. She raised herself on her elbows and looked around.
    Lying next to her was the most beautiful girl Luce had ever seen. She was about sixteen years old, and gleaming lights stroked like fire along her wet red- gold hair. She was staring straight at Luce, and she was furious.
    “Maybe you’re some kind of queen back where you came from,” the girl snarled at Luce. She was so angry she was trembling, and she spoke with an accent Luce didn’t recognize. “But this is my territory, and as long as you’re here you’ll follow my rules!”
    Luce was too confused to answer, and after glaring at her for a moment the girl continued talking. “So many of us die because of things no one can help! They get tangled in fishing nets and drown, or the orcas . . . I’m fighting all the time to try and keep everyone safe. And one thing I don’t have time to deal with is one of us almost dying just out of pure stupidity! What were you thinking, going so deep like that?” Around them other heads were breaking through the water. All of them were girls, some very young and some about Luce’s age. The red- haired girl seemed to be the oldest one there. She gazed harshly at Luce’s blank expression, then thought of something. “Don’t you speak English?”
    “I do,” Luce said. “I just I don’t understand what I did wrong.” She also didn’t understand where she was now, or even 44 i LOST VOICES
    how she was still alive, but she decided it would be better to ask about those things another time. The red- haired girl was tense with rage, almost baring her teeth, and Luce was afraid to make her any angrier.
    “You don’t understand what you did wrong! Swimming that deep as if you couldn’t drown! I could have easily drowned