Shadows Cast by Stars (37 page)

“No,” Helen says as she starts kicking the water again. A heron fishing nearby grows tired of our antics and flies away, squawking at us.

“So? Cass? What do you think?” Cedar says.

“It’s pretty cold,” I say, though even if it weren’t, there’s no way I’d skinny-dip with Cedar.

He shrugs and peels off his shirt, but when he unbuttons his shorts, Helen and I run off, making our way back
to the fire. Cedar is no more than a black shadow from there.

Helen holds her hands out to warm them. “He isn’t all bad,” she says. “He’s just … not good, either. I don’t know what he’ll do when he realizes he isn’t going to have you, Cass.”

I stare out into the night, listening to the waves. They’re a long way off. “I know.”

“I’ve known Cedar all my life. He’s my cousin, did you know that? We grew up together. He’s always been a bully, but he’s … different … when he’s around you. It’s almost like he wants to try.” She shrugs. “Like he’s hoping he could change. If you wanted him to.”

Like he could change
. The words leave me feeling incredibly sad, as if Cedar’s fate rests in my hands. “I do want him to change,” I say. “But if he did—for me—I mean, that wouldn’t be right. It wouldn’t be true. If he wants to change, he has to do it for himself.”

Helen nods. “I know. I think he does too, but it doesn’t mean he’s stopped hoping.” She stirs the fire. “Hope’s a pretty powerful thing.”

“Yeah,” I murmur. “I know.”

We sit in silence for several minutes, me thinking about what to do about Cedar, and Helen—who knows what she’s thinking about. Every time I’ve seen her near Cedar,
she’s looked as terrified as a mouse before a cat, but which Cedar? Cedar now, or Cedar past, or some Cedar yet to come? Is it just him, or all men? I wish I knew.

Above us are the three stars of Orion’s Belt—Mintaka, Alnilam, Alnitak. The last time I saw them was the night Paul and I sat on the windowsill at our house, before we left for the Island. The stars look different now, bright and shiny, like someone spit-polished them, and I realize Helen’s right. Hope’s a pretty powerful thing, and taking hope away from a person is the surest way to destroy him.

We decide to sleep by the fire, but Helen gives up, abandoning the warmth of the flames for the silence of the skiff because of Cedar’s snoring. I consider the same thing, but I’m caught in an awkward place. If I leave, Cedar might think I’m snubbing him, but if I stay, I’m never going to fall asleep and right now, sleep is the thing I need most.

I sit up and add a little wood to the fire, but when I lie back down, I find Cedar watching me. “What’s up?” I say, unnerved by the intensity of his gaze.

He doesn’t reply, so I turn my back on him, gazing out to the ocean as he shuffles under his blanket. Somewhere out there is Bran. I can feel it. The spirit stone can
feel it. Maybe tomorrow will be the day. Maybe tomorrow, I’ll find Paul. Maybe tomorrow, we’ll be together again. Maybe tomorrow, they’ll be safe.

The moon casts a spotlight on the ocean, a straight, brilliant beacon that leads right to me. How could they miss it? The heavens are conspiring with me for a change, and if they’re on my side, how can I fail?

I draw in a deep breath and realize that Cedar’s snoring hasn’t returned. The hair on the back of my neck lifts as I roll over and find him crouching right beside me.

“You okay?” he whispers.

“Oh. Yep. I’m fine.” I give him a quick smile. “Just watching the moon.” A cold sweat breaks on my brow. Something bad is about to happen.

He sits down so close to me that we’re almost touching, and then reaches under my blanket, putting his hand on my thigh. I reach down, pick up his hand, and put it on his own leg. He returns it to mine, and I return it to his. “I think it should stay there,” I say, giving his hand a light pat.

“Give me a break,” he murmurs. “We’re finally alone.”

I sit up and move away, trying to keep things light, friendly. “Not really—Helen’s just over there.”

“That’s not what I mean, Cassandra.” The way he says my name, my full name, makes me realize this is really
serious. He’s not just making a pass at me. He’s got something in mind.

I’m suddenly aware of his physical presence. There’s a musky scent about him that I’ve never noticed before, and his bulk looms next to me. I stand.

“Where are you going?” he says. His voice is deep and throaty.

I pick up my blanket and give it a shake. “The sand fleas are getting to me. I think I’ll go sleep on the boat too.”

“Cassandra,” he says. A hand extends toward me, but I step back.

“Cedar, you know it’s not like that.”

“He’ll hurt you.” His words are hard and tight and all the throatiness is gone. “He’ll hurt you and ruin you. One day, you’ll come back to me and say, ‘You told me, and I didn’t listen.’”

“Maybe,” I say as a knot forms in my stomach.
Is he right?
“But right now, I can’t be anything more than your friend. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry….”

He throws a log on the fire and suddenly his face is illuminated with orange light. He doesn’t look like the muscle-bound goon I once met. He’s a boy—just a boy. A boy who’s heartbroken, and as I edge away toward the skiff, I wish I could take that hurt away.

I
wake to a raven’s rasp. It perches on the dodger, bobbing up and down at me.

“Shoo,” I whisper at it. Helen doesn’t stir, so I say, “Shoo,” a little louder.

The raven still doesn’t budge. It just continues to caw and bob at me, until I caw back. Then it flies away, sailing straight down the beach to the edge of the water, almost running right into Cedar, who’s standing in the shallows, watching something.

I stand, stretch, and decide to let Helen sleep a little longer. The tide is licking the bottom of the skiff, so we could leave now if we wanted, but it’s a shame to wake the one person still asleep when there’s no immediate rush. I settle on the prow and watch Cedar. In another
place, in another time, maybe things might have been different. Maybe. But maybes aren’t very useful because they’re not real, and all that wondering about what could have been, if only … it never leads anywhere.

The sun turns the sky a red so violent that I can tell the weather’s going to change. That’s going to make our search difficult, and my heart sinks a little—until I notice the black shapes in the open water just beyond the mouth of the cove. That’s what Cedar’s watching. Orcas. Sea wolves. Our sign.

And he was going to let them pass without telling me!

Anger rages through my veins as I shake Helen awake more roughly than I should. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I say as she blinks at me. “They’re out there—we have to go.”

“Okay,” she says, pushing her hair away from her face. “Okay. Give me a second—do I have a second?”

“One,” I say.

“Where’s Cedar?”

I freeze. I’m so angry I could kill him. I’m tempted to leave him here, but I call him anyway. “We’re going!” is all I say. He’ll have to figure out the rest.

Fortunately for him, it takes Helen several minutes to wake up fully, and a few more before the skiff is truly floating—enough time for Cedar to hop onboard. He doesn’t look at me. I don’t look at him, either. We both
know that something has changed between us and that the friendship we once had—if it could be called that— is irretrievably lost.

But I have no time for that now—only the black dorsal fins of the orcas as I pray that they don’t disappear, that they’re not just some strange optical illusion—that they’re real.

Helen revs the motor and the skiff plows the water. I grip the gunwales, boring my gaze into the ocean, willing the orcas to surface. And then, just off our port side, one breaches, sending a flume of water high into the air. Others join it, and then they continue their migration south, dipping and diving through the waves as I thank them silently.

The wind whips up a stiff chop as we round the point, and dark clouds are billowing in the southeast. “Where to now?” Helen yells.

I don’t know. I somehow thought that when we found the sea wolves, we’d find Bran and Paul with them, but I scan the ocean and can’t make out anything. My hand finds Madda’s spirit stone. It’s silent too. “Still north, I guess,” I say.

Helen gives me a grim look. “We can’t go far. We need to save enough fuel to get back.”

“Do your best” is all I say.

The shoreline has been painted red by rising sun, so
the whole world seems coated in blood. I shudder and push the thought away. There will be no blood spilled this morning. And then, from the corner of my eye, I spot a blur of blue—a kingfisher. It ducks into the shadows and there, where a creek runs out to the ocean, I spy a war canoe.

We’ve found them.

In my mind, this is what I envisioned: Bran would run to me and spin me in his arms. Paul would greet Helen, and love her as much as I do. Maybe as a sister. Maybe as something more. We’d return home, triumphant. Our family would be whole again.

None of this happens.

The canoe is empty and badly damaged. Bullet holes riddle one side. Rusty bloodstains coat the ribs, as if the canoe was a living creature stripped of its flesh. My heart thuds against my breastbone. One of them—maybe both—is hurt.

“It had to get here somehow,” I hear Helen say as I run to get the medicine kit.

“Currents, probably,” Cedar says.

“Currents, my ass.” With the kit slung across my back, I duck into the forest. Standing on the beach staring at the canoe isn’t going to find them.

Helen chases after me. Great firs tower above us, watching as we wade through the sea of ferns on the forest floor. I look for signs that they passed this way—broken branches, crushed fronds, something, but there isn’t anything to find. When we reach a creek, the only sign of life is a doe and her fawn drinking.

“Good water source,” Helen says. “Maybe they came up this way.”

We wait until the deer leave, then scour the banks, looking for tracks. Nothing.

“Looks like tidal flats on the other side,” I say, nodding at the bright light behind a screen of willows. “Maybe they’re out there?”

“Maybe,” Helen says.

We search the flats, calling for Bran, for Paul as we go, but no one answers. My throat has gone dry.
Where could they be? Did the raven lie to me?
I pick up my pace, jogging down a stretch of beach, hoping each time I round a stand of sea grass, I’ll find them stretched out in the sun, but there’s nothing but stone and sand and forest.

“What do you want to do?” Helen asks when I draw up, panting. She glances up at the sky, now thick with clouds, with a worried look.

“Just a little longer,” I say.

“Okay,” she says. “But not too much longer. I don’t like the look of that storm.”

We head back toward the skiff, searching every log, every rock, every outcropping of beach oats. My brother is here. Bran is here. I know it. I can feel it.

The skiff comes into sight. I can just make out Cedar kneeling next to it, and then a shock of auburn hair appears next to him. “Over here!” he yells when he spots us. “I found them. Over here!”

I break into a run, scrambling over the seaweed, slipping, falling, and taking all the skin off my knees, but I don’t care. I cannot be fast enough.

And then, I round the prow of the skiff. Bran and Cedar are standing over a man lying flat on the ground.
Where is Paul?
I look on the other side of the canoe, and then at Cedar, who just shakes his head.

The man on the ground groans in pain, and I push the questions about my brother away. The man’s hurt. So is Bran, judging from the way his eyes are tinged with yellow.
See to them first. Then they’ll tell me where Paul is. Maybe he’s off hunting. Yes, that must be it. Hunting
. My heart settles into an even rhythm as I reach out to touch Bran’s cheek. It’s filthy. “You’re back.”

He trembles at my touch. “Hi.”

“Hi, yourself.” I wait for him to draw me into his arms,
and when he doesn’t, I take him in mine. He smells terrible, but I don’t care. He’s alive.

“Okay.” I turn my attention to the man on the ground. “Who is this?”

“This,” Cedar says, “is Arthur Eagleson.”

“Your father?” I whisper.

Bran nods. “He’s hurt bad.”

I unsling the medicine kit from my back and drop to my knees beside the man. “What happened?” I ask as I check his father’s pulse. Fluttery. Weak. Not good.

Bran just shakes his head. He’s on the verge of tears.

“Bran,” I say as I touch his hand, “if you want me to help him, you’ll have to tell me what happened. And where’s Paul?”

Bran furiously rubs his eyes as if that’ll make the tears go away. “He’s not here.”

My heart stops. “Bran, where is he? Where’s my brother?”

“Cass,” he whispers, “they came and took us. Took us all. They took us north. They had my father …” His voice breaks and he turns away so we can’t see him cry. “Paul offered himself for us,” Bran finally says. “So my father and I could come home.”