At night Niobe can hear them singing, the ghostly kinfolk inhabiting the sea. Their voices rise from the deep and swell like a chorus of baby whales threading the tremulous wind. Their eerie song makes her tremble. Her heart flutters. Her skin tingles. She can’t tell whether the soft cry bubbling up and spilling forth from her throat is constricting fear or maddening delight.
Dawn arrives, driving a splinter into her fragmented dreams. A knock at her door registers. Ma Etufe, the forty-something Himba neighbor with the froggy eyes and thick-rimmed spectacles, brings a ratty basket piled with eggs from the communal chicken coop. The older woman hands it over, watching Niobe curiously as she doles out what’s bound to be devastating news.
“The Lopez and Singh families left in the middle of the night. The rest of the Montoyas, too. The whole lot of ’em boarded the Coast Guard boat headed for the mainland.”
Niobe is still sleep-addled, still clad in her itchy-sleeved flannel pajamas. She veers into full wakefulness after a few seconds, Ma Etufe’s words sinking in.
Niobe curses under breath. Cowards. She scowls. The whole lot. Scurrying away from Calypso like thieves in the night. They could have at least talked it over with her. Not that it would have mattered. Not that how anyone felt about this whole mess would have changed.
She kisses her teeth but then she remembers her manners. She nods her thanks for the eggs.
“Alright,” heart slowly sinking, she tells the older woman. “I’ll remove them from the community registry.”
Niobe makes breakfast for two on autopilot; eggs from Ma Etufe and catfish fresh from the night traps. She’s at her mother’s bedroom door, arm poised to knock softly, when she realizes her mistake. She waits a beat before opening the door. Her mother isn’t there. Charlene’s bed is empty and neatly made. Niobe glances over at the desk by the window. Her mother’s laptop is still plugged into the solar-powered charger, power battery indicator silently blinking green.
“Two months.” A strangled little whimper sticks in her throat.
Niobe’s mother was the first of the submerged village’s residents to vanish. Charlene had left in her canoe to check on Calypso’s shut-in residents one morning and never returned. Niobe rows around Calypso searching day after day to no avail. Her hope that her mother is somehow safe and sound is being steadily eaten away by the disappointment and dread creeping into her gut.
Niobe straightens. Drawing in a deep, shuddering breath, she swipes at her stinging eyes with her tightly fisted knuckles. Resolute, she closes her mother’s bedroom door.
Midmorning. Niobe’s canoe slices through the brackish waters of Calypso’s back alleys. She repeats the arduous task of dipping her long paddle into the murky wet. One side then the other. One side then the other.
Beads of sweat drip from her hairline to her brows, the salty wetness stinging her eyes and trickling down her glistening neck to the valley between her breasts. The cloying humidity intensifies as cumulonimbus clouds gather, obscuring the sun’s merciless gaze. The indolent breeze echoes their empty promises of rain.
She hums a wordless tune as the canoe glides past tall, silent buildings half-submerged in the seawater and entangled in mangroves and hairy sargasso. A month ago, these waterways were full of life, crowded with canoes, people, music, and a floating market where you could buy anything from alligator limbs to water distillers. Niobe longs for that noisy energy. The mishmash of music, languages, and flavors. The laughter, the chatter, the shrieks of raucous vendors hawking their shady wares.
The silence is heavy but Niobe knows the buildings aren’t empty. She can’t see them but she can feel the furtive stares of the people living inside the semi-submerged structures. The ones who’ve yet to flee or be taken.
Her brown brows crinkle, betraying her impatience.
Her short dreadlocks quiver as she turns to cup her mouth and yells, “You can’t live on the water yet fear the sea!”
No one comes outside. No one responds to her taunt. They’re afraid. They’re afraid for Niobe. They’re afraid for themselves. Everyone knows by now. Something lurks deep within Calypso’s waters. Something that makes people disappear.
Doc Mali lives on the top floor of what was once the Yemanjá Holistic Treatment Center. There are two towers. Sea moss carpets the outer walls of the towers protruding from the water. A grand solarium dominates the east tower. The west tower houses many rooms, and this is where Doc Mali lives, plies her medicinal crafts, and consults her witchery bag of bones.
Niobe rows toward the east tower. She sets a small package onto the balcony before hopping out of the boat. She ties the grab loop to one of the cement banisters before scooping up the package entering the solarium.
Beautiful chaos reigns inside. Blooming lotus, papyrus, and lily pads vie for breathing room inside an above-ground pond. Pots bearing a multitude of medicinal plants, herbs, and vegetables crown the shelves lining the walls and multi-tiered planters hanging from the metal beams reinforcing the glass ceiling. The lush clash of scents is intoxicating.
Niobe sets her package down and grabs a large watering can. She goes to the cylindrical contraption squatting in one corner of the balcony. She cranks the lever on the device. The distiller’s yellow suction hose gulps seawater from below. The green output hose spits fresh water into the watering can. Niobe waters the plants then returns the watering can. She picks up her package. Crossing the bridge between towers, she sets foot into the old witch’s abode.
It’s warm inside her mentor’s workroom. It smells like earth, spice, and herbs. Dried bunches of rosemary, chamomile, sage, and lavender hang from the ceiling. Doc sits at her worktable. Her long white dreadlocks, gathered into a loose ponytail, frame her oval face. Her bright yellow tunic blazes in contrast to her nutmeg skin. Her long, slender fingers curl around the pestle she’s using to grind dried roots in her mortar. Beads of sweat drip from her wrinkled brow. She hums lowly, her mouth twisted into a wry ghost of a smile.
“Mornin’, Doc.” Niobe sets the package onto the table before her elder. “Fried green plantains and—” she jerks her head in the general direction of the east tower “—I’ve watered your plants.”
“Thanks for savin’ me the trouble,” Doc says with a toothy grin. “And thanks for the plantains, chile.”
Doc sets the pestle onto the mortar and picks up her stethoscope. Her wheelchair emits a soft whir as she navigates around the table. She brings it to a stop in front of Niobe. Doc eyes the younger woman critically. She pretends not to notice the way Niobe’s eyes fixate on the witchery bag, tied to her belt, resting in her lap.
“You’re lookin’ a bit blue,” Doc says. “Let me see.”
Niobe holds out her hand, shivering slightly as Doc examines the spaces between her fingers and traces the pattern of the veins on the back of her hand.
“Take off your blouse,” Doc commands.
Niobe obeys. She hugs the back of the chair and leans forward so that Doc can get a good look at her back. She trembles as Doc’s fingers trace a line down the left side of her spine then up the right. The skin there is welted forming two ridges on Niobe’s back.
“Feel that?” Doc asks.
“Yeah.”
“Does it hurt?” Doc prods.
“Nah,” answers Niobe. “Just kinda prickles and feels like there’s something icky stuck to my back.”
“Didn’t your Ma know anything about this?”
Niobe shrugs, trying to sound tough. “It didn’t start till she upped and disappeared.”
“I’ll apply another poultice.” Doc purses her lips and eases back in her wheelchair as Niobe puts her blouse back on then returns the chair to its rightful place.
She eyes Niobe intently. “You really have no idea what’s causing this?”
Niobe shrugs and swiftly changes the subject. “I came to see if you’ll teach me, Doc. Will you teach me how to rattle the bones?”
Late night comes and Niobe can hear seafolk singing again. In her mind’s eye, she can see them, dolphin-skinned humanoid creatures frolicking in the moonlight as they slip between curtains of sargasso in the murky sea. Their song is woeful and frantic. It fills her mouth and floods the gates of her brain. Something is wrong, she can tell. Something is terribly, terribly wrong but Niobe doesn’t understand what.
In her bed, she burrows deeper under the covers and squeezes her eyes shut, sternly willing her tense muscles to relax. When she finally drifts off to sleep, she dreams of her mother’s body submerged in black water. Hair limp. Eyes hollow and devoid of life. Niobe awakens with a start. Her shoulders shake. Her lips quiver. She weeps inconsolably in the dark.
Come morning, Ma Etufe sets out for the mainland.
“This village is done for.” The older woman’s fingers curl around Niobe’s upper arm. “Your ma, our mayor, is missing. Everyone’s leaving . . .
“Come with me,” pleads Ma Etufe. “My daughter can help us both get a fresh start on the mainland.”
Niobe can’t give a name to the emotion raging inside. It’s hot, scalding, and violent. Honestly, she’s tempted to punch the older woman in the face for even suggesting such a thing. But Ma Etufe’s done nothing to deserve that.
Instead, she gently extricates herself from the kind woman’s grasp. “I’m not leaving this place. Not until I find my ma.”
“Maybe the sea knows best. Life once crawled up out of the ocean. Maybe the sea is simply taking back its own.” Ma Etufe lightly pats Niobe’s cheek.
“Take care.” The older woman gathers up her bags and departs without ever looking back.
Days pass. The remaining denizens of Calypso either flee to the village or disappear. The mainland looms ominously, uncharted and incomprehensible territory. When not out on the water searching, Niobe spends her time on her mother’s laptop learning about the world beyond Calypso. Nothing she learns makes her feel in any way inclined to become a part of that scene. She longs for the days when Calypso was bustling with people and their noise, music, and laughter.
She longs for her mother’s easygoing, comforting presence.
She longs for the salty wetness of the deep blue sea.
Niobe tethers her boat to the rotting escalator railing of Doc Mali’s building. Her nerves jangly with determination and anticipation, she takes the stairs up to the bridge between towers two at a time. Today’s the day, she’s decided. That old witch is going to teach her how to consult the bones. Today. Come hell or high water.
She crosses the threshold to Doc’s workroom. She stops, uneasiness tightening into a fist inside her chest.
“Doc?” she calls out. “Are you here?”
She notices Doc’s empty wheelchair upended behind the worktable. Unnerved, she approaches the worktable. Her gaze swoops down to a thick booklet stuffed with old newspaper clippings.
She picks up a clipping. It’s over one hundred years old, from a few years after the floodwaters swallowed the peninsula once known as Florida. The article features a hazy photo of two women. Survivors of the epic disaster.
Niobe recognizes a much younger Doc Mali. Then her blood runs cold. The other woman in the photo is her own mother, Charlene, and she doesn’t seem to have aged a day in over a century.
The sound of movement from the doorway startles Niobe. The clipping slips from her fingers, fluttering to the floor as her gaze clashes with Doc Mali’s bemused stare. A tied handkerchief covers Doc Mail’s mouth and nose. Her right arm is held high, a smoking censer swinging from her curled fingers.
“Doc, what’s going on he—”
Niobe doesn’t get to finish asking her question. Her tongue suddenly thickens, swelling up inside her mouth. Her strangled breath hitches on the aroma of whatever’s burning. Sage. Parsley. Something that smells like the burning body of a peenie wallie that flies too close to a halogen lamp. Her brain is still processing this as the room tilts and her body hits the floor. Darkness slams down, eclipsing her mind.
Niobe awakens. She’s sitting on an old wooden chair semi-submerged in brackish water. She tries to move but her hands and feet have been bound with thick ropes.
“I wouldn’t do that, if I were you.” Doc Mali’s gravelly voice comes from across the room. “It reacts to movement. That’s how it locates prey. I can’t guarantee it wouldn’t hunt even you.”
Niobe’s head turns. She eyes the older woman who stands hunched in a far corner occupying the closest dry spot on the downward-sloping floor. Parking garage? Niobe briefly wonders but quickly switches gears. Right now, she’s got bigger fish to fry. Doc Mali is no longer holding the smoking censer. Instead, she cradles a large jar filled with something dark Niobe can’t quite make out under one arm. The jar emits a low thrumming sound like a drumbeat punctuating the stagnant air.
Niobe swallows the growing unease clogging her throat and makes a half-hearted stab at sounding nonchalant.
“What’s up, Doc?”
Doc Mali snorts derisively. She puts her thumb and forefinger in her mouth and blows. An ear-splitting whistle fills the air, the echoes reverberating throughout the lower reaches of the tower. The black water at the deeper end surges. In the poor light, Niobe’s narrowed eyes make out the shape of something rising up from the murky wet. Seaweed-like snarls of drenched, black hair. A gray-blueish human-like forehead. Eyes aglitter with quicksilver sclera and inky irises fixate warily on the spot where Doc Mali stands. The creature opens its maw, emitting an agitated, inhuman squeal. Niobe catches a glimpse of a mouthful of raggedy teeth. As the creature draws closer, a prescient kind of instinct sends a shudder of recognition shooting down her spine.
Her eyes start stinging and that lump in her throat surges back upward with a vengeance, raw and cutting like the crude edge of an old knife.
“No,” she whispers tremulously, with a convulsive shake of her head. “Please, God. No.”
“You catch on so quickly.” Doc delivers a sinister snicker before sobering then sounding almost regretful. “I always liked that about you.”
“Ma!” Niobe cries out, beseeching eyes following the creature as it treads the surface of the water, back and forth, back and forth.
Its ravenous glaze, sharpened by a predatory intelligence, cuts Niobe to the quick. It betrays no sign that it knows her. Not like a mother ought to know her daughter.
Instead, it sees only prey. Niobe’s heart cracks and she can feel it splintering into a thousand pieces as a new kind of fear begins clawing its way into her gut.
“What did you do to my ma?” Niobe spits confused betrayal and venom. “What the hell did you do?”
“Look at me,” Doc Mali says, removing her face covering. “I don’ look a day over forty and I no longer even need that infernal wheelchair.”
Niobe stares wordlessly at her mentor.
Doc Mali, looking decades younger than she did only days ago, makes a tsk-tsk sound with her tongue and teeth. She seems oddly let down by the fact that Niobe doesn’t understand.
“It’s blood,” Doc Mail says, a guttural laugh erupting from deep inside her throat. “If simply drinkin’ its blood does all this, c. Can you even imagine what eatin’ this flesh might do?”
She holds the jar up in the air and in the dim light, Niobe can finally see what’s inside. Suspended in clear liquid, the sea-creature’s still-beating heart. Niobe’s stomach turns. The creature in the water reacts violently, squealing and thrashing about. Doc Mali laughs and she laughs, the hideous sound making Niobe’s blood boil and boil.
“It stays close because I have its heart.” The older woman grins. “I feed it a regular supply of human flesh and bein’ of use to me gives meaning to its existence. What more could it possibly want?”
Something inside Niobe’s soul breaks with an almost audible snap. She doesn’t remember ripping her way out of the ropes or upending the wooden chair but the next thing she knows, propelled by blind rage and grief, she has both hands grabbing and squeezing Doc Mali’s scrawny neck.
Gagging and choking, the old witch loses her grasp on the jar. Its thick glass cracks as it hits the ground and rolls down the concrete surface and into the water. Wild-eyed,
Doc Mali shoves Niobe aside and lunges after the jar. Niobe loses her balance and lands on her ass in the water. The pain barely registers. Doc Mali flails wildly in the frothing water, screaming in agony, and the creature bites into flesh, breaking bone, and dragging her down into the water. The murk turns a cloudy crimson, swallowing
Doc Mali’s screams in a single gulp.
In the jarring silence that follows, Niobe can only sit there in the water, heaving and trembling while bawling wordlessly as the creature that was once her mother resurfaces, clutching the broken jar containing its heart close to the chest. Its eyes watch Niobe solemnly, and Niobe isn’t sure whether she only imagines the nearly imperceptible nod it gives her before retreating into the deep, dark wet.
A warm breeze buffets the air as the sun goes down and darkness begins to blanket the deserted corpse of Calypso. Listless, Niobe slowly rows homeward swamped by the sad certainty that there won’t be anyone waiting for her there.
The seafolk, they come out again at night. Song no longer frantic, they call Niobe to the deep. This time, she shucks off her pajamas and takes the stairwell down to the thirteenth floor. She dives headfirst into the brackish water. She is welcomed by a high-pitched, inhuman squeal.
Niobe follows the sound.
She swims out of the building, down the street, and dives into the depths of the wide, open sea. She never looks back.
