“But—”
“Do as he said. He has two stripes, and you’re just a woman.”
She stood breeding arguments suitable for the adolescent mind. A wedge of light pointed across the barn from the door. Kasuk’s broad shape came through it and the light thinned and disappeared.
“We have to get out of here,” Kasuk said. He came down the stairs past them. A narrow beam of light shot from his hand, glistening on black water stretching off as far as the light reached. “There are ships all over the sky, and the people in the house are all listening to the box. Something is going on.”
Up over their heads, a dog began to bark. He shone the torch along the walls and ceiling of the tunnel, overgrown with weed. They went down to the cold water. Along the edge it lapped barely to her ankles, but when Junna walked toward the center he fell in over his head. Kasuk held the torch down at his side. Junna swam toward them.
Paula stooped and dipped her hand in the water. It tasted brackish but not polluted. Something splashed away from the light ahead of them. The red beads of its eyes gleamed at them. Above them, on the surface, the dog was barking steadily.
“What is this?” Kasuk asked.
Paula said, “It was an underground railroad, all up and down the coast.”
“You said it goes to New York.”
“Hundreds of years ago. Before the island sank. Who knows where it goes now?”
He aimed the torch beam at the far end of the cavern. The light glanced off the narrowing walls. The water swirled into the black mouth of the tunnel. A wave broke in a ripple of foam.
“Come on.” He took her arm.
“Kasuk. I can’t swim. You go. Leave me here. I’ll be all right—”
A dull thud sounded like a thunderclap somewhere above them. The floor trembled under her. Her knees quaked. The water leaped along the walls of the cave. Kasuk said, “There, you see? Hold on to my back. Junna, stay behind me.” Paula put her arms around him, her cheek against his back, and he dove into the river.
She breathed deep and shut her eyes. The cold water closed over them. She raised her head into the air. Kasuk swam strongly under her. The light was gone. The air smelled of wet rot. One hand on the neck of Kasuk’s shirt, she let him tow her through the water. She heard the current rushing loud along the tunnel walls, and they were swept along in a close roar of water. Kasuk straightened and switched on the torch.
“Hold this.” He gave it to her over his shoulder. “Junna?”
“Here,” his brother called, behind him.
Kasuk swam on his stomach down the tunnel. Paula aimed the light ahead of them. The walls were massed with velvety weed. Thick curtains of it hung down from the ceiling. She ducked her head.
“Watch out!” Junna cried, behind them.
The river swelled. Paula clutched the torch. The water lifted them up and crashed them into the overhead wall. Greasy water filled her mouth and nose. She lost Kasuk. Her head broke the surface of the water and she gasped for air. She held the torch with both hands. The water leaped around her, booming on the walls of the tunnel. The light of the torch glowed in a green band under the water. Kasuk reached her. She flung her arms around his neck.
“Don’t strangle me.” He caught her hands. “I have you.”
Junna swam up to them. “What was that?”
Paula changed her grip to the back of Kasuk’s shirt. He took the torch. “Another bomb. Maybe the drinking dock, that was close. Let’s go.”
They swam off. The river swept them through the tunnel. Junna went on before them, his hair sleek, diving under the surface and popping up again like a water-puppy. They could not reach New York this way. Somewhere ahead, the air would turn foul, the tunnel would collapse, the roof fall in, they would drown in the dark.
“There’s light ahead,” Junna cried.
Kasuk switched the torch off. Ahead, an irregular patch of light shone into the tunnel through a hole in the roof. Paula sighed.
“It’s another station.” The air was clean. They were still inside the dome. Kasuk swam toward the light. Her feet struck the shelving ground, and she let go of him. She walked out of the water. Through the break in the tunnel roof, she could see the domelight. Kasuk grabbed her arm.
“Where are you going?”
“Kasuk—” She turned toward him, her hands on his arms. “Let me go. I have a chance here.”
He wiped his hand over his face. “How far is it to New York?”
“Ten hours. Eight. Depending on the current.”
“Good. Then we can make it.”
“Kasuk! I’ll drown!”
“You heard what Saba said. I may be stupid, Paula, but I know what he told me.” He turned to Junna. “Watch her. I’ll be right back.” He looked up at the hole in the roof, ten feet above them, crouched, and jumped. Swinging from the lip of the opening, he muscled himself up and out of the tunnel.
Paula went into the shallowest water. “We’ll all die,” she said to Junna.
The boy sank down on his hams in the water. “Papa will save us. He always does.” His hands played over the water. In his voice was the cheerful courage of someone who had never been afraid.
In the distance, up on the surface, a dog began to bark. She looked around the tunnel. There was nowhere to go. The opening overhead was too far for her to reach. It darkened, and Kasuk swung down through it. He had a coil of rope around his shoulder and a jug of milk in one hand.
They sat in the shallow water and drank the milk. Outside, the dog barked steadily. Kasuk wiped white foam off his mouth and his young mustaches. “You hear that? They’ll come through this city with packs of those things. We have to get out of here.”
She knew he was right. They tied the rope around their waists, five feet of slack between Kasuk and Paula and twenty feet between Paula and Junna, and she looped her arms around Kasuk’s neck and they swam into the dark.
The tunnel closed in tight around them. They came to a sheet of plastic thrust down through the ground, a foot thick: the wall of the dome. Kasuk dove under it. The air on the far side stank. The light glanced off patches of foam on the walls. The white crusts thickened to nests of round bubbles hanging just above the water. It buzzed. A million wings quivered all over the walls. Wasps zipped back and forth in the air.
“Take a deep breath.”
She filled her lungs and he dove. They tore through the water. It streamed over her face. They shot to the surface. The bubbles and the boom of wings lay behind them. They swam on. Bare rock walls lowered down around them, encrusted with salt. Her throat began to hurt when she breathed. Her mouth was full of a bitter numbing taste. Kasuk swam in a kind of breaststroke, silently, his hands only occasionally breaking the water. The light hung around his neck, shining through the water. A reek of gas clogged her nose. Her lungs refused it. She locked her fingers in his shirt, dizzy. Putting her head down close to the water, she drank the rotten air.
The two Styths swam steadily. In places the current carried them faster than they could swim. Once she lost her grip and was yanked away from Kasuk. Junna caught her before she could scream. She climbed back onto Kasuk’s shoulders. Her head pounded.
Her eyes itched and streamed. The poisonous air clawed at her lungs. The water rose in the tunnel until they scraped their backs against the rock roof. The walls widened abruptly. They were swept into the cavern of an ancient terminal.
Kasuk switched off the light. The terminal was not completely black. Through a wide crack in the roof, she could see the night sky. Far up there, Luna showed, silver-white. They swam into the black tunnel and he switched the light on again.
Wings fluttered past her. Something bobbed against her in the water, crawled along her side and leaped away. She kept her eyes closed against the stinging air. Her throat was raw. She licked her lips and her tongue began to itch.
“Kasuk—Kasuk—” Just beyond the light, Junna choked and gasped for breath. Kasuk spun around, grabbing for him. She clung to his shoulders. The boy gagged; he vomited; mucus streamed from his nose. He was dying. Kasuk pressed his mouth to his brother’s and breathed into him. Paula laid her head against his back. Something
