“Plasma’s a whole different element,” S’reee said, “but you might be onto something there. It could explain the connection to your colleague Roshaun as well. Like does call to like sometimes.”
“I wonder if I’m developing something like that for water.”
S’reee waved a fin in agreement that this could be a possibility. “Could be. It might explain why you took to underwater wizardry so readily, and did so well in the Song. But it’s a tendency, not a restriction. It doesn’t have to dominate your practice.”
Nita nodded and leaned against the rocks. “Something else to research…”
S’reee bubbled with laughter again. “The story of all our lives,” she said. “Though I’d try to put the research aside for a little. We do have to make sure we have other things going on in our lives than just wizardry, or what good are we to the Powers?”
There was an amused quality to S’reee’s voice, something almost secretive. Curious, Nita stretched out on the rock to get a better look at S’reee’s eye on that side. “Oh, really? What’s this all about?”
“Well, there are other reasons to go out singing than just errantry,” S’reee said.
That was when Nita remembered that “out singing” had more than one meaning for a whale. “Whoa, wait a minute! ’Ree, are you seeing somebody? You are! You’re finning around with someone!” Nita reached down and pounded S’reee on the flank in a congratulatory way. “Who’s the lucky bull?”
“Someone I met out on errantry—”
“Hey, great! Another wizard?”
“Oh, no, not at all. We can’t all date wizards, hNii’t! I met Hwiii’sh a few weeks ago up by the Grand Banks when I was on a meal break in the middle of a team wizardry. You know how it is, there are always tourists around who’re all itchy to see wizards doing what they do…”
Nita smiled ironically, letting the “dating” reference go by. She was so used to hearing this kind of thing from kids at school that she’d stopped protesting, since it just made everybody sure they were right. With luck, they’ll stop eventually. “Well, tourists aren’t a problem I have all that much,” Nita said. “So tell me all about him! What does he sing?” That being what you generally asked whales instead of “What do you do?”
“He sings aouih’hweioooiuh’hhaii!t.”
Nita had to listen to the word in the Speech to make anything of it. “Am I getting that right? He’s a food critic?”
“And very stuck up about it, too,” S’reee said, blowing a big wet laugh. “You should hear him going on about Arctic krill, and South Cape squid, and all the rest of it! Fortunately he thinks it’s a big deal that I’m a wizard, so I don’t have trouble holding my own when his ego starts to run riot…”
Nita leaned against the jetty and relaxed while S’reee talked, enjoying the fact that for once she had time to kick back and laugh at the concept of a whale who did nothing but share news about the presence and quality of food with other whales. But then lately it seemed rare for Nita to have “quality time” like this— time without school or schoolwork hanging over her head, or some terrifyingly heavy piece of wizardry that needed her attention. More of this, please, and enough saving the world for this year! Nita said silently to the One. Actually having the summer off, like a normal person, would be very, very nice! Not that she could ever be precisely normal again: wizardry kind of precluded that.
Up behind her on the jetty, Nita heard an odd sort of strangled pop. She scrambled around and peered up, one hand on her charm bracelet again, ready to wake up the light-diverting cloaking spell so she could pull it down over her and S’reee if need be. But there wasn’t any need. Halfway down the jetty, Carmela had just walked out of the air and was heading toward them down the rough stony path on the jetty’s top.
Nita let out a breath of mild exasperation. “Mela,” she said as Carmela got down near them, “you can not just go appearing out of nothing around here! People could notice.”
“But they don’t, mostly,” Carmela said, clambering down among the rocks to perch on top of one of the biggest ones near the waterline, dangling her legs over the edge. “Isn’t that one of the weird things about wizardry on Earth? Everybody says they want magic in their lives, and when it happens right in front of them, usually they don’t believe it. ‘Oh, she must have been there a moment before and I just didn’t see her,’ they’re all probably saying.” Then she paused and looked around. “Except, listen to me: who’s all saying? There’s nobody here. You’re just being paranoid. Loosen up! Good morning, Miss S’reee…”
S’reee, half-submerged except for one big eye, was bubbling in amusement. “And dai stihó to you, K!aarmii’lha. What brings you down here?”
“Well, my main project for the day is to go shopping,” Carmela said, “and this time Nita is finally coming with me.Aren’t you, Miss Neets?”
Carmela scowled a very overstated scowl at Nita. Nita laughed, glancing at S’reee. “She’s the only one I know who can make a shopping trip sound like a death sentence.”
“Well, depending on where you shop at the Crossings, it could happen,” S’reee said, rolling over in the water. “Some of the boutiques there are very species-specific: you’d have to watch what you bought. Sea’s Name, even some of the restroom facilities there could be fatal if you walked in the wrong door.”
“S’reee, it’s hardly about the toilets. We know all about which ones not to go into!” Carmela said.
“And if we didn’t, we could always ask Dairine,” Nita said under her breath, with a smile.
“Never mind the restrooms,” Carmela said, “it’s the stores that are interesting, S’reee. The clothes stores, especially. We’ve got to get Neets out of all those these floppy sweatshirts and jeans! I’ve asked her to come with me at least six times now.” Carmela bent down toward the amused S’reee in a most confiding way. “But she just keeps handing me these lame excuses. ‘Sorry, saving the universe, can’t go shopping today!’ So help me talk her out of this morning’s one! Which I’m sure she will now provide for us.” And Carmela turned expectantly to Nita.
A wave splashed higher than others had— the tide was coming in— and Nita paused to wipe spray off her face. “I was going to go up to Mars first.”
Carmela covered her eyes theatrically. “Knew it, S’reee,” she said. “It had to happen. She’s finally come down with Kit’s Mars bug!”
“Well,” S’reee said, adopting a fairly diplomatic tone, “you have to admit, it is hard not to find it exciting—”
“Especially when he’s up there with Ronan and Darryl,” Nita said.
“I know,” Carmela said. “That was going to be my first stop before I hit the Crossings. I was hoping Neets would come along with me so we could give them a good joint tease before moving on to more interesting things.”
“No way, Mela!” Nita said. “Not a good idea! All the signs point to this being some obscure boy thing. The note Kit left me had ‘Keep Out, Male-Bonding Road Trip’ stamped all over it.”
“All the more reason to crash the party!”
Nita began to sweat, realizing how much aggravation she was going to catch from Kit if she turned up on Mars with Carmela in tow. “No, seriously. You’re right about how many times you’ve asked me to go. Why don’t we let them get on with it and go shopping instead?”
“Too late, Neets,” Carmela said, and stood up. “I’ll go without you.”
“To Mars??” Nita said, now becoming seriously concerned.
Carmela smiled slightly and reached into one deep pocket of her jumpsuit. From it she pulled not the curling-ironish laser dissociator that Nita was expecting but a TV remote. This she flipped expertly in the air and caught.