Emily Windsnap and the Land of the Midnight Sun (28 page)

“I’ll second that!” Millie said, sweeping a hand briskly through her hair and putting on as brave a face as she could. “I don’t know what I ever saw in the man.”

Aaron swam over and swept me up into his arms. “We did it!” he said. “We really did it!”

Shona and Seth smiled shyly at each other. They were holding hands. “You helped us stop Njord,” Shona said. “If you hadn’t come back with the narwhal, we would all be dead by now — or trapped in a cave forever.”

“It was nothing,” Seth said modestly. “Just doing my job.”

Neptune swam to Seth. He took him in his arms and squeezed him in a tight embrace. “It was a
good
job,” he said. “Thank you. And now that Njord has gone, I imagine you’ll be needing a new one.”

Seth shrugged. “I guess so.”

“How does adviser to the king sound?” Neptune asked with a smile. “A vacancy has suddenly become available.”

Seth grinned. “Really?”

Neptune laughed. “Really. You have more than earned it!”

“Thank you, Your Majesty!” Seth said, beaming. “I accept your offer!”

“What will happen to the narwhal?” I asked as he swam around in between us.

“The narwhal will come home,” Neptune said. “With me.”

I felt in my pocket and pulled out the crystal. “And this? What shall I do with it?”

“Keep it,” Neptune said softly. “As a memento of the day we made the world safer — and a reminder of your bravery and loyalty.”

I didn’t know what to say — which didn’t matter too much, as my throat was too choked up with tears for me to say anything, anyway. “Thank you,” I eventually managed to croak.

Neptune turned to leave. “Come, let’s go home.”

“Wait!” Millie said. She was pointing at the mountain. “I’ve seen this before.”

We turned and looked at the mountain. The icy peak that moments earlier had been frothing waves, the wriggling waterfalls that flowed in long, jagged lines all the way down its sides to the sea. That was when I realized —
I’d
seen it before as well. Or I’d seen a reflection of it. “The mountain from the lake!” I said. “The one that we saw reflected but didn’t exist in real life!”

“It certainly exists now,” Aaron said.

It was always meant to exist,
I thought. This had
always
been Njord’s fate.

“I don’t know about any reflection in a lake,” Millie said. “But this is the one I told you about. The crying mountain from my dream.”

“Crying mountain?” Mr. Beeston asked.

Millie pointed at the waterfalls. As I looked, I realized she was right. The sun glinted on them, lighting them up with tiny dancing rainbows. They would always flow now. Njord’s tears, falling into the sea and fading away — just like all his evil plans.

“At least he got his wish,” Neptune said softly. “He can watch over the oceans forever now.”

We stayed a moment longer, each of us lost in our own thoughts. Mine centered on how close we’d come to a very different ending.

I felt a shiver wriggle through me. I didn’t want to think about that — I didn’t want to think about any of it anymore. It was time to leave it all behind.

I flicked my tail and glided through the still, blue water. “So,” I said, shuffling closer to Aaron as we swam along side by side, the sun heading slowly toward its soft midnight glow as our small group headed slowly home.

“So,” Aaron said.

“So you mentioned something about maybe wanting to do something again. Something we’d done once before. . . .”

Aaron smiled at me. “Did I?” he asked innocently. “I really don’t know what you’re talking about. What might that have been?”

I glanced at the others to make sure no one was watching. Mr. Beeston was in the boat with Millie, rowing her along. Neptune was ahead with the narwhal, leading the way. Shona and Seth were behind all of us, talking and giggling as they swam.

“This.” I stopped swimming, grabbed Aaron’s face in my hands — and kissed him.

“Oh,
that
!” Aaron said, smiling the best smile ever at me. “Thanks for reminding me. The only trouble is, I’ve got quite a bad memory,” he said. “I might need reminding again. Maybe a few times.”

“Don’t worry,” I said, laughing as the happiest feeling I’d ever known bubbled up inside me. “I won’t let you forget.”

Shona and Seth were smiling as they caught up with us.

“What are you two laughing at?” Shona asked.

“Oh, you know,” I said. “Just remembering things.”

Seth nudged his head back to where we’d come from. “Quite important, really, considering where we’ve come from.”

I shivered as I thought about the lake of lost memories.

“Good point,” Aaron said. “Maybe we should start practicing right away.”

“Mm,” Seth said seriously. He looked at Shona. “Maybe we should practice, too?”

Shona gave Seth a playful shove and swam ahead. I broke away from Aaron’s hand and joined her. We flicked our tails, spraying water in Aaron’s and Seth’s faces.

“You can if you can catch us!” Shona squealed, giggling as she splashed.

“You’re on!” Seth replied.

With that, the four of us swam and raced and played for the rest of the day.

And by the time the midnight sun moved across the sky to bathe the ocean in its gentle light, we had made so many new memories that there wasn’t room for the old ones anymore.

Thoughts of giant waves, evil brothers, stolen memories — or even crying mountains — were nothing more than a drop in the ocean.

As always, lots of people have been involved in helping to make this book come about. I would particularly like to thank . . .

My family, for fulfilling their usual roles of first readers, proofreaders, and general supporters along the way;

Dominique Royle, for enthusing about the midnight sun and insisting I visit Norway;

St. Ives Travel, for organizing the best research trip of my life;

the Hurtigruten ship,
Midnatsol,
for being absolutely stunning and amazing, and for providing ten days of incredible inspiration;

the Scattered Authors’ Society, in particular Celia Rees and Kath Langrish for one of those Charney lightbulb moments;

Lucy Coats, for the Bardic journey which led to Njord’s poem;

Amber Caraveo, for being a brilliant editor and for making the editing process such a creative, exciting, and pain-free journey;

Lisa Milton, Fiona Kennedy, and everyone at Orion, for being the perfect home for my books, and for doing so much to support them, and me;

the whole Candlewick team for being so lovely to work with and doing so much to support me and my books.

And Laura Tonge, for being a bit of all the above, and more.

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www.candlewick.com