“There is nothing innocuous about global warming,” Beka said with a scowl, but then heaved a sigh. “Still, you might have a point there. Let’s go see if we can find out anything from the other locals.”
“The fishermen, you mean?” Alexei said.
Beka laughed. “No, silly, the folks who actually live in the seas where this is all taking place. Fire up the boat, big boy. We’re off to talk to some dolphins. Maybe even a whale, if we get lucky.”
Oh, goody. Call me Ishmael.
*
They steered The Flora MacDonald out into deeper waters, heading into the ocean off Chatham. They sailed for two hours in ever widening circles until finally Chewie barked at something off the port bow, pointing one paw toward a distant shape. Dragon-dogs had remarkable vision, as he never tired of explaining to Beka.
When they approached the pod of dolphins, they were greeted by eager squeaking and whistling. There were about a dozen dolphins, although it was hard to get an exact count as they swam in circles around the boat, leaping and diving in an intricate water ballet.
“Hello, my friends!” Beka yelled to the dolphins.
More excited clicks and whistles emanated from the group, although one large scarred old male came up close to the side of the boat and seemed to be directing his clicking vocalizations directly toward Beka.
“How do they know you’re the Baba Yaga?” Alexei asked her without thinking. “You didn’t even introduce yourself yet.”
Beka’s eyes widened. “A better question might be, how do you know they know? Since when do you speak dolphin?”
Chapter 10
“I don’t speak dolphin,” Alexei said automatically. Then he thought about it for a minute, listening to all the chaotic noise. Besides the shouts of “Baba Yaga, it is the Baba Yaga!” he heard the words “boat,” “big man,” and something about fish.
He blinked. “Oh,” he said. “Maybe I do speak dolphin. Huh. I guess I wasn’t going crazy after all when I thought I was hearing Lulu tell me she wanted to go outside and dig in the dirt.”
“Well, this is an interesting development,” Beka said. “I can speak dolphin, but only because I did a spell for it, and it works a lot better when I am actually in the water with them. I was going to go in, but the water on this side of the country is damned cold and I’d just as soon not get into my wetsuit if I don’t have to.”
Alexei gave her a look.
“Hey, there’s surfing on Cape Cod. Did you think I wasn’t going to bring my wetsuit along? What’s the point in living in a magical traveling hut turned painted school bus if you can’t use it to tote along all your stuff?” She grinned at him. “We’ll have to go out later. We haven’t surfed together in ages, and I do so enjoy watching you fall off a board. But in the meanwhile, why don’t you ask our new friends if they have seen any sign of a sea monster, or anything else unusual?”
“Um, how?” Alexei asked. “I mean, I can make out some of what they’re saying, but I don’t exactly speak dolphin.” There was no way he was going to start making random clicking and whistling sounds. With his luck, he’d probably say something rude or obscene by accident.
Beka laughed, tossing her long hair back out of her face as the wind picked up. “When you talk to Lulu the dog, do you bark at her, or just speak normally?”
“I do not go around barking,” Alexei said, scowling at her. As usual, the look that would have made a grown man quake just bounced off the blonde woman. The Riders had helped raise Beka and the other Baba Yagas from the time they’d each been adopted by their mentor Babas, usually around four or five years of age. Despite his strength and ferocity, they all tended to view him as a quirky kindly uncle who happened to be good in a fight. It was annoying.
“Then clearly part of your new gift, if that’s what this is, makes it work both ways. You can understand animals - at least dogs and dolphins so far - and they can understand you. It seems to have worked with your pal Lulu. Go ahead, try it.”
Alexei rolled his eyes, but figured if he failed, the worst that would happen was he’d get to laugh at her when she had to get into the bitter Atlantic waters and freeze her skinny butt off.
“Uh, hello,” he said, gazing down over the side of the boat. “I am Alexei, friend to the Baba Yaga. We have some questions for you, if you don’t mind.”
The large male looked at him, his scarred nose bobbing up and down in the water as he worked to stay in one place. “Ask questions, friend of Baba. We will try to answer, if we can.” The other dolphins whistled their agreement.
“Cool,” Alexei said, mostly to himself. Then thought, wait until I tell Gregori and Mikhail, forgetting that they weren’t all together anymore, and for a moment the darkness threatened to overwhelm him again, like waves from the bottom of the sea. He pulled himself together with an effort.
“What do you want me to ask them?” This was Beka’s gig - he was only along for the ride. Let her figure out what she wanted to know.
He guessed he’d spoken a little more harshly than he’d intended to when she raised both eyebrows and stared at him, but too bad. This wasn’t his job anymore, and he suddenly didn’t feel like being out here, trying to pretend to be useful.
Beka bit her lip, but said, “I guess you can start by asking them if they’ve seen any monsters.”
“How the hell do you say ‘monster’ in dolphin?” Alexei muttered. Then said more loudly, “The Baba Yaga would like to know if you have seen any monsters.”
As he’d suspected, this just got him some confused sounding whistling and nothing else.
“What is monster?” the scarred dolphin asked eventually. Alexei heard the word repeated back to him as something that translated more closely into “big not real creature.”
“Oh, ah, something very large that doesn’t belong in your water?” Alexei said, trying to think like a dolphin. “Scary big creature that hurts dolphins and attacks ships?”
This was met with lots of loud, high-pitched whistling and rapid clicking. Even without his newfound talent, he would have recognized agitation when he heard it.
“I’m guessing that’s a ‘yes,’” Beka said dryly.
Alexei hung even further over the side of the boat and held up his hand. “Slow down,” he begged. “One at a time, please. It is hard for me to understand you when you all talk at once.”
He was pretty sure he heard a teen-sized dolphin say something to a companion about stupid Humans. Alexei didn’t bother to correct him.
“Big scary thing, yes,” the large dolphin said. “Eats all that swim in ocean.”
“Eats whales!” another member of the pod said.
“Pulls ships under the water!” added another. “With many long ugly flippers.”
“Long ugly flippers?” Alexei repeated that, and the rest, to Beka.
“Hmmm,” she said. “Maybe they don’t have a word for tentacle in their language.” She waved her arms at the dolphins. “Ask if these are flippers.”