Listen to the Water | FULL SERIES | Wattys 2022 Shortlist | ✔

(26) Taiki: Our Water

Ande's eyes find me the moment she reemerges—unharmed—from the inside core of the city. "Taiki," she signs, and my stomach drops. "We need to talk."

"Were you successful?" signs Yaz with the ghost of a smile.

"Perfectly. Also, we're safe here if we want to stay the night? Yaz, how soon do we need to be back in Underfarrow?"

Yaz hesitates for a moment, then signs with visible reluctance, "Sooner rather than later."

She doesn't say why, but Ande's either distracted or trusting enough not to mind. "Are we comfortable talking about sensitive matters on the way?"

"It's dawn. We need to sleep."

"Can I talk to Taiki before we sleep?"

"Preferably not, unless it's urgent enough that we'll need to do something about it before sleeping. I need everyone in peak shape tomorrow so we can travel at full speed."

Ande reluctantly agrees, and we find a place to sleep between the collapsed dens of Roshaska. I squirm about it, but say nothing. I don't want to show potential enemies that we're fighting amongst ourselves, and my sense of safety in here betrays me anyway. Ande's up first thing the next morning. By the time Yaz rouses the rest of us, Ande's already eaten, swum a lap around the city, and talked to Neem and the others here again. When she returns, she repeats yesterday's question about talking as we swim.

This time, Yaz answers it. "I don't see why not. We've got two sharks. Casin can screen the water well beyond the reach of anyone who'll be able to see our signs."

In spite of myself, having Kels with electrical senses along in our group is quickly becoming my favorite thing. It's not just reassuring. It's useful, and they've both demonstrated its usefulness in unique and creative ways ever since we left Underfarrow. Just yesterday, Casin showed me how she can identify camouflaged shellfish on rocks where even I didn't spot them, just by running her hand close to where they hide. It was the first time I've been actually, properly jealous of a shark-Kel.

Which I had to stop and think about for a moment, really. I haven't been jealous of them before. I always told myself it's because they kill my people. Now I wonder whether there's a part of me, too, that recognizes how exhausting it must be to have people suspicious of you all the time.

Yaz asks Ande if there's anything else we need to do here. There isn't, so I direct us the opposite way we came in, up the canyon Roshaska is nestled in the bottom of. We'll be swimming against the current and it'll take longer to get back, but we'll be safer from Andalua.

Ande makes sure Casin is on watch, then darts to my side. "I have a question about your people."

I stiffen. "What about them?"

"They don't want to fight, right?"

"Fight? Most of them. Satomi always wants more people to learn attack songs, so we can protect ourselves better, though."

"Oh yeah, not self-defense. Fighting like, fighting the surface Kels."

"Why would we fight the surface Kels? They're way too strong."

"That's what I thought. Okay, next question. How do they feel about the war?"

"They—" I break off as I run into an invisible barricade. "I'm... not sure about all of them?"

"Tell me what you do know."

I'm not sure where she's going with this, but I also kind of need to talk it out anyway, so I do. "Most people who talk about it are in favor of it. Kind of. People say it distracts the surface Kels... but then there are others who say it makes the surface Kels more wary, and that if there was peacetime in the surface waters, they would let down their guard and it would be easier for us to sneak up at night. Or there wouldn't be as much competition for food, but I don't think anyone believes that anymore. There's just as little food in peaceful areas as in conflict ones."