A Crack in the Sea Read online

  ALSO BY H. M. BOUWMAN

  The Remarkable & Very True Story of Lucy & Snowcap

  G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS

  an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

  375 Hudson Street

  New York, NY 10014

  Copyright © 2017 by H. M. Bouwman.

  Illustrations copyright © 2017 by Yuko Shimizu.

  Cover art © 2017 by Yuko Shimizu

  Cover design by Annie Ericsson

  Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

  G. P. Putnam’s Sons is a registered trademark of Penguin Random House LLC.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Bouwman, H. M., author.

  Title: A crack in the sea / H. M. Bouwman.

  Description: New York, NY : G. P. Putnam’s Sons, [2017]

  Summary: “Pip, a young boy who can speak to fish, and his sister Kinchen set off on a great adventure, joined by twins with magical powers, refugees fleeing post-war Vietnam, and some helpful sea monsters”—Provided by publisher. | Includes bibliographical references.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2016008734 | ISBN 9780399545191 (hardback)

  Subjects: | CYAC: Fantasy. | Adventure and adventurers—Fiction. | Kraken—Fiction. | Sea monsters—Fiction. | Slavery—Fiction. | Refugees—Fiction. | BISAC: JUVENILE FICTION / Fantasy & Magic. | JUVENILE FICTION / Action & Adventure / General. | JUVENILE FICTION / Historical / General.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.B6713 Cr 2016 | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016008734

  Ebook ISBN 9780399545207

  The interior illustrations were done in ink on paper.

  The jacket illustration was drawn in ink with digital color.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Version_1

  This book is for the other cousins: Isabelle, Grace, and Cole.

  And for Camille: fantastic child. And Mikayla, who fits in perfectly;

  and Kaitlyn, who is now stuck with us all. And especially, Ruhamah

  and Sophia: you traveled so far to come to this family, who loved you before we ever met you; and we love you more each day.

  CONTENTS

  Title Page

  Also by H. M. Bouwman

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Introduction

  Part One Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Part Two Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Part Three Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Part Four Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Part Five Chapter 1

  Part Six Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Part Seven Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Part Eight

  Part Nine

  Afterword

  Special Thanks

  Further Reading

  AS WITH TRUE STORIES, Venus’s story has no beginning.

  As with fantasy, her tale weaves through everything.

  The book about her—this book you are holding in your hands right now—will open with Kinchen and Pip and, soon enough, Caesar. We’ll arrive at Thanh much, much later. Because it is sometimes the nature of books to tell things in what seems to be the wrong order.

  Don’t forget Thanh. He’s coming. And Venus: will be here all along.

  PART ONE

  Kinchen (and Pip)

  Tathenn. Summer 1978.

  1

  WHEN KINCHEN came back from milking the goats, Old Ren sat up in bed and told her that Pip was gone. He’d been taken away by a very polite Raftworlder—one of the Raft King’s guards—down to the governor’s house for afternoon tea.

  “Afternoon tea?” Kinchen asked. It was the first thing that came out of her mouth, but certainly not the real question. What would the king of Raftworld—or their island’s own governor, for that matter—want with Pip? He was just a boy, only eleven. And on top of that, everyone in town thought he was slow-witted, “not all there,” as she’d once overheard a townswoman say, fake-delicately.

  (Kinchen had bumped into that woman and fake-accidentally caused her to drop her bag of apples. No one talked about her little brother that way. At least not in front of her.)

  Old Ren coughed, his unusually pale face even whiter than usual. His cold had prevented him all week from leaving the house, and today he hadn’t even left his bed. “Afternoon tea,” he confirmed. “And no, I don’t know why. Right after you left for the goats. The guard said they needed him—not anyone else, just him. And that he’d meet the Raft King at tea.”

  “I don’t understand,” said Kinchen. Already, though, she was finding her shoes for the trek into town. She’d have to go after him. Pip wasn’t stupid—he wasn’t—but he was odd, especially with people. He needed her help; he always would. She grabbed the dishrag and scrubbed at her face and hands. Probably it would be good to be presentable if she was going to attend a governor’s tea.

  Ren shook his head. “I offered to come along. But the guard said no, just Pip.”

  She stood in the middle of the room, shoes in hand, and stared at Old Ren. Their grandfather for all these years. The only adult she trusted completely. What was he telling her?

  He leaned forward in his bed and coughed once more, holding her eyes with his. “Pip has gifts that no one else here has. Gifts with water. And the Raft King, who lives on the water, has no such gifts. My guess is that they want to consult Pip. They have a favor to ask him, someone they want him to talk to.”

  Kinchen nodded slowly. That made sense. She stooped to pull on a shoe.

  “You aren’t invited,” Ren repeated.

  “I’m going.”

  Ren nodded and lay back down on his pillows, pulling the covers back over his chest. Years ago he’d told Kinchen that he’d seen her personality clear and sharp, right away, the moment he’d adopted her—when she was three and Pip was two. And knowing her as he did, Ren never st
opped her if she had her mind set on something. It was, in Kinchen’s opinion, one of the many good things about Old Ren.

  One shoe still in her hand, Kinchen studied him. “Are you going to be okay? I’ll be back as soon as I can. With Pip,” she added firmly.

  “I’d go with you if I could.”

  Kinchen knew then that Ren was worried. He wasn’t just letting her have her way; he was anxious about Pip.

  But he didn’t say any more about that. “You be careful. And try to be polite. I’ll be fine, child. I’m just going to take a nap.” He closed his eyes, and his face suddenly looked gray and immobile, like a statue of himself.

  She slipped on her other shoe and left, running down the hill and through the woods toward town.

  • • •

  KINCHEN RAN. She was very fast, but Pip and the Raftworld guard had quite a head start on her—probably more than an hour. Had the guard purposely arrived after she left the house? No, she wasn’t going to assume this was some kind of conspiracy. That was crazy. She was just going to find Pip and keep him from feeling lost and alone. Help him out. She put her hand up to her forehead almost without thinking and felt the coarser patch of hair that started at her temple and fell down the side of her face—the white stripe that she’d bleached into her dark hair, like a skunk’s tail. No matter how hard he tried, Pip couldn’t recognize faces, not even Kinchen’s. He couldn’t identify the governor or the Raft King or anyone else in town on sight, but with the stripe at least he’d always know his sister.

  As she ran, she thought about what the Raft King might want; information from the fish made sense. After all, the water was wide, and Raftworld perched on it.

  This world—the second world, as they all called it— contained few islands, and not all of them were fit for habitation. The Raftworlders lived on their enormous raft and moved from place to place, following the good weather and always searching for a place to call their own. And Kinchen’s people—the Islanders, as they were usually and simply called—lived on the main island of Tathenn and the little Colay islands that swung away from it in a string. Altogether, they called their land simply: the Islands.

  Tathenn, where Kinchen lived with Old Ren and Pip, was the seat of government for the Islanders, so naturally when Raftworld visited—which they did, every decade or so—they came to the big island. As was their custom, they had sent a bird ahead to announce their arrival. And two days later they’d arrived, and everything on the island was put on hold for a week or more of celebration while they were in port. So much partying and music and food.

  And so much trading: trading of cloth and baskets and books and paper (from the Islands) and beads and jewelry and fishing implements and clockwork devices and hydraulic machines (from Raftworld). And trading of food, and of stories and songs and news.

  And exchanging of people. Traditionally, a few people from Raftworld would decide to stay on the island; and a few from the Islands would elect to join Raftworld. These were volunteers, and they were celebrated for their choosing, for some people were simply happier living on land, and others happier at sea. In practice this exchanging meant that although the Raftworlders looked different from the Islanders—their dark brown skin and tightly curled hair contrasted with the Islanders’ medium-brown skin and straight hair—there were, after all these years of trading, some darker people on the islands and lighter people on the rafts. And with marriages and the having of children, even more mixing. Sometimes you couldn’t tell for sure if someone was a Raftworlder or an Islander.

  And since they were all here by accident and because of others’ schemes, they’d decided long ago to make peace with one another. When they met, they met in friendship.

  Last time Raftworld came to visit, Kinchen and Pip were both too young to remember it. Nine years ago, shortly after Ren had adopted them: Kinchen had been only three and Pip two.

  When Raftworld finally returned four days ago, Old Ren had reminded Kinchen and Pip of all the history between Raftworld and the Islands, especially the friendship part. And he said there would be all kinds of goings-on in town for the Islanders to participate in.

  “Maybe Pip should stay home,” said Kinchen. Her little brother, sitting at the table in their common room, hunched deeper into his book, so that only his spiky black hair stood up behind it.

  Old Ren looked up from threading a needle. He was across the table from Pip, rebinding an old book for the town library. It was an early handwritten manuscript, almost two hundred years old, from before they’d invented a press, and the smell of old paper hung in the air.

  “Because of the—the issue. With him in crowds. With faces. With people,” Kinchen said.

  Pip scrunched down even farther. Only the very top of his hair showed.

  “He should go.” Ren inserted the needle into the pages he was binding. “At least to hear the stories. You could tag along with him, keep him company if he likes.”

  Kinchen frowned. She wanted Pip to be safe and not to be embarrassed or do something foolish—which meant he should stay out of crowds and away from people.

  “You’ll both be fine,” said Ren. “And the storyteller from Raftworld is stellar.”

  But now? Now Pip was gone, and he’d be scared and he wouldn’t recognize anyone and who knew what would happen?

  Ren had said not to worry. But when he’d told her to be polite, she’d seen something flicker across his face. He’d glanced at her, his eyes pale blue and wide, and she’d stood shoe in hand and seen the fear there. She ran.

  2

  WHEN KINCHEN reached town, she headed down the back street directly for the governor’s house. She didn’t see anyone. Music and laughter rang from the dock area: crowds of Islanders there yet again, trading and eating and mixing with the Raftworlders, who wouldn’t go back to Raftworld until late at night—and then would return again by small boats early the next morning.

  She paused only for a second as she heard a particularly loud voice call out, “Tell us another one!” The Islands didn’t have an official storyteller, but Raftworld did—an old man with special gifts at remembering and making stories. Heeding Ren’s suggestion (though with reservations on her own part), Kinchen and Pip had lain on a dockside shed roof just yesterday and listened to the storyteller as he stood in the market, a crowd around him, and told tales. True stories, made-up ones, stories from this world and from the one before. The old Raftworld storyteller, dark-skinned like most Raftworlders and with thick white hair pulled back in a tie, had a deep, magical voice, and listening to him was like being inside a dream. Kinchen would have loved to hear more—and she knew Pip felt that even more strongly than she did.

  At the kitchen entrance to the governor’s big house, she hesitated, then slowly cracked open the door. Usually the cook—a terrifying person named Prissy who did not want her clean and efficient kitchen interrupted, ever—stood at the back window chopping and stirring, and would have hailed anyone who ran up to the back door. But today no one was there. Ah. Kinchen remembered a booth she’d spotted from her perch on the shed roof yesterday. A couple of Raftworld mechanics had brought several new clockwork and hydraulic kitchen devices—including something called a “beater” (which Kinchen suspected, based on the name alone, would appeal to the governor’s cook) and a new type of small bread cooker. Prissy would certainly be trying out these items as much as possible before making a trade for them.

  Perfect. Kinchen didn’t even need to dream up an excuse for being at the governor’s house—not yet, anyway. She slid in the side door, removed her shoes to be polite, and slipped through the kitchen, resisting the urge to irritate Prissy by rearranging the hanging pots or crumpling the neatly folded towel on the counter.

  The governor’s house was not enormous. It was merely larger than the other Island homes, because the governor held a lot of meetings there—often in a large, airy room next to the town’s library of his
torical manuscripts, which took up most of the rest of the ground floor. Kinchen had been in the house many times, to pick up or drop off books for Ren to repair.

  It took only a moment to be sure that no one was home. She even ran upstairs and checked the bedrooms. Back in the kitchen, she paused. Where?

  The kitchen window was open to the back garden, and through it drifted faint voices: people at the pond behind the house. Frowning, Kinchen went back outside, shoes in hand, and sneaked quietly down the path to the pond. As she drew nearer, she could hear the governor’s low, smooth tones intermingled with a deeper voice, a man’s, Raftworld-accented—less nasal than the Islanders—and speaking English, the language used for trade.

  But she couldn’t hear Pip.

  Sure enough, the governor and the Raft King (in a deep purple cape, easily recognizable as she drew near) stood with their backs to Kinchen, watching the pond. It wasn’t anything special, just a swimming hole fed by a creek that led from the sea. Occasionally a larger fish would find its way in from the bay, but mostly the creatures were small and quiet. Toddlers were brought here, where there was no tide or undertow, to learn swimming in safe waters.

  Kinchen crept closer, working herself behind a bush. She wondered what the adults were doing—and where Pip was. She feared . . . yes, there he was. Sure enough.

  In the middle of the small deep pond, Pip floated, facedown, completely still and spread-eagled like a drowned child.

  He was talking to the fish.

  The Raft King and the governor stood on shore, watching. “We have someone with a water gift, too,” the Raft King said. “But she doesn’t float. She sinks.” A tall, muscled man with big shoulders, he wore wide Raftworld-style pants under his impressive cape. His curly black hair was closely trimmed to his head.

  “Well, every gift is different.” The governor, her gray top and leggings dull next to the king’s clothes, shrugged as if these kinds of gifts didn’t make much sense to her. “He’s the only one we have right now like this. And his adopted grandfather,” she corrected, “but the old man has only a little magic, I’m told. And he’s too feeble to use it.”