That is brand new information for me.
“I appreciate you sharing that, Annabelle. Queen Annabelle?” I correct, a questioning note to my voice.
“You don’t have to call me queen,” the kraken says regally. “Annabelle is fine. We don’t stand on the same type of ceremony you hairless things do on the land.”
There’s no mistaking the derision in her voice, and I try not to take umbrage.
“I have hair,” I say.
“Yes,” she says. “But not like that thing barking next to you. It has a lot of hair.”
She sounds impressed by Gunner.
I look down at the dog, whose pink tongue is lolling out. He’s surprisingly calm for the fact that we are talking to a giant royal kraken.
This is fine and normal. Just another day.
“Sooooo, I have to admit that I don’t know anything about the ward, so any other information you could tell me would be so helpful. I would love to get that back up and running as soon as we could. Anything you can tell me about any of this?”
“Your human problems are not my concern. The things that happen on land are yours and yours alone to deal with. I am too busy making sure that the sea remains calm.”
With that, the eye slowly blinks again, and the tentacle unwraps itself from my leg, slithering wetly across the rocks and back into the ocean.
The eye stares at us balefully for one more moment, and I find myself crying out, “Wait! If you could just tell me what to do?—”
But the eye disappears again, leaving only the choppy water sliced apart by fat raindrops and no hint of what is apparently lurking just below the surface.
“She said that something is coming,” I say to Caleb.
“She?” he asks, perplexed. Not that I’m blame him, it’s a whole mood. “Oh yeah? Well what do you mean she said something? I didn’t hear anything.”
“She was talking in my mind,” I finally say. “I’ve never even heard — I’ve never experienced anything like that. I mean, I have the visions and whatnot, but I’ve never had anything speak directly into my mind.”
“You have visions?” Caleb says.
“It’s really not something that we need to talk about right now. You know, I think we need to focus on the fact that there’s a giant royal sea creature just off the shore of our town who’s saying that unless we get the ward back up and running — or the rune or whatever the hell that is — that there’s something in the ocean that’s coming for us that she’s doing her best to hold off.”
I shake my head.
“I don’t like the sound of that.” Caleb holds out a hand, and I grab it, grateful for the steadying touch and the fact he’s offering it at all after that freakiness.
Rain spills off the yellow hood, seeping into the neckline of my dress where it pours down my neck.
“A squid that can talk inside your head. This is all sounding very Dungeons and Dragons,” he says.
“Huh? What do you mean?” I blink up at him, tugging the hood further over my face.
“He’s talking about the stuff like cephlapods that use mind control,” Gunner explains. “Like slugs, you know? Horror. It’s like a whole stereotype of squid people. Mind flayers. Isn’t that right, Caleb?" Gunner tilts his head, rain running right off his waterproof coat. "Didn’t you watch Stranger Things, Ivy? How do you not know what Dungeons and Dragons is?”
“I have heard of it!” I totally fell asleep during Stranger Things.
“It’s really taking off, honestly,” Gunner continues. “One group of players recently sold out Madison Square Garden so people could watch them play live.”
“Is that what that credit card charge was last month?”
“I plead the fifth,” Gunner says.
“The fact that your dog?—”
