“Wait a minute. Is there a mermaid hell?”

“Yes,” she says, “I call it humanity.”

I roll my eyes at her. “Shut up. You love humans.”

“I do not . Using land as an escape from boredom is natural. It’s

like taking up a lover or going to one of those theme parks.”

Taking up a lover? I shake my head. I’ve already learned that

lesson. “Just for the ride?”

The air is grittier in Manhattan. There are more people on the

streets than near the small Brooklyn hangouts. We hop onto the bike

and head into the park, which is fairly deserted at this time of the

night.

“Another map.” Gwen points. I hit the brakes, and she falls onto

me. “Now you’re just doing it on purpose.”

She studies it in the soft light of the lamp post. “It’s not far.

That way.”

Something about the way the breeze blows around us and then shifts

suddenly to the west tells me she’s right.

“This park smells new,” she comments.

“That’s what happens when you’re so old.”

“If there were a gentleman here, he’d slay you for speaking to me

that way. I’ll teach you a thing or two about chivalry yet.”

“Didn’t they tell you? Chivalry died about the same time as punk

rock.”

“I think you like to say things that I’m not going to understand

on purpose.”

“But you’re so cute when you’re confuzzled.”

She smacks the back of my head.

“This isn’t right.” I stop pedaling, this time slowly so that she

doesn’t fall off. “No. It’s not.” I’m no oracle, but the pond is so

open, so bare. I can see the water, the ripples of lamp posts and

shadows. A tiny movement catches my eye. Between the shadows of

buildings that cut right through the night sky, the squirrels

scavenging and dogs barking, I don’t know how I notice her, but I do.

A tiny woman wrapped about a hundred times in a deep red shawl

stands at the top of a small mount. Her face is blocked by shadows and

a mess of black hair. She stands and stares, tilting her head to the

side as if something about me is amusing. Then she turns and walks

right into a passage of trees, so it looks like the darkness swallows

her.

The ground is too littered with rocks and broken branches to take

the bike. We feel our way clumsily.

“Keep your dagger out,” Gwen whispers behind me.

I unzip the familiar pocket of my backpack and feel for my blade.

I can feel Gwen’s cool fingers reach out for my wrist, then slide down

to my hand. Even on a nice summer night like this, my skin prickles.

“Why isn’t she saying anything?”

I shrug but then realize she can’t see me in the dark. “Maybe

she’s mysterious. Aren’t oracles supposed to be mysterious?”

“Maybe she’s not the oracle. Isn’t New York famous for crazy

humans?”

“If something is funky, you need to leave without me, okay?”

She doesn’t respond, because I know she isn’t going to listen to

me. The downward slope of the path comes as a surprise. I miss the

step and slide down on my heels. My flip-flops come off, and I lose

them in the dark. Gwen isn’t far behind. I land in a puddle that is

part of a small pond. Tiny specks of light wriggle and laugh over my

head. They’re fairies, about the length of my hand. One of them comes

close and presses her whole body against the side of my face. I can

feel her teeny, tiny mouth kiss me before she pulls away and hides in

the hole of a gnarly tree.

“Fairies,” Gwen says distastefully.

I go, “Tell me how you really feel.”

“I feel ignored,” says a raspy voice on the other end of the pond.

The fairies gather around a white boulder beside the oracle. I can

see her face, bathed in the soft fairy light. I know why she wraps

herself in so many folds of cloth. She is unlike any of the merpeople

I’ve met. Her face is round and wide. The wrinkles on her cheeks are

like the grooves on the side of a melting taper. The whole of her eyes

are black, and I shut my eyes against the memory of the black blood

coming out of the merrows.

“Does something so ugly offend the young prince?”

I try to right myself and put on my best smile, like she’s Lourdes

the lunch lady and I want some free chocolate milk. “I’m not

offended.”

The sound of the park fills her silence-the ripple of the pond,

the leaves brushing against the push of the wind, fairy wings flitting

faster than batting eyelashes in Van Oppen’s class, the very distant

sound of cars honking. That’s it, the cars honking. It’s the only

thing that reminds me I’m in the city.

“Come closer,” she tells me.

I step a foot in the pond. In five steps I’m in front of her.

“You wait till I ask you to sit,” she observes.

In truth, it’s because I’m afraid I’ll crush one of the fairies.

“What will you give me, Tristan Hart?”

I don’t think I’ll ever get used to people just knowing my name. I

feel for the pearl in my pocket. “What will you give me in return?”

She laughs, a raw brittle sound that reminds me of twigs breaking.

“Will you tell me I’m beautiful? The other champion told me I was most

beautiful.”

“Have there been others?”

“Just one. The golden son of the West.”

“Dylan,” Gwen offers. She sits with a few of the fairies watching

her curiously.

I don’t think I should lie to the oracle’s face. Wouldn’t she

know? Instead I say, “What if I can give you something that was taken

from you?”

She sits taller. She smooths her hair away from her face and

frowns when she sees my hands are empty. “What can anyone take from

me? I, who have nothing to give.”

“You’re an oracle, though. Right?”

She harrumphs. “In truth, I got the dregs of my sissies. The

shaft, as you humans call it. But I like you. Not just because you’re

young and as lovely as the calm of the sea seconds after a storm.

Though you are, you are. Would you stay with me so I can look at you

prettily? But no, Sea Kings cannot stay. Unlike golds and souls, you

aren’t meant to stay.”

“Stay where?”

“Why, right where you ought to be, of course.”

Of course. Maybe she is a crazy New Yorker after all. I reach into

my pocket, and she recoils from me, almost falling off her boulder. I

hold my dagger with my free hand and wave it so she can see I mean no

harm. Then again, waving a dagger isn’t the universal symbol for I

come in peace. “Don’t be afraid. It’s only this.” The marble-sized

pearl hangs between us on its long gold chain.

Her eyes fall on it instantly. Her hands reaches out, bony fingers

like twigs in a nest waiting to catch it. I pull it away.

“Your mother. Always the troublemaker she was.” She smacks her

lips like she tastes something sweet and sticky. “Do you know what

that is, boy?”

“It’s Tristan,” I say, annoyed that she’s speaking about my mom.

Oracle or not. “But you already knew that. What’s your name?”

“That’s none of your concern.”

“Fine. And no, I don’t know what it is. I thought it was just a

necklace.”

“Just a necklace,” the oracle says to the fairy closest to her.

The fairy laughs, a thin prickly sound that reminds me of pine needles

falling in a cluster. “It’s the Venus pearl. It’s only made when two

clams stick together and have one baby pearly.”

I go, “That sounds incredibly gross. Plus, I knew that. What’s so

special about that?”

“It’s the only one I’ve ever seen of its kind. And it’s rightfully

mine.”

“Finders keepers.”

She reaches inside her red shawls, and I pray to whatever gods are

out there that she’s not trying to seduce me.