I don’t want to get any closer to the submarine that killed my parents. How can Luca tolerate being inside it, alone, at four in the morning? I’d rather sleep in a haunted house with an axe murderer.
But, at the same time, knowing Luca is on board gives me courage. It makes me feel a little ridiculous. If he can do it, why can’t I?
‘How did it kill my parents?’ I ask. My mouth feels full of sand. ‘What happened, exactly?’
Ophelia exhales through her nostrils. ‘We successfully raised the ship. We moored it just where you see it now, though at the time it looked more like an island of mud. Your father wanted to open the main hatch immediately. He was … perhaps incautious. The door began to open for him. He pushed his way inside. He was just over the threshold when …’
Ophelia’s voice falters. I realize I am asking her to relive one of her most traumatic moments. But I need to know.
‘When what?’ I ask.
‘There was an electrical charge,’ she says. ‘He died instantly, Ana. I doubt he even knew what hit him. Your mother, however …’ Ophelia’s gaze matches her steely eyewear. ‘She rushed in to try to help him. She grabbed him while …’
Oh, god. My poor mother. Despite all her training, of course her instinct would have been to grab my father and pull him out of danger. The electricity would have coursed through her body, too … maybe not killing her instantly, but causing massive internal damage.
‘We could not save her,’ Ophelia says. The weariness in her voice tells me that she tried everything, with all of her Orca training, and that my mother’s death was neither instant nor peaceful.
‘I am so sorry, dear,’ Ophelia says. ‘Her last wish …’
‘Cremation,’ I guess. The black pearl at my neck feels warm. I remember a comment Luca made the night before. ‘The underwater gardens of Nemo … You scattered their ashes there?’
Ophelia lowers her head. ‘I wish we could have given you and Dev more closure. The circumstances … were complicated.’ She points to the black-pearl necklace. ‘Sita left that on board our research boat. She never dived with it. That’s why it survived, why we could send it to you.’
I expect my anger to become a tsunami. I imagine myself raging across this pier, throwing things at Ophelia and the submarine, screaming at the entire world.
Somehow that doesn’t happen. I look at the Nautilus. I feel smouldering resentment, even hatred, but I also feel more certain than ever that this weird submarine and I are connected by fate. I have to make my parents’ sacrifice mean something.
‘All right,’ I say. ‘Where’s the entrance?’
It isn’t obvious.
There is no conn tower, no visible hatch, no rails. There isn’t even a gangplank.
Ophelia leads us to the middle of the ship. Ester takes my hand, which is completely unlike her. Her palm is warm and moist. I’m not sure who is comforting whom, but I’m glad to have her with me. It occurs to me that this is the first time a Harding and a Dakkar have been in this cavern together since the day Captain Nemo died.
After a moment, narrow slits like gills open in the side of the ship. Metal tendrils unfold, weaving themselves into a stairway. At the top of the ramp, a circular section of the hull irises open.
My ears roar. It takes me a moment to realize Ophelia has just asked me a question.
‘What?’ I ask.
‘Would you like me to go first?’ she says again. ‘It might be safer if –’
‘No, I’ll do it,’ I say.
Nelinha shifts uncomfortably. ‘Ana, you sure?’
I step to the edge of the stairwell.
Every nerve in my body is telling me to run. I’m so awash with emotions I could drown just fine without water. But I think I know what went wrong for my parents. I think I know what to do.
My father was a Shark. Ophelia is an Orca and a Shark. Luca is a Cephalopod. All of them would have seen the Nautilus as a prize to be opened and explored. My mother, Sita, was the only Dolphin in the group. I doubt she had time to think or act like one when they raised the Nautilus. My father was too impulsive. He rushed in and died. My mother died trying to save him.
‘Hello, Nautilus.’ I speak in Bundeli.
That was Nemo’s native tongue. He would have grown up speaking it, along with English, back when India was under British subjugation. If Nemo spoke any language to his creation, I’m guessing he would have chosen the language he dreamed in.
‘I am Ana Dakkar.’ I try not to feel self-conscious about addressing an open hatchway. I have talked to dolphins, dogs, orangutans and even students from Land Institute. Talking to an antique submarine shouldn’t be any sillier.