Changelings

The path to the cave was well trod by the time they slipped behind the steaming falls and found seats on the ledge.

The space behind the waterfall was not a cave exactly, because it didn't go back very far. It was more of a room up above the hot springs, and it was the closest place to Kilcoole where people could go to talk to the planet.

Usually when everyone was packed in it felt cozy and snug, with the smell of the smoked salmon and soup floating around the people who had feasted at the latchkay mingling with the sulfury smell of the hot springs. The warmth of everyone's body heated the grotto so that after a while they removed their furs.

Even in the winter when everything was iced over there was a strong sense of grasses and brambles, berries, and flowering weeds pushing up through the frigid soil, just waiting for the ice to break. Like the ghost of last summer, Murel thought, or the summers before that.

But tonight for the first time ever the twins felt restless and ill at ease in the grotto. The stalactites protruding from the ceiling seemed in danger of falling and stabbing someone, and the stone seat under their bottoms was very hard and very chilly.

Something bad is going to happen, Ronan said. And it's going to happen to us.

I feel that way too but how could it with Mum and Da here- and Clodagh, Johnny, and Marmie, besides? They'll probably give out to us for running off from everyone yesterday - well, swimming off, that's all. I wonder if Da was always getting in trouble like this when he was our age?

Young Desi Sivatkaluk was the lead drummer tonight. Desi was the same age as Aoifa, but his father, Old Desi, had been the lead drummer at the last latchkay. Old Desi and his entire team fell through the ice and drowned while out on a hunting trip only a few weeks before, so now his son played his drum. He must have been practicing a lot because he never missed a beat.

Nanook and Coaxtl stood guard at the edge of the spring, just beyond the watery veil concealing the grotto. Someone uncovered a platter piled high with strips of salty-sweet, pink smoked salmon and started passing it around. When the plate got to Da, he got up and tossed some of the strips to the cats.

When everyone had eaten, Clodagh stood and said, "We have a troubling thing to tell our world tonight. Who will sing the first song?"

Auntie Sinead stood up. She had good songs and usually sang them Irish-style, to old tunes that went with lots of other words. She was the best dog driver, hunter, fisher, and trapper in Kilcoole, and her songs were full of action and adventure. This one she started by saying,

"The tune is 'Wild Colonial Boy' and I call it"-she smiled at Ronan and Murel for the first time since their rescue-" 'The Wild Shongili Twins.' I've had only a day to find the words, and some of this I heard from others, but for those of you who did not know of my niece and nephew's recent ad-venture, I made this song."

She sang, her voice clear and strong:

"When I was young I ran my traps. My brother Sean he swam As a selkie he could swim much more than human men Now he has two children and as selkies they too swim But now Sean's moored to desk work. No more seal swimming for him.

Without their Da to roam with them, these children swam away To roam the fields of river ice with otters they did flay But wolves find otters tasty and the children almost died Still our Murel she digs a hole, 'Dive, otters, now!' she cried.

My dogs and I we heard them cry, the big cats made all speed The children now were crying, the wolves -poised to do the deed That would have broken my poor heart, Petaybee's heart as well And Sean and his brave wife would find a private bit of hell.

The cats they leapt, and me I swept the children to my sled But had we not been looking, our twins would now be dead. So I ask you, my neighbors, what will happen when again The selkie twins go swimming with no one to shepherd them?"

"It was only the once," Ronan said when she'd finished and everyone was making appreciative noises. "We were trying out the warm suits Marmie sent us."

"We didn't mean to be gone so long," Murel said, looking into the faces of her neighbors, who were regarding them as if they were the tracks of some strange animals they had never seen before.

Sing them my song, Otter said from somewhere nearby.

Otters make songs? the twins asked together.

Of course otters make songs. Otters like fun, and music is fun. The waters are music to otters, and otters sing songs to its melody. But I cannot speak to the other two-leggeds and make myself understood. I will sing to you and you sing to them.

Okay, fine. Sing.

Announce us first! the otter said.

Ronan told the other people, "Our otter friend has a song to share he wants to sing through us."