The salty breeze threatened to rip the broad-brimmed hat from the nest of carefully constructed hair the moment her foot touched out of the cab. She snatched the hat from the playful grasp with a reflex she thought had been lost.
Blasted wind. Apparently some things never change no matter how long you stay away from them. Grandma never did. And that's the only reason she was back at this rancid-salty-splintered old town because Grandma was dead.
"That'll be six coin, miss," the cabbie said. The wind likewise threatened his cap—but could not get a grip on such a small thing wedged around such a large skull.
The young woman quickly handed over the coin, well ready to be rid of her travels, and picked up the carpet bag that had been unloaded on the boardwalk.
The cabbie wiped his tri-horn into motion and they headed slowly away upon the cobblestone, people parting around them like water.
The streets were busy this time of year. Summer time. Disgusting. Who would want to spend hours under the sun on beaches covered with sand getting into every nook and cranny? And the sea wasn't any better.
Couldn't grandma have waited a few months to give up the ghost? Her timing was most inconvenient.
Leather wingtip boots clacked sophisticatedly down the decrepit boardwalk. With one gloved hand, she carried her bag, with the other, she held her skirt so it wouldn't brush. It was new after all. As was the hat. She would bet ten coin no one would be able to recognize her in this get up—not the girl she used to be; running around on skinny legs, freckled from the sun, skinned from barnacle crusted rocks. She was a lady now. A lady of class. A lady of class from the City of Cities—
"Why! Skin my scales and gut me! If it isn't little Seaweed Sal!"
From the opposite side of the street, a rather off-kilter voice cut through the bustling. The young lady, unable to run—curse these skinny heeled boots—stood fixed as the sailor hobbled across the road with his small pale wyvern clinging to a bony shoulder. There were more spaces than teeth in his broad genuine grin, and at least fifty wrinkles had been added to his face.
But she was a lady. A lady of class. And so she responded to the greeting with as much warmth as the twenty year gap in their acquaintance afforded.
"Hello, Stormy Joe. Hello, Cumulus."
"Catch me a barnacle! It is you! Seaweed Sal all grown up."
"I go by Sally now."
But Stormy Joe had already stopped listening. To her dismay, he was shouting down the street to the fish and chips cart.
"Ahoy! Marduk! Look who's home!"
"Seaweed Sal!" The burly fish peddler beamed, leaning over the counter and squashing a customer's chips. Marduk in return shouted down the street to the pearl jeweler.
"Seaweed Sal's back!"
Along with the whip of the wind and the ring of chimes and the din of the crowd, that bloody nickname was passed from one old acquaintance to the next to the next—all the way down the street. Vacationers offered her glances as she sheepishly continued on, receiving greetings as she could. It was like being some sort of famous person... a famous person with the worst moniker ever in the worst town ever. Who would want to be famous in Gull Stone? And who came up with such a disgusting name anyway?
YOU ARE READING
The Calypso Rehabilitation Lagoon for Sea Dragons
FantasyAfter twenty years, Miss Sally is called back to her seaside hometown to settle her grandma's estate. However, Grandma Rosemary has left behind more than an aged old house ready for re-sale.
