Ocean: War of Independence Read Online Free Page A

for your family, not the worst. I have always hoped you and your grandfather would see what is right, the way your sister already has.”
    “Where is she?”
    “With my son. She is quite well, and quite active.”
    “If she’s with your son, she is not well. He brainwashed her, got to join him in his ridiculous, hopeless campaign for the cause of the ocean.”
    “It is not ridiculous, and I am pleased to report it is not hopeless, either, as you must have heard.”
    “I’m not interested.”
    “She’s your sister. Of course, you’re interested.”
    “I don’t know how you stirred things up in the spirit world, old hag, but I’m convinced you did it, and you did it maliciously, no matter your lies. Everything that’s happened to my family is your family’s fault, and I should kill you for it. I already killed a man on a boat, as you may have heard, even though it was self-defense.”
    She stood calmly, showing no fear.
    Her composure unsettled him. He felt a deep despondency, that even if he retrieved his stash of money and jewelry he would never find a way to escape, at least not for long. A new, dark thought came over him.
    “I should kill you, but I won’t. Instead, I’ll kill myself in front of your eyes—to show you the results of your family’s meddling and demands for land that doesn’t belong to you. That will make two Ellsworth deaths that are your fault.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “My grandfather and me.”
    She took a step toward him, her eyes and face filled with kindness. “You think your grandfather is dead? I’m happy to tell you he is not. I just got back from the hospital, where I spoke with the nursing staff. They say he has a chance of recovering.”
    “He was shot in the head, a terrible accident! I saw him fall.”
    She took another step toward him. “The bullet shattered part of his skull, but glanced off and did not enter the brain, though bone fragments did—which have been removed. He’s still in a coma, but his vital signs are good, and improving.”
    “You’re lying! Stay back!”
    She continued toward him. “He’s going to get better. We’ve asked the healing gods for help, and I think they’re responding, knowing he’s worthy of being saved.”
    “Stay back! I’m warning you!”
    She reached him, and put a hand on his gun-hand, pushing the snub-nosed weapon down. “You don’t really want to hurt me or yourself.” Her voice was infinitely calm, as if she was able to draw from her otherworldly resources, the spirits that were with her constantly. “You just need someone to care for you, and get your thoughts in order.”
    She took the weapon away from him, and said, “Come, I’ll take you to your grandfather.”
    Jeff burst into tears. “The doctor thinks he’s going to be all right?”
    “He has a chance, boy, a real fighting chance.”
    ***

Chapter 3
    It was late morning, two days after Gwyneth set up the Golden Gate blockade. A fog had just cleared over the channel. She swam on the western side of the cordon of sea creatures, watching while a huge container ship turned away from the barricade and headed back out to sea. It was guided by a white U.S. Coast Guard cutter—one of the military vessels that had been sent to that side of the formation from a station at the Presidio, and from another on the coast. Additional cutters patrolled the bay on the inside of the floating barricade, having come from the Mare Island station at Vallejo.
    Gwyneth had not made any experiment to see if she could break up part of this barricade, fearing that might confuse the animals so soon after setting up the formation—and the priority was to block the channel, anyway, not to see if she could improve on her powers. In any event, she assumed that the animals would be as stubborn as those in the Hawaiian Islands, and must have already developed their own form of unit cohesion, and resistance against dispersal.
    She knew this blockade was getting a great deal of media