Read Online Kraken by M. Caspian - Free Book Online

for his touch, eager to know everything. Cy held out a dining chair for Will.
     
    “Food first,” said Cy.
     
    “But I want to see you in the water. If we eat won’t that mean we can’t go swimming for forty minutes?”
     
    “Old husbands’ tale. We’ve got all the time in the world. Now sit.”
     
    Cy stuck a pan on the tiny stove for the sausages and stuck bacon on a tray under the broiler.
     
    “But, you know, I still can’t stay here, right?”
     
    Cyrus’s face fell. “What? No! I just got you back! You were coming here to live with Parker, right? This wasn’t just going to be a weekend break. You knew you had to come because the island wanted you back.”
     
    “That’s sounding very . . . disturbing.”
     
    “No, you’re staying here. I need you!”
     
    “You do not need me.” No-one needed him, Will knew that better than anyone. “I’ll stay for the weekend, all right? And I’ll come back again. But I have to go home tomorrow.”
     
    “So, how long were you with Parker?”
     
    “A year.”
     
    “Why didn’t you want to move in with him?”
     
    “It wasn’t . . . it just wasn’t right. He wasn’t right.”
     
    “And why’d you come after him?”
     
    “Because—”
     
    “What about your job? Do you love it?”
     
    Will couldn’t bring himself to lie.
     
    “Tell me about your friends, Will. Tell me about who will miss you on the mainland.”
     
    Will felt hot tears spring to his eyes. Cy’s hand brushed the hair away from his forehead.
     
    “I’m just . . . I’ve never been that kind of person, that’s all. I’m not . . . gregarious.”
     
    “It’s not you, Will. You’ve had a temporary life. You weren’t supposed to leave here. It was a mistake you left, but we can fix that now.” He kissed Will again, and Will struggled a little, pushing back against Cy’s chest with his fists.
     
    “A week. Stay a week,” Cy said, against Will’s lips.
     
    Will nodded, and Cy smiled into their kiss. The pop and hiss of bacon took Cy back to the stove, deftly pulling out the oven tray with a dishcloth and flipping the rashers with tongs.
     
    “But you have to talk,” said Will. “I need to know.”
     
    “What do you want to know?”
     
    “What you are would be a good start.”
     
    “I’m a cephalopod. Like squid and octopus. Also ammonites and belemnites, which are extinct.”
     
    Cy served Will his hot breakfast, cutting a mouthful of bacon and holding it to Will’s lips. Will took it off the fork neatly and chewed thoughtfully, as he cut into his sausages. “Wait, why do I have a tomato and you don’t?”
     
    “Because humans need more than meat to survive and. I don’t. Eat it.” Cy lowered a crispy rasher of bacon into his mouth, chewing as he spoke. “I have a theory, actually. I don’t think ammonites became extinct. I think they shed their shells and evolved the ability to shift appearance much earlier than octopuses did.”
     
    “Isn’t it octopi?”
     
    Cy put his hand out and halted Will’s fork as he raised it with its cargo of tomato and bacon. “Focus. And don’t interrupt.”
     
    Will put his knife and fork down. “Can I see it again? Can I see you again?”
     
    Cy transferred his fork over to his left hand, and held his right hand out, palm facing down. Will grasped it and turned it over.
     
    Cy didn’t need to close his eyes, or seem to concentrate, he just . . . shifted, and the hand in Will’s became slimmer, longer, darker, extruding itself like an organic telescope from below Cy’s elbow. The skin was the same warm temperature as Cy’s skin – as Cy’s human skin – and had a raised plush texture. Will brought it up to his face to peer closely at it: a million tiny raised nubs gave it almost the appearance of thick fur.
     
    Will pressed in gently with his fingers, feeling the squish and give, then resistance as Cy firmed its texture. Will stroked his fingertips lightly over the surface. Cy put his fork