Read Online The Crossing of Ingo by Helen Dunmore - Free Book Online

he went down to the cove, and met her, and fell so deep in love with her that he knew he would abandon everything for her.
    I am not sure why he left a record of these times. Perhaps it was a clue for whichever Trewhella might come to read it one day.
    My eyes sting. I so wish I could go back in time. If only I could come in and find Dad while he was writing those figures. He must have felt completely alone. Ingo was pulling him, the waythe Call is pulling us, and he couldn’t tell any of us about it. All he could do was leave a message almost in code, and hope that maybe one day somebody would understand.
    I roll up the map very carefully with Dad’s piece of paper inside it, exactly as it was. I wrap the faded tape around the parchment, and tie it so that the bow won’t loosen even if it has to wait for years before it is undone. I slide the scroll to the back of the drawer at the left hand side, where it fits perfectly.
    I’ve left my own message now for whoever comes after me. I wonder if one day in the future some girl who looks a little like me will unroll the map and look at those four little figures, and understand what they mean.

CHAPTER FIVE
    “W atch out, Conor, I’m going to throw it.”
    “You’re crazy,” grumbles Conor. “I told you, you should have given it to the cat.”
    I take a small plastic bag out of my pocket, and shake out the bed of weed which is wrapped around the fish egg. The little fish is still alive, swimming inside its rubbery membrane. I shudder, draw my arm back and throw egg and weed as far away from us as I can into the waves.
    Sea water swirls around my legs, almost knocking me off balance. I grab Conor’s arm and we stand together, waiting, watching the horizon. The Call is alive in both of us. It’s like music rising at the start of a crescendo, but it hasn’t got there yet. We are waiting for Faro.
    The sky is dark today. The wind chops off the white crests of the waves. Even inside our cove, where the water is protected by a curve of cliff and by the rocks that guard the entrance, the sea is wild.
    A wave sucks back, tugging at us, wanting to pull us with it. We manage to stay upright, but we have to fight for balance.
    “There he is!” shouts Conor.
    Faro’s head shows through the wave crests and then vanishes again. Next time he rises he is only fifty metres from shore. He waves, and we plunge forward. I dive through the first wave and then the next, cutting through the water with Conor beside me. We are not in Ingo yet, but the water feels like home.
    We reach Faro. His head is above the surface and he is breathing air. He is pale and his face, like the sea, is stormy. I wonder if the air is hurting him. I thought it was growing easier for Faro to make the transition.
    “Are you all right, Faro?” I ask.
    “I was pursued,” says Faro, and anger blazes in his eyes. “Look.” He flips over so that we can see his tail. There is a gash in it at the base. “I am losing blood,” says Faro. “I have called my sister but she is with a child who was thrown against the rocks by a rogue current. She will come when she can.”
    “Faro! It looks deep,” I say.
    “It is deep. It was intended to be deep. Mortarow pursued me. The sea bull has gored me.”
    “He did this to you?” demands Conor, and a fury equal to Faro’s flares in his face.
    “Ervys’s followers have taken up arms,” says Faro. There is deep anger in his voice as he shakes back his hair defiantly. “He has taught the Mer to arm themselves against their brothers and sisters. He has defied the law of the Mer. Saldowr shall hear of this.”
    “Faro, can you climb up on to a rock?” I ask him. “We aren’thealers like Elvira but if we press hard on the wound that might stop it bleeding.”
    “It will weaken me more to leave the water. I came to tell you that in two nights we will answer the Call. But Ervys’s followers are waiting for us. They will pack the Assembly chamber if they can. They