Free Three for a Letter by Mary Reed, Eric Mayer Page A

blonde hair were coming loose, as if to match her young charge’s unruly hairstyle. “We saw it! It was swimming right to shore, looking straight at us!”
    “It won’t harm you, my dears,” Zeno reassured them kindly. “It’s a creature of the sea and therefore cannot venture on land.”
    “Indeed,” Hero added, “the beast can’t do much more than put a pretty flush on your face, Bertrada. But what were you doing, walking on the beach at this hour?”
    “It gets so hot later in the day that we thought we’d go to the shore early for a picnic and then look for shells. But it’s true, Hero. The creature was swimming right toward us!” Bertrada pushed back a loose strand of hair, directing a coquettish smile at the brawny man.
    Poppaea began to hop up and down and scream even louder before slyly loosening her hair further so that its curls fell down over her plump cheeks. From the corner of his eye, Zeno caught her glancing furtively at him, as if to judge what effect her display of mock hysterics was having.
    “Now then, don’t be so loud, Poppaea,” he chided her gently. “You’ll hurt my old ears. It’s just as well Sunilda isn’t here or I would be deaf between the two of you screaming!”
    Bertrada looked horrified. “Sunilda! Where is she?”
    Poppaea suddenly looked genuinely frightened and burst into tears.
    “She was running along right behind us,” Bertrada stammered. “Or at least I thought she was.”
    “Don’t worry,” Hero reassured her quickly, “I’ll go right away and find her.”
    “No.” Zeno placed his hand on the younger man’s shoulder. “I’ll go. You have work to do.”
    Hero’s jaw tightened with anger. “Do you think I’m incapable—”
    Zeno pulled his hand away from the Egyptian’s shoulder as if from the glowing forge. “Sunilda is in no danger,” he said as he turned and hurried out of the workshop.
    ***
    Zeno trotted briskly along the track through the olive grove until his weary legs reminded him he was much older than he had temporarily imagined himself. He emerged, panting, on the headland not far from the spot where Hero’s newest automaton would shortly be staging its first and final performance. From the high ground he scanned the sea, empty now save for an occasional bobbing seabird and the sharply upthrust crags of the island. The beach, running away in a curve toward the village, appeared likewise devoid of life.
    Reaching a point where the land sloped more gradually, he made his way down to the beach. He walked along the shore, calling Sunilda’s name repeatedly. His heart pounded from exertion and he began to feel panic swelling with each heartbeat.
    He finally stopped at the shrine sitting opposite the island. The shrine was a simple, open-sided, four-pillared structure with a small pedestal sheltered under its flat roof. Soggy ashes lay in a deep bowl set into the top of the pedestal, the remains of a question addressed to the goats that someone had written on a scrap of parchment and burnt before sunrise in keeping with tradition. It was all superstitious nonsense, of course, but entertaining enough.
    Zeno blinked. The strengthening sunlight glinting off the incoming waves hurt his eyes. Had Porphyrio really come for the child? Could the sea have swallowed her up? He was struck by an inexplicable sense of doom. He would never see her again. Another young life was gone, snatched away from under his roof.
    Then he heard laughter carried on the freshening breeze and he reminded himself that he had known all along where he would find her if he had just paused long enough to think about it.
    Minthe’s house sat at the base of a hill that thrust out toward the water. Surrounded by herb beds, her home was a strange dwelling, originally a small half-ruined temple to some forgotten god and now repaired in a makeshift manner.
    Minthe and Sunilda were looking out to sea, sitting on a fallen marble column that served as a bench.
    “We just talked to