Eleven

STACY GASPED WHEN the cold water slapped up against her legs as she ran into the waves. A shiver started up her body, but before it could reach her waist, Stacy dove into a coming wave, soaking her entire body. She came up for a gulp of air and then began swimming as quickly as she could toward the animal.

I should have known I’d find an animal to rescue here at the beach. . . . I seem to find one no matter where I go.

She swam for a minute or two and then glanced behind her as she continued to paddle. She could see Page and Molly far in the distance, looking nervously at her from the beach. Stacy hadn’t meant to go out this far into the ocean, but the animal kept swimming farther away—it was obviously weak and being pushed out with the current. Stacy stuck her head down in the water and swam as fast as she could for the length of another breath. She blew bubbles out through her nose and paddled vigorously until she needed to come up for more air. When she broke through the water, she saw that she was an arm’s length away from her rescue target, but that the animal she’d seen from the beach wasn’t an animal at all. It was a tangle of trash. Just some aluminum cans, plastic bags, and candy wrappers—all held together by a twisted knot of twine and seaweed.

Trash? Why would there be a bunch of trash floating in the ocean? Stacy reached her arms out and turned the garbage over in the water, examining it. The campers up the shore! Stacy was so angry. I swam all the way out here for nothing? Just to . . . to rescue a pile of litter! She calmed herself by thinking about how it was actually a very good thing that there wasn’t an animal who needed rescuing, but she was still upset about it. And exhausted too. In fact, Stacy was so tired from the swim out that even treading water was proving difficult for her. Stacy looked back at the beach where Page and Molly were. They were just tiny specks on the sand now. She was so far out in the ocean! Stacy swallowed the little lump of panic that bubbled up inside of her. It’s fine. I’ll just swim back to shore now. Stacy began paddling back toward the coast, but no matter how hard she swam, she kept getting pushed farther and farther out to sea. What’s happening? Am I just too tired? Stacy’s legs and arms ached, but she kept swimming, determined to get back to Page and Molly. Another minute passed and Stacy looked up to see she wasn’t any closer. She stopped swimming and decided to tread water for a bit to regain some energy before swimming again. But even dog-paddling was too hard for her now. The water was pushing her backward. I think I’m in a rip current! Suddenly, Stacy’s arms gave out from exertion, and she dipped below the surface, completely submerged for a moment before bobbing up again and gasping for air. Both her throat and nose burned from swallowing salt water.

“Help!” Stacy managed to shout, but she realized there was no one around to hear her. She slipped under the water again, this time for several seconds more than the first. I . . . I think I’m drowning. Everest! Everest, can you hear me? Stacy managed to come up for air again, splashing wildly—unable to see which direction the beach was anymore. Everything around her was blue.

“Page!” Stacy managed to sputter. “Page, get Noa-bluhhbluhh!”

Stacy sank under the water once more. She wasn’t sure if she would be able to swim back up to the surface for air this time. Everest might still be asleep and unable to hear my thoughts. I should never have come out here without my wolves. I didn’t know the ocean was so strong.

Stacy forced her eyes open under the water. It stung briefly, but then she could see around her. She could see the ripples of the rip current she was fighting, and how it was pushing her away from the land. Out of the corner of her eye, she also saw a familiar white shape speeding toward her under the waves. Noah!

Stacy reached out and grabbed onto Noah’s back, and he pulled her up to the surface. She took a huge breath of air and tightened her grip around the wolf’s neck.

“Noah!” Stacy gasped. She was so relieved Page had been able to get Noah to save her. But no sooner had Stacy taken another deep breath in than a large wave came and crashed over them both, sending them tumbling underwater. Stacy was pushed and pulled by the water just like the pile of trash had been, completely powerless to the churning of the ocean. She looked over to Noah, whose face had an unfamiliar expression of panic on it. Noah swam toward Stacy, and she grabbed hold of his fur once again as he fought in vain against the current before relenting and allowing it to push them back again.

Stacy had never seen Noah like this in the water. It appeared—even though he was the best swimmer of the pack and could hold his breath for as long as he wanted—he was no match for the sheer power of the ocean. Still, Noah continued to paddle as hard as he could, desperate to save Stacy.

Stacy couldn’t believe how foolish she had been. She did not have a backup plan. Noah had been her only hope. And if he couldn’t save her in these waters, Stacy was sure that Everest, Basil, or Wink wouldn’t be able to either. Their best chance of survival would be letting the current take them wherever it wanted to—and hoping they were lucky enough to wash up on the beach somewhere, instead of being carried farther out to sea . . . or down to the bottom of the ocean.

Suddenly, Stacy looked up and saw a graceful white figure jumping effortlessly over the rip current and diving below them. Was that? It couldn’t be . . . Pearl?! Stacy looked down in the water as Pearl zoomed around underneath them until she popped up directly between Stacy and Noah. Stacy blinked several times to make sure she hadn’t just swallowed too much salt water and her eyes were playing tricks on her.

Pearl looked like a completely different wolf. Her fur was longer and wavy and flowed around her beautifully in the water. And the way she glided through the ocean was so different from how Noah swam. She used her hind legs and tail together as one powerful muscle to propel her through the water like a fish, or a dolphin, or . . . a mermaid! Pearl gave Stacy and Noah a salty lick on the face and then shook the excess water from her head. Stacy and Noah exchanged puzzled looks with each other but shrugged and held on to either side of Pearl as the graceful wolf swam them down-current through the riptide and over to the beach where all the other wolves and Page and Molly were anxiously waiting. As they approached the shore, Pearl caught a wave and rode it onto the beach, with Stacy and Noah clinging to either side of her. Pearl made the transition from swimming in the water to running on the sand with delicate ease, leaving Stacy and Noah sprawled out on the beach on their bellies, panting heavily.

“Pearl is . . . amazing,” Stacy managed between breaths. “Did you all see her? She saved us.” Stacy looked around at the others—Everest, Basil, Wink, Ribsy, Paisley, and Atlas—and saw that they all had different reactions to Pearl’s transformation, ranging from astonished to impressed to downright disbelieving. Page and Molly ran over to Stacy and Noah to make sure they were all right. Stacy comforted them.

“I’m okay, I’m okay,” Stacy said, gently stroking Page and Molly on the head and taking back her satchel from where it was hanging around Page’s neck. “Page, you saved the day in alerting Noah. And then Pearl saved both of us—well, me at least—from drowning.”

Stacy took a minute before she could get up, but eventually she stood and wrung out her wet hair. Everest walked over, carrying Stacy’s pair of boots and her flannel shirt in his mouth.

“Thanks, boy,” Stacy said, taking the boots and the shirt from Everest’s jaw and putting them on. Her cutoff shorts and tank top were still soaked, but the flannel provided some warmth against her freezing skin.

Stacy walked over to where Pearl was standing. Stacy couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Pearl looked one hundred percent better. Stacy surveyed their surroundings. The rip current had pushed them much farther south than where she’d started from, and they were on a completely different part of the beach now, probably almost a mile from the cove where they’d spent the previous night. This part of the beach was rockier and looked like it would be completely underwater when the tide came in. Stacy wasn’t sure what their plans were for the rest of the day now that Pearl was feeling better, but she knew that she and Noah needed to rest and that this probably wasn’t a safe spot to do so. She was just about to suggest they all head back to the cove when something on the beach caught her eye.

“Oh wow,” she gasped. “I . . . I don’t believe it!”

Stacy was looking at something up the beach when, suddenly, a loud male voice boomed behind them in the ocean.

“Over there! On the beach! What are those?”