Maelstrom Book 2 the Twins of Petaybee

Chapter 1 Waving good-bye to their parents and friends, their beloved river and forests, to their home world, Petaybee, Murel and Ronan Shongili strapped themselves in for another launch into space. So soon! It seemed they'd only arrived home and now it was time to go again. It'll be great fun, sure it will, Ronan assured his twin sister in thought-talk. We'll see new places, meet new people, make new friends I'd have liked a bit more time with the old places and old friends nevertheless, Murel complained. But here we are again. It feels as if we never left. She looked around the lounge of the Piaf, a luxury liner much larger and more sophisticated than Kilcoole, the tiny village that was home. The lounge alone was as long as Kilcoole's main street and could have held eight of the village's largest building, the latchkay lodge, inside. Except for that, Ronan said, with a meaningful nod at the one big difference in the lounge since their last trip. Since they'd traveled from school back to Petaybee less than three short months before, the small saltwater tank had been replaced by an enormous one that dominated the lounge and dwarfed its occupants. Now the tank held a single Honu, the sentient sea turtle that was the sacred totem animal of their friend Ke-ola. The tank looked vast and empty despite the energetic game of tag between the Honu and Sky, the twins' river otter friend. On the return journey, if all went well, the tank would hold many moreand even largerHonus traveling with their people to what would become their new Petaybean home. During takeoff, the ship's owner, Marmion de Revers Algemeine, and Captain Johnny Green, its commander, remained on the bridge. Marmion's friendship had helped their family, their village, and their planet countless times over the years. The twins had known her all of their lives, and by now she knew their most important secret, as well as their father's. Many people on Kilcoole knew but very few outsiders. Johnny was not an outsider, since he'd been born on Petaybee. When the time had come for him to leave the Company Corps, he had chosen service with Marmie over life on Petaybee, but he was Petaybean all the same. Ronan, Murel, and Ke-ola watched the liftoff from the lounge's viewport and the bank of screens that flanked it. Ke-ola was the reason for their current journeyand the reason Ronan and Murel were using thought-talk. They didn't want him to overhear their complaints and get the idea that they hadn't wanted to come. The actual sight of Petaybee receding to a cold white and gray ball seemed no more real than its image on the screens. The cabin's pressure and gravity were so well maintained that the ship might have still been on the ground. They could not hear or smell or taste the passage, or feel it in the wind that was not there. They felt no sensation of lifting or moving. The water in the tank didn't so much as slosh, but the Honu and Sky swam to the side to watch the departure. Then Sky tagged the Honu's shell and they began their game afresh. The twins and Sky had become swimming friends before they were sent away to Marmie's space-station school. When they returned, Sky was waiting to help them find their missing father, even though Da had been lost at sea where river otters didn't ordinarily go. For their sake, the otter had even allowed himself to be transported in a helicopter, which was how he, as the first and only otter of any kind to inhabit Petaybee's skies, however briefly, had earned his name: Sky, the sky otter. Murel hoped that now that the little fellow was going into space he wouldn't want to change his name to Space. She&McCaffrey, Anne is the author of 'Maelstrom Book 2 the Twins of Petaybee' with ISBN 9780345470041 and ISBN 0345470044.