Graciela in the Abyss

PROLOGUE
Black water on a summer day always means someone will die. Like every good fisherman, Graciela Lima’s father had shared that knowledge with his daughters from the cradle, just as surely as he’d taught them to mend nets and set crab traps in the shallows.
But, although the water churning below the cliffs was the color of dark oyster shells, on the morning of her thirteenth birthday, Graciela’s only thoughts were of being a year older. She wanted a special day. So she begged her older sister for a picnic on the bluffs until, remembering how to have some fun, Leticia had finally agreed.
They climbed against the wind and over the loose rocks.
They ate olives and cheese and had a contest to see who could spit pits the farthest. They told each other the shapes they saw in the clouds and let the sun redden their cheeks.
Then, while Leticia dozed, Graciela unlaced her worn leather boots, which were already too small and pinching at the toes, and she walked to the cliff’s edge. She peered down the steep drop at the boulders below. The rocks looked like monsters’ teeth, and the dark water raged with white ocean foam, opposite colors clashing. Each battering wave sent a spray of seawater high into the air that soaked her dress through.
Salt water dripped from the ends of Graciela’s curls as she leaned even farther. She called over her shoulder to her sister. “Come look down if you dare, dormilona.”
Leticia rose to her elbows sleepily and startled when she saw her sister at the outcrop. The cliff was so very high.
“Mamá will punish you when she sees those wet clothes,” Leticia said, trying not to sound as alarmed as she felt. Her black hair lashed her face as she got to her feet. “She won’t make you cake. Come back from there.”
Graciela ignored her. A bossy older sister could be such a bother, especially one like Leticia, who was now sixteen and had, of late, become criminally responsible and obedient, like the proper young señoritas Mamá hoped they’d both become.
Graciela turned back to the water and looked out over the ocean. She suddenly wished that her life could be bigger than being thirteen. How, Graciela wondered, could mending socks and going to market ever be exciting? Not even Leticia had an answer for that.
“What’s your plan, burrita?” Leticia asked. She took one step toward Graciela and then another, as if walking on something very breakable. “It’s far too high to jump in for a swim. Come away from there before you fall.”
Graciela curled her callused toes stubbornly against the cliff’s edge. Blades of grass sprouted between the warm stones.
“I might enjoy a dip,” she said with mischief in her voice. There was a deep satisfaction in being contrary, even if it was only to Leticia.
“Don’t be silly,” Leticia said. “You can’t swim. Now step back.”
It was true. Papá had deemed swimming unladylike, another thing forbidden.
Graciela turned to argue just as her sister reached her. But all at once, the wind gusted sharply and tore her from the cliff.
For a fleeting moment, Graciela felt as weightless as a kite hovering. The seconds seemed to slow, but the breathless joy was only temporary. She had only enough time to see the anguish in Leticia’s face as she reached an outstretched hand to save her.
Then came the heavy drop.
Graciela broke the dark water with a crash.
Down she sank as the sea pulled her away from the sister she loved to a place where everything became cold and all light vanished from above. Graciela’s eyes grew heavy, and her heartbeat slowed in her ears. Finally, there was only silence.
She rested at the bottom of the sea through Mamá’s wails about the curse of having reckless daughters. She slumbered on as Leticia died of yellow fever a few years later, when the disease arrived at the docks from Cuba. She was motionless through the years that her father grew old and bent with age. In fact, she lay on the silty seafloor until the bones of all who had ever known her had turned to dust in graveyards and her name had been completely forgotten.
When she finally awakened one hundred years later, Graciela sat up, shocked at the dark water all around and at her own now-translucent skin. Hagfish, writhing like eels, sucked away the last morsels of meat from what was left of her bones. There wasn’t even time to scream before she heard a voice in the darkness.
“Don’t be afraid,” it said. “I’m Amina.”
Graciela saw a pale green light pulsing from a creature unlike any she had ever seen. Amina’s face, body, and arms were jellylike, but she had no legs at all that Graciela could see. Instead, the shimmering tunic she wore ended in ragged edges that resembled Spanish moss hanging from a tree. Kelp-like hair floated around her head like tentacles.
Amina offered a webbed hand and smiled to show a set of teeth made of mottled pearl.
“A girl’s spirit isn’t meant to die,” she said. “You are part of the deep now, Graciela. And I will be your Guide.”