"I can lift the turtle with the ocean." Her voice stayed quiet; this was calm statement of fact. "I can hold it for a long time. But what you showed on the map, anywhere we go from here closer to land, that's going to take days. Maybe longer. Not to mention wind and currents and weather and who knows what else." She pressed her lips together, her arms coming back around herself. "I don't usually plan things out. I just do them. But this . . . I can't do it myself, and there's too much that could go wrong. There's a lot that we'd need to know in advance. And then we'd need others -- a lot of others -- to help lift and steer and deal with whatever happens."

A breath. "I don't . . . I'm not . . ." Her lips came together tighter, and she wrestled for the words. "Steven . . . he'd want this. But people . . ."

A quick shake of the head, almost verging into a shudder. "I can't."

She didn't explain. But she withdrew back inwards on herself, shoulders tight and hunched again. The water-Klaus waited, expressionless.