The ghost laughed. “Oh, but Principessa, I didn’t tell you where the diamond is.”
“But you did, Your Grace,” Serafina said, confused. “You said Miha dropped it into the sea.”
“I told you that Miha dropped the necklace I gave her. That necklace was a fake. I’d hidden the real diamond. To safeguard it. It’s still aboard this ship.”
Sera’s heart leapt with excitement. The diamond was here. Merrow’s talisman was on board the Demeter!
“Will you allow me to take it?” she asked.
“For a price.”
“Whatever I can give you, I will.”
“Your life?” the infanta asked, reaching out to touch Serafina’s cheek. Her fingers stopped only inches away from it.
Serafina realized too late that she had allowed the infanta to come too close, but she did not flinch. She felt that the ghost was weighing her, testing her. She knew she must show no cowardice.
“Yes, Your Grace. If that’s what I must give to save my realm,” she replied.
The infanta nodded approvingly. She withdrew her hand. “You have a strong heart, Principessa. And a brave spirit,” she said. “You will need both, for I wish to go home, and I require that you take me there.”
Serafina felt as if the breath had just been squeezed out of her. The infanta’s request was a death sentence. She knew, as all mer did, that water bound human souls. If a human died on its surface, her soul went free, but if she drowned in its depths, her soul was trapped and became a ghost.
No soul wanted to be bound. It raged against its fate. The strength of that rage determined a ghost’s power. Restless waters, like those of the shore with their ebb and flow of tides, or the rushing tumble of rivers, dissipated rage. Ghosts of those waters, like the rusalka, tended to be weak. They could slap and pinch, but not kill. They could take objects from the living, but couldn’t hold on to them. They ranged freely through the waters where they’d died, more of a nuisance than a threat.
Shipwreck ghosts, however, were strong. A vessel made so well that it could keep an ocean out could also keep a soul in. The fierce life force that flowed out of a human at death was not dissipated on board a ship, but rather concentrated by being trapped within a cabin, galley, or berth. It entwined itself with the ship, wrapping around its wooden beams or burrowing into its metal hull, which is why ghost ships did not rot or rust. Instead, they endured, drawing on the power of the souls onboard. And the souls endured, too, bound forever to their vessels.
Unless a living creature agreed to free them.
“I have been trapped on this ship for four hundred years,” the infanta said. “I pine for the sun, for the blue sky, for the warm winds of Spain. I long for the scent of jasmine and oranges. I want to be free, Principessa. I want to go home.”
If she agreed to the infanta’s request, Serafina would have to take the ghost’s hand and swim with her to Spain. She knew she had little chance of surviving the trip, because a ghost’s touch pulled the life out of the living, little by little, until there was none left.
From stories told of shipwreck ghosts, Sera knew that the living could withstand minutes, even hours, of their touch, but days? No one had ever survived that long.
You have a strong heart, the infanta had said.
Is it strong enough? Serafina wondered.
“Your answer, Principessa?”
“My answer is yes,” Serafina replied.
The diamond was hidden beneath a floorboard in the infanta’s cabin. Serafina swam belowdecks. Using a knife she found in the ship’s galley, she started to pry the boards up, and suddenly there it was, glinting at her—Neria’s Stone. It was a clear, deep blue, and as large as a turtle’s egg. Serafina had seen many jewels—her mother’s vaults were full of them—but she had never seen anything like the goddess’s diamond. As she picked it up, she felt its power radiating into her hand. The sensation was both thrilling and frightening. She quickly dropped it into her bag. Even though she was no longer touching it, she could still feel its power.
“You’ve found it,” the ghost said, when Sera returned to her. “I hope it brings help to you instead of harm.”
Serafina steeled herself. Now she had to uphold her end of the agreement. “Your Grace,” she said, offering her hand.
The infanta took it and Serafina arched her back, gasping. It was as if the ghost had reached inside her and wrapped a cold hand around her heart. The ship groaned and shuddered in protest, as if it knew the infanta was leaving. A long crack split its deck. A piece of a mast broke off and crashed down to the seabed. Sera felt her heart falter; she felt her breath slow. For a few seconds, the world and everything in it went gray.
Fight it, Serafina! she told herself. Fight it!
She thought of her mother, fending off the invaders with her last breath so that, she, Sera, could escape. She thought of Mahdi, risking his life to defeat Traho. She saw her friends bravely taking the bloodbind with her, and Vrăja staying behind to face the death riders.
And then she summoned all the strength inside her and swam, pulling the infanta away from her ship and into the open, sun-dappled sea.
“ARE YOU SURE ABOUT THIS?” Neela asked Kora.
“Not at all,” Kora replied.
“Wrong answer.”
Kora ignored that. It was the next morning, one day after Neela had arrived in Nzuri Bonde. They had all risen before dawn and had silently swum out of the village. Now Kora was going over the plan one last time with two of her Askari—Khaali and Leylo. Strong and powerfully built, they were not only formidable fighters, Neela had learned, they were also whale riders.
“Tell Ceto I’ll give him my thanks in person when the deed is done,” Kora said when they’d finished talking. She touched her forehead to Khaali’s, then Leylo’s. She sent them on their way, then turned to the others. “Ikraan, you need more green on the back of your neck. Jamal, I can see the tip of your tail fin. Neela…” She shook her head, sighing.
“What?” Neela said defensively. “I camoed! I totally camoed!”
Basra snorted.
“I did! What’s wrong with my camo? Don’t you have anemones in Kandina?”
Kora sang a couplet. The bright purple and blue splotches on Neela’s torso and tail disappeared. Kora sang again and Neela was instantly mottled in five different shades of mud.
Neela inspected her arms. “Uck,” she said.
“You’d prefer to get them chewed off?” Basra asked archly, turning on her tail.
“You’d prefer to get them chewed off?” Neela mimicked.
Basra’s superior attitude was getting to her.
Kora, Neela, Basra, and several other Askari were at the edge of the Razormouths’ breeding grounds. It was a barren, rocky place, littered with the rotting carcasses of sea creatures. Half the group, including Basra and Neela, was wearing camouflage. The other half was not.
“All right, the camoed group looks good. Are we all ready?” Kora asked.
Everyone nodded, though the Askari were more enthusiastic than Neela.
“You know the plan. We head to the caves together, then we split up. My team acts as bait and lures the dragons to the prison. Basra’s team lies low in their camo. After the dragons give chase, they search Hagarla’s cave for the moonstone and grab some swag. You have an hour, Basra, then you join us at the prison. If all goes well, we swim home together.” Kora paused, then shouted, “Great Neria, favor us!”
“Great Neria, favor us!” the Askari shouted back.
“Great Neria, favor us!” Neela shouted, a little late. She tried to sound as tough as the Askari, but didn’t quite succeed. Basra rolled her eyes.
They started off, swimming straight into the heart of the breeding grounds. Basra and her group hugged the seafloor; Kora and her group swam high. Everyone swam fast. It was all Neela could do to keep up. About ten minutes later, Kora stopped and silently pointed to a cave. Its mouth was wide and high. Bones were scattered all around it. Neela’s
heart was in her throat. Once the dragons gave chase, Kora and her team would have to stay ahead of them for three leagues. And dragons were fast swimmers. Neela wondered if she’d ever see Kora again.
While Basra and her group remained on the seafloor, Kora’s group hid behind an outcropping of rock. Kora did not join them. Instead, she positioned herself halfway between the rock and the cave. She took a deep breath and emitted a sharp distress cry—the sound a mermaid makes when she’s hurt. She did it again, and then once more, but nothing happened.
“Come on, you smelly tub of guts,” Neela heard her say. “You lowtide, stink-breath, sponge-brained—”
Then there was a sound—a slow, heavy pounding that shook the ground. Kora smiled grimly and cried out again. A few seconds later, Hagarla, the dragon queen, stuck her head out of her cave.
“Oh. My. Gods,” Neela whispered.
“Keep it together, Princess,” Basra warned.
“Bite me, sharkface,” Neela said, fed up with the snide remarks.
Basra gave her a look, but Neela didn’t see it. Her eyes, as big as abalone shells, were on the dragon.
Hagarla was the size of a small whale. Her scaly skin was the blue-black of a bruise, her underbelly the color of a drowned man. Six yellow eyes with black horizontal slits for pupils stared from a massive, serpentlike head. A forked black tongue flicked from her lips. She roared loudly, and Neela saw that she had rows of sharp teeth in her jaws. They spiraled all the way down her throat and were clotted with the bloody chunks of her last meal.
Kora cried out again. Hagarla’s head whipped around, her eyes narrowing as she spotted Kora. She tensed then sprang, but Kora shot off. Other dragons came out of their caves. Hagarla turned and roared at them, possessive of her prey, but they wanted to eat Kora too, so they joined the chase.
When Kora gave the signal, the rest of her group swam out from behind the rock, all shouting and whooping. Their appearance sent the dragons into a frenzy. A dozen of them sprang at the mermaids. Kora and her warriors streaked off, and the dragons followed, propelling themselves with their great raylike wings.
Basra waved her group on. “Let’s go!”
Inside Hagarla’s cave, the smell of decaying flesh was overwhelming, and Neela thought she was going to be sick. She shook off her queasiness and kept swimming, trying to stay focused on her mission. Twenty yards into the cave, the passageway widened into a large, high-ceilinged cavern.
“Holy sea cow,” Neela said, stunned by what was in it—a staggering amount of treasure. Gold plates, silver chalices, coins, glassware, porcelain vases, suits of armor, jewels, goblets, pieces of mirror glass, brass figures, statues of marble and alabaster, chunks of obsidian, malachite, and lapis, several cars, a few bicycles, chrome coffeepots, cutlery, ropes of pearls, swords, scissors—anything with a sparkle or a gleam had been heaped into a small mountain.
“Naasir, grab some swag,” Basra ordered. “Everyone else start searching.”
Naasir took a mesh bag from his pocket and started to fill it. The others dug into the treasure pile.
Neela started flipping bits and pieces of treasure off the pile with her tail. “How am I ever going to find the moonstone in all this?” she said.
“Start with Hagarla’s chest. It’s by her nest. She keeps the best stuff there. Hurry. We don’t have much time,” Basra ordered.
Neela found the chest and eased its lid back. She pulled out necklaces, golden crowns, gemstones, ropes of pearls as long as her tail—one after another. A few minutes later, she was at the bottom of the chest without having found the moonstone.
“Go help the others search the pile,” Basra said. She herself was looking around the edges of Hagarla’s nest.
“Hey!” came a muffled voice. “I think I found it!”
“Ikraan?” Basra called. “Is that you? Where are you?”
“On the other side of treasure mountain.”
“What are you doing? Grab the moonstone!”
“Um, no can do, Chief,” Ikraan said.
Neela and the others dropped whatever they were holding and swam over the treasure pile. Ikraan was floating just above another nest—this one containing six tussling baby sea dragons, each as big as a great white.
One had a gold scepter in its long black claws. Another had a soda can. A spiny sea urchin. A snorkeler’s mask. A snorkeler’s head. And a moonstone.
Neela caught her breath when she saw it. It was Navi’s talisman; she was sure of it. It was the size of an albatross’s egg, nearly six inches long. Silver-blue in color, it glowed from within.
“Isn’t that cute?” Basra said acidly. “They’re sleeping with their cuddly toys.”
The babies heard them. They hissed. One tried to scrabble out of the nest.
“How are we ever going to get that moonstone away from them?” Naasir asked.
Neela had an idea. She started to sing, soft and low.
“What?” Basra said. “What’s that going to do? We’re going to have to take them out, one by one.”
“No, wait, Basra!” Naasir said. “Look!”
The babies were swaying back and forth. They’d stopped hissing. Their scaly eyelids drooped over their yellow eyes. Neela was singing them an old Matali lullaby—one her mother had sung to her. After a few minutes they were almost out, when one suddenly slugged another one for no good reason. They all started tussling and hissing again, but Neela kept singing, and a few minutes later they were finally asleep.
“Nice work!” Ikraan whispered.
No longer singing, Neela swam toward the nest. It was for her to get the moonstone, no one else. She halted when a baby stirred, then hovered above the one who was holding the moonstone, clutching it to his chest. Working slowly and carefully, Neela pried his claws from around the talisman and took it. Then she turned to the others and smiled.
Which was a big mistake.
A swipe of pain across her back, sudden and blinding, made her scream. She dropped the moonstone. The baby dragon whose toy she’d taken had clawed her. He hissed angrily, then yawped for the jewel. Blood rose from the jagged tears in Neela’s skin, curling through the water. Their sibling’s noise, and the smell of blood, woke the others. Their eyes opened rapidly, their tongues flicked through their lips, and they started to crawl out of the nest.
In agony, Neela swooped down and retrieved the moonstone. As soon as she had it, Ikraan and Basra grabbed her. Naasir and Jamal snatched pieces of treasure from Hagarla’s pile and threw them at the babies, driving the creatures back into their nest. Furious at being deprived of a nice bloody snack and pelted with hard objects, they all started yawping loudly.
“Come on, we’ve got to go. Now!” Basra ordered.
Neela and the Askari fled. They swam away from the nest, over the treasure pile, and down the passageway to the cave’s mouth.
“Thank gods they’re too young to come after us,” Ikraan said, looking behind herself. She still had Neela’s arm.
Basra, ahead of them all, stopped short. “But he’s not,” she said.
Ahead of them, standing in the cave’s mouth, was a male dragon. He was smaller than Hagarla, but not by much. He growled at the mermaids, flattening his ears.
“Swim back to the treasure room. Very, very slowly,” Basra said quietly. “It’s our only chance.”
The mermaids did so, their eyes on the dragon. He followed them, snaking his head from side to side. Silvery strands of saliva spilled from his jaw. To Neela it felt like forever until they were back in the treasure room, but it had only taken a few seconds.
“Spread out and hit the ground,” Basra ordered.
They did and their camo blended them into the muddy, weedy cave floor. Confused, the dragon stopped short. He sniffed the water, then scuttled toward Neela, scenting her blood.
“Hey!” Basra yelled. “Hey, silt for brains! Over here!”
The dragon’s eyes narrowed. He lunged at her, jaws snapping. She darted backward, just out of his reach.
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“Get out of here, all of you!” she yelled, drawing the dragon farther away from the passage.
Naasir, still holding his bag full of stolen treasure, made a dash for it, but the dragon sensed him. The creature whirled around and swung his massive head toward the merman. Naasir dove under the dragon’s chest and around his foreleg, barely avoiding his snapping jaws. He tried to make the passage, but the dragon blocked him, roaring in anger.
Ikraan swore. “We’ll never get out of here,” she said. “Basra, keep him engaged. I’m going to draw him over the treasure pile to the nest. Everyone else, get ready.”
While Basra clapped her hands at the dragon, luring him toward her, Ikraan darted backward, grabbed a jeweled box from the treasure pile, and then swam to the nest. Neela couldn’t see what she was doing, but two seconds later, she heard a baby dragon’s screech. Ikraan must’ve thrown the box and hit one, she thought.
At the sound of the screeching baby, the male roared. He turned his back on Basra and scrambled over the mountain of treasure.
“Go!” Ikraan yelled, her voice carrying up from the nest. “Get out of here!”
Basra grabbed Neela’s arm and yanked her toward the passageway.
“We can’t leave her!” Neela cried.
“We don’t have a choice!” Basra shouted. “If we go back for her, we might all die!”
Neela didn’t want to go with Basra. She wanted to go back for Ikraan. But Basra’s grip was like a vise, and Neela was too weak from blood loss to break free. She knew that the Askari were trained to leave one of their own if saving him or her endangered them all. It was more important that the group, not the individual, survived. If Basra couldn’t save Ikraan, how could Neela? Basra was so much tougher than she was, and Basra had decided.
Someone is always deciding, Neela thought as Basra continued to pull her away. My father and mother. Suma. My teachers. The grand vizier. Even the subassistant.
They decided what she did. What she wore. What she studied. Where she went. All she could decide was what flavor bing-bang to eat.