The two mermaids looked around. The place was bustling. Bright morning light filtered in through the windows. Merfolk were sitting at tables or at the bar, eating breakfast. A mermaid wearing a red jacket glanced at Serafina and Neela, then returned her attention to her bowl of seaweed. Serafina pointed at a large plate-glass window. It had the café’s name on it.
“The Old River?” she said. “Nice going, Neels. We need the Olt River.”
Neela squinted at the letters. “Oops.”
“You have no idea where we are, do you?” Serafina asked.
“Well, I’m fairly confident we’re in, or close to, a river.”
“Really? What gave it away, detective? Couldn’t be the café window, could it?”
“Ha. So funny, Sera. What gave it away is the smell of freshwater.” She sneezed. “It always does that to me.”
Just then, a graceful turtle swam past them.
“Let’s ask him where we are,” Neela said.
“I don’t know Tortoisha,” Serafina said.
“I don’t either. I’ll sing a loquoro,” said Neela. Loquoro spells enabled a mermaid to temporarily understand another’s language. “Excuse me, sir,” she called out after she’d cast it.
The turtle stopped and turned around—v-e-r-y slowly. Neela knew that turtles did everything v-e-r-y slowly. He raised his head and looked at her with his large eyes.
“Hello,” she said brightly. “Do you know what town this is?”
The turtle frowned. He scratched his spotted head. Blinked. Thought hard. Took a deep breath. Blew it out. Scratched his head again. Flapped his flippers. Then, finally, he spoke.
“Z-d-r-a-s-t-i,” he said slowly.
“Does he know? What did he say?” Serafina asked.
“He said Hi,” Neela replied.
“Hi? All that for Hi? It’ll take a week to find out where we are! Forget this. Let’s ask someone else.”
Neela shook her head. The mermaid in the red jacket was looking at them again. “We’re attracting attention. Let’s get out of here.”
As they opened the door, they heard more voices.
“Shipwreck silver! Right off a gogg yacht! All first-rate!”
“Songspell pearls! Transparansea pearls! Best quality! Cast to last, folks!”
“Keel worms here, plump and juicy! Ribbon worms, sweet and slimy!”
The café was on the town’s main current and a morning market was in full swing. Its stalls were hung with all manner of goods. Foodmongers sold freshwater fare: braids of marsh grass, frog eggs, pickled crayfish, candied water spiders, and leech puffs. Saltwater importers displayed clams, mussels, scallops, walrus cheese, and the long, twining egg cases of whelks. There was a secondhand clothing stall and salvage stalls selling anything that could be scavenged from a shipwreck—dishes, clothing, lanterns, teapots, knives and swords, even the skulls of terragoggs for those who liked to collect them.
“Voice too small, ladies? Lift it up and push it out with our patented voice enhancer!” a merchant called. “Totally discreet! Results guaranteed!”
As they swam down the main current, Serafina could see that the town they were in was poor and sprawling, nothing like Cerulea. It was a shabby place, made up of found things. The freshwater mer, living so close to the terragoggs, had an abundance of one thing no matter how poor they might be: garbage. And they made good use of it. Serafina and Neela swam down the current, saw a shop built from oil drums, another from plastic buckets. Others were made from wrecked boats, stacked tires, or shipping containers that had fallen off freighters. Roofs were shingled with flattened tin cans or plastic bottles. Down at the end of the current was a department store that had been built from a sunken oil tanker.
“Sea cucumbers—still oozing!” a peddler called.
“Gooseneck barnacles—crunchy and sweet!” another cried.
And then the mermaids heard another voice, right behind them: “They’re coming.”
Neela whirled around. It was the mermaid from the café, the one with the red jacket. Her tail and torso were white with brilliant orange patches, the colors of a koi fish. She had almond-shaped eyes and high cheekbones. Her black hair was coiled into two knots on top of her head. She carried an embroidered silk bag over one shoulder. A sword in a scabbard was slung over her back.
“They’re coming,” she repeated. “You should get out of here.”
“Who’s coming?” Serafina asked.
“Moarte piloti. That’s what the locals call them. It means death riders. Traho’s men.”
“Who are you?” Neela asked warily.
“My name’s Ling. I’m from Qīngshuĭ in Qin.” She called to a manta who was gliding above them and spoke to her in perfect RaySay. Then she asked something of a school of anchovies in Pesca. Finally a stickleback told her what she wanted to know.
“Fifty of them. On hippokamps,” she said. “Three leagues off, but coming fast.”
Neela’s fins began to prickle. “You speak a lot of languages,” she said.
“I’m an omnivoxa,” said Ling.
Neela knew that omnis, who could speak every dialect of Mermish, and communicate with most sea creatures, were very rare. The prickling in her fins grew stronger. She suspected that Ling was more than some random mermaid from Qin.
“You haven’t even disguised yourselves,” Ling continued. “They’ll pick you out in no time. Even with that really bad haircut.”
“Um, thanks,” Serafina said. “Guess the illusio wore off.”
“How did you know who we are?” Neela asked brusquely.
“Because you stick out like sore fins. You’re wearing dresses that probably cost more than most people here make in a year. That, and Traho’s wanted signs. Your faces are everywhere. There’s a price on your heads. Twenty thousand trocii each. Every bounty hunter and his brother is after you. If I recognized you, they will too. You’ve got to get out of here. I’m going to get some food, then hit the northbound currents, and find a cave till the death riders blow by. I suggest you do the same.”
“Do you know where we are?”
“Are you serious? You don’t know where you are? You two are hopeless,” Ling said, shaking her head. “Radneva. In the Black Sea. The Dunărea River is about a two-day swim from here. Then it’s another two days, maybe three, to the Olt.”
“But how do you—” Serafina started to say.
“Know where you’re going?” Ling finished. “Because I’m going there, too.” Then she quietly sang the Iele’s chant.
As she did, Neela’s fins flared. Her suspicions had just been confirmed. Ling had heard the chant. She’d had the same dream. The Iele had called her, too.
“I’m the One who sings all creatures’ songs. Vrăja summoned me, just as she summoned you, Daughter of Merrow,” Ling said to Serafina. “Which one are you?” she asked Neela.
“One whose heart will hold the light,” Neela said, giving Ling a dark look.
“Of course,” Ling said cheekily. “How could I have missed that?”
Neela glowered at her. She didn’t want this. She didn’t like it. It scared her.
“Forgive me for not shining my light at this particular moment. We’ve had just a teensy bit of a bad time. Nothing much, really. Just an invasion and a kidnapping. An attack by speargun-wielding thugs. Had to swim for our lives a few times. Got stuck in a mirror with a psycho. Maybe I’ll get my glow back tomorrow,” she said waspishly.
Ling gave her a solemn look. “You’re going to have a worse time if you don’t come up with a disguise and get out of here….” Her voice trailed off. Her face took on a distracted look, as if she was listening to another conversation.
“What is it?” Neela asked. “Do you hear something else?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “Maybe it’s just mackerel chattering.” She frowned. “It sounds like laughter, though. Strange.”
“It’s the monster,” Serafina said gravely. “I hear it too.”
“But I
’ve never heard it when I’m awake. Only in my nightmares. That means…”
“…it’s getting stronger,” said Sera.
“Yeah,” Ling said grimly. “I guess it does. Hey, see you at the Iele’s maybe.” She started to swim away.
Sera put a hand on Neela’s shoulder. “I know what you’re feeling, but we need to go with her. She’s one of us, Neels,” she said.
Her words struck a chill into Neela. One of us. Part of her still wanted to believe that none of this was real. Part of her still hoped that someone—her uncle Bilaal, her father, or one of the praedatori—would ride in on a big white hippokamp and tell her that it was all over, that Traho had been captured and everything was okay and she didn’t have to face a dangerous journey, a bunch of freaky witches in a dark cave, and worst of all, that thing in the waterfire. Meeting Ling made that a lot harder.
“Neela?”
“Okay. Yeah. Let’s go,” Neela said, her voice trembling a little.
“Wait, Ling! We’re coming with you,” Serafina called out.
In her head, Neela heard the Iele’s chant. She heard the gray-haired witch calling.
“One down, three to go, Baba Vrăja,” she whispered.
She and Serafina hurried to catch up.
“I’D KILL FOR A BING-BANG RIGHT NOW.”
“When would you not kill for a bing-bang, Neels?” Serafina asked.
The mermaids were swimming across a sandy shoal. It was early evening. They’d left Radneva two days ago and had been on the move ever since, stopping only to sleep at night. They’d sang velo spells to speed them along at first, but stopped when they realized that velos, difficult enough to cast in salt water, required even more magic in freshwater. Using back currents, they’d worked their way north, up the coast of Bulgaria toward Romania and the mouth of the Dunărea.
“A chillawonda would be nice, too. Or a zee-zee. Gods, I’d love a zee-zee. I’d like a cup of sargassa tea, too. Clean clothes. Pretty hair combs. A massage. A soft bed. And a crisp, blue water apple,” Neela said.
“Here, have some shriveled-up reef olives and stale walrus cheese instead,” Serafina said, handing her the bag of food they’d bought at the Radneva market.
“Olives and cheese again?”
“It’s all we have left. We better hope we hit a village soon.”
“We will. Aquaba’s at the mouth of the Dunărea,” Ling said. “I’m sure we’re close.”
It had been hard going on the currents, riding them—and sometimes fighting them—to get to where they were now. Neela was tired, dirty, hungry, and longing for home and its comforts. And though they were getting closer to the Dunărea, they still had leagues to go to reach the Olt.
“Did we go west around that sandbar off Burgas? Or East?” Serafina asked, looking around. She was holding a kelp parchment map in her hand. It belonged to Ling.
“West. Definitely west,” Ling said. “That was the shortcut we took. Remember?”
Ling was a good navigator. She’d led the way out of Radneva to a back current and had found them a roomy cave to hole up in for their first night together. They’d avoided death riders and bounty hunters, and at Ling’s urging, had changed the color of their hair and clothing with illusio spells. The only problem was that an illusio, like any spell, eventually wore off. Maintaining it took effort and energy—energy that was going into the constant swimming they were doing. Ling was always reminding them to recast it. Neela was grateful when night fell and she could revert to her true appearance. She knew that she and Sera would have to come up with more permanent solutions, but that would require another village, where they could buy some clothes.
It felt strange to Neela to be three instead of two, and she wasn’t always comfortable around Ling, as the merl could be blunt. She also had a disconcerting way of abruptly stopping a conversation to listen to a passing shoal of blennies, or interrupting it to say something like, “Have you ever noticed the amazing overlap of sibilant clickatives in Dolpheen and Porpoisha?” Neela never really knew if Ling was listening to her or to a sea creature that happened to be swimming by.
Ling was smart and tough, though, and she’d saved them from being captured. She was also the one who knew the route to the River Olt, so Neela had no choice but to accept her.
The three mermaids had talked as they’d made their way north. Serafina and Neela had shared their backgrounds, and Ling had told them that she was from a large clan, most of whom lived in her village.
“Actually, we are the village,” she’d said with a laugh. “Every house contains a relative of mine.”
“How big is your family?” Neela had asked.
“My extended family? There are over five hundred of us. My immediate family—my mother, sisters, and brothers, grandparents, aunts and uncles, and cousins—we’re fifty-three. Maybe fifty-four by now. One of my aunts…” She paused, listening, then said, “The size of the sea horse lexicon is incredible, don’t you think?”
“Oh, totally,” Neela had replied.
“So, as I was saying, one of my aunts was expecting when I left.”
“And you all live in one house?” Serafina had asked.
“A very big house,” Ling had said, her smile fading. “All of us but my father. We lost him a year ago. He went out to explore in the Great Abyss, as he loved to do, and he didn’t come back. My mother has barely said two words since he disappeared.”
“I’m so sorry, Ling,” Serafina had said.
“What happened?” Neela had asked.
“I don’t know,” Ling had replied. “The entire village searched for him. For days and days. But he was never found. Maybe he went too deep and something attacked him. Or maybe he blacked out. All I know is that I miss him.”
“It must’ve been hard for your mother to let you go so far away from her,” Serafina had said. “Especially after losing your father.”
“She didn’t exactly let me go. In fact, she didn’t want me to. But the legend of the Iele is very strong in my culture. My grandmother, Wen, is also our clan’s shaman. She’s very wise and a keeper of the clan’s traditions. When I told her my dream, she said I must go. So I went. And here I am,” she said. “I’ve been on the currents for two months. A few days ago, I started to think I was crazy for coming. And then I met you two—”
“—and now you know you are,” Neela had joked.
But Ling hadn’t laughed. “—and I knew I wasn’t. The things you told me about the attack and Traho, the fact that we’ve all had the same dream…the Iele are real. We’ve been called for a reason.”
“Yes, we have. But what is it? That’s the big, scary question,” Sera had said. And then she and Ling, still poring over the map, continued across the shoal.
Neela watched them go, then reluctantly followed, knowing that every stroke they took brought them closer to the answer.
“I don’t like it,” Ling said now, her hands on her hips.
They’d come to the edge of the shoal. It dropped away steeply to a broad seabed that was flat and open and planted with water apples, but all the trees were bare.
“It’s too open. We can be seen.”
“We have no choice,” Serafina said. “According to Ling’s map, we can’t go west toward the coast because the shoals are too high. We’d have to surface near gogg beaches. And we can’t go east into deep water. The current’s too strong there. It’ll push us off course.”
“Let’s make it quick, then,” she said.
The three mermaids set off. They followed the current into the seabed and made their way across it, attuned to movement, listening for the sound of voices or the swish of fins.
Neela kept looking behind them as they swam, expecting to see death riders crest the shoal at any second, but they didn’t. She was just beginning to think they might make it through unnoticed when she heard Ling say, “Uh-oh.”
Directly in their path was a merman holding a hoe. Its edge gleamed sharply, even in the evening light.
Neela looked left and right and saw several other mermen emerge from behind the trees, carrying scythes and pitchforks. They were ragged and thin, and their mouths were set in hard lines. “They don’t seem too pleased to see us,” she said.
“No, they don’t,” Serafina said.
“Get ready,” Ling said. “On my signal, swim straight up.”
“What if they follow us?” Neela asked.
“Hopefully we can lose them. They look like they don’t have much stamina for a chase. Okay, ready? One, two…”
Suddenly the merman with the hoe lowered it and bowed his head. “Long live Serafina, principessa di Miromara!” he shouted.
One by one, the others followed his example. They made fists of their right hands, struck their chests, then saluted.
“Hail, Serafina, principessa di Miromara!”
“Long live the Merrovingia!”
“Death to the tyrant Traho!”
Neela glanced at Sera. The illusio spell she’d cast had worn off again.
The merman holding the hoe swam up to them. He bowed and told them his name was Konstantin. “Forgive us, Principessa. At first we didn’t know who you were. There are death riders in these waters.”
Serafina turned in a circle, looking at all those gathered around her. As she did, the other mermen approached. They took her hand and kissed it. They called on the gods to favor her. They told her their stories in voices that were halting and emotional.
“I was away visiting relatives. When I returned, the village was empty. It’s the next one over. They were gone, all gone…”
“They came at night…”
“Where did they go?”
“Why, Principessa, why did they take my family?”
“Help us find them. Help us, please.”
Serafina, Neela, and Ling learned that the death riders had taken nearly everyone in their village. They’d left only a handful of mermen to work the orchards for them.
“They say your uncle escaped, Principessa. That he’s raising an army of Kobold goblins in the north. Is it true? Have you any word from him?” Konstantin asked hopefully.
Serafina shook her head. “No. Nothing.”