I felt the first brush of something on my wrist and swallowed my spike of fear. But at the second brush, I shot back up. I couldn’t see Sigis anymore, but I heard a yelp and guessed that one of the creatures of the deep had fastened itself to him. A tentacle wrapped around my calf, and I struck out in panic. How ironic if both of us were to die down here.
I kicked again, and the sentinel freed me. Then I swam, hoping I was still headed in the right direction. Gradually my eyes picked up shapes, long and thin, looping through the water around me. My mind attached names to the shapes, questioning.
Focus. At last, I spotted the light, and as I kicked closer, it resolved into lamps. I checked behind me. Fish and fishmen, long things and finned things. But no Sigis.
Two guards appeared beneath me, and two came up to swim beside me to keep me from leaving the lit area. None of them was Meire.
But I didn’t need her anymore, I realized. Something floated in the water around me, giving it a strange, oily sheen. As it dusted my fingers, strange eddies appeared in the water. Ice crystals formed like rose petals and fell away from my body. Magic. It illuminated a trail before me.
The trail led to a rocky face that loomed like a mountain. Little flowers, pale as moons, dotted its surface, tilting their bloodred stamens toward the lamps.
They clustered around an opening in the rock. A light flickered from within. I aimed for the light and swam.
As the Snowmount had been carved Above, so had the Stonemount Below. Black-on-black scenes showed Morvoi, the God Below, bringing the first citizens down to be his subjects. Sharks terrorized fishmen, and kraken wrapped their arms around pillars. Little fish and squid as dark as stone swam back and forth above us. The petals that brushed against my body darkened, turning as thin and sharp as volcanic glass. I pressed my legs together, thinking of their knife edges, of the little sharks around us.
The duke Below floated beneath a relief of Sjiotha and Morvoi. He wore his electrum crown, with points like teeth. His dark, dark eyes regarded me. In his hand, he held the pearl.
He beckoned. A guard swam in, bearing a body in his arms. Sigis.
I didn’t know whether my former foster brother was unconscious or worse. Welts covered him, wrapping around both legs and his torso, kissing his neck and cheek. The duke Below observed me, as I, in turn, observed my rival. “You match your father for ruthlessness.”
It was the sort of statement I’d been chasing after all week. Now it left me cold.
“We are not in the habit of starting wars,” the duke Below said. “But you have won your trial.” He held out the pearl, sparkling, the size of my little fingernail. It was cool against my fingers, and so light my stomach lurched with the fear of losing it.
“Hail, Your Grace,” he said, and curled into a bow to me. Around us, the citizens Below followed him.
“Hail,” I replied.
“It pleases me that it is you,” the duke said. “We will keep you.”
What did he mean by that? Doesn’t matter. My mouth was dry, for all that water surrounded me. Now was my chance. “And if I’m grand duke, do I not get a grand duke’s privilege?”
His eyes hooked into me. “Like your father, you hunger for our magic.” It did not sound like a compliment. “What will you do with the secret when you have it?”
“I’ll bring my family back.”
A low hissing sounded around me. Was it the wrong thing to say? “And after?” the duke asked, never taking his black eyes from my face.
“I don’t know,” I confessed. I hadn’t thought beyond the awakening until yesterday. Maybe a parliament would demand the knowledge, or order the creation, of a guild. Maybe our trade would become less restrictive. But it wasn’t a decision for me to make alone.
The duke regarded me a few moments more. Then he said, “You will be a friend to us, Ekata Avenko. As we are a friend to you. So I say, as a friend to a friend, we will give you what you need to stabilize your magic Above. In return, you will not try to wake your family.”
Something strange and heavy coiled in my stomach, dragged at my feet. What? “Why not?”
The duke cocked his head. “Because we do not want it. We cursed them, after all. We made you the Grand Duke of Kylma Above.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
You—you…” Panic wrapped its cold grip around my spine. My feet stilled in the water; my hand loosened around my prize pearl. “You cursed us?”
The duke Below signaled a servant. She bore a messenger bowl, shining, white, strange. The duke withdrew four shimmering pearls from the pouch at his belt and crushed them in his fist. He opened a handful of light that flashed through the water and dipped it through the oily barrier, into the air Above. “We cursed only those who deserved it most. And now that the succession is clear, we can be finished. If you are so reluctant, I do not mind taking on the task—” He began to stir with his fingers.
“No.” The word burst out of me, and even I was surprised by the vehemence of it. But I meant it, I realized. “You can’t do that.”
The duke’s mane flattened against his head. “Why not?” Was it the strange light, or did the orange spurs at his elbows seem brighter?
“You can’t kill them. Maybe they don’t deserve to live, but that’s not your choice.” It was for my ministers, for my parliament. Maybe for me, even. But not for him.
“He who has the power makes the choice.” The duke’s head turned. He regarded Sigis, supine in the arms of his guard. “There is one who understands this. Should we wake one of your sisters and make Sigis grand duke instead?”
“You can’t threaten my life. You can’t hurt me during the coronation trials.”
“We may not touch you during the coronation trials,” the duke Below corrected. “But we may… adjust things with regard to your family.”
“I…” They’d cursed us. It made such horrible sense. But if they had—“Why did you tell me about Yannush?”
“Yannush favored the wrong candidate. He tried to kill you even when we instructed him not to. I told you we are friends, Ekaterina. We did as friends should do.”
My stomach twisted bitterly. He’d killed three of his own citizens to make me trust him. “And now you’re threatening me.”
“I do not wish to. But look at the weapons we hold,” the duke said. I didn’t think he meant it as a mark of intimidation. Their rotting spears spoke of desperation. “Your father stopped trading iron and wax. Things decay around us, and we cannot replace them. We must defend ourselves from the deep. We are not servants of Above. We are not interesting and exotic things to study. We are our own people, and we have our own needs.” He continued to stir the air with his hand. Magic was volatile, magic didn’t follow orders, magic couldn’t be controlled—except by them. How?
“You told me you didn’t meddle in the affairs of Above,” I said, more to buy time than anything else.
He smiled. “Of course I told you that.”
“But if you don’t care… why didn’t you kill me the first time I came Below?”
“Kill you?” The duke seemed puzzled. “Why would we kill you? You are curious. You are spirited. You are dazzled by us.” Easy to manipulate. “And we need someone of the Avenko line.” His hand paused. “Tell me it can be you, Ekaterina.”