“No,” she said, her hand moving to caress the pendant. “The moonstone is the same. I do wish I could speak to Leela again, though.” She turned her eyes toward the clouds. “I hope she’s all right.”
Leo did too, but Leela’s dangers were far away and theirs were very much real and, apparently, chasing after them. He didn’t want to imagine what would happen if the Renalt and her warships caught up with Ambrosine’s galleon. Even if they made it to Culinnon, was the island’s magic strong enough to protect them? Leo still wasn’t even entirely sure what magic Culinnon possessed. It just sounded like a very pretty place so far, and that wouldn’t help withstand cannons or gunfire.
“I was thinking about Rahel,” Sera said.
“Really?”
“Well, not about her but about her memory. I think the memories can serve a purpose. This power of my people may have been lost for a time, but I am on the planet now and my magic is stronger than I have ever felt it before. In the City Above the Sky, we blood bond with each other to read hearts. It is sacred because we share ourselves, open our minds to each other the way you and I did when we bonded.”
Even now, when Leo recalled that night in the theater, he could still see the memories they’d shared as clearly as if it had happened yesterday.
“But with this self blood bond, it is not the same,” she continued. “Rahel did not see into my mind. And I was able to make her feel something.”
“Yeah, she was pretty freaked out,” he agreed.
Sera was shaking her head. “No, Leo,” she said. “I made her feel shame.”
“Oh.” Leo hadn’t thought about it like that.
“I’ve been wondering,” Sera said, and she turned her back on the ocean and looked out across the deck. “If perhaps I can use it to instigate other emotions. Good ones. Or . . . I don’t know, meaningful ones. Perhaps this was a way the Cerulean were able to spend time on planets. Sensing emotions, calming the occupants or making connections with them using their own memories.”
“I can feel a plan being formed,” Leo said, and Sera flashed him a mischievous grin that sent his heart tripping over itself.
“I am not trying to take this power lightly,” she said. “But I was just hoping I could test out this theory, this ability, and at the same time, give a gift to someone I think deserves one very much.”
Leo followed her gaze to where Bellamy was standing at the prow of the ship, still as stone, her frizzy hair caught up in the wind. His chest grew tight.
“You’re a very good person, Sera Lighthaven,” he said.
“I haven’t done anything yet.”
“No,” he said, offering her his arm. “But you will.”
They walked over to Bellamy, who started when she heard them coming.
“Good morning,” she said politely.
“Good morning, Bellamy,” Sera said. “We were . . .” She looked to Leo, uncertain, and he gave her an encouraging nod. Sera cleared her throat. “I was hoping I might . . . I was wondering . . .”
Leo had never seen her so flustered. But then Bellamy looked away, back out over the prow.
“We are almost to Culinnon,” she said. “Ambrosine always knows when we are close.” Her fingers tightened on the rail. That small movement seemed to loosen something within Sera.
“You miss your husband very much, don’t you,” she said.
Bellamy tensed, then nodded.
“I can help you see him,” Sera said. “Right here, right now.”
Bellamy whirled around, eyes wide. “You can?”
“But it would have to be our secret,” Leo said quickly, foreseeing the danger. “My grandmother can’t know.”
“A secret?” Bellamy said, tempted but uncertain.
“Ambrosine has plenty of secrets of her own,” Leo said. “It only seems fair that we have some ourselves.”
A slow smile crept across Bellamy’s face. “A secret,” she said. “All right.”
Sera squeezed Leo’s arm, then released him. “This might be a little startling,” she said. “But I promise I won’t hurt you.”
Bellamy was only allowed a moment of shock before Sera’s eyes began to glow, brighter and brighter until they burned, and Leo once again felt a gentle wind ripple over his body, freezing him in place as she drew up their veils of memory, of life. He couldn’t see them—Sera had told him that they were colorful and that his was a patchwork of grays and greens. He wondered what colors Bellamy’s veil was, and what thread Sera was plucking from it now. And then he saw, as clearly as he’d seen Sera’s memories in the theater and Rahel’s on the ship.
Bellamy was much younger, lounging in a rowboat with a man with dark blue eyes and handsome, hawkish features. One of her hands dangled in the water amid lily pads and lotus blossoms while the man rummaged through a picnic basket.
“Will you read me another poem, Hektor?” she asked.
“In a moment, my love,” Hektor replied. “I’m just looking for . . . ah! Found it.”
Bellamy giggled. “What on earth has kept your nose in that basket for so long?”
Hektor’s cheeks flushed. “I seem to have misplaced my heart,” he said, holding out his hand. “It appears to be yours now.” In his palm was a small silver ring with a tiny snail shell in its setting in place of a jewel. “Would you do me the privilege of spending the rest of your life with me?”
Bellamy clapped her hands over her mouth, tears filling her eyes. For a long moment, she did not speak. “Hektor,” she finally choked out.
“Is that a yes?”
Her eyes shone, then turned wary. “But what about your mother?”
“I’m not frightened of her.”
Bellamy gave Hektor a look that plainly said, Liar.
“Fine, maybe I am a little, but it’s my life, isn’t it? Alethea got to marry who she wanted; why shouldn’t I?”
“Oh, darling, you know it’s not the same,” Bellamy said, cupping his face in her palm.
“Is that a no?” Hektor asked, real fear in his voice.
Bellamy leaned forward so she could kiss him. “It is a yes. A thousand times yes.”
He took her in his arms and she cried against his chest. “I have never loved anyone in my life but you,” he murmured into her hair.
And then they were kissing again and the memory dissolved.
Leo could still feel the tingles in his stomach, the yearning for physical affection, a side effect of the memory share. He’d felt what Bellamy had felt, yet it was also mixing with his own feelings, the ones he fought against every night after he’d left Sera and closed the door to his room. Bellamy was frozen in shock but Sera was looking at him, and the expression on her face was . . . strange. Almost like she was seeing a different version of him.
Then she reached out very slowly and ran her fingers down the back of his hand. “Leo,” she said, and his insides shivered.
“By the goddesses,” Bellamy gasped, coming alive at precisely the worst moment. She gulped at the air. “What . . . what . . .”
Sera turned to her and the spell was broken. Leo felt himself shaking. He wanted her eyes back on him, wanted her fingers back on his skin.