“You are still weak.” He knocks me in the eye, and I know it’s
going to bruise. “That is why you have failed.”
I push him with all my force until he rolls over, spitting blood
onto the leather floor and unable to get up.
“I’m stronger than you, Ugly.”
The oracle rushes in with Brendan and Yara.
“How dare you enter here!” the oracle says, her voice a deep boom
that would send me hiding under my bed.
Yara grabs Karel. “Come with me. Now.”
“Amada?” I ask. “Where is she?”
“When she felt you waking, she went to get me.”
Now that Grumble is gone, my body trembles with adrenaline. The
white fire is gone, and the blood on my chest has dried to a nasty,
muddy red. I take a rag the oracle gives me and clean it off.
“You saw,” she says.
“I saw.” I flex my fingers, working out the pain. “And I know
where to go. We have to leave right now.”
The oracle nods and nods. “Take what you need.”
“I just need my friends,” I say.
The oracle puts her veil back on and we go outside. The circle is
quiet. A few villagers gather and watch Grumble get taken away
somewhere by Yara.
Isi stands on the dais, waiting for me.
I march right to her. “Are you happy now?”
She looks at me defiantly. “I did what I thought was best.”
A big part of me knows not to talk to an elder this way. Not just
an elder, but the leader of these people. Still, the small part of me
that’s been tricked and beaten the crap out of is ticked off.
“I can get over the part where you made me believe the Naga was a
big threat to you, because at the end of the day, she was the big, bad
wolf in your woods. What I can’t get over is that you would have me
kill your own daughter, and then you stand at the edge of the forest
crying every night. Don’t look so surprised. I’ve seen you.”
Isi touches her temples, pushing back whatever thoughts make her
weak. “I have lost many daughters to the throne. That has not changed.
I could not bear to see Amada suffer so. It’s been so long that I
didn’t recognize her face.”
“I recognized yours,” Amada says. She walks between the villagers
who take numerous steps back. Some don’t even bother to stay. She
takes in their emotions, one by one, but doesn’t flinch. The white
dress is all kinds of wrong on her. It’s like putting a tutu on a
wildcat.
“I want to feel for you, Isi, I do,” I say. “You all have been
teaching me to be strong and push away the things that make me human.
And you know what I’ve decided?”
She lifts her chin, waiting for my answer.
“I’ve decided that I like those parts of myself. All of them.” I
look up at the sky. Raise my arms to the violet moon, the murmuring
winds around the weeping trees. “The fortnight is ending. I see Nieve
and Kurt moving their armies when I dream. You can stay here lamenting
the great big detention sentence the old kings gave you, or you can
make yourself a new world.”
Kai and Dylan come forward. Kai has traded her bow for a staff
with an onyx spearhead. Dylan has my backpack over one shoulder,
stuffed with God knows what. Brendan takes nothing but the sword he
came with. My A team is ready.
“I’m coming with you,” Amada says.
We look at each other for a long time. She has these eyes that
even her beast form can’t hide. Her hair is down to her hips. She has
the frozen, careful movements of her days as the Naga. What must it be
like to go back to your people after so long and not belong?
“No,” Isi says. “You cannot go.”
Amada steps forward slowly. “The stories said that a son of Triton
would rid the land of the beast. Of me.”
“Don’t go saying I’m not a merman of my word,” I say.
Yara comes running from wherever they put Grumble. I hope they
tied him by his ankles from the cliff he pushed me off. “I want to go
with you too.”
“No,” Isi says. No, no, no. It echoes deep into the woods where
tiny birds take flight.
“But-” The maiden warrior of the River Clan gets cut off. “He’s a
son of Triton. He can-”
“The seal of the king may be weak, but it isn’t gone yet. You are
needed here with your people.”
I look into the eyes of a woman who’s lost so much. Then at Yara’s
stubborn face, hungry for a fight that she might have a chance of
winning. I reach out to her and we embrace forearms.
“Despite everything,” she says, “you do have allies here.”
“Despite everything,” I say, “you still have choices out there.”
The river people go back to their fluid forms. I can feel their
eyes watching us move across the square and toward the forest. After a
few steps, the sun bird lets his presence be known, flying overhead.
As we walk, I tap Amada’s hand. “Are you sure you want to do
this?”
She rubs her arms, like they are foreign to her. “More than
anything.”
“Guys,” I say, coming to a stop. “Do we know the way out?”
Brendan puts hands on his hips. “I thought you knew where we were
going.”
I sigh. “I just avoided getting killed by mini-Vin-Diesel. I
wasn’t about to ask for directions.”
“Sometimes I don’t understand the things you say.” Kai shakes her
head. Her hair is braided down her back like the other clan girls.
Dylan raises his hand. “I haven’t had any success getting out,
clearly.”
He looks back at the village. It’s not that far. I can make out a
thin line of smoke from the communal fire pit. I elbow him lightly.
“You don’t have to come,” I tell him. I want to make sure that
whoever is with me has a choice in the matter. Even though I know that
I need Dylan on my side.
I’m glad when he doesn’t hesitate. “I do. I owe it to you. To my
father.”
Amada is the one who holds a hand up next. The movement is so
sudden that Dylan jumps back. “I believe I know the way out.”
Amada takes us through the barren meadows to the same cave
entrance where we fought.
Brendan arches his eyebrow at me, and I give him my best
reassuring nod.
“This way,” she says. She enunciates her words carefully, pleased
at the sound of her own voice. I wonder what it’s like to not hear
yourself speak for years and years. Some people would call that a
blessing if it happened to me.
Once we walk past the dome-like cave, we reach a dead end where a
waterfall has formed from a source on the surface. The runoff water
carves a path that leads to a depression in the stone, like a basin or
a wishing well.
As we stand in front of the waterfall, I wish for the sound of one
voice in particular, like it’s as easy as fishing a penny from my
pocket and throwing it in the fountain. I have no pennies. Or pockets,
for that matter. Well, I do, but you wouldn’t find any pennies in
there.
“The island is designed to keep people out. If you make it inside,
you stay. Only the king and his children and their children can come
and go.”
“Then it’s a good thing we brought Tristan after all,” Brendan
jokes.
“No, you’re of the family blood,” Kai reminds him.
Brendan turns to me. “Where are we going exactly, dear cousin?”
And I don’t even hesitate. “The Glass Castle.”
“What did you see?” Kai says.
“The old kings. The first battle. It was amazing. I’ve never seen
so much raw power. It’s like they each were one being with their
creatures, communicating in their minds. Like I was limitless-until I
wasn’t.”
“Like Nieve and Kurt will be, as well,” Kai says. “When the beasts