Oh, Kelo.
It suddenly hit her, hard.
Maybe the effects of the cartena flower had finally worn off. Maybe it was discussing the test with Palia and Roe. Maybe it was only that enough time had passed that the reality became impossible to ignore.
“Are you all right?” Palia asked.
“Whoa, don’t faint,” Roe ordered. The two women were on either side of her—Mayara hadn’t even noticed they’d moved. “I suppose it’s healthy you aren’t taking this all in stride. But you’ll have to develop a way to cope soon. We’ll be taken for three days of intensive training before we’re delivered to Akena Island. It will be our last chance to prepare for what’s to come. And your first chance.”
Mayara didn’t care about training or about what would happen on the island. She knew she wasn’t going to survive it. At least Kelo won’t have to face a world without me.
It was a terrible, horrible thought. But he’d said it would break him if she went to the island. At least he’ll never know. He died thinking I’d live. She felt as if she wanted to burst into sobs, but the sobs were clogged in her throat.
She wished he hadn’t asked it of her, to be a Silent One. It wasn’t for him to decide whether she should choose death or a life like death. And then she pushed that thought down—he’d only said it because he was afraid.
She wondered if her choice would break her parents. Her mother . . . Would she feel this new pain on top of the old, or would it all mix together in a perfect storm of sorrow? How would her father bear it, losing two daughters? She’d have to trust her aunts and uncles and cousins to watch over them now. Mayara gulped in little breaths, as if she was about to dive. She felt as though there wasn’t enough air.
“Three days to train,” Roe repeated. “You can do this!”
“Maybe it will be enough,” Palia said. “Maybe we won’t die.”
“Optimism, Palia?” Roe asked. “I’m proud of you.”
“I’m lying through my teeth,” Palia said. “Obviously we’re all going to die. But I didn’t think it would be helpful to say that.”
Mayara almost smiled, painfully. “You just said it.”
“Thattagirl.” Palia patted her shoulder. “No more panicking. Gather your courage and all that. Just because it’s hopeless doesn’t mean we can’t act like it’s not.”
“You’re really terrible at comforting people,” Mayara told her.
“I blame my upbringing,” Palia said. “And Lord Maarte. And the queen. And the archaic traditions that put us in this position. I also blame the spirits, bad luck, and an unripe mango I ate for breakfast. It really didn’t agree with me.”
This time, Mayara smiled for real—something that she wouldn’t have thought possible in the wake of Kelo’s death. Her smile died almost as quickly as it came.
I’ll never see his smile again.
AT DAWN, MAYARA WAS ESCORTED OUT OF THE FORTRESS BY A Silent One. She, along with Roe and Palia, was to be transported to the training site via one of the Family Neran’s trading ships—which would be an honor if we weren’t being taken to our deaths, Mayara thought.
As she stepped through an archway onto a white-and-red dock, she saw the famed triple-masted sailing ship, gorgeous in every detail and worth more than the combined wealth of every villager Mayara knew.
Kelo would love to see this.
Just thinking of him made Mayara feel as if a wave had hit her full-on. Halting at the plank that led to the deck, she blinked back tears as she stared at the ship. Kelo would have spent the whole journey gawking at the artistry. Every inch, every plank, every rope, and every sail was as exquisitely crafted as the furnishings in the fortress. The ship itself was made of red-, white-, and yellow-hued planks that had been fitted together to make the hull into a beautiful mosaic. All the ropes were braided with strands of shimmering silver, woven together with water-reed fibers. The sails were a brilliant red to rival the brightest sunset, and the sailors wore clothes as fine as any lord, embroidered with silver threads and studded with bone buttons. Completing the picture, Lord Maarte himself was at the helm. He looked even more intimidating outside in the light than he had in his darkened office. He shone in the sunlight, the gold and silver of his uniform reflecting the sun in almost-painful flashes. His hair and his beard had been tied in multiple braids, and he wore a heavy pendant—his house’s symbol, a bird whose wings held the sun. The sails too bore the same symbol, white against the red. Altogether, it was glorious.
And horrible.
“Kelo won’t ever see this,” Mayara said. “Because of you.” She directed the last at the Silent One who guarded her. “He won’t see another ship or another sunrise. He won’t . . .” She swallowed hard, unable to go on.
The Silent One looked at her, and Mayara imagined she saw a hint of pity in those shadowed eyes—but no, the Silent One was emotionless and unreadable, because the woman behind the mask wasn’t human anymore.
Squaring her shoulders, Mayara walked up the plank onto the ship. The Silent One joined her sisters. All three were motionless, except for the fluttering of their robes in the wind. She wondered if they sweat under their masks. Or laughed. Or cried. Or felt guilt over those whose lives they had taken and lives they had destroyed. Maybe they had abandoned all emotion when they’d relinquished their names and identities.
Murderers, she thought.
Trying to put space between her and them, Mayara crossed the deck to Roe and Palia.
Roe beamed at her, as if this were an exciting adventure, while Palia humphed, squinted at the sun, and then started to shuffle away.
“Hate ships,” Palia said. “Get me when it’s over.”
The older woman disappeared belowdecks, leaving Mayara and Roe above with the sailors and the Silent Ones. Shouting to one another, the sailors stowed the plank, untied the ropes, and unfurled the sails. Lord Maarte barked orders from the helm. The Silent Ones merely watched. One stood on the prow. One on the stern. And the third not far from her and Roe.
Roe leaned against the railing and looked out at the sea eagerly, as if she couldn’t wait to be underway, which they soon were. Mayara faced the opposite direction: looking back at the fortress and her island as they receded.
Wind filled the triple sails.
“This is exciting!” Roe said.
“You’re excited to die?”
Roe rolled her eyes. “I don’t plan to die.”
How can she be so naive? Nearly everyone who went to the island died there! The test was designed to weed out those who were unsuited and leave only the best of the best. And I’m not that. Mayara had no experience, no training, no strategy for how to survive. I’m just an oyster diver. “I’m not planning to either, but it’s going to happen. It’s the most likely outcome.”
“Likely but not certain,” Roe said. “Death can’t catch me if I chase it.”
Mayara stiffened. “What did you say?”
“It’s a saying. Haven’t you heard it before? It comes from the tale of the first islander.” Leaning against the rail of the ship, Roe launched into the story, chattering cheerfully. “He was a fisherman, and in the wake of the first great battle between the queens of Renthia and the wild sea spirits, he couldn’t find any fish. All the leviathans had scared them off. So he got into his boat to row out to deeper waters. Everyone told him he was crazy—the deeper waters were where the wild spirits ruled. He’d never survive. And he told them that death was searching for him and everyone else up and down the shore of Renthia, so if he went out to where death lived, he’d be fine. His family let him go, because they thought anyone who was spouting such nonsense was probably going to die soon of some terrible mind disease anyway. Or something like that. Anyway, he went out into the sea, and found that the queens had killed so many of the gigantic spirits that their skeletons had formed the islands. He made his home there and caught thousands of fish. When at last the battle was over, others rowed out to the new islands and found him there, as fat and as
happy as could be.”
Mayara had never heard that version of the story. She’d been taught the first queen of Belene had founded the island nation, not some stubborn fisherman. But she liked it.
“Sorry—I didn’t mean to bore you with the whole tale. I’ve spent a lot of time listening to my grandparents tell me stories. It’s pretty much all I did for most of my childhood.”
“It’s all right,” Mayara said. “It was a good distraction.” For a few moments, she wasn’t thinking about what she’d left behind or what lay ahead. Of course, now that Roe had finished, it all came back.
As they sailed farther and farther away from the only home she’d ever known, Mayara looked out across the water. Spray spattered her face as the ship sliced through the sea. A pod of dolphins swam parallel with the ship. She watched their smooth bodies leap, glistening, out of the water, one after another. They looked so full of life as they journeyed through the sea.
And here I am, traveling to my death.
Death should be sudden. Not this slow march toward inevitability. She wished she felt more like the elderly grandmothers of the village when their time came—she’d seen them leave the world with dignity.
Except Great-Aunt Hollena, she remembered.
On her ninety-ninth birthday, Great-Aunt Hollena had smashed every window in the village and then run off the end of the dock. She might have made it to her hundredth birthday, people said, if she hadn’t misjudged the leap, hit her head, and drowned before anyone realized where she’d gone.
If you can’t die with dignity, die dramatically became a new village saying. As funerals went, it had been a fun one. Great-Aunt Hollena wouldn’t have wanted any tears.
Oh, Kelo, why did this have to happen?
Mayara didn’t want to die, either with or without dignity. She wanted to be home with her new husband, her parents, and her cousins. She wanted to be diving for abalone in the mornings and sipping fish soup with Kelo in the evenings while they watched the fishing boats come into the harbor. She wanted it so badly that it physically hurt in her gut.
They stood by the railing, side by side in silence, each lost in her own thoughts, until Roe pointed at the horizon. “That’s where we’ll train.”
In the distance was a small island, one of the many that dotted the sea around the five major islands of Belene. It looked like a fist rising out of the ocean, covered in green. There, they’d receive their final training before they were deposited on the Island of Testing.
Only in Mayara’s case, she hadn’t yet had any training.
“They’ll bring the other nine of us there too. Plus an heir to train us.” Of the twelve spirit sisters who chose the island, only the three of them were in the Neran Stronghold. The others had been held on other islands in the homes of other ruling families. “Some of them had nearly a year to prepare. I’d thought I’d have more time.”
“At least you’ve had three months,” Mayara pointed out. “I’ve had none.”
“That’s true.” Roe brightened. “And you know the saying: You don’t have to outswim the shark; you only have to outswim the other swimmers.” She added quickly, “I’m joking.”
Mayara nodded to show she wasn’t offended.
“Also, I can’t swim,” Roe said. “And I’m pretty sure the fastest swimmer might end up dying anyway.” She frowned at that thought.
Mayara ignored Roe’s musings, because something the girl had said struck her as odd. Mayara had always swum, for as long as she could remember. It felt as natural to her as walking—even more so, because in the water, every movement could be smooth. But she knew, at least intellectually, that there were plenty of people who couldn’t. It did seem shortsighted, though, for someone who lived on an island. And a serious problem for someone who expected to survive the Island of Testing. “How do you plan to escape sea spirits if you can’t swim?”
“By not going in the water.”
Fair enough, she thought.
They were both silent for a moment, looking out across the sea at the fist-shaped island; then Roe said, “I heard you tried to run.”
“Only made it eight days before they caught us.” Mayara sighed. “I suppose it was the height of optimism to think we’d be able to hide from them for a lifetime.” She thought of how certain Kelo had been. I never should have agreed to his plan. She should have refused to climb into those death boats. At least then he’d have been spared.
Roe boggled at her. “Eight days? I’ve never heard of anyone evading the Silent Ones for more than a single day.”
“I know the coast near my village, so I knew where to hide.” And I had Kelo with me.
“Eight days! Okay, that clinches it. We’re teaming up.” Roe clapped her hand on Mayara’s shoulder.
“I thought you were just going to outswim me.”
“Yes, but that was before I knew you escaped the Silent Ones for eight days!” Roe was marveling at her as if Mayara had defeated a leviathan. Mayara didn’t feel as if she’d done anything remarkable. After all, she’d failed. “If I could have escaped . . .” Roe trailed off, glancing at Lord Maarte.
“Did you try?”
“Actually, the opposite. I tried for years to get Lord Maarte to admit that I had powers. But every time I tried to rile up the spirits, an heir or a Silent One would shut it down. It was only when I unleashed an ice spirit during one of his feasts, while his magical lackeys were busy elsewhere, that he finally couldn’t deny it anymore.”
“But . . . why?” Mayara had never heard of anyone who wanted to be caught. “You wanted to be sent to the island?”
“I want to be an heir,” Roe clarified. “It’s all right if you don’t understand. Palia thinks I’m crazy too.” She leaned farther over the railing, holding her hands out to touch the spray from the waves as the ship cut through the sea. “And so does Lord Maarte. He was definitely angry after the feast. Suffice it to say he doesn’t like me much.”
“What exactly did you do?”
Roe grinned. “Froze his soup. And I don’t mean just made it chilly. I had the ice spirit sculpt the soup in everyone’s bowls into these frozen waterfalls. And then I made it freeze the doors shut and turn the floor into an ice rink.”
“You didn’t!” To the Lord Maarte, head of his Family, ruler of their island?
“Everyone tried to run and then . . . whoops! Slipped on the ice. I watched it happen through the eyes of the spirit. Looked like a bunch of newborn sheep, everyone wobbling all around.”
“You’re serious?” She didn’t know it was even possible to control the spirits with that degree of precision. And what did Roe mean she watched “through the eyes of the spirit”? Is that a thing we can do? Mayara didn’t know much about how their power worked. It had been safer to pretend it didn’t exist.
Solemnly, Roe nodded. “Lord Maarte’s nephew tried to stand up by grabbing on to Lord Maarte and accidentally yanked his pants down.”
Mayara surprised herself: she laughed. Roe joined in too. Maybe the story was true, and maybe it wasn’t, but it felt good to laugh again. And to feel as if she’d made a friend.
A few of the sailors shot them startled looks. She realized that none of the sailors had made eye contact with them or the Silent Ones. The Silent Ones were considered by all to be . . . disquieting, at best, so that was understandable, and as for her and Roe and Palia . . . They probably don’t want to befriend the doomed.
Looking out at the sea again, with the sun sparkling on the waves, she thought, I don’t feel doomed. In fact, she didn’t feel any different from how she had yesterday. She felt well fed, well rested, and heart sore. But she didn’t feel on the verge of death. I’ve stared death in the face before, surrounded by blue. This doesn’t feel like that.
It felt, weirdly, like a beginning.
A terrible beginning, without Kelo.
“Do you really think it’s possible to survive?” Mayara asked. She had no illusions that she could survive this, but perhaps Roe had a ch
ance.
“Others have. Otherwise there wouldn’t be heirs. And if they could do it . . .” Roe gave an elaborate shrug. “Palia says I’m not a realist. She’s wrong.”
“How have you been training?”
“I’ve been trying to learn survival skills mostly, at least as much as my grandparents can teach me,” Roe said. “I haven’t been outside the stronghold in years, so I’m pretty hopeless in the wilderness. But I’ve learned how to start a fire, boil water, clean a fish . . .” She wrinkled her nose. “After that lesson, I couldn’t eat a fish for a week. And when they showed me where roe comes from . . . I nearly changed my name.”
Mayara laughed again, then sobered. It wouldn’t do her any good to be able to gut a fish if the spirits on the island gutted her first. She looked at the helm, where Lord Maarte stood majestically, his ponytail of braids flowing behind him in the wind, and something finally dawned on her. Roe talked as though she’d grown up in the fortress. “You’re Family Neran?” She couldn’t imagine him taking his own relative—daughter? niece?—to the island and then leaving her behind. What kind of monster would do that?
“Oh no, I’m not a Neran. My family is under their protection.”
She glanced again at Roe and raised both her eyebrows. Protection from what? Or who? “Do you know how to protect yourself from spirits? Did your grandparents teach you that?” That was the point of the test: to teach potential heirs how to handle hostile spirits. If they passed, they receive more intensive training, beyond anything a Silent One ever learned.
Roe became serious too. “I’ve been practicing that as much as possible. But there hasn’t been much opportunity. The Silent Ones have been keeping watch over me to ensure I don’t cause any more ‘incidents,’ and Lord Maarte . . . I’d hoped he’d allow an heir to train me or at least give me advice. That’s what he’s done for the children of his guards and servants who showed an affinity for spirits. But he refused. It causes political problems for him if I survive.”
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